White Street Landfill Controversy: a Case Study in Environmental Justice and How Experience Overpowered Ascendant but Un-Mobilized Tea Party Ideals

MADSEN, RACHEL S., M.A. White Street Landfill Controversy: A Case Study in Environmental Justice and How Experience Overpowered Ascendant but Un-Mobilized Tea Party Ideals. (2012) Directed by Dr. William T. Markham. 188 pp. This thesis examines a controversy in Greensboro, North Carolina over proposals to reopen a municipal landfill to household waste. Key elements include how the outcome of the dispute was influenced by anti- and pro-landfill leaders and groups, or lack thereof, the formation of coalitions and alliances, each side’s perspectives and arguments, and various historical factors. The primary data source was semi-structured interviews with 19 people who were directly involved in the landfill controversy. Other information came from local newspapers, public records, and documents, such as agendas and flyers from the grassroots environmental justice organization’s meetings and rallies. Participant observation at several meetings and rallies was also used as a supplemental data source. The study’s key findings provide insight into the importance of organization, the benefits of the alliances and coalitions formed among anti-landfill individuals and groups, how certain arguments were used to attract support and counter the opposing side’s claims, and how local history, culture, and traditions played a role in the controversy. WHITE STREET LANDFILL CONTROVERSY: A CASE STUDY IN ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE AND HOW EXPERIENCE OVERPOWERED ASCENDANT BUT UN-MOBILIZED TEA PARTY IDEALS by Rachel S. Madsen A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of The Graduate School at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts Greensboro 2012 Approved by _______________________ Committee Chair APPROVAL PAGE This thesis has been approved by the following committee of the Faculty of The Graduate School at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Committee Chair_______________________________ Committee Members_______________________________ _______________________________ ____________________________ Date of Acceptance by Committee _________________________ Date of Final Oral Examination ii ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would like to thank my mentor, Bill Markham, for his tireless support and guidance in this project. I am also very grateful to Sarah Daynes, Paul Luebke, and Steve Kroll-Smith for their helpful input and encouragement. iii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................1 II. REVIEW OF LITERATURE ................................................................................7 Urban Politics...............................................................................................7 Social Movement Theory ...........................................................................17 Grassroots Environmental Justice Movements ..........................................29 III. RESEARCH METHODS ....................................................................................50 IV. FINDINGS AND INTERPRETATION PART I .................................................60 Greensboro’s Racial History as Backdrop for the Landfill Controversy ..............................................................................60 Key Leaders and Groups ............................................................................63 Goals ..........................................................................................................72 Coalitions and Alliances ............................................................................77 V. FINDINGS AND INTERPRETATION PART II ...............................................89 Obstacles Faced by the Two Sides.............................................................89 Strategies and Tactics ................................................................................94 Arguments and Counter-Arguments ........................................................102 Role of the Media.....................................................................................114 Advantages of the Two Sides ..................................................................118 VI. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION ...............................................................128 Summary of the Controversy ...................................................................128 Overarching Conclusions .........................................................................132 Implications for Theory and Further Research ........................................142 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................................146 APPENDIX A. HISTORICAL SUMMARY OF THE WHITE STREET LANDFILL CONTROVERSY .............................153 iv APPENDIX B. INTERVIEW SCHEDULE ....................................................................165 v CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Most research suggests that sites for locally unwanted land uses (LULUs) in the United States have been disproportionately located in racial/ethnic minority and low socio-economic status communities, and these sites have frequently become sources of political controversy. Typically, large corporations or various levels of the government propose the construction of facilities such as landfills, incinerators, or chemical plants, and the government is closely involved in the decision-making process regarding the siting. While few city government or corporate officials would admit that a community’s political power balance influences their decisions regarding siting environmental hazards, they are undoubtedly aware of which districts have the most potential to resist LULUs and which have little economic and political clout. Residents in the threatened communities, for their part, have increasingly adopted the NIMBY (Not-In-My- BackYard) response to these proposed sitings. In the early 1980s, NIMBY responses led to organized community opposition and activism that sparked a grassroots environmental justice movement. In one such case, Warren County, North Carolina, in 1982, the term “environmental racism” was coined to describe the unequal distribution of environmental hazards on the basis of race. 1 In 2009, a superficially similar controversy erupted regarding the potential reopening of a municipal landfill site in Greensboro, North Carolina. This case was similar to other environmental justice disputes in some ways, but differed from them in key respects. First, it involved not a new facility, but reopening an existing landfill in a low income, minority neighborhood to save money. Second, it was prompted by the election of a new city council with a majority supported by conservative, “tea party” oriented individuals and groups. Third, opposition to reopening the landfill involved a coalition of grassroots African American and neighborhood activists and moderate whites concerned about the city’s image, racial harmony, and economic development. The purpose of this case study was to examine how the outcome of the dispute was influenced by the leaders and groups on both sides, the formation of coalitions and alliances, each side’s perspectives and arguments, and the effects of historical and contextual factors. The White Street Landfill is located in an area of northeast Greensboro inhabited mainly by people of lower socio-economic status, the vast majority of whom are African American. It has existed since the 1940s. In the late 1990s, discussions began about the problem the city would face when the currently permitted parts of the landfill reached capacity in eight to ten years, and the City Council began to consider the options of using another landfill to dispose of the waste or expanding the existing landfill. The latter option was met by strong opposition from local residents, who had begun voicing complaints about the landfill as early as 1995, citing health problems, blowing trash, foul- smelling odors, garbage truck traffic, and the racial discrimination they believed the landfill symbolized. As a result, the City Council decided in 2001 to close the landfill to 2 all municipal solid (household) waste. The landfill continued to take construction waste and was used for a small volume of household waste in order to keep its permit valid. After 2006, household waste was transported approximately 62 miles to Republic Services’ Uwharrie Environmental Landfill in Montgomery County, costing the city a total of around 12 million dollars a year (Green 2011). After the 2009 municipal election brought a conservative majority, backed by the tea party, to power on the platform of cutting spending and keeping taxes low, the City Council began soliciting proposals from several private companies to reopen the landfill to household waste. This led to the revitalization of opposition to the landfill, comprised of an alliance of environmental justice proponents, neighborhood residents, former mayors and other politicians of moderate persuasion, and white progressives, which ultimately managed to block the proposed reopening Over a period of two years, local activists opposed to the landfill came together to form the main social movement organization of this movement, the Citizens for Economic and Environmental Justice (CEEJ). By early 2011, this social movement organization had become the major force behind the opposition movement. Coalitions were also formed between it and other local groups, including the League of Women Voters of the Piedmont Triad,

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