Miami-Dade County: A Legacy of Environmental Injustice

The patterns of environmental harm present in the landscape are not accidental but rather purposeful. The foundations for such harm does not have a definitive start date. However, the red-lining of this county with the Home Owner's Loan Corporation (HOLC) in the 1930s instilled the segregation in the landscape, which later permitted these communities to be disproportionately selected as the location of hazardous waste sites, brownfields, and other pollutant dumping.

Through processes of “racial zoning,” federal housing policies, established by the Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC), created discriminatory lending system known as “redlining” (Mohl, 319). Across America, the HOLC investigated real estate conditions from cities such as Philadelphia, Atlanta, and Miami during the Great Depression. They created maps to reflect the “desirability of the neighborhoods” utilizing grades such from A (Green - Best), B (Blue - Still Desirable), C (Yellow - Definitely Declining), and D (Red - Hazardous). Therefore, lenders would make their decisions, which were discriminatory, based on these maps (Hillier, 207, 208).

In the early 1930s, a majority of Miami-Dade County’s black residents lived in a crowded fifty block area, today known as Overtown. Later, the Miami elite wanted to expand the business district and made room for white neighborhoods. Therefore, Overtown and the communities that lived there had to be relocated. They chose Liberty Square as the location for new public housing to begin. More plans for removal of blacks were discussed by the Dade County Commission, but they were never implemented. Nevertheless, the choosing of Liberty Square demonstrates the racial thinking that was behind the implementation of redlining (Mohl, 320-324).

Black neighborhoods thus were given lower ratings. Additionally, black neighborhoods that were adjacent to white areas (that could become “black neighborhoods” in the future) were given lower ratings (Mohl, 326). This policy was legal for several decades, and instilled segregation into the landscape of Miami. In the 1960s, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 banned racial housing discrimination but other less explicit discriminatory methods were implemented to preserve the status quo (Mohl, 333). Although the original plans of distant black communities away from Overtown were not implemented, through explicit and implicit policies, segregation of distant black communities is apparent in landscape today.

Examine the relationship of historically redlined communities and modern demographics.

Defined by the Environmental Protection Agency, a contaminated site can be one of three classifications:

(1) “Sites contaminated by improper handling or disposal of toxic and hazardous materials and wastes.”

(2) "Sites where toxic materials may have been deposited as a result of natural disasters or acts of terror."

(3) "Sites where improper handling or accidents resulted in release of toxic or hazardous materials that are not wastes."

Contaminated sites pose a risk to the surrounding communities and environment as the chemicals may persist and have the ability to move through the environment in various (sometimes undetectable) means. For more information regarding the potential risks and methods of movement of chemicals, visit the  EPA’s website regarding contaminated sites. 

It is evident that there are higher concentrations of contaminated sites in closer proximity to predominately black and historically marginalized communities.

These contaminated sites contain material that are harmful to human health and that of the environment, generally. There are many redeveloped waste treatment sites in the brownfield areas for a full list visit the  EPA website . Most of the hazardous waste sites in Miami-Dade County are are Superfund sites which are sites that contain hazardous waste materials that need long term clean up. Many of these sites occur in Brownfield areas which occur most in minority communities as seen in the redline maps. Previous companies holding the sites mishandled waste properly and it contaminated the groundwater, soil, and in some cases aquifers that held drinking water for the county.

Defined by the Environmental Protection Agency, a brownfield, a specific type of contaminated site, "is a property, the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance pollutant, or contaminant." Brownfields adjacent to neighborhoods immediately depress those property values in that neighborhood The location of these brownfield sites, adjacent to black and other marginalized communities, further compounds the effects of historical redlining by depressing the property values in those neighborhoods (Meyer, 56).

There are many health risk factors associated with being located near these residual pollutants. Various means of exposure, whether to air, groundwater seepage, or direct means, poses a risk to the surrounding communities similar to other contaminated sites (Meyer, 58). It is evident that the location of these brownfield sites is correlated with the location of black and other marginalized communities.

