Environmental Justice

The Haw River Assembly is dedicated to the goal of environmental justice and equality for everyone living in the watershed. Our efforts are guided by our mission statement, our strategic plan and the work of our Environmental Justice, Diversity and Inclusion Committee. Over the years we have worked with communities fighting disproportionate burdens of pollution based on demographic factors such as race and income. We support efforts by communities fighting proposals that would bring new degradation to water and air quality including landfills, mining, fracking, coal ash, and rights to clean water, wastewater treatment and access to public natural areas.

Read more about the Easton Acres landfill on our interactive story map!

New Interactive Mapping Tool!

The Haw River Assembly has created a community mapping tool to show where pollution is located and specific environmental justice problems within the watershed. This map can be seen below; it contains data about potential and existing sources of pollution overlaid with demographic data to show the primary communities that are being affected by pollutants in certain areas, so that we will be able to better provide support to these communities in tackling these issues. Additionally, we have included spotlights of community leaders and groups working on environmental justice within the watershed. 

You can click HERE to view the StoryMap in full screen

We are grateful to our interns, Lucy Grey (UNC-CH) and Quinn Beckham (Duke University), for their work on this StoryMap project.