Janiece Watts: Waste, Climate Justice, and Environmental Justice

Minneapolis alone produced about 140,000 tons of waste in 2017. According to Eureka employees, 50 percent of items thrown in the trash in Minnesota are recyclable, and 30 percent is compostable. In 2017, the Twin Cities burned 58% of their trash, sent 4% to landfills, recycled 21%, and composted 15% (City of Minneapolis 2018). Eureka employees say that Saint Paul has a rate of 40% recycling and 10% composting. Regardless of the particular numbers, half of what is going into landfills or incinerators is recyclable material.

Waste is a huge part of our lives, and despite the upward trend in recycling, there is still far too much going into the trash. I had a conversation with Janiece Watts about the relationship between waste and environmental justice, and how her work with Eureka Recycling relates to this. I learned that garbage is intimately connected to racial and economic justice, and that if we really want to stop climate change, we need to pay more attention to what we’re buying, and what we’re throwing away.

Americans produce about 4.4 pounds of trash per person per day; without disposal systems, cities would be nothing but huge piles of garbage. Traditionally there were two main methods to get rid of this waste; what Janiece Watts calls “burn and bury.” Americans produce about 4.4 pounds of trash per person per day; without disposal systems, cities would be nothing but huge piles of garbage. These disposal methods, rather than being “solutions,” are sites of huge environmental injustices. Landfills and incinerators are mostly placed in low-income communities of color, bringing their pollution, emissions, disease, and smell into already vulnerable areas. Janiece Watts sees recycling and composting as a solution to this problem. Recycling reduces the need for these methods of disposal. Rather than only spewing pollution, it brings long-term jobs and reduces pollution and waste that would otherwise be shunted into other minority neighborhoods.

The majority of the Twin Cities’ waste is incinerated to produce energy. However, incinerators are a real environmental justice problem. They are framed as positive contributors of energy, but in fact are almost exclusively placed in low-income communities of color, and produce massive emissions by burning trash (Peeples 2003). One example is the Hennepin Energy Recovery Center, or HERC, managed by Covanta Energy. This facility is placed in North Minneapolis, a largely minority area that has historically lacked the financial and political resources to prevent the industrial activity. Janiece Watts has fought HERC with several groups, helping in a community struggle she says began with the facility’s proposal 30 years ago.

Since it was built in 1989, HERC has been cited several times for toxic emissions over standard levels (Wright et al). A 2015 Minnesota Pollution Control Agency study in Minneapolis showed that air pollution in North Minneapolis is still above recommended levels, and that heavy metals are in the air breathed by residents (McMahon 2016). Janiece Watts stated that incinerators are one of the largest sources of air pollution and carbon emissions, and indeed HERC is one of the most serious point-source polluters in the state (Wright et al). However, this plant is not regulated as closely as it should be, and a lot of emissions are self-reported, raising community suspicions of the plant. Few studies have been done on the environmental and health effects of garbage incineration, but the high rates of asthma in the community have caused community members to be deeply concerned about HERC (Benson 2014). Asthma is a major concern for North Minneapolis residents, who are mainly low-income and people of color (Tigue 2016). Eureka employee Janiece Watts agrees that “race is the highest predictor of living near these sites” emitting toxic pollution. These factors show that the presence of a garbage incinerator in North Minneapolis demonstrates the environmental injustice of burning trash.

Workers’ rights around waste also tie into environmental justice. Watts explains that in landfills and incinerators, workers are usually temporary, and safety and rights standards are lax. Even in many recycling plants, injuries are frequent and dangerous with a for-profit view, and these workers are often people of color who are more vulnerable and have less of a political voice (Mock 2015). There are serious labor concerns tied into waste disposal that can be solved by more strict standards for labor and for trash.

Eureka recycling is a not-for-profit recycling company that collects the recycling from all of the residents of Saint Paul, as well as some other areas (CSP). They serve 282,000 residents, and provide justice-oriented recycling and outreach services for all. The company is committed to advocating for Zero Waste, and focusing on upstream reduction, as well as reducing the percentage of waste that ends up in landfills and incinerators (Eureka website). The company is profitable, but also committed to making the world more sustainable and just, as Watts explained in our interview together. Her work over the past year has helped the company become more introspective and justice-oriented.

