Environmental Justice, Resilience Justice, and Watershed Planning

Watershed planning is an increasingly used governance tool for addressing environmental problems at ecosystem scales of watersheds, which are areas of land that drain to a common body of water. In recent years, watershed planning in the United States has been undergoing an “equity evolution”: watershed planners have begun integrating environmental justice considerations into their plans, often in response to demands by low-income communities of color. This Article explores a comprehensive set of principles, processes, analytical tools, and strategies for equitable watershed planning. It integrates a resilience justice perspective with environmental justice.

Resilience justice is concerned with the systemically unequal vulnerabilities and adaptive capacities of marginalized and oppressed communities, who are vulnerable to disruptions and changes like natural disasters, climate change, and housing insecurity (e.g., gentrification) and have been marginalized from governance systems affecting their capacities to thrive. Watershed plans should not only address unequal environmental harms and decision-making but also empower low-income communities of color and facilitate their resilience. An equity transformation, not merely an equity evolution, is needed in watershed planning. This Article examines a case study of the University of Louisville Resilience Justice Project’s work with government agencies and communities to integrate environmental and resilience justice into planning for the Mill Creek watershed, composed of marginalized neighborhoods in Southwest Louisville, Kentucky.