What Is the HEAL Act? Washington’s Environmental Justice Law

The HEAL Act in Washington — short for the Healthy Environment for All Act — is a 2021 state law that requires seven state agencies to build environmental justice into how they plan, spend, engage with the public, and evaluate major decisions. Signed as SB 5141 in July 2021, it came out of recommendations from Washington’s Environmental Justice Task Force and targets the uneven way pollution and poor health outcomes are distributed across the state’s communities.¹ It did not create a new agency or a new permit. It changed the obligations of agencies that already shape environmental conditions on the ground.

Which Agencies the Law Covers

Seven agencies carry the HEAL Act’s core duties: the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Ecology, Health, Natural Resources, and Transportation, along with the Puget Sound Partnership. These were chosen because they have the most influence over environmental health conditions in Washington. Other state agencies can opt in voluntarily.²

If your question is whether a particular state program answers to the HEAL Act, the answer turns on which agency runs it. A Department of Ecology permit falls within the law. A program at an agency that has not opted in does not.

Who the Law Is Meant to Protect

Two groups sit at the center of the statute. An “overburdened community” is a geographic area where residents face combined, multiple environmental harms and health impacts. A “vulnerable population” is a group at higher risk of poor health outcomes from environmental harms because of socioeconomic factors — unemployment, high housing costs relative to income, limited access to food or healthcare, linguistic isolation — or sensitivity factors such as low birth weight and higher hospitalization rates. The definition specifically includes racial and ethnic minorities, low-income populations, communities disproportionately harmed by pollution, and workers exposed to environmental hazards.³

The statute also defines environmental justice itself as the fair treatment and meaningful involvement of all people, regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, in developing and enforcing environmental laws and policies. The definition goes beyond process: it requires prioritizing vulnerable populations and overburdened communities, distributing resources equitably, and eliminating harm.³

To identify where overburdened communities actually are, agencies rely on the Washington Environmental Health Disparities Map, maintained by the Department of Health. The map combines environmental threats like pollution exposure and proximity to hazardous waste sites with vulnerability indicators such as poverty rates and health conditions. Census tracts containing tribal lands are automatically classified as overburdened communities on the map.⁴ The community engagement statute directs agencies to use the map when evaluating the communities affected by their actions.⁵

What Covered Agencies Must Do

Each covered agency carries several overlapping obligations. They phased in on a staggered timeline beginning in 2022.

Strategic Plans

By January 1, 2023, every covered agency had to add an environmental justice implementation plan to its strategic plan. The plan must describe how the agency applies environmental justice principles to its work, and must include agency-specific goals and actions to reduce environmental and health disparities, metrics to track progress, methods for equitable public engagement, strategies to comply with federal civil rights laws including Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and specific timelines for incorporating environmental justice into agency activities.⁶

Tying the plan to federal civil rights compliance means agencies cannot treat the HEAL Act as a standalone exercise. The plan has to address how the agency avoids discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, disability, and age across its programs.

Community Engagement Plans

By July 1, 2022, each covered agency had to adopt a community engagement plan describing how it will interact with overburdened communities and vulnerable populations when evaluating new and existing programs. The statute requires these plans to cover:⁵

How the agency identifies and prioritizes which overburdened communities to focus on.
Outreach strategies designed to overcome barriers to engagement, including language barriers.
How the agency uses the Environmental Health Disparities Map and similar screening tools.
Practical support that removes barriers to participation, such as child care and reimbursement for travel expenses, to the extent legally practicable.
Communication methods accessible to people facing language or other obstacles.

Agencies must consider guidance from the Environmental Justice Council when writing or updating these plans. The approach differs from a standard public comment process: instead of posting a notice and waiting to see who shows up, agencies have to go to the communities most affected and make participation realistic.

Tribal Consultation

The law creates a separate tribal consultation track that runs independently from general public participation. Covered agencies must develop consultation protocols in coordination with tribal governments and must offer government-to-government consultation with federally recognized tribes on three triggers: updates to environmental justice strategic plans, creation or revision of community engagement plans, and significant agency actions affecting tribal rights and interests in tribal lands.⁷

Consultation must happen whether or not a tribe requests it, and independently of any public participation process. The Department of Health must also offer tribal consultation on the development of the disparities map itself. Nothing in the chapter authorizes agencies to collect data about sacred sites, traditional cultural properties, burial grounds, or other protected tribal sites.

