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Vantage to Pomona Heights Chapter 4 230 kV Transmission Line Project FEIS Environmental Consequences PAGE 4-245 4.10 ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE 4.10.1 Methods and Impact Types Following the guidelines for environmental justice (EJ) evaluations (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 2010), the objective of the impact analysis was to identify any populations of minorities or low- income persons that could be disproportionally affected by the Action Alternatives. The results of analyses of race/ethnicity and low-income statuses for Census Block Groups in which the Action Alternatives are located or are within a three-mile radius were summarized in Section 3.10. The primary outcomes of the analysis were that: 1) overall, the Action Alternatives traverse some Block Groups with substantially above-average presence of Latinos, but not other minorities and low-income persons, relative to the Project study area (comprised of Benton, Grant, Kittitas, and Yakima counties); and 2) because the set of Census Block Groups traversed by each of the Action Alternatives is so similar, the distinctions among Action Alternatives are negligible. This section provides more detail on EJ impacts by identifying the Census Block Groups that have particularly high proportions of minority or low-income populations. 4.10.2 Impact Level 4.10.2.1 Minority Populations As previously discussed in Section 3.10, four of the nine Action Alternatives are within 3 miles of the same Census Block Groups as one other Action Alternative, meaning there are only five distinct sets of Block Groups out of the nine Action Alternatives (four sets of duplicate Block Group lists). The New Northern Route (NNR) Alternative with or without the Manastash Ridge (MR) Subroute are all within three miles of the same Census Block Groups. Additionally, the only difference in the route segments, MR-1, is not within three miles of any communities. The Block Groups with particularly high proportions of minority populations were identified. This identification entailed 1) ranking Census Block Groups from highest to lowest presence of minorities, and 2) identifying Block Groups that are outliers in terms of minority population. “Outliers” was defined as having a proportion of a minority over 150 percent of the proportion of that minority in the four-county Project study area which contained 39.3 percent minority population. Therefore, all outlier Block Groups contained at least 58.9 percent minority population. It should be noted that Block Group 1, Census Tract 120 in Benton County was removed from this analysis due to having insufficient sample size with a total population of only 5 people. By comparison, the next lowest Block Group contained 644 people and the average Block Group contained a total population of 1,789 people. Use of the 150 percent threshold resulted in a list of Block Groups that contained Latino populations of 51% or higher. Only Block Group 2, Census Tract 1 in Yakima County contained a non-Latino minority population which met the 150 percent threshold. This Block Group contained a 5.7 percent Black or African American population and a 7.2 percent American Indian and Native Alaskan population. The populations of these two minorities in the Block Group were 115 and 147, respectively, considered large enough to be a concern. The racial and ethnic compositions of Block Groups that were identified as potentially affected using this criterion are detailed in Table 4.10-1.