Freedom Hill Is Not for Sale—and Neither Is the Lower Ninth Ward

Abstract

In 1999, a series of flood and rain events inundated Princeville, North Carolina. This historic community, the first town in the United States founded by African Americans, chose to stay in place rather than to relocate. This article presents the relocation decision within the contexts of history, place attachment, and community connections. Interview, observation, and documentary data reveal themes that led to the decision to remain in place. A Discussion section ties the decision to place attachments and recommends that future research should move beyond the individual level of analysis. Recommendations for policy and practice are included. In particular, how residents are attached to their communities and the ways in which they negotiate the environment relative to that place must be linked to mitigation efforts such as relocation buyouts. Immediately after Hurricane Katrina in 2005, discourse surrounded areas in New Orleans regarding the future of a location similar in many ways to Princeville, particularly, the Lower Ninth Ward. The article concludes with an examination of that discourse and updates reconstruction progress in both Princeville and New Orleans.

Keywords

relocation buyout place attachment community race disaster flood hurricane disaster recovery

The present-day residents remain a cohesive black community and anticipate future physical improvements as well as the preservation of the heritage of Princeville. (Mobley, 1981, p. 1)

In 1999, flooding destroyed most of Princeville, North Carolina, in the United States. This historic community, the first one founded by African Americans, faced a hard choice: to relocate outside of the floodplain or to reconstruct. Relocations, also called “buyouts,” are used in other disaster situations. Most recently, U.S.-based communities, like Times Beach (Missouri), Soldier’s Grove (Wisconsin), and Arnold and Cape Girardeau (Missouri), successfully relocated (Federal Emergency Management Agency [FEMA] & Department of Homeland Security, 2003). However, resistance to buyouts can occur under certain conditions (Handmer, 1985).

The ultimate goal of buyouts is to mitigate loss of life and property. Because Princeville is situated in a floodplain along the south side of the Tar River, it faces continual risks,¹ having flooded at least seven times since 1800.² In 1967, with partial funding from hopeful Princeville citizens, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built a dike:

We have high water practically every year and every five or six years things get so bad that some families have to leave. With the river taken care of, there’ll be building and remodeling, and people coming back instead of leaving. We’ll have running water in the houses, too, and maybe the government will give us a grant of some type for sewage disposal.³

However, five rain events in 1999, including Hurricanes Floyd and Dennis, caused the Tar to crest over 43 feet,⁴ exceeding a 500-year event: The town went under water for 2 weeks (Hicks, 2001). Floodwaters first entered through a low spot near the railroad tracks, then flowed around the northern end of the dike. The river then topped the dike, compounded by local topography and right-angle river bends (Riggs, 2001). The purpose of this article is to tell Princeville’s story, of why the community resisted a buyout despite the potential for continued risk. In conclusion, we contrast Princeville’s experience to what happened in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.

Princeville, North Carolina, USA

Princeville was first named Freedom Hill when Union troops freed local enslaved Africans along a slight rise next to the Tar River.⁵ Princeville’s history stands in contrast to Mitchellville, South Carolina, which was established between 1862 and 1865 by the Union Army for newly freed Africans. Freedom Hill area residents, including freedmen and freedwomen and a few Whites, claimed the swampy, south side of the Tar River and its floodplain as home (F. Brown, 2001; U.S. Department of State, 2003). In 1865, locals chartered Freedom Hill as the first U.S. town ever governed by African Americans. In 1885, the General Assembly of North Carolina incorporated the town:

That the corporate limits of said town shall be as follows: Beginning at the upper side of the Albemarle and Raleigh Railroad bridge on the bank of Tar river, opposite Tarboro; thence running a straight line to Battle Bryan’s lower spring; thence west two hundred and fifty yards; thence south-east a line parallel to the Albemarle and Raleigh Railroad, seven hundred and fifty yards; thence east six hundred yards to a stake in H.H. Shaw’s field; thence north to Tar river bank; thence down said river bank to the beginning.

In 1905, locals renamed their city to honor local citizen Turner Prince’s postflood leadership (Hicks, 2001). Today, many of Princeville’s residents claim ancestry among these founders.

