Greening the ghetto Majora Carter
if you’re here today and I’m very happy
that you are you’ve all heard about how
sustainable development will save us
from ourselves
however when we’re not at Ted we are
often told that a real sustainability
policy agenda is just not feasible
especially in large urban areas like New
York City and that’s because most people
with decision-making powers in both the
public and the private sector really
don’t feel as though they’re in danger
the reason why I’m here today
in part is because of a dog an abandoned
puppy I found back in the rain back in
1998 she turned out to be a much bigger
dog than I’d have anticipated when she
came into my life
we were fighting against a huge waste
facility but planned for the East River
waterfront despite the fact that our
small part of New York City was already
handled more than 40% of the entire
city’s commercial waste a sewage
treatment palletizing plant a sewage
sludge plant for power plants the
world’s largest food distribution center
as well as other industries that bring
more than 60,000 diesel truck trips to
the area each week the area also has one
of the lowest ratios of parks to people
in the city so when I was contacted by
the parks department about a $10,000
seed grant initiative to help develop
waterfront projects I thought they were
really well-meaning but a bit naive I’d
lived in this area all my life and you
could not get to the river because of
all the lovely facilities that I’d
mentioned earlier then while jogging
with my dog one morning she pulled me
into what I thought was just another
illegal dump there were weeds and piles
of garbage and other stuff that I won’t
mention here but she kept dragging me
and lo and behold at the end of that lot
was the river I knew that this forgotten
little street end abandoned like the dog
that brought me there was worth saving
and I knew it would grow to become the
proud beginnings of the community led
revitalization of the new South Bronx
and just like my new dog it was an idea
that got bigger than item
imagine regarded much support along the
way and the Hunts Point Riverside Park
became the first waterfront park of the
South Bronx it had in more than 60 years
we leveraged that $10,000 seed grant
more than 300 times into a 300 million
dollar park and in the fall I’m actually
going to exchange marriage vows with my
beloved thank you very much
that same pressing my buttons back there
which he does all the time but those of
us living in environmental justice
communities are the canary in the coal
mine we feel the problems right now and
have for some time environmental justice
for those of you who may not be familiar
with the term goes something like this
no community should be saddled with more
environmental burdens and less
environmental benefits than any other
unfortunately race and class are
extremely reliable indicators as to
where one might find the good stuff like
parks and trees and where one might find
the bad stuff like power plants and
waste facilities as a black person in
America I’m twice as likely as a white
person to live in an area where air
pollution poses the greatest risk for my
health I am five times more likely to
live within walking distance of a power
plant or a chemical facility which I do
these land use decisions created the
hostile conditions that lead to problems
like obesity diabetes and asthma
why would someone leave their home to go
for a brisk walk in a toxic neighborhood
our 27% obesity rate is high even for
this country and diabetes comes with it
one out of four South Bronx children has
asthma without asthma hospitalization
rate is seven times higher than the
national average these impacts are
coming everyone’s way and we all pay
dearly for solid waste costs health
problems associated with pollution and
more odiously the cost of imprisoning
our young black and Latino men who
possess untold amounts of untapped
potential
50% of our residents live at or below
the poverty line twenty-five percent of
us are unemployed low-income citizens
often use emergency room visits as
primary care this comes at a high cost
to taxpayers and produces no
proportional benefits poor people are
not only - still poor they are still
healthy unhealthy fortunately there are
many people like me who are striving for
solutions that will
compromise the lives of low-income
communities of color in the short-term
and won’t destroy us all in the long
term none of us want that and we all
have that in common so what else do we
have in common first of all we’re all
incredibly good-looking graduated high
school college postgraduate degrees
travel to interesting places didn’t have
kids in your early teens financially
stable - never been imprisoned okay good
but besides being a black woman I am
different from most of you in some other
ways i watch nearly half of the
buildings at my neighborhood burned down
my big brother Lynn he fought in Vietnam
only to be gunned down a few blocks from
her home I grew up with a crack house
across the street
yeah I’m a poor black child from the
ghettos these things make me different
from you but the things we have in
common set me apart from most of the
people in my community and I’m in
between these two worlds with enough of
my heart to fight for justice in the
other so how did things get so different
for us in the late 40s my dad a Pullman
porters son of a slave bought a house in
the Hunts Point section of the South
Bronx and a few years later he married
my mom at the same at the time the
community was a mostly white
working-class neighborhood my dad was
not alone and it’s others liked him
pursued their own version of the
American Dream white flight became
common in the South Bronx and in many
cities around the country redlining was
used by banks wherein certain sections
of the city including ours were deemed
off-limits to any sort of investment
many landlords believed it was more
profitable to torch their buildings and
