Drafter
Clerk 11/03/2021
Title
A RESOLUTION approving and adopting the 2021 plan update for the Local Hazardous Waste Management Program in King County.
Body
WHEREAS, RCW 70.105.220 requires local governments to prepare and implement local hazardous waste plans, and
WHEREAS, the Local Hazardous Waste Management Program ("the program") was launched in 1990 to fulfill that state statute through the efforts of a coalition of local governments including the city of Seattle, King County and other cities and Tribes within King County, and
WHEREAS, the King County Board of Health, in BOH chapter 2.08, established and authorizes the program's management coordination committee ("the committee") to prepare and implement the required plans through the coalition of governments represented on the committee, and
WHEREAS, the committee summarized, from those plans, the program's mission, which is to protect and enhance public health and environmental quality in King County by reducing the threat posed by the production, use, storage and disposal of hazardous materials, and
WHEREAS, the program's last plan update was in 2010, and, since that time, there have been significant changes in the populations and businesses that the program serves, the number and the complexity of hazardous materials and products that the program addresses, the scientific understanding of the toxicity of those products and the approach the program is trying to take to reduce or prevent the use of hazardous components in products during their manufacture, and
WHEREAS, on June 18, 2020, the board passed Resolution 20-08, declaring racism a public health crisis, and it has been demonstrated that Black, Indigenous and People of Color experience lower outcomes related to health, housing, income, education, employment and criminal justice due to institutional and systemic racism, and
WHEREAS black, Indigenous, and people of color can be disproportionately exposed to hazardous materials, and
WHEREAS the program has a vision that race is not a determinate of hazardous waste exposure, and
WHEREAS, the program assessed its past approaches and activities, and worked to obtain input from the public and its partner agencies, to develop a plan update that comprehensively addresses changes since 2010, including changes in populations and businesses, changes in hazardous products and materials and changes in the program's approaches;
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED by the Board of Health of King County:
The Board of Health hereby approves and adopts the Local Hazardous Waste Management Program's 2021 Management Plan Update (November 2021).