Geographically, Princeville claims about 1.3 square miles and 40 streets with few businesses or other services. A 1974 housing study by the North Carolina Department of Natural and Economic Resources (1974) revealed major housing challenges: 45.5% of Princeville’s housing was classified as “deteriorating,” with an additional 38.6% deemed unsafe. Approximately 39% of the population lived in “housing that is not conducive to good health, safety, or welfare.” Current census data lists 940 residents, but a number of locals dispute this figure due to temporary postdisaster housing and put the population closer to 2,100. Their average household income in 1999 was $15,916, with 44% working in manufacturing. Further, over 60% of the community are women, while 51% are elderly.

Literature Review

Places are important to people, connoting shared meanings and ties to one’s identity and to family. Places are “environmental contexts with real consequences for people” that represent a “significant symbolic locale,” answering critical questions about the self: Who am I? Where am I? Where do I belong? (Hummon, 1986, p. 34).

Altman and Low (1992) believe that place attachment contributes to the integrity of individual, group, and cultural self-definitions; offers insight into cultural identity; and fosters collective identity (Altman & Low, 1992; B. Brown & Perkins, 1992; Hummon, 1992; Pellow, 1992; Rubinstein & Parmelee, 1992; Rapoport 1871a, 1982b). Citing others (Lavin & Agatstein, 1984; Proshansky, Fabian, & Kaminoff, 1983), Hummon (1992) posits, “Place identification inevitably involves sentiment: minimally, self-characterization using place meanings may enhance or threaten self-esteem; more profoundly, environmental socialization may involve deeper ties of emotional commitment and affiliation” (p. 253).

We know how to navigate because places offer orientational ties. Place-role ties tell us how to act. We also carry “value ties,” which identify places as desirable or undesirable (Hummon, 1986). Homes in particular provide “financial security, sentimental experiences, social relationships, and memories; and a cultural symbol that expresses stability, comfort, and identity” (Cheng, Kruger, & Daniels, 2003, p. 89). Place identity, an emotional attachment, increases belonging to one’s community (Vaske & Kobrin, 2001).

B. Brown and Perkins (1992) highlight how places help people to form stronger community bonds while simultaneously defining the individual self. Massive and continual disruption to those ties, such as when an entire community’s social fabric is disrupted, may lead to significant personal and familial dysfunction (Erikson, 1978), although other many disaster researchers have illustrated how disasters facilitate social cohesiveness (Tierney, Lindell, & Perry, 2001). In an Australian study, Handmer (1985) noted “high identification with community and place are also associated with resistance to relocation as is community identification itself” (p. 7). In short, when we experience displacement, we lose a critical resource (Phillips, 1995).

Age and place

Rubinstein and Parmelee (1992) suggest that places anchor an individual in life events associated with independence and competence. Their conceptual model links individual identity to a collective, meaning “the larger sociocultural context: social norms, mores, and meaning inherent in a given culture and hence shared by its members” (Rubinstein & Parmelee 1992, p. 144). Handmer (1985) notes that older residents may be more motivated to resist acquisition.

Cultural dimensions of place

Pellow (1992) opines that

African group loyalty is based in kinship, and its locus is the group’s land. Among traditional African societies, the group’s land is considered sacred . . . for the Ashante of south central Ghana, the spiritual dimension to land and the ownership of houses, in combination with a closely knit social system, result in the equivalence of land rights and loyalties with the social structure. (p. 26)

Miller and Simile (1992) analyzed communities in South Carolina that were primarily Black, elderly, and poor—demographically similar to Princeville. In their work, the culture of the community versus the culture of the relief organization may influence what happens similar to what Oliver (1978) called “relief culture” and “victim culture.” His insight magnified the power differentials inherent in such a relationship.

