Victims of Toxic and Hazardous Substances Emergency Relief Act of 1980

Victims of Toxic and Hazardous Substances Emergency Relief Act of 1980 - Directs the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency: (1) to determine promptly, but in no event later than 15 days, whether toxic or hazardous wastes pose a serious and immediate threat to the public health or safety, whenever the Administrator receives evidence that such wastes may pose a threat to the public; and (2) to submit to the President a recommendation that a state of hazardous substances emergency be declared, if the Administrator determines that such wastes pose such threat. Authorizes the President, in the President's discretion and upon recommendation of the Administrator, to declare a state of hazardous substances emergency with such amendments and deletions to the Administrator's recommendations as the President sees fit. Directs the Administrator: (1) after such state of emergency has been declared, to forward recommendations for immediate actions to protect the public health and safety to the Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency; and (2) thereafter, to act promptly to (a) determine the extent of the contamination of air, land, and water (including ground water), and (b) screen and test the population likely to have been exposed to such wastes in a manner or degree capable of causing physical injury (including any poisoning, burn, infection, chromosomal damage, or genetic defect); (c) study crops and livestock in the affected area and identify those unfit for human consumption; and (d) evaluate alternatives to prevent further damage to human life or health. Directs the Administrator to submit initial and supplemental reports and recommendations at specified times to the Director. Requires the Director, on the basis of such reports and recommendations and other relevant information, to undertake promptly, during the first 12 months following the declaration of a state of emergency, actions necessary to protect public health and safety, including: (1) immediate relocation of the physically injured or those in serious danger; (2) permanent closing of contaminated structures and property; (3) purchase, at prior fair market value, of homes closed; (4) medical treatment to reverse, treat, or prevent physical injury or reimbursement for such treatment; (5) compensatory payments for residents whose income is interrupted due to the toxic or hazardous wastes; and (6) commencement of a screening program for early detection of future physical injury resulting from exposure to such wastes. Subrogates the United States to the rights of any individual compensated under this Act, to the extent that such individual has a cause of action against a person who has disposed of a toxic or hazardous substance and such disposal has resulted in a state of hazardous substances emergency. Requires that the emergency state be terminated 12 months after it is declared or upon the President's declaration of termination. Authorizes appropriations to carry out this Act.

Written by analysts at the Congressional Research Service and published on Congress.gov, not by Civibrief. Summarized at the "Introduced in House" stage on May 21, 1980. It describes the bill, it is not the legal text.

Every answer above is assembled from this measure's own record on Congress.gov and from published counts of what Congress has passed before. Civibrief does not predict outcomes and takes no position on any measure.