Minneapolis Foundation is suing the EPA over frozen environmental justice grants

The Minneapolis Foundation is suing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, alleging the EPA illegally froze tens of millions of dollars in federal grants intended to address environmental harms and economic disparities in some of the nation’s most disadvantaged communities.

The Thriving Communities Grantmaking Program, which was established by Congress under the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, dedicated $600 million in block grants for projects aimed at tackling climate and environmental justice issues in neighborhoods historically overburdened by pollution and a lack of financial opportunities.

The EPA awarded that money to more than a dozen regional partners — largely nonprofits and academic institutions — as community grants for projects such as installing air pollution monitors, conducting asthma screenings and replacing lead pipes in homes.

The Minneapolis Foundation was awarded roughly $60 million to deliver to applicants across six Midwestern states, including Minnesota, as well as 37 federally recognized tribal nations. But EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced last month he was canceling all the agency’s environmental justice grants, nearly 800 programs in total, including the Thriving Communities program.

The foundation is joined in the suit by Baltimore-based nonprofit Green and Healthy Homes Initiative and Seattle-based Philanthropy Northwest, which were also awarded $60 million each from the grant program to distribute as a regional partner.

The EPA has since informed the Minneapolis Foundation that its funding was officially terminated as of May 1. The federal agency did not immediately respond Friday to a request for comment.

“Communities working to reduce air pollution, protect their drinking water and address other basic human needs are bearing the consequences of the federal government’s recent actions to cancel funding for environmental and public health projects,” the Minneapolis Foundation said in a statement Friday regarding the lawsuit.

As of Feb. 21, the Minneapolis Foundation had received just $1.2 million of its $60 million federal grant, according to a FOIA request obtained by the Sierra Club and shared with the Minnesota Star Tribune. According to the suit, the EPA has illegally blocked access to $180 million in obligated funds among the three organizations.

Since it began accepting grant applications in December, the Minneapolis Foundation has received more than 650 applications from local governments and other community organizations around the Midwest, according to the press release.

Some of the proposed projects include developing new green space in Cincinnati, improving disaster preparedness processes in rural Illinois and cleaning up water contamination in the Great Lakes, the Minneapolis Foundation said.

Since President Donald Trump took office in January, his administration has frozen billions of dollars in congressionally appropriated funding, largely climate and environmental justice-related grants offered by the EPA. That includes $20 billion the EPA awarded to state green banks to be distributed as grants and loans for clean energy and other environmental projects.

Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison filed a lawsuit in March against the EPA on behalf of the Minnesota Climate Innovation Financial Authority, which had been awarded $25 million from the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. That lawsuit has been joined with an earlier suit filed by Rhode Island over frozen EPA funding. A federal judge has ordered the administration to continue dispersing those funds.