Disasters do not occur (or very rarely occur) in the cultural context of the relief culture, whose context is essentially post-disaster. They occur indiscriminately in the cultural contexts of different societies, specific in kind to every disaster and central to it . . . obliged to survive in some form or other after the whole operation is over. The relief culture witnesses the victim culture in an unrepresentative state—at its weakest, most helpless and least effective. (Oliver, 1978, p. 126)

Oliver asserts that disaster-stricken communities may internalize the perception of failure and allow the relief culture to take control over the recovery process. Thus, perceptions by relief organizations that land acquisition is the best means of mitigation may be indicative of a lack of input from the victim culture and create tensions between these groups. Oliver underlines the importance of addressing “deep structures” of a stricken social system in order to have desirable results.

Finally, research by Perry and Nelson (1991) on hazard information dissemination demonstrates that ethnicity plays an intervening role in what might be considered legitimate or preferred sources of information. Understanding such culturally influenced risk communication may be especially crucial in postdisaster buyout decisions.

The decision to accept the buyout or to rebuild in place is complicated and mediated by race, class, age, and cultural context. These issues resonate in the narrative of Princeville.

Method

Our research team visited Princeville and Raleigh between 2000 and 2003. We conducted multiple interviews with over 40 individuals in 29 organizations, including emergency personnel, elected and appointed officials, recovery workers, religious leaders, volunteers, planners, and social service organizations. We also gathered documents, such as recovery plans, meeting minutes, proposals, and newspaper articles.⁶ Visual data included videotapes from organizations as well as video, digital, and still documentation of housing recovery efforts, levee mitigation projects, historical sites, and general reconstruction.

We used purposive, snowball, time phase, and spatial zone sampling (Dynes, 1987; Erlandson, Harris, Skipper, & Allen, 1993; Killian, 2002; Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Mileti, 1987; Phillips, 2002; Quarantelli & Wilson, n.d.). To develop a body of data, we transcribed interviews and wrote extensive field notes (Richardson, 1999; Lofland & Lofland, 1995). Documents were examined for supporting or contradictory data as well as for new leads (Webb, Campbell, Schwartz, & Sechrest, 2000). We independently identified themes, then compared and codeveloped a narrative telling Princeville’s story. This constant comparative method allowed an explanation, grounded in the data, to emerge (Erlandson et al., 1993; Glaser & Strauss, 1967).

To heighten credibility and trustworthiness of the data, we established an “audit trail” notebook, in which we maintained a field log, a record of methodological decisions, and links between data and domain, taxonomic, and componential analyses (Spradley, 1980). We also searched the data for evidence contrary to our findings, a process called negative case analysis (Erlandson et al., 1993). We offered confidentiality to our respondents. To mask potential identity, they are referred to here only as respondents. If an individual is named, it is because we gleaned his or her comment from a local newspaper article.

Findings

Princeville represents a powerful place for individual and community attachment, a symbol of survival against racism, natural hazards, economic deprivation, and challenges to self-determination. The Tar River originally brought enslaved Africans into the county. When the ancestors created this community, the land represented all that they could claim. The intentional segregation resulted in varying benefits:

Whites generally saw the black community as a partial solution to the social problem brought about by the abolition of slavery in what had been one of the state’s largest slave-holding counties. For many whites, a separate black community like Freedom Hill provided Tarboro and Edgecombe County a way to place the former slaves at a social distance, but at the same time, it kept the farm workers, laborers, servants and artisans upon where the city and county’s economy depended in the area.⁷

Freedom Hill was the only place, notes former mayor Glennie Matthewson: “There was no place for them to live in Tarboro unless it was on the premises of white families, in the back yard, and they felt it was better to live on this side.”⁸

Princeville drew others to “come to the vicinity seeking freedom and federal protection” (Mobley, 1981, p. 1) in a place that gave “the first indication that they enjoyed the status of free men.” As seen by the head of the Freedmen’s Bureau,

to be absolute owners of the soil, to be allowed to build upon their own lands cabins, however humble, in which they should enjoy the sacred privileges of a home, was more than they had ever dared to pray for. (quoted in Mobley, 1981, p. 2)

