The Center for Health, Environment and Justice has been on the front line in the fight for environmental health for 40 years. We train and support local activists across the country and build local, state and national initiatives that win on issues from Superfund to climate change.
We Can Help You Win
CHEJ has the tools to help residents fight against toxic threats in their community. We can provide scientific information to make your case, leadership training to build your organization and organize your community, and ongoing coaching throughout the process.
Whether you are starting a new initiative from scratch with volunteers or have been working together for years, CHEJ is there for you. Contact us to find out more.
Love Canal
Our story began in Love Canal, NY, where Lois Gibbs led her neighbors to be protected from 20,000 tons of hazardous waste buried in their backyards. Love Canal was national news and the catalyst for the federal Superfund program.
Armed with lessons about the power of organizing, education and the bold voice of local residents defending their families, Lois launched CHEJ in 1981. We’ve been fighting for a healthier environment ever since.
A Network For Change
Our nationwide network of more than 300 local community groups works locally and at the regional, state and national levels to achieve critical policy impacts around issues like fracking, release of toxic chemicals, climate change, industral waste and more.
The communities we serve are largely rural, low-wealth or working class—the places that typically bear the brunt of environmental degradation. Together, we make a difference.
‘This is environmental racism’ How a protest in a North Carolina farming town sparked a national movement
Ben Chavis was driving on a lonely road through rolling tobacco fields when he looked in his rearview mirror and saw the state trooper. Chavis knew he was a marked [...]
Can a wildlife refuge help a community’s fight for environmental justice?
Albuquerque’s South Valley was once a thriving oasis of food production watered by a network of historic irrigation canals, or acequias. Today it’s home to several historic neighborhoods along the Rio [...]
Environmental Protection Agency launches crackdown on pollution that disproportionately affects people of color
Michael Regan, head of the US Environmental Protection Agency, has sought to revive the effort to confront environmental racism by ordering the agency to crack down on the pollution that disproportionately [...]
Environmental Justice for Overburdened Communities: A View from New Jersey
Last year, the New Jersey state legislature passed a landmark environmental justice bill that requires the [...]
Aquaculture Diversity On The Chesapeake Bay
By: Sharon Franklin, Chief of Operations In a recent article in the Chesapeake Quarterly “Diversity Grows [...]
Climate Change and Toxic Exposure
By: Julia Weil, Community Organizing Intern Climate change alters essentially everything in our environment, and it [...]
No More Sacrifice Zones!
“No More Sacrifice Zones!” is our campaign to organize people who are poisoned by corporate greed and at high risk for Covid-19 complications to lead a national effort that ends the sacrificing of their families, and our planet.
Every day, people in America become exposed to a toxic mixture of chemicals in the air we breathe. They are released in unknown quantities by energy plants, dirty factories and CO2-emitting vehicles.
These foul chemicals are not found equally everywhere in our country’s air: They are highly concentrated in areas where people have lower incomes and are part of racial minority groups.
These have become known as America’s “Sacrifice Zones.”
We are uniting people suffering from cancer, moms whose kids are born with physical impairments, and residents who simply can’t afford to live anywhere else to share their stories, name the solutions they need and build the power necessary to enact change.
Will you join us?
