Standing on the shoulders of those before them, community members of rural Mason, Tennessee, gathered this past Juneteenth at Cedar Grove Missionary Baptist Church. They were there to publicly announce a list of demands for their new neighbor, a multibillion-dollar Ford electric vehicle plant. Set to open next year, the facility promises billions to the […]
Adam Mahoney
Adam Mahoney is the climate and environment reporter at Capital B. He can be reached by email at adam.mahoney@capitalbnews.org, on Bluesky, and on X at @AdamLMahoney.
Posted inClimate Change, Environmental Justice, Extreme Weather
‘We Can’t Wait’: How Black Neighborhoods Are Preparing for the Summer Heat
After closing out May with four days of triple-digit temperatures and New Orleans’ first heat advisory of the season, the group of mainly Black elders welcomed the “dip” in temperature on June 1. Still, it swelled to 96 degrees that morning as roughly 35 people huddled in a community center in the city’s Upper Ninth […]
Posted inClimate Change, Extreme Weather
NOAA Predicts a Record Hurricane Season. Will Black Communities Be Protected?
Edward Buckles was 13 when Hurricane Katrina hit his hometown in 2005. In the aftermath, 1,400 — mainly Black — New Orleans residents died. That spring, researchers predicted the 2005 season to be the most intense in U.S. history, but a 2007 study concluded that confusing directions from authorities, religious faith, and financial barriers led […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Water Quality
Jackson’s Water Is Still Brown. The EPA Says That’s Not Discrimination.
As a child, Brooke Floyd wondered why her grandmother cooked all her food and washed all her dishes with bottled water. As an adult living in Jackson, Mississippi, it became clear. After a storm damaged a water treatment plant in 2022, leaving most of the majority-Black city without water flowing through their faucets for weeks, […]
Posted inAir Pollution, Environmental Justice, Land Pollution
This Environmental Victory May Reinforce Injustices in Black Communities
While virtually every environmental group across the nation celebrated the Biden administration’s historic steps to lower pollution last month, John Beard sat patiently. After years of advocacy and hundreds of scientific studies, the federal government designated two “forever chemicals” as hazardous substances. This move makes it easier to mandate the removal of these man-made compounds […]
Posted inBlack Farmers, Economy, Food Access
A New Road Threatens to Displace a ‘Safe Haven’ for New Orleans’ Black Youth
NEW ORLEANS — As the youth group sat in its warm-up circle, Kennedy Turner, half-jokingly, scoffed at his peers. “Why didn’t y’all react to my prom photos in the group chat?” Quickly, Cionne Chase, 19, jumped in to explain that she did, in fact, react to the photos and most definitely did not deserve to […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Water Quality
Flint’s Warning to America
FLINT, Mich. — At the edge of Saginaw Street, a hand-painted sign is etched into a deserted storefront. “Please help, God. Clean-up Flint.” Behind it, the block tells the story of a city 10 years removed from the start of one of the nation’s largest environmental crises. Empty lot. Charred two-story home. Empty lot. Abandoned […]
Posted inEnvironmental Justice, Health, Unsafe Water, Water Quality
Federal Mandate Targets ‘Forever Chemicals’ Driving Black Communities’ Water Woes
Belinda Joyner, a former schoolteacher in North Carolina, a state where cancer clusters born from water contamination have formed, wonders if it is enough to regulate future contamination without working to repair communities that have lived with the pollution for generations. “We’ve been saying this for so many years,” Joyner said, “and it ticks me […]
Posted inEconomy, Science
Eclipse Fever Is Gripping Black Texans
The word “eclipse” comes from a Greek word meaning “abandonment,” but in Texas, this week’s total solar eclipse has had the polar opposite effect. An estimated 4 million tourists are expected to have flocked to the Lone Star state to see the once-in-a-generation event, which starts in the Dallas area around 1:30 p.m. CT on […]
Posted inPublic Safety
East Coast Earthquake Reveals Holes in Disaster Preparedness
In New York, a city of 8 million people, daily exposure to a cacophony of sounds and shakes is the norm. So, sitting in her apartment in Brooklyn, Nichole Jenkins thought it was just a big truck driving down her street. Elsewhere in Brooklyn, roommates Sannah Boyd and Imiyah Weatherspoon swore construction work was being […]