This segregated floodplain also made home ownership possible: “The land—so susceptible to flooding—was cheap, especially in the lean years of Reconstruction when property values fell”;⁹ “it held little value or interest for the white planters” (Mobley, 1981, p. 3). Princeville offered a safe haven when the Klan arose, affording protection in numbers large enough to discourage violent attacks (Mobley, 1981). And though Union soldiers had provided some initial support, “the freedman received little assistance after the early days of Reconstruction. . . . By 1869, the agency [Freedman’s Bureau] had departed the state. . . . The blacks were totally on their own.”¹⁰

Whites tried to strip Princeville’s incorporation into the 1940s on the basis of allegations of crime, public drunkenness, and prostitution. Princeville apparently represented a “threat to the doctrine of racial superiority. Apparently they reasoned that a community of Negroes who had proven themselves capable of success in business, religion, education, politics, and self-government, ran counter to the whole concept of black inferiority” (Mobley, 1981, p. 35). Jim Crow laws and the White supremacy movement caused Princeville residents to be temporarily disenfranchised. The latter movement compelled the local newspaper to proclaim, “White people must stand together in this election or the Negro will go one step higher in the political scales and whites lower” (Mobley, 1981, p. 32). Nonetheless, Princeville politicians successfully thwarted every attempt to strip its incorporation, including defending its independence before the state legislature.

Princeville’s dialectical struggle between threat and survival has been a continual, historical theme. For example, few businesses exist, usually employing five or less. In 1997, North Carolina intervened in the town’s finances when local residents revolted at a lack of services and refused to pay taxes. Yet the community persevered and recently reclaimed its right to economically self-determine.

Princeville has also refused to cave in to repetitive loss flooding, though the economic deprivation experienced locally has impacted the ability to mitigate risk. As one example, the levee built in 1965 came to be an economic challenge: “It may not have been maintained as well as it should have been. Vehicles had been driving up on the dike. We are trying to keep trees from growing on it,” noted a respondent. Another concurred,

We got a 500-year flood here and it kicked everybody’s tail and it was assisted because the town was so poorly maintained. The water overran the dike but so too did the natural drainage ways, which were severely encumbered with growth and structures. There was no place for the water to go.

Continual maintenance challenges and the “flood of the century,” noted one respondent, “brought them to their knees. But they have a tremendous resolve, these people in Princeville. They deserve better than they can make for themselves.”

And consider local emergency response capabilities. Until the 1970s, a volunteer bucket brigade fought fire; local men pulled the typically horse-drawn fire truck. Local volunteers belonged to the North Carolina Colored Volunteer Firemen’s Association and were noted for their community dedication. The local 1976 Edgecombe County Bicentennial Commission honored Princeville’s survival spirit:

In the midst of two of the most destructive floods of 1924 and 1940, there were a few diehards who refused to leave their homes or businesses. They took refuge on the second floor of the Grade School and imported their food by a motor boat. It was these die-hards with other local citizens who returned that kept Princeville alive. They too envisioned their forefathers’ dream—they wanted a unique town; unique because it would be a town of Blacks governed by Blacks.¹¹

Princeville offers a collective identity based on survival place attachments:

The heritage is the reason behind why we wanted to stay and why we needed to stay. And to just hold on to land that our forefathers had . . . that has made us stronger and it is something that, if you can learn something from the flood, that sticking together and holding on to what you have is something that our community provides.

A legacy of survival sustained our interviewees: “They are a proud people that have been through a lot of adversity. And they have withstood adversity and moved on.” A local resident offered, “My people took that swampland and made a town out of it. It would make us look real bad to let it go now.”¹²

Equally important, the community with its people, places, and history was all it had left after the flood. “The high water came in Friday morning and it came in very fast. By noon Friday, everything was covered. There was no warning; if there had been, people could have at least gotten their pictures, their memories.” With the homes, photographs, furniture, and landscaping gone, Princeville’s residents could only salvage the land and its legacy.

Giving in would not only have compromised community ties to place but would dishonor the residents’ ancestors.

