Mayor Brandon Johnson announces plans to address pollution burdens in Chicago’s environmental justice neighborhoods

A year after federal investigators outlined how Chicago funnels industrial polluters into Black and Latino neighborhoods, Mayor Brandon Johnson vowed Monday to overhaul zoning, planning and land-use ordinances that perpetuate the city’s long history of racial segregation.

Johnson called his pledge the beginning of what promises to be a lengthy, contentious effort to undo the effects of decades of government redlining and other racist real estate practices, as well as more recent city policies that encouraged heavy industry to move out of predominantly white neighborhoods into other parts of Chicago disproportionately burdened by pollution, poverty and disease.

In the meantime, Johnson said, his administration is stepping up enforcement of pollution complaints, broadening community outreach and tapping into newly available federal funds to deploy air quality monitors throughout the city. He also directed city departments to consider the cumulative impacts of pollution on neighborhoods when making decisions.

If his most ambitious plans are adopted by City Council, Johnson said, future generations will look back and say today’s leaders “responded equitably, so people can breathe, have clean water and a good paying job that’s associated with environmental justice.”

“This is an opportunity to grow Chicago,” Johnson said at a City Hall news conference when asked if his actions and proposals could discourage business investment.

Both of Johnson’s immediate predecessors, Lori Lightfoot and Rahm Emanuel, made similar promises about incorporating environmental justice concerns into their decision-making.

City health officials under Emanuel and Lightfoot also documented how Black and Latino neighborhoods on the South and West sides breathe the dirtiest air in the city. A new cumulative impacts report by the Johnson administration released Monday expands upon that work by including other stressors common in low-income communities of color, including proximity to toxic waste dumps, freight yards and major highways.

The policy changes proposed by Johnson come after years of organizing by neighborhood groups and their attorneys. They persuaded federal officials to intervene after Lightfoot cut a deal to close an often-troubled scrap shredder near wealthy, largely white Lincoln Park on the North Side while clearing the way for the owner to build a new operation in the low-income, predominantly Latino and Black Southeast Side.

Under pressure from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Housing and Urban Development, Lightfoot ended up denying the final permit Reserve Management Group needed for its new shredder. An administrative law judge overturned the permit denial in June but Johnson’s administration has appealed the decision.

Another leftover from the Lightfoot era is guiding Johnson’s environmental justice efforts. Shortly before leaving office, she agreed to update the city’s zoning ordinances to settle a civil rights complaint filed by federal housing officials.

Johnson declined Monday to be specific about his proposed changes. But Angela Tovar, hired by Lightfoot and retained by Johnson as the city’s chief sustainability officer, began working on the cumulative impacts study in 2020 and has advocated for greater oversight of industrial polluters.

“Let’s embrace this moment as call to action to build a Chicago that truly leaves no one behind, a city that thrives sustainably and justly for generations to come,” Tovar said.

Leaders of several community groups stressed that much more work needs to be done. They thanked city officials for including them in work groups that led to Monday’s announcement, a gesture some described as a sea change compared with how they once were treated at City Hall.

“In my 25 years of doing this, I never thought once I would stand here today, hearing the words ‘environmental justice,’ hearing the term ‘environmental racism’ come from the mouths of our elected officials,” Kim Wasserman, director of the Little Village Environmental Justice Organization, said while flanked by Johnson and some of her fellow activists.

Olga Bautista, who leads the Southeast Environmental Task Force, said the mayor’s plan “is not going to solve everything, but it does put forward the issues.”

“This isn’t about Altgeld Gardens,” said Cheryl Johnson, who leads People for Community Recovery from the South Side public housing development. “It’s about environmental quality for all of us in this city.”

mhawthorne@chicagotribune.com