collect insurance money rather than a
cell under those conditions dead or
injured former tenants notwithstanding
Hunts Point was formerly a walk to work
community but now residents had neither
work nor home to walk to a national
highway construction boom was added to
our problems in New York State Robert
Moses Speer had an aggressive highway
expansion campaign one of its primary
goals was to make it easier for
residents of wealthy communities in
Westchester County to to go to Manhattan
the South Bronx which lies in between
did not stand a chance
residents were often given less than a
month’s notice before their buildings
were razed 600,000 people were displaced
the common perception was that all a
pimps and pushers and prostitutes were
from the South Bronx and if you are told
from your earliest days that nothing
good is going to come from your
community that is bad and ugly how could
it not reflect on you so now my family’s
property was worthless save for the hope
that it was our home and all we had and
luckily for me that home and the love
inside of it along with help from
teachers mentors and friends along the
way was enough now why is a story
important because from a planning
perspective economic degradation but
gets environmental degradation which
forgets social degradation the
disinvestment that began in the 1960s
set the stage for all the environmental
and justices that were to come
antiquated zoning and land use
regulations are still used to this day
to continue putting polluting facilities
in my neighborhood why are these factors
taken into consideration when land-use
policy is decided what costs are
associated with these decision and who
pays who profits does anything justify
that look what the local community goes
through this was planning in quotes that
did not have our best interests in mind
once we realized that we decided it was
time to do our own planning that small
park I told you about earlier was the
first stage of building a Greenway
movement in the South Bronx
I wrote a one in quarter million dollar
federal transportation cramp to design
the plan for a waterfront Esplanade with
dedicated on Street bike paths physical
improvements helped inform public policy
regarding traffic safety the placement
of waste and other facilities which if
done properly don’t compromise the
community’s quality of life they provide
opportunities for to be more physically
active as well as a local economic
development think bike shops juice
stands we secure 20 million dollars to
build first phase projects this is
Lafayette Avenue and that’s redesigned
by Matthews Neilson Landscape Architects
and once this path is constructed it
will connect the South Bronx with more
than 400 acres of Randall’s Island Park
right now we’re separated by about 25
feet of water but this link will change
that and as we nurture the natural
environment its abundance will give us
back even more we run a project called
Bronx and mycological stewardship
training which provides
job training in the fields of ecological
restoration so that folks from our
community had the skills to compete for
these well-paying jobs little by little
we’re seeding the area with green collar
jobs then as both the people that have
both a financial and personal stake in
their environment the started an
expressway is an underutilized relic of
the Robert Moses era built with no
regard for the neighborhoods that were
divided by it even during rush hour it
goes virtually unused the community
created an alternative transportation
plan that allows for the removal of the
highway we have the opportunity now to
bring together all the stakeholders to
re-envision how does 28 acres can be
better utilized for parkland affordable
housing and local economic development
we also built the city’s New York City’s
first green and cool roof demonstration
project on top of our offices cool roofs
are highly reflective surfaces that
don’t absorb solar heat and pass it onto
the building or atmosphere green roofs
are soil and living plants both can be
used instead of petroleum-based roofing
materials that absorb heat contribute to
urban heat island effect and degrade
under the Sun which we in turn breathe
green roofs also retain up to 75% of
rainfall so they reduce the city’s need
to fund costly end of pipe solutions
which incidentally are often located in
environmental justice communities like
mine and they provide habitats for our
little friends so so cool
anyway the demonstration project is a
springboard for our own green roof
installation business bringing jobs a
sustainable economic activity to the
south cross
I like that too okay anyway I I know
Chris told us not to do pictures up here
but since I have all of your attention
we need investors and a pitch it’s
better to ask for forgiveness than
permission
anyway okay Katrina prior to Katrina the
South Bronx in New Orleans Ninth Ward
had a lot in common both were largely
populated by poor people of color both
hotbeds of cultural innovation think
hip-hop and jazz both the waterfront
communities that hosts both industries
and residents in close proximity to one
another in the post Katrina era we have
still more in common we’re at best
ignored and maligned and abused at worse
by negligent regulatory agencies Pranita
zoning and lacks governmental
accountability
neither the destruction of the Ninth
Ward nor the South Bronx was inevitable
but we have emerged with valuable
lessons about how to dig ourselves out
we are more than simply national symbols
of urban blight or problems to be solved
by empty campaign promises of presidents
come and gone now will we let the Gulf
Coast language for a decade or two like
the South Bronx did or will we take
proactive steps and learn from the
homegrown resource of grassroots
activists that have been born of
desperation out in communities like mine
now listen I do not expect individuals
corporations or government to make the
