Environmental Public Health Tracking: Environmental Justice

Tracking environmental justice data is important to help communities make decisions to achieve health equity. The national Tracking Network gathers data and information to make decisions about our environment and our health, including personal, community, regulatory, and public health decisions.

The Tracking Network allows users to identify demographic factors, environmental burdens, socioeconomic conditions, and public health concerns directly related to environmental justice. By understanding these data and tracking changes over time, we can make better decisions that reduce environmental injustice and better protect all communities.

Many data sources are used to track environmental justice. For a breakdown of each data source, check our data details page.

There are three key data points for tracking overall environmental justice. One of these key data points is called an index, and more than one are called indices. The three indices we track in Wisconsin are:

• The Environmental Justice Index (EJI) is the broadest measurement; it is calculated using the combined rankings of a location's environmental burden, social vulnerability, and health vulnerability. The EJI gives us a measure of the cumulative effects of environmental justice indicators on human health and well-being. The EJI ranking is easy to understand in terms of comparison. For example, if the number that you see when you select a county is .75, that means 75% of census tracts in the nation likely experience less severe impacts from environmental injustice than the area you selected. It also means 25% of tracts in the nation likely experience more severe effects.
• The Environmental Quality Index (EQI) gives a snapshot of the environment that includes five domain indices: air domain, built domain, land domain, sociodemographic domain, and water domain. A low index score indicates better, healthier environmental quality. Wisconsin's tracking data can either be viewed by looking at the overall EQI, or by each domain.
• The Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) refers to a community's resilience. It is a measure of how likely a community would be to survive and thrive if confronted with external stresses on human health, like disasters or disease outbreaks. SVI scores range from 0.00 to 1.00. A score of 1.00 represents the greatest level of social vulnerability to human suffering and financial loss in the event of an emergency. You can learn more about SVI on the CDC's website.

Environmental justice information and data are useful to anyone interested in working to build healthier communities. For ideas on how to start, visit our Ideas for Taking Action page. If you work in public health, government, science, research, or for a community organization, you can use environmental justice tracking data to:

• Identify areas that may require additional resources to improve environmental health and health equity,
• Characterize the unique environmental and social factors that can lead to combined effects of environmental burden on health,
• Inform policy and decision-making to address those factors, and
• Establish meaningful goals and measure progress towards environmental justice and health equity.

You can select data in the Wisconsin Tracking portal by county (or census tract in some cases), and this will give you an idea of conditions in your community. To see how your county compares with other counties, and with the national average, visit the CDC Environmental Justice Dashboard.

Demographics: Percent of population aged 5 years and over that speak English less than “very well”

This dataset was collected from the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, and the American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. ACS is a nationwide, continuous survey designed to provide communities with reliable and timely demographic, housing, social, and economic data every year. However, because ACS data are based on a sample, they are subject to sampling variability and some uncertainty.

Read more about the Census ACS methodology. The definition for people who speak English less than “very well” includes people whose native or primary language is any language other than English.

Demographics: Percent of population aged 65 years and older living alone in a non-family household

This dataset was collected from the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, and the American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. ACS is a nationwide, continuous survey designed to provide communities with reliable and timely demographic, housing, social, and economic data every year. However, because ACS data are based on a sample, they are subject to sampling variability and include some uncertainty.

Read more about the Census ACS methodology. A non-family household can be either a person living alone or a householder who shares the housing unit only with non-relatives—for example, boarders or roommates. Non-family households are maintained only by people with no relatives at home.

Demographics: Percent of population by demographic group

Data provided by the CDC National Vital Statistic System. Estimates between censuses were used for 2000-2009. Estimates after censuses were used for 2010 onward.

EQI: Air Domain Index

EQI and domain-specific indices are available publicly at the EPA Environmental Dataset Gateway. The Air Domain Index is the result of a principal component analysis using 43 air pollutant variables, including both criteria and hazardous air pollutants. This index summarizes average air pollutant exposures from 2006–2010 for each county in the United States. Lower index scores mean higher environmental quality, and higher index scores mean lower environmental quality.

EQI: Built Environment Domain Environment Index

Environmental Quality Index (EQI) and domain-specific indices are available publicly at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Environmental Dataset Gateway. The Built Environment Domain Index is the result of a principal component analysis using 15 built environment quality variables, including street information, business data, highway safety information, walkability score, green space/open land, and U.S. Census data. This index summarizes average built environment quality measures from 2006–2010 for each county in the United States. Lower index scores mean higher environmental quality, and higher index scores mean lower environmental quality.

EQI: Land Domain Index

Environmental Quality Index (EQI) and domain-specific indices are available publicly at the EPA's Environmental Dataset Gateway. The Land Domain Index is from the result of a principal component analysis using 18 land quality variables, including pesticides, general agriculture, facility counts, mine data, and radon rankings. This index summarizes average land quality measures from 2006–2010 for each county in the United States. Lower index scores mean higher environmental quality, and higher index scores mean lower environmental quality.

EQI: Overall Environmental Quality Index

Environmental Quality Index (EQI) and domain-specific indices are available publicly at the EPA Environmental Dataset Gateway. The EQI presents data in five domains: social and demographic data (sociodemographics), air, water, land, and built environments to provide a county-by-county snapshot of overall environmental quality across all U.S. data provided at the county level for all counties (3,143) in the U.S. for the time period 2006–2010. Lower index scores mean higher environmental quality, and higher index scores mean lower environmental quality.

