Caddo Commissioner Burrell Shares His I-49 ICC Letter to U.S. Transportation Secretary Buttigieg

Dear Secretary Buttigieg,

I am the Honorable Roy Burrell. I served the people of District 2 from 2004 to 2016 as their Louisiana State Representative, and before that I served my community as a District G Shreveport City Councilman (1996-2003) in Caddo Parish, Louisiana. I am currently serving as a member of the Caddo Parish Commission (2020 to 2023). I have dedicated my life to serving others; especially those who have been historically marginalized. In an interview in April 2021 with the news website Axios, you spoke about the historic discrimination and harm done to Black communities by the federal highway system building interstate roadways through their respective communities. Those of us who are old enough to remember the last interstate highway built could agree with that statement. There were various reasons for this seemingly unjust decision, but mostly political, just as it is today.

Currently more thought and consideration has gone into building roadways. For example, the environmental process is much fairer to residents than ever before regardless of race and ethnicity. There are economic and cultural surveys and community planning exercises that lend valuable input to the Environment Impact Study (EIS) that guides the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) to make better and more just decisions when building a new major highway structure. Nowadays completing major highway structures adjunct to Black communities and cities can be a catalyst and economic benefit to those dying communities who have been disenfranchised and disinvested like in Shreveport, Louisiana.

Purpose

The purpose of my letter is to address the highway structure in Shreveport, Louisiana known as the Inner City 1-49 Corridor (ICIC), a 3.6 mile section that encompasses over 2 miles is inundated and uninhabitable properties. This section is the missing gap in the north-south 1-49 roadway continuum and noncontiguous section of interstate that forces travelers to drive 14 miles west around the city on La Hwy 3132 and 1-220. If you continue on 1-49 from the south, it is dead-ending at 1-20 (running east and west) forcing traffic wanting to continue north to be diverted through inner city neighborhoods, the Shreveport downtown area, or by taking 1-20 West for 10 miles to connect to the 1-220 Loop North, or merging onto a congested 1-20 East traffic through Bossier City, Louisiana-simply a nightmare!

The 1-49 roadway has not always been a point of contention for the Shreveport community.

From its inception in the '70's until the early '80's when the southern route was built connecting Lafayette to Shreveport, this superhighway was considered a major economic corridor running north and south, bringing jobs and prosperity to a poor State and people. The ultimate vision for 1-49 was to marry the commerce from Canada to the Gulf of Mexico.

The building of the 1-49 Corridor was not without its growing pains, as it snaked its way through sparsely populated rural green spaces and small towns to more densely populated cities. Laying hundreds of miles of thick concrete is palatable to some but not to everyone, despite ethnicity or political ideology. Normally there is less opposition from those in less populated municipalities than larger ones.

Historically, these superhighways like the l-49 roadway are not without its environmental and political controversy. Unfortunately, those who plan the concrete monstrosities have traditionally discriminated against communities of color and the poor who live in them by running the roadway through their communities, uncaringly disrupting their peace and livelihood. The lack of economic and political power by these marginalized communities failed to stop the road construction activity that sometimes devastated and divided many of them, forcing the residents to give up their businesses and homes with little compensation.

Many local, state and federal "powers-that-be" felt these communities would have less push back than more wealthy white communities. Ironically enough, as federal housing discrimination laws changed discriminatory practices in housing such the Fair Housing Act, it helped eliminate traditional community financial redlining and planned location mapping of ethnic groups. But building these large roadways, if planned, designed fairly, and properly constructed through minority communities, could be a tremendous benefit by removing economic and social impediments.

These roadways can provide an economic and social competitive advantage for many minority groups that were originally restricted territorially and relegated to becoming deteriorating and dying communities of color. People in marginalized communities could then move to any area in the city they could afford; therefore, diversifying many neighborhoods that are seen as strictly Black or white.

As these superhighways are built near or through these marginalized and poor communities that many times have been historically neglected and devoid of community investment by government and the private sector, the impact of such a project could actually catalyze community and economic development activity, and redevelopment while eliminating property blight.

