April 16, 2007 @ 3:24 pm

Majora Carter: Pass the Greens

by: Laura Checkoway

Bronx activist brings environmentalism to the Boogie Down.

We're all busy chasing green. But environmental activist Majora Carter's hustle isn't about stacking paper - it's about greening the ghetto. It's about people of color taking a look around and questioning why their neighborhoods aren't as beautiful as they could be, why there aren't more parks to play in, why so many children are suffering from asthma. It's about the air that we breathe. A lifelong resident of Hunt's Point in the South Bronx, Carter founded the nonprofit organization, Sustainable South Bronx in 2001 to mobilize grassroots environmental activism among New York City's poorest and most environmentally oppressed citizens. And why shouldn't the birthplace of hip hop also be home to greenbelts, rooftop gardens, fresh produce, clean air, and picnics in the park? Awarded the 2005 MacArthur Foundation Fellow, Carter is co-hosting the Sundance Channel's The Green, the first regularly scheduled programming destination dedicated entirely to the environment, premiering Tuesday, April 17 at 9pm ET. Laura Checkoway spoke with Carter about some frightening statistics, taking action, and how it ain't easy being green - but she's working to get us there. You were born and raised in the South Bronx during the time that hip hop was being created there.
Totally. The Boogie Down! I remember the first time I heard Sugar Hill Gang, the first block parties. That was beautiful in many ways, at least musically. Everybody wanted to be a rapper. I at least tried. I was really bad. I pretend that I don't remember… I was DJ Welshy. Where did the name come from?
I liked Welsh's grape juice. The Bronx is known as a rough place to grow up. Was it for you?
Despite the fact that it's a tough place to be, I never felt unsafe here. The neighborhood changed dramatically when I was seven. That's when the fires started. People basically torched their own buildings or just abandoned them. We lost 60% of the people that lived in the South Bronx during that period. One day there's a family next door. You go to bed at night, wake up the next morning, and they're gone. How did the fires and devastation affect the spirit of the community?
Even though there was a part of me that enjoyed being a part of the community that was left, there was definitely a part of me counting down the days until I could leave. The South Bronx was historically known as the epitome of a blight. It was hideous. I was just like, I'm outta here. And when I finally applied to college, I was gone. Where did you go to college?
Wesleyan University. I didn't even bother applying to schools anywhere near in the city. What brought you back to the Bronx?
I was broke and needed to move back in with my parents. It was after college just before I went to grad school, in 1996. For the first year I spent no time in this neighborhood except to sleep. It was like, I hate this place, I don't wanna be here, it's dirty, it smells funny, it still has that stigma attached to it, And then I got politicized. I realized a community like the South Bronx, New Orleans, you name it, these communities aren't this way because people are lazy or stupid or don't give a crap. They are regulated to be like this. They are created. They sure are, and it's so blatant!
My brother was killed not too far from home. Seeing that kind of human catastrophe was like that's nasty, but if you look at all the economic drivers that made all those things happen. I was like wait a second. No. It was around the same exact time that the city was planning on building this huge waste facility right on our waterfront. And we realized that we already handled 30-40% of the city's waste. That's why we had this asthma rate that was so ridiculously high. We see 60,000 truck trips a week. There's all this waste, wind blowing debris, and it was just like, No! We fought that, eventually won… How did you initially start mobilizing?
I spent a lot of time working to mobilize the community and mostly door knocking. We would use the local media to our advantage. It really was a David versus Goliath kind of thing. You have the city and the state of New York saying. "We have to build this facility right in your back yard even though you're already dealing with all these other impacts" and the entire community being like "Excuse me? Wait a second!" It's like why would you do that? We're the poorest congressional district, you think we're not gonna fight? How did you create awareness to get the community involved?
Part of the reason why white communities know how to get what they want is because they're always talking about what they want. We don't do that. We were often taught that we didn't always have the worth or the right to demand. So it was first helping people understand what the environmental impacts were. We made the connection between people's health, in particular that children. I was like, wonder why you have to take your kid to the emergency room twice a month, at least? It has something to do with the diesel emissions from these facilities that are right down the street from your house. And there's a ridiculous concentration of all those things right in that area of the Bronx, right?
We handle about 30% of the city's commercial waste, 100% of the Bronx waste. We have four power plants, a sewage treatment plant, a sewage sludge power diving plant, and the diesel omissions from about 60,000 trucks a week. One of your big projects has been creating the Greenway along the riverfront. Can you talk about that?
Around the same time we were fighting this jail, we kept getting notices about grant funding to do restoration projects. From what I could see, all that was on the river was all this industry, so you can't even get there. But we were able to leverage that money more than 300 times over. So, that's really amazing and beautiful. Actually, I got married there. How were you able to make all of that happen?
Much of it was not accepting "No" from anybody. Or if I did have to accept it, realizing that they weren't the only person I could ask for support. We went to community members, we went to private sectors, we went to the city, we went to other groups. This is the beginning of the South Bronx brainwave, but first we gotta start thinking more comprehensively about the development of our waterfront and the way that it supports our community, and not something that the city when they feel like it, can throw waste facility on it just because they figure we're not gonna fight. In cities and neighborhoods across the country, there's so much fighting to do against environmental injustice. And yet it feels like not nearly enough people go up against the system.
I still think that communities of color think environmentalism is something that only rich white people do… I'm not that. [Laughs] And my roots are about as poor as they come. They need to understand my major reason for doing this is a quality of life. I totally think that environmental justice is an extension of civil rights issue. The same way that a water fountain shouldn't have a Whites Only sign, clean air shouldn't either. In cities and neighborhoods across the country, there's so much fighting to do against environmental injustice. And yet it feels like not nearly enough people go up against the system.
I still think that communities of color think environmentalism is something that only rich white people do… I'm not that. [Laughs] And my roots are about as poor as they come. They need to understand my major reason for doing this is a quality of life. I totally think that environmental justice is an extension of civil rights issue. The same way that a water fountain shouldn't have a Whites Only sign, clean air shouldn't either. Exactly. Can you speak more about the horrors of the environmental hazards the Bronx and other communities are dealing with?
Columbia University came out with a study last year that showed this chemical that's produced when you burn fossil fuel that has been shown to cause brain damage in young kids and affects their ability to learn. Many poor communities of color are in areas that have facilities that produce this chemical. Many states actually work to figure out how may jail cells they're gonna build by how many kids are reading at or below grade level by the third grade. What!?!
If this is what's happening in our communities and that our kids are being set up to better go to prison than go on to higher education, then there's no wonder to why our communities are in the shape that they're in. So when I talk about the environment, it's about creating policies and projects that improve the quality of life for people. It is not just about hugging trees. What are some projects that you're working on now?
We're trying to build an eco industrial park with raw materials that are recycled and, interestingly enough, the same place we want to build that eco industrial park that could create 500 jobs is the same exact place the city wants to build a 2000-bed jail. This is happening all over the country. It is not specific to the South Bronx. That's why people of color and all poor people need to understand this. Once people start to understand, what can they do?
There are people like me in many different parts of the country. At same point, we're gonna have to bring these issues to the table the same way the civil rights was. We want to make sure our community is participating in the development of the policies and practices that improve our communities and are impacting global warming. I'm just afraid we're gonna be left behind if we see this as a "whites-only" kind of thing. You still live in the Bronx. Do people know you when you walk down the street?
After I won The Macarthur Fellow, our local News 12 in the Bronx covered me. I had people stopping me in the street saying, We are so proud of you, girl. We've known all about you, we've been watching you for years.

Article tags: Majora, Carter, Pass, Greens 

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