world a better place because it is right
or moral this record this presentation
today only represents some of what I’ve
been through like a tiny little bit
you’ve no clue but I’ll tell you later
if you want to know but I know it’s the
bottom line or one’s perception of it
that motivates people in the end I’m
interested in what I like to call the
triple bottom line that sustainable
development can produce developments
that have the potential to create
positive returns for all concerned
the developers government and the
community where these projects go up at
present that’s not happening in New York
City and we are operating with a
comprehensive urban planning deficit a
parade of government subsidies is going
to propose big box and stadium
developments in the South Bronx
but there is scant coordination between
city agents agencies on how to deal with
the cumulative effects of increased
traffic pollution solid waste and the
impacts on open space and their
approaches to local economic and job
development are so lame it’s not even
funny
but at because on top of that the
richest the world’s richest sports team
is replacing the house that Ruth Built
by destroying two well-loved community
parks now we’ll have even less than that
stat I told you about earlier and
although less than 25 percent of South
Bronx residents owned cars these
projects include thousands of the new of
new parking spaces yet zip in terms of
mass public transit now what’s missing
from the larger debate it’s a
comprehensive cost-benefit analysis
between not fixing and help unhealthy
environmentally challenged community
versus incorporating structural
sustainable changes my agency is working
closely with Columbia University and
others to shine a light on these issues
now let’s get this straight I am NOT any
development hours as a city not a
wilderness preserve and having and I’ve
embraced my inner capitalist and but I
don’t have probably all have anything
you haven’t you need to
good so I don’t have a problem with
developers making money there’s enough
precedent out there to show that a
sustainable community friendly
development can still make a fortune
former fellow tedster bill McDonough and
Amory Lovins both heroes of mine by the
way you don’t have shown that you can
actually do that I do have a problem
with developments that hyper exploit
politically vulnerable communities for
profit that it continues is a shame upon
us all because we’re all responsible for
the future that we create but one of the
things I do to remind myself of greater
possibilities is to learn from
visionaries in other cities this is my
version of globalization
let’s take Bogota poor Latino surrounded
by runaway gun violence and drug
trafficking a reputation not unlike that
of the South Bronx
however this city was blessed in the
late in the late 1990s with a highly
influential mayor named Enrique Benny
Lusa he looked at the demographics few
Bogota knows owned cars yet a huge
portion of the city’s resources was
dedicated to serving them if you’re a
mayor you can do something about that
his administration narrowed key
municipal thoroughfares from five lanes
to three outlaw parking on those streets
expanded pedestrian walkways and bike
lanes created public plazas created one
of the most efficient bus mass transit
systems in the entire world for his
brilliant efforts he was nearly
impeached but as people began to see
that they were being put first on issues
reflecting their day-to-day lives
incredible things happened people
stopped the littering crime rates
dropped because the streets were alive
with people his administration’s attacks
several typical urban problems at one
time and on a third-world budget at that
we have no excuse in this country I’m
sorry but the bottom line is they’re
people first agenda was not meant to
penalize those who could who could
actually afford cars but rather to
provide opportunities for all Bogota
knows to participate in the city’s
resurgence that development should not
come at the expense of the majority of
the population is still considered a
radical idea here in the US but Bogota
is example has the power to change that
you however are blessed with a gift of
influence that’s why you’re here and why
value the information we exchange use
your influence in support of
comprehensive sustainable change
everywhere don’t just talk about it at
Ted this is an a this is a nationwide
policy agenda I’m trying to build and as
you all know politics are personal help
me make green the new black
help me make sustainability sexy make it
a part of your dinner and cocktail
conversations help me fight for
environmental and economic justice
support investments with a triple bottom
line return help me democratize
sustainability by bringing everyone to
the table and insisting the
comprehensive planning can be addressed
everywhere I’m glad I have a little more
time listen when I spoke to mr. Gore the
other day after breakfast um I asked him
how environmental justice activists were
going to be included in his new
marketing strategy his response was a
grant program I don’t think he
understood that I wasn’t asking for
funding I was making him an offer
what troubled me was that this top-down
approach is still around but don’t get
me wrong we need money but grassroots
groups are needed at the table during
the decision-making process of the 90%
of the energy that mr. Gore who reminded
us that we waste every day
don’t add wasting our energy
intelligence and hard-earned experience
to that count I have come from so far to
meet you like this please don’t waste me
by working together we can become one of
those small rapidly growing groups of
individuals who actually have the
audacity and courage to believe that we
actually can change the world we might
have come to this conference from very
very different stages in life but
believe me we all share one incredibly
powerful thing we have nothing to lose
and everything to gain job bellows