Successes from community organizing to prevent neighborhood displacement

The Environmental Justice Movement emerged in reaction to wrongful acts compelling grassroots communities to demand a voice in decisions affecting them. Unjust United States policies allowing hundreds of communities to be uprooted and displaced persist today. Federally supported urban renewal, promoted as economic development, has disproportionately displaced minority and low-income neighborhoods. Residential displacement has been tied to negative health impacts including decreased mental health; loss of social networks, collective efficacy, and financial assets; and poor developmental outcomes. While urban development is purported to enhance infrastructures and improve quality of life, communities affected by involuntary displacement are usually excluded from procedures that shape those outcomes. In 2011, hundreds of predominantly African American, low-income households in an urban Arkansas community came under threat of displacement by eminent domain for the creation of a biotechnology research park sponsored by the local universities and municipality. Excluded from the planning process, residents and others actively opposed the project. Persistent, grassroots community organizing was successful in altering the developer's strong willed intent to displace the communities. While this story is still unfolding, citizens have successfully engaged decision makers in the sponsoring agencies to require that non-residential sites be considered. Against the backdrop of development projects in which powerful political and corporate influences prevail in causing displacement, this case has relevance for all communities facing similar challenges. Lessons learned and strategies used from this Arkansas story will be discussed; including the importance of coalition building, storytelling, media engagement, and use of citizen engagement and social capital.