Environmental Justice Assessments

Starting July 1, 2023, covered agencies must conduct an environmental justice assessment whenever they take a “significant agency action.” Five categories qualify:³

Significant rulemaking, meaning adoption of major legislative rules as defined in the state Administrative Procedure Act.
New grant or loan programs the agency is authorized or required by statute to carry out.
Capital project grants or loans of at least $12 million, or transportation project grants or loans of at least $15 million.
Agency request legislation submitted to the Governor’s office or the Office of Financial Management.
Other actions an agency identifies as significant through consultation with the Environmental Justice Council.

Forest practices permits and state timber sales are explicitly excluded from the assessment requirement. By July 1, 2025, each covered agency also had to identify additional actions beyond the baseline triggers that should receive assessments, and must publish on its website the types of actions it treats as significant.⁸

The assessments evaluate cumulative environmental impacts on overburdened communities and determine whether an action will create or worsen health risks. Findings are public, which connects agency decisions to their consequences for specific populations.

Budgets and the 40 Percent Goal

Each covered agency must build environmental justice into its budget development, spending decisions, and decisions about granting or withholding environmental benefits. Agencies have to equitably distribute funding tied to programs that cause environmental harm or provide environmental benefits toward overburdened communities and vulnerable populations, to the extent allowed by law and consistent with legislative appropriations.⁹

The statute sets a goal of directing 40 percent of grants and expenditures that create environmental benefits to vulnerable populations and overburdened communities. It is an aspirational target rather than a hard floor, but agencies must track their spending and the state maintains a public accountability dashboard. When making spending decisions, agencies must focus expenditures on reducing environmental harms in overburdened communities, create opportunities for those communities to participate in expenditure decisions, and articulate environmental justice goals and performance metrics.⁹

Who Oversees Compliance

The HEAL Act created the Environmental Justice Council, an advisory body of 14 members appointed by the Governor to two-year terms. Members represent community-based organizations, tribal nations, and populations disproportionately affected by environmental harms. The council advises agencies on strategic plans, assessments, budget criteria, and community engagement plans. It recommends which agency actions should be treated as significant enough to require an assessment, advises on using the disparities map, and serves as a public forum where residents can raise concerns and get directed to the right agency.¹⁰

Starting December 1, 2023, and every two years after, the council evaluates each covered agency’s progress and reports to the public, the Governor, and the legislature. Covered agencies must submit annual updates to the council by September 1 to support this review. This biennial report is the primary accountability mechanism in the law.

Alongside the council, the Department of Health runs an interagency workgroup made up of staff from each covered agency. The workgroup provides the day-to-day technical assistance an external advisory body cannot: helping agencies build environmental justice into their plans and assessments, developing tools to evaluate programs and budgets, training staff on data and assessment tools, and identifying goals and metrics the council can use to measure performance.⁷

How the Law Is Enforced

The HEAL Act’s enforcement is indirect. The law does not create a private right of action for individuals to sue agencies for noncompliance, and there are no automatic fines or penalties for agencies that fall short. The council’s biennial progress reports to the Governor and legislature create political and public pressure rather than legal liability.

The most concrete enforcement hook is the environmental justice assessment. Because an assessment is part of the record for an action like a permit or a rule, it can be challenged through existing administrative appeal processes when tied to an appealable agency action. If an agency skips a required assessment or produces an inadequate one, that gap could form the basis for challenging the underlying decision. Agencies also face potential federal consequences independent of the HEAL Act: the EPA investigates whether recipients of federal funding comply with civil rights laws, and a pattern of directing pollution burdens toward minority communities could trigger Title VI scrutiny.

1
Washington State Legislature. SB 5141 – 2021-22
2
Washington State Office of the Attorney General. About the HEAL Act
3
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code RCW 70A.02.010 – Definitions
4
Washington State Department of Health. Washington Environmental Health Disparities Map
5
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code RCW 70A.02.050 – Community Engagement Plans
6
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code RCW 70A.02.040 – Incorporating Environmental Justice Into Strategic Plans
7
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code Chapter 70A.02 RCW – Environmental Justice Obligations
8
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code RCW 70A.02.060 – Environmental Justice Assessments
9
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code RCW 70A.02.080 – Environmental Justice Obligations Relating to Budgets and Funding
10
Washington State Legislature. Washington Code RCW 70A.02.110 – Environmental Justice Council