Former Mayor Glennie Mathewson: “My ancestors’ energies and efforts and resources went into a specific property in Princeville. Those are the streets I played in, the trees I climbed. You take a town and move it anywhere and then you’re severed me from my actual roots.”¹³

Former Mayor James E. Bridgers: “The history of Princeville is very important. It will show the young where Princeville has been and where it is now. Our town is great.”¹⁴

Rebuilding emerged as the strongest option for many: “You’re asking them to pick up and move and go to some place else,” said one respondent, “and they’re saying, ‘Wait a second, I don’t want to move. This is my home, this home has history—not only my history but also a community history.’”

Nonetheless, every flood has led to the exodus of some Princeville residents.¹⁵ After 1999, not everyone agreed to the restoration. Media reports and interviews indicate that between 80 and 92 residents applied for a buyout. During the final town council debate, commissioners voted 2-2 between a “leave-it-or-levee-it” choice. Mayor Delia Perkins voted for restoration, a position that media reports had documented since just after the flood. And though numerous residents had attended prior public meetings, only 10 attended the final vote. “A lot of people felt like they wanted to sell out. They did not want to live in Princeville anymore,” one respondent told us. In the end, though, the small number of 80 to 90 persons, versus what most respondents said were 2,000 others, led to the decision: “The majority of people wanted to come back and that was the basis for not participating in the buyout program,” a respondent offered.

In response to the declined buyout, FEMA commissioned a Princeville recovery plan, which “recognizes the most important element of the mission is the return of Princeville’s residents to their town.”¹⁶ In the executive summary, fully three of the five “bold steps” center on recognizing “Princeville’s heritage and the cultural legacy it can preserve for future generations,” including replacing Town Hall at the historical center, restoring the original town hall and schoolhouse as an African American cultural museum, and establishing parks, trails, and recreational areas to “capture the spirit of place and family that is such an important part of African-American history and culture.”¹⁷

Leveraging the Legacy

Princeville’s leaders rallied, bringing critical, external support to the town’s aid. Rev. Al Sharpton visited and said,

If this was Valley Forge, imagine what America would be doing. We preach black pride. Here’s an example of a town that has faced a major disaster. I think it’s incumbent upon black America to use its economic and political resources to try to restore that city (Yellin, 1998).

Jesse Jackson came, calling for debt forgiveness, loans, and a development bank. Marlon Jackson of the Jackson Five, along with executives from the Major Broadcasting Cable Network and American Airlines, organized a telethon that raised $1.2 million. The Artist (formerly known as Prince) donated $37,000 in building materials. The Lowe’s Corporation provided $1 million in donated materials.

“We have had tremendous support from faith-based groups,” said a respondent. “Methodists worked with individual homeowners. The Mennonites came in the day after Christmas and worked throughout the summer and beyond.” Another respondent concurred: “Were it not for the faith-based organizations, this town would not be so far down the road to recovery.” These groups were critical to the rebuilding process. “We had an overflow of volunteers, from the general public, from the faith community—we were abundantly blessed,” a respondent said.

Led by North Carolina Representative Eva Clayton and New York Representative Charles Rangel, the Congressional Black Caucus lobbied Washington for funds. Clayton said, “The challenge we are facing in Princeville is how to keep its legacy and make it viable in the future.”¹⁸ In Executive Order 13146, U.S. President Clinton established the President’s Council on the Future of Princeville to “help this city that occupies such a significant place in our history,” directing the council to consider the

(a) unique historic and cultural importance of Princeville in American history; (b) views and recommendations of the relevant State and local governments, the private sector, citizens, community groups, and non-profit organizations, on actions that they all could take to enhance the future of Princeville and its citizens; and (c) agency assessments and recommendations to repair and rebuild Princeville and, to the extent practicable, protect Princeville from future flood (Clinton, 2000).

The council later concluded,

The legacy of Princeville is one of survivorship. . . . The people of Princeville are very proud of their heritage and their ability to overcome adversity. Their decision to stay was a courageous one, and the Federal Government can provide Princeville with the opportunity to preserve its place in American history while rebuilding a better, safer, and more disaster resistant community (Clinton, 2000).

