Department of Legal Counsel

Environmental Justice

Generating cases at CSS is often a function of the excellent advocacy work initiated by the staff of the CSS Department of Policy Research and Advocacy or the CSS community organizing staff. In the 1990’s the CSS community organizing staff operated in a number of boroughs and led a series of community efforts to address environmental health issues in Brooklyn and in the Bronx. When advocacy and political pressure required additional strategies, the CSS Department of Legal Counsel became involved and secured long-term relief, even in the face of short-term setbacks.

Ferrer v. Appleton (1994) and Martinez v. New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (1994): Both of these state court challenges were brought in Bronx County on procedural grounds to delay and halt the operations of a medical waste incinerator in an area of the Bronx that had one of the highest asthma rates in the country. The incinerator was owned by Bronx–Lebanon Hospital and operated by a private corporation. After continued litigation, political pressure, and grassroots organizing, the incinerator was shut down for good – seven years after its construction.