On July 26, 2010, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released an interim guidance document to help agency staff incorporate environmental justice into the agency’s rulemaking process. The guidance document, “Interim Guidance on Considering Environmental Justice During the Development of an Action,” provides a step-by-step guide to help EPA staff ask questions and evaluate environmental justice considerations at key points in the rulemaking process. The guide also describes the statutory and policy framework for considering environmental justice issues. The U.S. EPA will use the lessons learned from workgroups using the interim guidance and consider them in the development of new technical guidance and revisions to the Interim Guide later this year.

The U.S. EPA is seeking public feedback on how to best implement and improve the interim guidance document. The interim guidance can be found here: http://www.epa.gov/environmentaljustice/resources/policy/ej-rulemaking.html. Feedback can also be submitted at this web address.