The Continual Challenge of (Re)claiming Place in Princeville

In addition to rebuilt homes and municipal buildings, Princeville is establishing a 3-mile trail, along the Princeville Levee, that will provide walking and biking options open to wheelchair access (Rails to Trails Conservancy, 2003). This “Heritage Trail,” part of the National Recreation Trails’ (2001) “Save America’s Treasures” Program, began prior to the flood and is designed to represent the town as “an example of strength and perseverance.”¹⁹ In early 2003, the Trust for Public Land helped the town to obtain a matching grant for 11.29 additional acres. Other funds will be used to develop the trailside Riverside Heritage Park (Trust for Public Land, 2002). Visitors will be able to enjoy fishing, birding, and wildlife observation opportunities while viewing the Tar River, Princeville Cemetery, a new visitors center and museum in the old town hall, and Mt. Zion Primitive Baptist Church.²⁰

Princeville’s new town hall has reopened near the former site of Turner Prince’s home. City officials just launched the Royal Press, a local newsletter. The interim town manager wrote,

I hope that as you read this newsletter you will gain a better understanding of all the projects that are occurring in Princeville. You will be hearing more about future improvements to the Town’s water and sewer system, drainage projects, Heritage Trails, and other new developments. (“From the Office,” 2003, p. 2)

The Princeville Word Search game invited readers to look for these words: America, awareness, beginnings, Blacks, celebration, chartered, citizens, flooding, freedom, mayor, Princeville, progress, rebuild, and revitalize.

Princeville continues to honor its past. In 2002, during Princeville’s annual birthday week celebration, Doris Stith, executive director of the Community Enrichment Corporation, said, “Hope is here. We will persevere.”²¹ Milton Bulluck, a former resident who became a singer for the Platters, concurred: “It is good to see the people of Princeville come together and continue the seed planted by my great, great grandfather. This is a great occasion. This is what I want to see.”²²

Princeville has survived the flood of the century, though the preflood economic challenges continue. One of our respondents predicted,

We are going to rebuild homes that were valued at $15,000 each, the equivalent of $75,000 today. Will they be able to pay the taxes on them? Think about it. They are fixed income and I am afraid that therein lies a real problem. We will make it real pretty and they won’t be able to afford it. This is one of the more impoverished counties in North Carolina.

As feared, several residents now face foreclosures. Some residents are experiencing difficulty paying taxes or heating and cooling bills on homes larger than their original dwellings.

Hurricane Katrina and the Lower Ninth Ward

On August 29, 2005, the issues of place attachment, disaster, and self- determination swept with the storm surge and the barge into the Lower Ninth Ward. Hurricane Katrina approached the U.S. Gulf Coast, pushing a storm surge into the levees and canals that protected the city of New Orleans. Within the city, an area known as the Lower Ninth Ward, which was 98% African American, fell victim to overtopping along the Industrial Canal. Heavy, torrid water obliterated multiple blocks of the neighborhood with major loss of life particularly among elderly African American men. Images of people being rescued from rooftops captured global attention as family and friends struggled to survive in attics, on overpasses, and in makeshift shelters. Over 80% of New Orleans flooded for weeks, with approximately 8 feet of water destroying remaining structures. Access remained nearly impossible even for professionals as they searched and retrieved the deceased for up to a year. Advocacy organizations, like ACORN, placed signs and claimed space in the area to support residents displaced in faraway states.

Discourse immediately regenerated over mitigation of risk in floodplain issues coupled with intense sentiments to safeguard historic communities, meaningful social relationships, and a minority-dominant locale. Concern over future risk along with the costs of rebuilding characterized the majority of public debate. The Washington Post reported the debate between residents, public officials, historic preservationists, and buyout opportunities thusly:

The mayor himself has spoken ominously about the need for residents to come in, “take a peek,” retrieve a few valuables and move on. Historic preservation advocates fear that the city will capitalize on a program run by the Federal Emergency Management Agency that pays to tear down damaged buildings but not to repair historic private properties. (Connolly, 2005)

The Lower Ninth also garnered considerable support to rebuild. Celebrities, university programs, volunteer organizations, and others also generated funds and efforts to rebuild the area.

