ECONOMY

WASTE MANAGEMENT SUSTAINABILITY REPORT 2014 93ENGAGING WITH COMMUNITIESOther engagement activities of notein this area include the following:• Memberships in Pennsylvania andCalifornia EJ advisory councils• Chair of the Business Network forEnvironmental Justice• Speaker at the U.S. EnvironmentalProtection Agency training programon engaging community groups in thepermitting process• Member of the EPA’s NationalEnvironmental Justice AdvisoryCouncil work group on public engagementin the permitting process• Member of the EPA Science AdvisoryBoard’s work group on technicalguidance to implement environmentaljustice throughout the EPA’s regulatoryprogramsOur focus on community engagementand the important issue of environmentaljustice is consistent with our workto expand the scope of our communitypartnerships through the Wildlife HabitatCouncil and Keep America Beautiful.As we have reflected upon the evolutionof waste management in the UnitedStates and globally, we sponsored twoterms of a coalition of community advocates;environmentalists; federal, stateand local government representatives;businesses; and academics broughttogether to recommend how to drivemore sustainable materials managementpractices. The world’s resourcesare finite, and efforts to transform andreuse rather than dispose of discardedmaterials must be consistent with environmentalexcellence and social justice.It makes sense for a broad-based coalitionto take up this challenge.The central premise of sustainable materialsmanagement is that producers ofgoods and services step back, analyzethe impacts of their actions, andrecognize the need to couple environmentaland social good with economicprogress. The Sustainable MaterialsManagement Coalition first reported in2012 on how governments, businessesand stakeholders should think about themost productive and sustainable waysto use, reuse and transform wastes.The Coalition then asked a representativegroup of its members to reporton the benefits of “life cycle thinking.”The resulting report in 2013 sought toeducate policymakers and the generalpublic on the promise life cycle thinking“Life cycle thinking is a fancy term that speaks to an importantprocess. When end users purchase a good or service, they don’talways see the larger sequence of events that preceded theirpurchase. How were the raw materials sourced and what were theenvironmental implications of that step? How was the productmanufactured, and what environmental footprint did that phaseleave behind? How do the end users consume the product? Andhow will they dispose of it?”— Barry Caldwell,Senior Vice President, Waste Management