If properly planned and designed, an interstate roadway could provide service roads that can promote and spur additional business and residential development. In addition, property values of minority property owners may increase or be sold to the government at a profit. Non-property owners or renters in these depressed, underprivileged communities may have an opportunity to relocate to a better neighborhood or have access to facilities that are better than where they presently reside since they cannot be discriminated against in housing as they once were.

The reunification and diversification of these underprivileged ethnic groups into the general population have shown signs of creating upward mobility in marginalized populations, improved income and quality of life benefits as they assimilate into more affluent conditions. Another positive benefit of diversification highlights that crime and drug activity are known to decrease and education opportunities increases when people progress and become hopeful.

These aforementioned attributes and detriments can be applied to the controversy surrounding the Inner City 1-49 Corridor (ICIC) through Shreveport core area. Since the 80's, at least 2/3 of the ICIC has been already built through the City of Shreveport from Bert Kouns Industrial Loop in south to Interstate 20 (1-20) to the north, where it terminates. This is an existing 6-mile stretch of interstate highway placed through predominately Black and white communities. The remaining 3.6 miles of proposed roadway from 1-20 to 1-220 Loop through the minority Allendale neighborhood became unnecessarily politicized in the mid-1980s, stopping the progress of the ICIC construction. Even without the road construction, there has been no community or economic development in the Allendale community for over 35 years, until after the disastrous Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans in 2005.

History

At that time, the ICIC was proposed to follow a route through the poorest part of the Allendale community called the "Bottoms", named ideally due its topography in a low-lying area of Shreveport. Also, history has it that in the early 1800s, Shreveport had a yellow fever epidemic due to the water inundation in this area, harboring mosquitoes, infecting and killing many citizens. Many residents fled to higher grounds, expanding to the west and developing neighbors like Queensborough and Highlands.

The Bottoms was also home to a Catholic missionary named Sister Margaret McCaffery (deceased) who cared for the poor and downtrodden, mostly poor Blacks and the underserved. She was loved by all and saw the threat of the ICIC construction as an infringement on the poor. Her political activism led to strong opposition to building the ICIC roadway in the late 1980s and 1990s due to intentional misinformation by greedy landowners and politicians wanting the interstate traffic to be directed around the west and southwest side of Shreveport, to sell properties in new residential and business developments.

Although very controversial, that effort by wealthy individuals led to the building of La Hwy 3132/Interstate 220 Loop across the Cross Lake, threatening Shreveport's major water supply due to oil and gas deposits beneath the lake, an environmental nightmare if ruptured. This allowed the ICIC project to be moved politically to the back burner for years until I revived it in the early 2000's. After Sister Margaret's death in February, 1998, according the late Jim Montgomery, her confidante, he stated that she recanted her opposition before her death to building the ICIC roadway. Also, she realized that she had been told lies and misled that the government would take the home of the poor people in the community without compensation.

Many wealthy people who supported her cause but used her to create the opposition from Black residents, needed to stop the roadway construction until they could acquire this valuable real estate or profit from federal tax credit used to subsidize many of the substandard housing in the community.

Due north of 1-20 lies the community of Allendale, a large inner city minority neighborhood which opposed the ICIC roadway construction, despite the steady deterioration, dilapidation and high crime conditions that existed. Adjacent neighborhoods included Ledbetter and Lakeside communities. According to Shreveport historian Gary Joiner, the Allendale community was named after a Louisiana Confederate Governor Henry Watkins Allen, originally built for a wealthy white Shreveport population wanting access to farmland and horse pasture west of the city. Allendale was never originally built as a "Black Neighborhood" as promoted. At the time, I even supported Sister Margaret's efforts until becoming an elected official. I then researched and found that the ICIC could help this dying community.

As the old adage says, "When you learn better, you should do better", comes to mind. They built large Victorian houses in the late 1800's, and later building small three-room shotgun houses for the poor white working class and craftsmen in the 1920s and 1930s. Eventually, when white people moved to better conditions in newer neighborhoods, Blacks were allowed to buy and rent many of these existing properties. In the 1950s, these shotgun homes became government subsidized slum homes, and the first public housing apartment complex called Jackson Heights Apartments (known as the Projects) was built. A number of Black churches were also later built in the Allendale community during the mid-1800s and early 1900s.

