LARRY LAPACHIN
Larry Lapachin sat in the carriage house office he shares with three other interns at the International Institute for Indigenous Resource Management (IIIRM) and discussed his work. Lapachin grew up in Ironwood, Michigan and got a bachelors degree in social work cum laude from the University of Wisconsin-Superior. He is currently a graduate student working toward a masters degree in environmental science at Miami University of Ohio. His three month internship with the Institute is part of his Masters program and he's very excited about his work.

His research is part of a multi-year effort to help develop an architecture for undertaking quality of life assessments that integrate human health, ecological, economic and cultural impact assessments when considering the impact of environmental pollution on communities. The project links his undergraduate work in sociology with his graduate studies in environmental science.

"I am identifying risks; community risks to environmental pollution --everything and anything. Risks to people, plants and wildlife," Lapachin said. "Some community risks have to do with housing, education, very broad environmental issues and from there I am looking at each one and coming up with characteristics for each one. For example, if I am looking at housing, then I would look at sub-standard housing, said Lapachin. "Substandard housing causes higher rates of pest infestation which means an increased number of children in hospitals with asthma. It goes from a risk to a characteristic for that risk to a consequence of that risk and why it is important."

On September 6th and 7th in Denver Colorado before governmental officials, academics and tribal experts in risk analysis, cultural risk and risk management, Lapachin made a presentation on "Community Risk Taxonomy" based on his quality of life research for the institute.

The presentation outlined the need for an evaluation tool to identify and inventory both positive and negative risk burdens. This taxonomy would be comprised of risk factors, the characteristics of those risks, the consequences/rational for how these risks affect human health, the environment, the economy and the culture and then come up with a way to quantify the impacts.

As an example Lapachin showed the group sample taxonomies for unsafe housing conditions and unemployment. With these and other risk areas he said he is looking at them from the points of view of various sub populations; urban, rural, Native Americans and migrant workers. "We'll look at every issue through a different lens to better understand their viewpoint." The taxonomy could eventually be used by tribes, federal agencies, communities, developers, political figures, and other stake holders in the community.