.

Katrina 2005? Since 1866, or year two of Dixie’s first Reconstruction, coastal Mississippi’s Turkey Creek community has wrestled with nature and man. Fraught with storms, magnolias, shady land deals and EPA clean-ups, its ecology, history, and politics are among small town America’s most enigmatic and testing. Surviving Jim Crow, civil war and even slavery, the community entered the 21st century with likely erasure from the map as its one big issue. Then came Hurricane Katrina. The worst natural disaster in US history could not have struck a more vulnerable place or people at a more inopportune time. A victim of New South urbanism, Turkey Creek had been ravaged for more than a decade by developers, politicians and government agencies willing to trade the Mississippi gulf coast’s unique cultural and natural assets for the homogenous sprawl of a casino driven economy. Squeezed tighter each day by the Gulfport-Biloxi Airport and commercial over-development at I-10 and US 49, Turkey Creek’s homes, wetlands and people were gasping for relief when Katrina hit land. An equalizer to a point, the storm did introduce others on the coast to terms like smart growth, long-term recovery, and new urbanism. But having cried for balance and sustainability for years, Turkey Creek residents are no less wary today than ever. The blunt truth is they have already tasted what the top-down redevelopment push currently sweeping coastal Mississippi and Louisiana will likely mean for poor folks, blacks and anyone else not in the proverbial loop. In 1994, soon after being annexed without input or consent, the entire community was re-zoned for commercial and industrial development through an alleged “clerical error” in Gulfport City Hall. Getting listed as one of Mississippi’s Ten Most Endangered Historical Places in 2001 was no salvation from the boomtown feeding frenzy that caused destruction of their ancestral creekside cemetery that very same year. When asked in 2003 why area residents opposed a multi-million dollar commercial development entailing the massive loss of additional wetlands, Gulfport’s then-mayor, Ken Combs, referred to the community as “a bunch of dumb bastards … (who) didn’t vote for (him) anyway.” On the one hand, Katrina has blown in greater attention and concern from outside groups than the community has seen before – though far less than Mississippi’s waterfront communities or New Orleans. On the other hand, there has been more loss of Turkey Creek’s diminishing resources in the six months since the storm than in the one-year period preceding it. Judging from the massive four-panel billboard and car dealer lot recently planted near the community’s heart, nothing much different can be expected from local authorities or developers who insist on viewing the lower Turkey Creek basin as coastal Mississippi’s “economic center of gravity.” Besides losing elbowroom and cultural continuity, Turkey Creek gets more than 70 inches of yearly rainfall, with or without a Camille or Katrina. Runoff flows into open ditches in front of most homes, and continuing destruction of the area’s wetlands intensifies flooding significantly. Fearing that talk of “a bigger and better Mississippi coast” may again mean a smaller, wetter and less foliated Turkey Creek, residents from several of its African-American neighborhoods have collectively embarked on their own urban planning process. With support from The Lawyer’s Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and the Berkeley-based firm of MIG, Inc., they have held two planning charrettes since Hurricane Katrina, and have developed an impressive draft plan for long-term revitalization. In addition to housing and economic development, which are critical as well as standard in talk of reviving poor areas, the plan has historic preservation, habitat restoration and an urban greenway along the 13-mile creek as additional cornerstones. While besieged at the center of Mississippi’s second-largest city and third Reconstruction, the Turkey Creek community is – more importantly – a proud and resilient outpost of the South’s eroding coastal ecology, cultural history and community spirit determined to hold on. For eight generations, its people have faced natural and man-made adversities with a characteristic mix of practicality, innovation, perseverance and faith. In the aftermath of Katrina, creating their own comprehensive blueprint for the area’s recovery, rebuilding and renewal will be no different. Hopefully, it will also serve as a beacon to others. Derrick Christopher Evans is a sixth generation descendant of Turkey Creek’s original settlers, as well as the Founder and Executive Director of Turkey Creek Community Initiatives.