By the late 1990s, the Projects became dilapidated, crime and drug infested. The city and federal governments condemn the structure for habitation. Despite these horrible living conditions, many Project residents refused to move until they were told that the ICIC roadway would be built through the complex. Finally in the early 2000s, the complex was razed, making way for the ICIC to continue north to connect Interstate 220, on to Arkansas and beyond.

In 2001, as a Shreveport City Councilman, I pushed for inner city redevelopment of this older neighborhood. I helped create a nonprofit called the "Inner City Entrepreneur (ICE) Institute to focus on neighborhood revitalization projects. As an economic developer, I recommended revisiting the extension of 1-49 through the Allendale neighborhood since it had deteriorated by nearly 80%, and many residents had moved to other areas of Shreveport creating massive blighted and vacant properties.

In 2003, I became the State Representative for the Allendale/Ledbetter/Lakeside neighborhoods. I then approached the late Governor Kathleen Blanco to support the extension of 1-49 through the city. I coordinated numerous meetings with city and state government officials, neighborhood residents, businesses and churches to discuss restudying the ICIC roadway through Allendale. Also, the late Governor appointed me to the 1-49 Task Force to promote its construction.

In 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast, driving many Louisiana citizens north to safe areas. Many hurricane victims evacuated to Shreveport and areas further north, east and west. Homeless evacuees from Hurricane Katrina found help in Shreveport with the Fuller Center for Housing, established by Millard Fuller, the original founder of Habitat for Humanity. Later in 2005, the former Mayor Keith Hightower who supported the ICIC donated vacant properties to the Fuller Center, but wanted them to stay away from the original path of the potential ICIC roadway. Also, I supported the Fuller Center's efforts as their State Representative (2004-2016) by providing state tax credits for building material while in the legislature. Prior to my representation, the former Mayor Cedric Glover was the State Representative for the Allendale area.

Because Glover wanted to run as Shreveport's first Black mayor, I agreed to swap the Allendale area for a downtown business district to help with his fundraising efforts. Glover was glad to rid himself of the Allendale community indicative of his comments, quipping that "those po' folks don't vote". But my mission and vision was clear. We needed federal help from a new highway like the ICIC to help catalyze the neighborhood revitalization process. Since the Allendale community had lost nearly 70%-80% of its original residents between 1975 and 2000, it had become almost a ghost town riddled with drugs, gangs and crime. Due to the Fair Housing Act and better employment, young and older Black residents were leaving these low-income communities in droves.

Many neighborhood schools were closing, and churches were relocating as the inner-city Black population shifted and many whites took fight to the suburbs and rural areas. Most of the original housing stock in the Allendale community was dilapidated and in disrepair due to prolonged neighborhood disinvestment. There has been little new housing development in Allendale since the Federal 235 Home program in the late 60's.

Allendale still had many "slave-type or shot- gun" styled structures with only three rooms, and few in-door toilets which was later added. In the 90's the federal housing authority declared them unsanitary and un-inhabitable, torn down by the city after the greedy, wealthy and well-connected investors used federal government grants and tax credits to capitalize on the terrible housing shortage. There was no housing development in Allendale or older minority communities until after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. It became obvious that the former (Mayor) Glover was not supportive of the ICIC roadway although he would not publicly talk against its construction.

He even intentionally rebuilt another low-income housing complex called the Renaissance Apartment (locally known as the Projects) directly in the path, and at the "dead head" of 1-49 south and 1-20, obstructing the future path of the ICIC although the apartments could have been swapped for other properties elsewhere.
Clearly, his political strategy was to drive the traffic west onto the La Hwy 3132/1-220 Loop away from the dying inner city neighborhoods that needed the economic boost. It became common knowledge that Glover's opposition to the ICIC project supported his politics and his campaign supporters, some who were associated with the Community Renewal Organization (CRO).

