The administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency traveled to Jackson, Miss., in November to discuss the city's poor water quality at an elementary school where children have to drink bottled water and use portable restrooms outside.
The halls were mostly empty on the day he arrived. The portable toilets couldn't flush because the water pressure at the school was so low.
He made some changes after seeing that scene and others in low-income communities in Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas and elsewhere.
The E.P.A. will announce on Wednesday that it will step up monitoring and enforcement of federal rules regarding air and water quality, particularly in communities of color, which are disproportionately burdened by pollution.
The situation for myself, talking directly to community members, and the fact that children miss school days because the water isn't safe is startling. He said the environment in the United States of America was unacceptable.
President Biden has made addressing racial disparity and the environment a core part of his agenda. Some of the pioneers in the environmental justice movement were invited to be on the advisory council. Agencies were instructed to incorporate environmental justice into their decisions. He promised that disadvantaged communities would get at least 40 percent of the benefits from federal investments in climate and clean energy programs.
Mr. Biden's top environmental justice appointment, Cecilia Martinez, and another appointment, David Kieve, both left their posts recently.
Concerns have been raised about the future of Mr. Biden's environmental justice agenda.
In a call with reporters on Tuesday, Mr. Regan said he felt an obligation to the marginalized communities that have been waiting for federal attention. The Journey to Justice tour is where he spent the last year touring towns and meeting with community members.
I pledge to do better by people who have been hurting for a long time.
Mr. Regan said that the Trump administration had not conducted enough inspections. The monitoring of industries that cause pollution fell off sharply in March 2020 when the Trump administration said that they wouldn't be held responsible if there was a Pandemic.
The E.P.A. said it would increase the number of air pollution inspectors and use novel monitoring methods like a new aircraft that uses sensors and software to detect emissions in real time.
Robert Taylor, leader of the Concerned Citizens of St. John, became emotional as he described Mr. Regan's visit to the region.
Mr. Taylor said that they were being attacked by people who were supposed to protect them.
The E.P.A. plans to make the data available to the public. Mobile air pollution monitoring equipment will be deployed in those parishes.
The agency requires the Denka Performance Elastomer plant in St. James Parish to install monitors to identify the source of emissions. Residents have long complained that pollution from the plant has caused health problems, including breathing difficulties and cancer, because the plant uses the chemical chloroprene to make synthetic rubber.
E.P.A. said that the company complied. Denka could not be reached for comment.
In Jackson, Miss., a majority Black city where residents have suffered from contaminated drinking water as well as chronic water outages, the E.P.A. had issued a notice of noncompliance for failing to repair equipment to ensure safe drinking water.
The Coalition of Community Organizations is a nonprofit advocacy group based in Houston.
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