EPA awards UConn with $10 million for 'environmental justice' program
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has given $10 million to the University of Connecticut in order to promote 'environmental justice' in New England.
'EPA selected UConn to establish one of 18 TCTACs across the country and awarded UConn $10 million to support this work for five years,' an EPA press release reads.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has given $10 million to the University of Connecticut in order to promote “environmental justice” in New England.
On Oct. 30, the EPA announced its funding of the “Thriving Communities Technical Assistance Center” (TCTAC) at UConn, which will provide technical assistance to New England “to help address local environmental justice challenges.”
“EPA selected UConn to establish one of 18 TCTACs across the country and awarded UConn $10 million to support this work for five years,” an EPA press release reads.
“Too often, communities with the most pressing environmental justice concerns have been left behind due to barriers in accessing federal funding,” EPA New England Regional Administrator David Cash remarked in the press release. “UConn’s technical assistance center is a game-changer for New England and will provide greater access to services to ensure overburdened and underserved communities and our Tribal nations can access historic investments to address generational environmental and health disparities.”
UConn’s vice president for research, innovation, and entrepreneurship, Pamir Alpay, expressed praise for the grant and shared a desire to ensure “environmental justice” throughout the region.
“With the EPA’s generous support, we are proud to extend our expertise and resourcefulness to support environmental justice throughout the cities, towns, and Tribes of New England,” Alpay said in the press release.
“I’m proud to see the federal government partnering with UConn to help ensure every community can fully benefit from the Biden-Harris Administration’s historic investments in environmental justice,” U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal said, according to the same press release.
However, the EPA’s announcement does not provide a clear definition for what “environmental justice” means.
This is not the first time a university has pursued “environmental justice.”
In August 2023, Princeton University hosted a course dedicated to the subject, in which students learned about “violent settler colonialism” and “environmental racism,” while also contemplating “gender, race, and sexualities” in regard to “environmental issues.”
In June, UConn’s School of Fine Arts decided to give grants of up to $25,000 to faculty members researching subjects related to “anti-racism” to help “support efforts to create a just, diverse, and fully inclusive society at all levels, from the local to the global.”
Campus Reform has contacted the University of Connecticut and the Environmental Protection Agency for comment. This article will be updated accordingly.