A number of parallels as well as some critical differences highlight the issue of rebuilding minority-dominant areas in floodplains. Using the examples of the Lower Ninth Ward and Princeville, this section first examines similarities followed by contrasts. As described earlier, both places hold considerable significance for immigration patterns as well as African American history. Both locations emerged, literally, out of swampland accorded to disenfranchised populations who forged communities, identities, and livelihoods despite segregation, racism, and prejudice. Residents of Princeville and New Orleans also suffered disproportionate losses, a finding consistent across research comparing how racial and ethnic minorities fare in disaster (Dash, 2010). In Princeville, losses centered on the residential sector, with those affected returning for the most part to original locations and critical social networks. In the Lower Ninth Ward, losses included not only homes but lives. Elderly men died in numbers far disproportionate to their population numbers in New Orleans, particularly in this area (Sharkey, 2007). As residents and officials grappled with postconstruction decisions, rumors and fear spread across both locations that a land grab might occur, ultimately displacing residents from meaningful social sites. Debate over whether people had the right to return to their own homes and properties took place among outsiders in a discursive disenfranchisement that belittled the meaning of place. Damage required extensive external support, with aid pouring in through philanthropy, volunteerism, governmental funding, and advocacy. Both locations began to mitigate homes by elevating structures above potential flooding and strengthening levee systems.

Differences also characterize both locations. The number of deaths in New Orleans is staggering, with far more fortunate survival rates in Princeville. Princeville experienced near-complete reconstruction along with new and improved community, government, and congregate living facilities. The Lower Ninth Ward has fared less well, with uneven rebuilding, leaving some homes in uncomfortably isolated places along otherwise barren streets. Trusted voluntary organizations poured into Princeville as they did into New Orleans, yet at the 5-year mark post-Katrina, the number of available volunteers has dwindled markedly in the Lower Ninth Ward. In contrast, given that approximately 4,679 residences were lost to the Katrina levee failures, along with an additional 868 sustaining major damage in the Lower Ninth Ward—and that only 24% have returned to date—the overall rate of return for New Orleans pales in comparison to Princeville (Greater New Orleans Community Data Center, 2010). Explanations might stem from the magnitude, scope, and impact of Katrina, which overwhelmed available resources at local, state, and federal levels. Displaced residents from Katrina also relocated temporarily to places from short distances to entire states away from home, making it difficult to rebuild. Given that over time, preexisting patterns of social and political relationships return to roughly where they were, it might also be possible that the Lower Ninth Ward’s continual struggles characterize politics as usual. Further, given that additional disasters have occurred with economic recession and the BP oil spill, a full recovery may remain impossible.

Five years later, the Lower Ninth Ward is an example of the unevenness of recovery. The Make It Right Foundation (founded by Brad Pitt) and other nonprofits have rebuilt homes that are green, floodproof and windproof, and elevated. These homes show the possibility of change not only for the Lower Ninth Ward but for all of New Orleans. Of the 17,000 residents that were there before the storm, nearly 4,000 have returned, mostly in the more resourceful, less flooded area referred to as the Holy Cross neighborhood.

As with many neighborhoods in New Orleans, the Lower Ninth’s returning population saw the storm as an opportunity to organize itself in a more structured and effective way. While viewed as a forgotten area before Katrina, isolated by geography and community, the Lower Ninth Ward emerged as the iconic representation of the failure of the levees and the government response, and its rebirth has attracted global attention. Two major victories reverberate in the community: One of the schools and the library have reopened. Yet, the crime has returned, it is still a food desert, and few businesses exist in the area.

In the Lower Ninth Ward, the decision to return was made difficult by structural, economic, and political barriers. The Lower Ninth remains largely because of grassroots organizations and community members. While much of the Lower Ninth Ward remains uninhabited, there is a tremendous sense of optimism by community leaders. They have reimagined themselves within their history—families, faith, and community.