EQ: Sociodemographic Domain Index

EQI and domain-specific indices are available publicly at the EPA's Environmental Dataset Gateway. The Sociodemographic Domain Index is the result of a principal component analysis using 12 sociodemographic variables, including U.S. Census, Economic Resource Service, election results, and crime data. This index summarizes average sociodemographic measures from 2006–2010 for each county in the United States. Lower index scores mean higher environmental quality, and higher index scores mean lower environmental quality.

EQI: Water Domain Index

EQI and domain-specific indices are available publicly at the EPA's Environmental Dataset Gateway. The Water Domain Index is the result of a principal component analysis using 51 water quality variables, including water impairment, waste permits, domestic water source, deposition for six pollutants, drought status, 39 chemical contaminants, and one microorganism. This index summarizes average water quality measures from 2006–2010 for each county in the United States. Lower index scores mean higher environmental quality, and higher index scores mean lower environmental quality.

Health status: percent of population aged 5 years and over with a disability

This dataset was collected from the US. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, and the American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. ACS is a nationwide, continuous survey designed to provide communities with reliable and timely demographic, housing, social, and economic data every year. However, because ACS data are based on a sample, they are subject to sampling variability and include some uncertainty. Read more about the Census ACS methodology. Because the ACS has replaced the decennial long-form as the source for small area statistics, there is no disability data in the 2010 Census. The Census Bureau collects data on disability primarily through ACS and the Survey of Income and Program Participation (SIPP). The definitions of disability are not always alike so caution should be taken when making comparisons across surveys. Generally, the SIPP estimates of disability prevalence are broader and encompass a greater number of activities on which disability status is assessed. The ACS has a narrower definition but can produce estimates for states, counties, and metropolitan areas.

Households: Percent of housing units with no vehicle available

Data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. Read more about the Census ACS methodology.

Households: Percent of mobile home housing units

Data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. Read more about the Census ACS methodology.

Internet Access: Percent of households with no Internet access

Data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. Refer to the Technical Notes for more information about ACS.

SVI: Percentile rank for household composition/disability, housing/transportation, minority status/language, and socioeconomic vulnerability

Data are provided by CDC/ATSDR's Geospatial Research, Analysis & Service Program and are developed using Census 2010 and American Community Survey (ACS) data. The Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) uses U.S. Census data to determine the social vulnerability of every census area. The SVI ranks each Census area on 15 social factors, including poverty, lack of vehicle access, and crowded housing. It then groups them into four related themes, as well as an overall ranking. Maps of the four themes are shown in the figure in the SVI fact sheet. For 2010, the household composition/disability percentile does not include disability because the 2010 Census data does not contain data on disabilities.

SVI: Overall percentile vulnerability rank

Data are provided by CDC/ATSDR's Geospatial Research, Analysis & Service Program and are developed using Census 2010 and American Community Survey (ACS) data. The Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) uses U.S. Census data to determine the social vulnerability of every census area. Census areas are subdivisions of counties for which the Census collects statistical data. The SVI ranks each area on 15 social factors,* including poverty, lack of vehicle access, and crowded housing, and groups them into four related themes, as well as an overall ranking. Maps of the four themes are shown in the figure in the SVI fact sheet.

Socioeconomic status: Percent of population aged 16 years and over who are unemployed

Data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, and American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. Read more about the Census ACS methodology. The ACS uses the same employment status concepts as those used in Census 2000. The ACS data, however, are annual averages, whereas the census estimates relate to the period when the census was conducted—from March to June 2000. The labor force questions changed in 2008, so use caution when making labor force data comparisons from 2008 or later with data from earlier years. More information can be found on the Census website. Since employment data from the CPS and the ACS are obtained from respondents in households, they're different from statistics based on reports from individual businesses, farm enterprises, and certain government programs. Some difference between measures of employment may exist for people holding more than one job, private household workers, unpaid family workers, self-employed people, people younger than 16 years of age, and people who had a job but were not working at the time of survey. Further, the employment status data in household survey tabulations include people based on place of residence regardless of where they work, and establishment data report people at their place of work regardless of where they live. This second point is particularly important when comparing data for workers who commute between areas and is likely to be more important the smaller the geographic area.

Socioeconomic status: Percent of population aged 25 years of age and over with high school diploma (or equivalent) or higher

Data provided by the U.S. Census Bureau, American Factfinder, and American Community Survey (ACS) five-year estimates. ACS is a nationwide, continuous survey designed to provide communities with reliable and timely demographic, housing, social, and economic data every year. However, because ACS data are based on a sample, they are subject to sampling variability and include some uncertainty. Read more about the Census ACS methodology. For each race, ethnicity, and sex, the total number of people graduating high school or the equivalent were calculated by summing the following eight columns of highest education attained: high school graduate (includes equivalency), some college less than one year, some college one or more years, Associate degree, Bachelor's degree, Master's degree, Professional school degree, and Doctorate degree. Percentages were calculated by dividing this sum by the total population for the corresponding race, ethnicity, and sex.

Percent of population living in poverty

These data are collected from the U.S. Census Bureau, Small Area Income and Poverty estimates. Read more about the Census ACS methodology.

Explore the definitions and explanations of terminology found on the portal, like age-adjusted rate and confidence intervals.