The health risks posed by the proximity to these contaminated sites, which may contribute to underlying health conditions, makes these communities more susceptible to contracting COVID-19 compared to other communities. Additionally, the inequitable access to healthcare and health disparities (due to environmental harm and historical discrimination) increase the risk of contracting COVID-19 in these communities. This is evident in the map of Florida below where total deaths from COVID-19 are shown by county. Miami-Dade County is home to the highest number of EPA deemed Superfund sites when compared to the rest of the state, all contaminated sites in Florida can be found on the  EPA website .

There are lower rates of health insurance for those who are Black/African American and Hispanic/Latino compared to White residents of Miami-Dade County. Therefore, those without health insurance are more susceptible to contracting COVID-19 as their underlying conditions are left untreated, or it is more expensive to do so.

Black and other historically marginalized communities on Medicaid receive lower quality care than white communities due to discrimination in services (Greene et al., 2006; Tai-Seale et al., 2001; Meyer, 1994; Fiscella et al., 2002). These communities have greater long-term care needs due to the effects of historical healthcare discrimination, inequitable access to healthcare resources, and the effects of environmental injustices in their communities (e.g. Brownfields, Contaminated Sites, etc.) (Fiscella, 8). The study by Greene et., (2006) found that physicians are less likely to participate in Medicaid in areas that are racially segregated, poor, and nonwhite. This further exacerbates racial disparities in access to healthcare, adding to the environmental and racial injustices of a region.

In Miami-Dade, specifically, the zip codes (which were historically redlined) and are predominately black and brown have the highest enrollment of Medicaid. These are the same zip codes with high rates of environmental injustices as well. Other illnesses such as asthma are disproportionately high in those zip codes due to poor healthcare and environmental injustice (such as air pollutants). Therefore, these multiple discriminatory processes (housing, healthcare, environmental harm) have contributed to the high rates of COVID-19 compared to other zip codes and counties in Florida.

“Contaminated Land.” EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, 4 Sept. 2018, www.epa.gov/report- environment/contaminated-land.

Fiscella, Kevin, et al. “Disparities in Health Care by Race, Ethnicity, and Language among the Insured: Findings from a National Sample.” Medical Care, vol. 40, no. 1, 2002, pp. 52–59. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/3767958. Accessed 29 Nov. 2020.

Greene, Jessica, et al. “Race, Segregation, and Physicians' Participation in Medicaid.” The Milbank Quarterly, vol. 84, no. 2, 2006, pp. 239–272. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/25098117. Accessed 29 Nov. 2020.

Hillier, Amy E. “Residential Security Maps and Neighborhood Appraisals: The Home Owners' Loan Corporation and the Case of Philadelphia.” Social Science History, vol. 29, no. 2, 2005, pp. 207–233. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/40267873. Accessed 26 Nov. 2020.

Meyer, Madonna Harrington. “Gender, Race, and the Distribution of Social Assistance: Medicaid Use among the Frail Elderly.” Gender and Society, vol. 8, no. 1, 1994, pp. 8–28. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/190069. Accessed 29 Nov. 2020.

Mohl, Raymond A. “Whitening Miami: Race, Housing, and Government Policy in Twentieth-Century Dade County.” The Florida Historical Quarterly, vol. 79, no. 3, 2001, pp. 319–345. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/30150856. Accessed 27 Nov. 2020.

“Overview of EPA's Brownfields Program.” EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, 24 Nov. 2020, www.epa.gov/brownfields/overview-epas-brownfields-program. 

“Redline Map for Miami, Florida,” Digital Public Library of America,  http://dp.la/item/4573304fbab01ebd6f4b90de845c20ba 

Tai-Seale, Ming, et al. “Racial Disparities in Service Use among Medicaid Beneficiaries after Mandatory Enrollment in Managed Care: A Difference-in-Differences Approach.” Inquiry, vol. 38, no. 1, 2001, pp. 49–59. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/29772933. Accessed 29 Nov. 2020.