Discussion and Conclusions

Disasters bring about a renegotiation of place, throwing location and identity into question. Locational displacement represents more than losing one’s home; it tears at the place ties that define the self and the community. The entire loss of a community thus represents a shearing of the social fabric. Renegotiating places, and reclaiming identity through place, involves dealing not only with the individual level but also with the cultural and social structural dimensions of place. This is particularly evident in the board’s decision to rebuild Princeville despite some opposition and the continuing efforts to reconstruct the Lower Ninth Ward. When residents talk about locations and the legacy of their ancestors, they speak of it in the cultural context of history and the collective experience of a people.

Resistance can also be viewed as a functional means for a variety of end goals. Though we situated our findings within the framework of place, other implicit goals emerged. Mitigation projects and donations allowed communities to improve their public facilities and deteriorating infrastructure (FEMA 1996; FEMA 2001). Resistance also brought national attention, enhancing place attachments among a broader base of constituents.

Implications for Research

Interestingly, most of the place writings concentrate on the individual and/or social-psychological dimensions, such as identity. We suggest moving to a collective level of analysis. What of the group, crowd, aggregate, or community and their ties to place? Consider, for example, famine refugee camps, the situation in Palestine, and group exiting in mass evacuations (Johnson, 1987, 1988; Wenger, Aguirre, & Vigo, 1994). Research findings compel us to ask about ties to place as they are influenced by the social structure: economic, political, religious, educational, and familial ties to place, for example. More broadly, sociohistorical and cultural place attachments must be more fully explored.

For example, while Princeville, North Carolina, today is not a traditional African community, the legacy of its African heritage is evident in the ways in which property interests are substantiated much more through word of mouth and community consensus than in legal documentation and written records. Given the uniqueness of Princeville’s history, a feeling of interconnectedness between that African heritage and the traditional kinship relationships can be heard when speaking to residents today. Similar elements exist today in the Lower Ninth Ward, where much property passed from one generation to the next and community activism characterized collective efforts to reclaim neighborhoods.

More could be made of the linkages between culture, place, and disaster-originated displacement along the lines of Pellow’s (1980, 1989) work. The dysfunctional dimensions of ties to place should also be examined. For example, what of events in places where survival was threatened by the collective? What of those refusing to leave meaningful places during evacuations? What of individuals refusing to leave coworkers behind? What of communities that refuse to relocate despite unmitigated risks? What kinds of place attachments (individual, collective, cultural, economic, familial) promote these behaviors? How might relocation opportunities be reconceptualized to honor place attachments and community-based relationships?

Implications for Policy and Practice

How residents are attached to their communities and the ways in which they negotiate the environment relative to that particular place must be further linked to mitigation efforts (Handmer, 1985). Those urging buyouts must attend to context-based, cross-cultural identity tied to the community’s intrinsic, place-based needs. Oversights may lead to poor communication and tensions that could sustain risk, lead to rejection of mitigation measures, or sustain repetitive losses, not to mention overrunning the right to community self-determination.

Practice and policy must also understand the larger social structure. Communities situated in disaster-prone areas are often there as a result of poverty coupled with a lack of affordable housing. This situation compels all of us to continually address poverty and vulnerability as a lifetime commitment to social change (Pasterini, 2000). As noted by Miller and Simile (1992), charity organizations straddle both relief and victim cultures in disaster. While these groups did facilitate massive rebuilding efforts in Princeville, the final outcome resulted in possible foreclosures for some residents. Such organizations should immediately examine their policies and practices for rebuilding and consider economic sustainability as an important factor influencing home design.

Cheng et al. (2003) claim that discourses “revolve around competing place meanings that are deeply held, vigorously defended, and applied in ways that border on religious conviction” (p. 98). Such was the case in Princeville and the Lower Ninth Ward.

Footnotes

Acknowledgements

This article was presented at the American Sociological Association and International Research Committee on Disasters Annual Meetings, Atlanta, Georgia, August 2003. The authors wish to thank Robert Stallings for suggestions relevant to this article.

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

This research was made possible by National Science Foundation Grant CMSD-97904344. The conclusions are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the National Science Foundation.

Notes

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