The Elizabeth River Project has teamed with researchers from the Virginia Institute of Marine Science and the College of William and Mary to build an online mapping tool that can help the nonprofit and other community partners to better incorporate environmental justice issues into planning and restoration efforts.

Joe Rieger, ERP’s Deputy Director for Restoration, said the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency defines environmental justice (or “EJ”) as the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations and policies.

He said the new Elizabeth River Environmental Justice Tool “provides a great additional way for us to more deliberately focus our planning efforts in historically under-resourced communities of color.”

ERP turned to VIMS for assistance in developing the new environmental justice mapping tool as VIMS is the lead agency tasked with evaluating the ecological h...