Janiece Watts: Career and current work

A lifelong Minnesotan, Janiece Watts came to Eureka from a background of environmental and social justice organizing. She sees her current EJ work as a way of uniting all of her justice interests under one umbrella. Even just a sampling of her previous jobs can demonstrate just how hard she works, and how broad her justice organizing background is. Watts spent some time with Working America campaigning for economic justice, working to raise wages and get people enrolled in MNsure, Minnesota’s state insurance. Following this interest in economic justice, Watts also spent some time at a co-op working for food justice: expanding local food systems, building the local economy through food, and getting justice for workers. Watts has also been involved in a number of electoral campaigns and voter registration initiatives to increase minority communities’ voting access and political voices. The last stop on this chain of activism was at Neighborhoods Organizing for Change (NOC), a grassroots racial justice organization with a variety of initiatives. Watts found Eureka through her work with NOC and a coalition of community groups that came together to fight HERC. Janiece Watts was working at Eureka for less than a year as the Community Engagement Manager in 2018. Her role was to work on outreach and education, help Eureka reach the community, and look at Eureka’s relationship to environmental justice. From her lens of racial justice developed from her many years of activism, Watts has a great understanding of the intersection of racial, economic, and environmental concerns that are involved in environmental justice organizing.

In reflecting on this career path, Watts discussed the difference between grassroots and “grasstops” work. She calls government work “grasstops” because it’s the opposite of community organizing, as the few privileged people at the top making rules and policies rarely see the larger ground-level impact of their policies. Having worked in both, Watts criticizes the misunderstanding of justice found in “mainstream nonprofits” and government. One of her state-level jobs was an environmental organization, which bought land and set it aside as preserves and natural spaces. Watts called this “place-centered conservation,” a way of seeing the environment that relies on the separation of humans and nature. The disconnect between humans and nature in this kind of conservation got her to wondering: what about the people involved in the environment? Where did they fit into this kind of conservation? These questions and their answers led her away from “grasstops” work to a community-oriented path of environmental justice.

So how has Watts used this lens to view recycling as environmental justice? She explained how waste can be toxic and hazardous, and its health effects are usually pushed onto communities that are already vulnerable to health issues: low-income, underserved, and minority communities. Waste can be toxic and hazardous, and its health effects are usually pushed onto communities that are already vulnerable to health issues. Race is the highest predictor of living near waste disposal sites, and the dangers of living in these areas is known by those in power, and ignored. Watts is adamant that “no one should have to live like that,” and speaks to the power dynamics involved. Her background in economic justice and workers’ rights has also helped her focus on the economic injustices of “burn and bury.” Most of the people employed at waste facilities are immigrants and people of color in temporary positions. These temporary positions mean that landfills and incinerators pay lower wages and have more lax safety standards. This is something Watts and Eureka have been attempting to subvert with their own standards at Eureka.

Labor and economic standards at Eureka are very different than at most conventional waste facilities. The employees at the MRF, the truck drivers, and other employees all receive living wages, access to healthcare, paid time off, and insurance. Watts has recently been involved in forming a People of Color and Indigenous workers’ caucus at the plant, to ensure that the racial and economic divides between the mainly white office and the mainly minority MRF workers are being discussed. The company wants the MRF employees to be able to speak to management, since at most similar facilities workers rarely have a voice. Labor justice remains a concern of Watts, and Eureka is seeking to set themselves apart from other waste-management facilities. With their not-for-profit model, Watts says that Eureka has the freedom not to think of people as disposable. “We put our values in the way we operate,” and justice has to start within the organization if they hope to advocate for justice elsewhere.

In fact, the not-for-profit model does allow the company to put a lot of resources and energy into advocacy. A lot of Watts’s work with Eureka has to do with policy. Eureka isn’t just trying to reduce waste by physically recycling it; the center has an advocacy arm that focuses on policy. Currently, Watts is seeking to ban plastic bags in Minnesota. Plastic bags are one of the most problematic products made, clogging Eureka’s MRF, appearing all over the environment, and, worst of all, they are not feasibly recyclable. In battles such as this, Watts emphasizes a need for relationship building with the community, gaining their understanding, and garnering support. Also necessary is a knowledge of politics. She says plenty of policies seem good on the surface but are actually harmful, and advocates need to know how to tease out the harm from the good. She wants to craft policy that works for everyone and involves everyone, from “tree roots to grasstops,” from the communities impacted, to the policy writers who don’t see their policies’ impacts in marginalized communities. It’s also tough to try and make policy in partnership with other environmental groups, because in mainstream climate activism, waste is often treated as an afterthought.

Policymaking does get difficult when navigating waste advocates’ relationship with the climate movement. Watts explains how waste is often left out of the climate change discussion and the mainstream environmental movement. It is brought in as an “afterthought,” when it is actually intimately connected to greenhouse gas emissions, land use, and climate change. Recycling reduces the energy costs and emissions from extraction, incineration, and landfilling, and is also more cost-efficient and cleaner. Waste should not be separated from climate change, and bringing the two into conversation, especially with a lens of environmental justice, is vital to the success of the climate movement.

