MCEA September Newsletter

In this edition of MCEA’s Environmental Monitor:

• Learn how nitrate pollution gets in our water — and what we can do about it 
• Take a deep dive into 3 big wins MCEA recently secured for the climate 
• Don’t miss our in-person event on the 50th anniversary of one of Minnesota’s bedrock environmental laws 
• Glimpse MCEA in action on Cumulative Impacts implementation work, and take action to make sure the air pollution law meets its promise
• Get ready for Legally Green on the River this Sunday!
• Trivia: You can see one of MCEA’s projects from orbit, do you know which one?
• MCEA in the news: Read about HAFA Farms and how MCEA helped protect it
• MCEA is hiring a legal assistant!

Nitrate pollution from widespread manure and fertilizer application is seeping into Minnesotans’ water. It’s contaminating drinking water, putting entire communities in SE MN at risk of developing adverse health impacts tied to nitrate-exposure. It also contributes to an oceanic dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, underscoring how choices made at the headwaters of the Mississippi flow across the United States. 

Click here to learn the top five things you need to know about this alarming issue in MN, and what MCEA is doing about it. 

We have a mandate both from the legislature and the people of Minnesota to take bold, visionary action to address the climate crisis. We also have entrenched power systems that make it harder to shift away from fossil fuels as fast as science demands of us. 

MCEA Staff Attorney Barbara Freese has been litigating the science of climate change since the 1990s, and has always been fascinated by how humanity confronts its mega problems. She achieved a full-circle moment in her decades-long climate career earlier this month. 

Don’t miss this insider look on the key wins she recently helped secure at the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission, and what she says about how they will help ensure our state lives up to both the letter AND spirit of the new 100 percent law. Read the piece here. 

As we prepare to link arms with hundreds of supporters at Legally Green this weekend, we’re reminded of the proverb, “If you want to go faster, go alone. If you want to go further, go together.” At MCEA, we prove the truth of this every day.

We’ve been doing this work for almost 50 years, and while we’ve had huge victories, one of our proudest achievements is how much we’ve accomplished in coalition with other organizations. MCEA collaborates with dozens of partners each year. This work matters so much that strengthening our partners and coalitions to increase our impact is one of two Strategic Priorities in our 2022-2025 Strategic Plan. 

Thank you for helping create a better future. We’ll get there together.

We’re wrapping up our 2023 Green Beagle CLE series with a focus on one of our state’s bedrock environmental laws: the Minnesota Environmental Policy Act (MEPA). 

2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the law, which requires the government to consider the environmental consequences of actions before granting approvals, issuing permits, or making decisions about projects. Join us on Tuesday, October 24 from 1:00 PM - 5:00 PM for a half day, in-person symposium on how this law shaped a half decade of environmental protection in Minnesota, and what's ahead.

Learn more and RSVP here to our upcoming, free symposium. 2.5 standard CLE credit will be applied for.

Left: Minnesota Environmental Justice Table’s Sophia Benrud and Clean Water Action’s Sasha Lewis-Norelle speak at a Cumulative Impacts community event in Duluth. Right: MCEA’s Mair Allen speaks outside a Cumulative Impacts rally in St. Paul. 

MCEA continues work on new air pollution law at community meetings 

The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) has begun the rule-making process for the Cumulative Impacts law. Community engagement meetings were one of the first requirements of the process. 

MCEA staff attended two – one in St. Paul and one in Duluth – to learn about the MPCA engagement process and help raise awareness about the new law. We’d like to thank our coalition partners in the Frontline Communities Protection Coalition for their time and for organizing the Duluth event. Learn more about how the law addresses pollution disparities in Minnesota and what you can do to help make it as strong as possible below. 

Take action and tell the MPCA you want MN’s new air pollution law to live up to its promise 

Turning the Cumulative Impacts law into an effective and impactful framework for the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) will be a three-year endeavor. MCEA will be there every step of the way to help secure language that doesn’t allow loopholes for facilities to continue to pile on pollution in neighborhoods already overburdened with pollution and health impacts. Working as part of the Frontline Communities Protection Coalition, MCEA helped put together a comment you can send to the MPCA that supports strong measures that would:

- Provide clear guidelines for making decisions under the law. For the sake of accountability and generating trust, the MPCA must explain how and why decisions are being made.

- Ensure that analysis of the cumulative impact of pollution is accessible and understandable for everybody .

- Create a process that empowers impacted neighborhoods to negotiate community benefit agreements and ensures developers can’t use the process to bypass permit denials. A community benefit agreement is one way a facility could add more pollution to an area. It’s unclear what this process would look like or what the “benefits” could be. 

Take one minute and submit your comment here to help ensure the MPCA gets this right. 

You can also learn more about the rulemaking process here, as well as the history of the law.

We’re so excited to connect with you this weekend for Legally Green on the River!

If you didn’t get to purchase your tickets online, we’ll have a limited number of tickets available at the door for $95. 

MCEA is proud to support local farmers. This year, we sourced hundreds of pounds of produce from Twin Cities treasure, Hmong American Farmers Association (HAFA), for the event. Keep reading to learn more about what makes the farm so special. And we’ll see you Sunday to celebrate the work we all put into protecting Minnesota’s environment!

MCEA in the News

HAFA farms, an MCEA community partner, was recently featured in an article by MPR. It shows the important relationship access to farming has to building community, generational wealth, biodiversity, and cultural preservation.

MCEA Healthy Communities program director, Evan Mulholland, is quoted contextualizing the highway expansion that threatened the farm within historical roots of structural and environmental racism. 

“Communities of color have traditionally carried the burden of road construction,” Mulholland said. “A preliminary look at the history of the highway development in Minneapolis and St. Paul and most other cities in the country, it’s really striking how that happened — and it’s not stopping."

MCEA was proud to work alongside HAFA to help protect its future this past legislative session. You can read more about our work with HAFA here. 

Do you know the name of this landmark?

Hint: It can already be seen from space, but there’s a proposed expansion to make it even bigger. 

Click here to get the answer and find out more!

We’re hiring a Legal Assistant!

The legal assistant provides essential support to MCEA’s legal team, as well as general administrative support to MCEA staff. The successful candidate will have a front-row seat for cutting-edge legal work that is shaping environmental policy across the state. 

Find out more about the position here!

MCEA is Minnesota’s leading nonprofit environmental law and public policy organization working to protect our environment and the health of our people.