The Environmental and Conservation Issues Room
Conservationists See progress.. Black Farmers see regress.
Conservationists See Rare Nature Sanctuaries. Black Farmers See a Legacy Bought Out From Under Them.
In Pembroke, the well-intended efforts of mostly white nature conservationists overlook one thing: The township’s Black farming community has never fully supported them. Now, a generations-old way of life is threatened by the push for conservation.
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Sixty miles south of Chicago, this wildlife reserve is among nearly 2,900 acres owned by private individuals and environmental groups — most prominently, The Nature Conservancy — trying to establish a network of nature sanctuaries in Kankakee County. Their efforts have overlapped with those of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which two decades ago put forward a plan to buy up and preserve thousands of acres of what conservationists consider a rare habitat, one that includes the nation’s largest and most pristine concentration of sandy black oak savanna.
But these well-intended efforts overlooked a key consideration: the support of the residents of Pembroke and surrounding areas. Across the region, the acquisition of land by both the federal government and private conservationists occurred — and planning for more continues — in the face of persistent objections from local communities, including residents of this longtime Black farming community.
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The tension has become an ongoing case study in how predominantly white environmental organizations and government agencies — willfully or not — can marginalize communities of color by prioritizing conservation goals over the wishes of residents.
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https://www.propublica.org/article/c...=pocket-newtab
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Originally Posted by RMNIXON