Conclusion: Waste, EJ, and Intersectional Issues

Recycling represents an intersection of issues that places it within environmental justice, and Janiece Watts’ work demonstrates this clearly. The interplay between internal and external environmental justice is at the crux of her work; how are workers treated in the environment of the workplace, and how is the work of the Eureka MRF affecting its own surrounding environment?
Recycling causes a ripple effect, with multi varied impacts on the environment and the people in it. Upstream, recycling reduces the need for raw resources, lessening the energy costs of extraction. Downstream, it keeps waste from going into landfills and incinerators, keeping those emissions and toxic wastes from impacting communities of color. Eureka’s dedication to policy and Zero Waste contributes to the wellbeing of the community, and its commitment to its employees’ wellbeing is also part of environmental justice.

Eureka is working diligently in the community to spread the word about reducing waste and recycling more. Education is a big part of Watts’s job, and she tries to clear up the common confusion around recycling. People often have trouble understanding both the details and the large-scale impacts of recycling. Watts likes to show people that it’s “not as complicated as it seems.” With community outreach, recycling can become accessible and not confusing. Watts says that knowledge is important; just telling the public about Eureka, what it is and what it does can raise awareness in important ways. Tours give people a view into the workings of a recycling plant, showing them that it’s not an opaque and scary process. More understanding of the process and more accessibility can help people recycle more accurately, and can help waste become a bigger player in climate conversations.

Although policy can seem hopeless to many environmental justice advocates, it is not hopeless to Watts. She and other Eureka employees work very hard advocating for policy changes in Minnesota. Eureka’s focus on policy shows how the organization is different from other waste management facilities, and provides a model for a better future in waste management.
But most of all, the most refreshing thing about Watts is that she understands what it is to live in this world. She’s realistic about where people are at in the process of recycling. She knows that “we all have to live in this system,” and thinks it’s important to be sympathetic to how difficult recycling can seem to people, and to help it look fun, important, and easy.

References

Peeples, Jennifer. “Trashing South-Central: Place and Identity in a Community-Level Environmental Justice Dispute.” Southern Communication Journal, vol. 69, no. 1, 2003, pp. 82–95.

Tigue, Kristoffer. “ Environmental and community groups join forces to take on an old foe: the HERC.” Minnpost, April 20 2016. Web.
https://www.minnpost.com/community-sketchbook/2016/04/environmental-and-community-groups-join-forces-take-old-foe-herc

n.a. “New data confirms poor air quality in North Minneapolis.” Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. MPCA, March 23 2016. Web. April 2018. https://www.pca.state.mn.us/featured/new-data-confirms-poor-air-quality-north-minneapolis

Benson, Lorna. “In the Twin Cities, Asthma Hospitalization rate highest along I-94: Here’s Why.” MPR News. Minnesota Public Radio, July 8, 2014. Web. April 2018.
https://www.mprnews.org/story/2014/07/08/for-some-asthma-patients-smoking-housing-conditions-and-uneven-insurance-are-a-deadly-mix

Mock, Brentin. “How Cities Can Make Work Safter for Recycling Workers.” Citylab. The Atlantic Monthly Group, June 26, 2018. Web. April 2018.
https://www.citylab.com/life/2015/06/how-cities-can-make-work-safer-for-recycling-workers/396899/

McMahon, Cassie. “North Minneapolis Air Monitoring Study: 2015 Data Summary.” Minnesota Pollution Control Agency. Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, March 2016. Web. April 2018.https://www.pca.state.mn.us/sites/default/files/aq2-78.pdf

Wright, E., Winters, J., Kennedy, R. “Hennepin Energy Recover Center [HERC]: Reevaluating Waste Management in Minneapolis.” Scribd. MPIRG, n.d. Web. April 2018.
https://www.tcdailyplanet.net/community-voices-take-the-next-big-step-and-shut-the-herc-down/

n.a. “Minneapolis 2017 Tonnage.” Minneapolismn.gov. City of Minneapolis, Feb 14, 2018. Web. April 2018.
http://www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/solid-waste/about/stats/WCMSP-208551

Jossi, Frank. “In Minnesota, waste-to-energy debate firing up once again.” Energy News Network. Energy News Network, April 26, 2016. Web. https://energynews.us/midwest/in-minnesota-waste-to-energy-debate-firing-up-once-again/

Bullard, R. D. (2018). “Dumping in Dixie Race, Class, and Environmental Quality”, Third Edition. Boulder: Routledge.