A Spatial Analysis of Environmental Justice: Examining the Effects of Redistricting and the Spatial Relationship of Minority Communities to Brownfields in Cook County, Illinois

Keywords: Brownfields, Environmental Justice, Geographic Information Systems, Cook County, Commissioner Districts, Voting Rights Act
Session Type: Virtual Paper Abstract
Day: Saturday
Session Start / End Time: 2/26/2022 02:00 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada)) - 2/26/2022 03:20 PM (Eastern Time (US & Canada))
Room: Virtual 30

Abstract

Cook County is infamous for racial environmental disparities. It is also infamous in terms of its non-partisan redistricting process of the Cook County Commissioner Districts. This study addresses the spatial relationship between minority populations in the Voting Rights (VR) Districts and brownfield locations within Cook County, Illinois. With the commissioner districts of Cook County just having been redrawn, the authority the commissioners have over the Cook County Land Bank Authority, and the close spatial proximity that minority populations have to brownfields, this study attempts to provide a novel contribution to Chicago’s local procedural and distributive environmental justice literature. Based on research done by Kramar et al. (2018), this study measures environmental justice through minority proximity to brownfields and geometric complexity of Commissioner Districts as a proxy of gerrymandering within Cook County, Illinois. The purpose of this research is to raise awareness on the issue by identifying these relationships and to encourage policy change at the county government level to include more concrete brownfield cleanup plans for the VR districts. Public U.S. Census and EPA data are used in a GIS to test minority distance to brownfields, number of brownfields in VR districts compared to non-VR districts, and complexity of newly drawn districts. The study finds a positive relationship between brownfield numbers and VR districts. I suggest through this research that Commissioners consider the relationship that minorities have to hazardous waste sites in the next round of redistricting, making cleanup for these communities of interest as crucial as keeping them together.