2. Meaningfully engage communities throughout the design and implementation of Justice40 programs and projects
Ensure Justice40-eligible communities and the organizations that serve them are aware of available funding opportunities.
All Justice40 programs and projects should begin with a commitment to ensuring that the needs and priorities of the communities involved guide the work from the outset. But involving and engaging community members first requires awareness—if communities and the organizations that serve them are either unaware of or confused about the funding opportunities available through Justice40, they will not be able to engage with the programs intended to benefit them, resulting in a missed opportunity for both the communities in question and for the federal government. Meaningfully engaging members of “disadvantaged” communities requires building and maintaining trust, which necessitates establishing relationships and following through on commitments, among other conditions. While the administration cannot build these relationships on behalf of federal agencies and their offices, they can make it easier for communities to reach the relevant agencies, programs, and resources. One way of doing this could be to create a “one stop shop” for accessing all the information related to Justice40 and its covered programs across all federal agencies.
Communities interested in Justice40 funding opportunities are currently required to navigate a maze of agency websites and webpages to access this information. Many nongovernmental organizations have created Justice40 guides and resources: for example, the Equitable and Just National Climate Platform created a Justice40 Resource Guide, Emerald Cities Collaborative developed a Justice40 Community Benefit Playbook, and Harvard Law School’s Environmental and Energy Law Program hosts a Federal Environmental Justice Tracker that contains a section on Justice40 specifically. However, none of these resources carry the authority of the federal government, and the proliferation of external resources may create confusion in cases where the information conflicts. And although some federal agencies have regional offices where community-based organizations and local governments can connect with federal staff, these offices are unable to support the full scope of Justice40 programs across all relevant agencies.
A federally hosted guide that provides information on all Justice40 covered programs or a clearinghouse with frequently asked questions would lower the barriers to accessing relevant information for eligible communities. These resources could also be accompanied by the provision of “switchboarding” services, which could provide wayfinding support for communities to navigate available information and could also connect them to specific programs, people, or agencies who can answer questions or address community needs. The guide, FAQ, and any services provided should all be made available in languages other than English, and should use clear, simple, and accessible terminology.
Formalize the integration of community input and expertise throughout all Justice40-covered programs and projects.
Justice40’s goal of delivering 40 percent of benefits from select federal investments to “disadvantaged” communities is a form of distributive equity, which is concerned with the fair allocation of resources. But it is equally important to attend to procedural equity in the processes and mechanisms through which distribution decisions are made. Community members, particularly those with lived experience of economic and environmental injustices, have access to information and context that is often not available to those outside of the community, and can offer insights that even the most robust quantitative data fail to capture. Embedding their input and expertise within all stages of Justice40 programs and projects can lead to more effective and sustainable solutions to local needs, and is critical to advancing equity, climate action, and economic health.
The administration should formalize integrating community input and expertise throughout the design and implementation of the Justice40 Initiative. This could be accomplished by, for instance, providing direction to federal agencies in the final implementation guidance on when and how to engage and involve members of the community, helping agencies create mechanisms for direct feedback from affected communities, and incorporating community-led monitoring mechanisms into agency evaluations and accountability measures. The administration should also direct federal agencies to require that funding recipients—whether states, regional bodies, local governments, private actors, or nongovernmental organizations—demonstrate plans to incorporate community input throughout all stages of the project lifecycle, including in how projects are designed, built, maintained, and evaluated.
Provide guidance on ways to conduct meaningful and non-extractive community engagement.
While some federal agencies have established community outreach and engagement programs (for instance, the EPA holds monthly national environmental justice community engagement calls and the Department of Transportation (DOT) has an Office of Public Engagement), many do not. To ensure that federal agencies can and do meaningfully engage members of the community, the administration should provide guidance that emphasizes not just the quantity of community engagement efforts, but also the quality, with the goal of moving beyond consulting and involving community members to actively collaborating with, if not deferring to, them.
These guidelines should also specify methods to ensure that engagement events are inclusive and accessible to a range of community members, including community leaders and members of the community least likely to have been engaged in the past. This can be done in many ways, including compensating participants for their time and expertise, providing transportation or childcare services or offering reimbursement for such services, and ensuring that all accessibility needs (such as translation and physical access requirements) are met. There are many resources that the administration can leverage to provide guidance on effective and non-extractive methods of community engagement, including a guidebook on community-engaged methods assembled by Urban researchers, a resource on facilitating community participation and moving toward community ownership co-developed by Facilitating Power and the Movement Strategy Center, and a list of community engagement best practices compiled by Groundwork USA.