''Health Impact Assessments Take on Broader Role in Cities and States''
Aaron Wernham, director of the Health Impact Project discusses the benefits of health impact assessments in this edition of Governing.
More infoBenefits and Best Uses
- HIA can build community support and reduce opposition to a proposed project. By ensuring that decisions are made with full attention to community concerns, HIA helps reduce conflicts that can delay projects. For example, an Alaska Native community considered litigation over plans to allow oil and gas lease sales in their traditional hunting areas. Instead, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) worked with the local government to complete an HIA, which resulted in new protections that addressed community concerns while still allowing development to go forward. Owing in part to the success of this HIA, an environmental impact statement associated with the lease sales was never challenged in court. Since then, the BLM has begun using HIA more commonly in similar planning and permitting decisions.6
- HIA facilitates collaboration across sectors. HIA provides a structured, pragmatic way for those in public health to collaborate with officials in other agencies and sectors, ensuring that these officials have the health data they need to make better decisions.
- HIA is not always necessary. If health is already a focus of a proposed policy
or project, or if the potential health effects are too hypothetical, HIA may not offer any new information to decision makers. To avoid unnecessary time and expense, an effective approach to screening can determine whether HIA will add value.
