By Faith Jones

Faculty Mentor: Dr. Jackie Gallagher

Abstract

Environmental injustice is when poor or marginalized communities are negatively impacted by hazardous waste, resource extraction, and land use that they don’t benefit from. Environmental justice, which is a movement to combat environmental injustices, is defined by the EPA as “the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations and policies.” Fair treatment is outlined as no group of people having a disproportionate share of negative environmental consequences. The project aims to better understand the connection between environmental justice and soil health, specifically the levels of trace metals that could be harmful to human health in urban soils. A wide variety of metal concentrations have been found in twenty sites across the Fredericksburg region. By using ArcGIS these metal concentrations can be compared to socioeconomic factors to determine if there is a correlation relating to environmental justice implications.