The CRO was established as a nonprofit community initiative that promoted rebuilding of the social fabric within distressed communities by "selling friendship", as it was publicly promoted. It became more of a political group primarily funded by well-to-do and well-connected individuals who used many Black residents like Dorothy Wiley (a Hurricane Katrina evacuee) as a "front" to promote and sell their mission. Shortly after forming, the CRO hired an architect and environmentalist named Kim Mitchell as a project planner. He had recently been a former partner in the contracting architectural firm of Mitchell and Associates that had once bid to design and build the same controversial ICIC roadway section in question-but failed.

In a planning meeting he attended with the North Louisiana Council of Government (NLCOG), Mr. Mitchell declared that he would stop the building of the ICIC roadway after losing the project. The CRO aligned its operation with the Fuller Center and moved to a satellite location within its housing development where Mr. Mitchell immediately started to organize the neighborhood residents against the proposed ICIC project. The first opposition group he created was called "Loop-It", which later became known as Allendale Strong with the support of the CRO, headed by Mrs. Dorothy Wiley, a New Orleans resident and recent evacuee from Hurricane Katrina.

Shortly after Hurricane Katrina drove many people north, the late Governor Kathleen Blanco visited Shreveport to thank the citizens and public officials for housing many South Louisiana evacuees. While in Shreveport, she praised the 1-49 corridor as a vital evacuation route from the South to Shreveport, and vowed to finish the roadway north to Arkansas which had not been completed at the time. As she rode the 1-49 route north, she noticed the roadway "dead- headed" at Interstate 20 (running east and west), and asked why did the roadway end here? The Governor had heard that during the evacuation travelling on 1-49 north, many buses carrying wary passengers had gotten lost once reaching Shreveport because the roadway ended at 1-20 or circled around the city on the La 3132 /1-220 Loop causing them to take the wrong road to their final destinations. Many who were going to Dallas and Oklahoma resulted in travelling to Arkansas, and vice versa-a total nightmare.

After the Governor's visit, she assigned her Transportations Secretary Johnny Bilberry to meet with Shreveport's community leaders and churches in the Allendale community to start the process of completing the 1-49 roadway through Shreveport north to Arkansas and on to Canada. As the state official for the area and along with Shreveport Mayor Hightower (2001- 2008), we organized numerous community meetings to discuss the building of the ICIC through Allendale and north to the Arkansas line. At the time, most of the Allendale community, including church pastors and business community were excited about what the ICIC could do to better the area. We felt that the Allendale community had gotten past the old 80's opposition to the roadway. Even with the untimely death of Governor Blanco, the two succeeding Governors Bobby Jindal (R) and John Bel Edwards (D) both supported the ICIC connector.

Present Day

Little did we know that State Representative Glover (later Mayor) was constantly undermining our efforts because of a political agreement to loop (thus the opposition group "Loop-it") all of the 1-49 traffic westward across Cross Lake (Shreveport's water supply), and around the dying inner city area. He needed to satisfy his political commitments to the CRO and property developers in west and southwest Shreveport although the construction would be more expensive, according to the EIS. Former Mayor Glover and Mr. Mitchell would constantly tout to the Allendale community the ICIC would never be built, therefore continue to build housing structures in the ICIC project area.

The ICIC project study (EIS) cost over $4 million dollars at the time and was placed in the State's budget in 2007 by me nearly 13 years ago. The estimated ICIC project cost was $350 million then, but today is costing nearly $500 million due to incompetence, unnecessary delays and political obstructions. The ICIC project is estimated to create many jobs, better housing options, and business development opportunities with a $863M annual economic impact. It would also divert hazardous traffic from the 1-220 Cross Lake Bridge, which is our water supply. It would also clean up a tremendous amount of dilapidated and vacant properties which promote crime and drug activity. It would spur additional economic and community development for neighborhood revitalization, if properly planned and much more. I think you can see we may have a "diamond in ruff', if we can get out of the way of ourselves. Thank you for listening Sir.

Sincerely,
Roy Burrell-President
Caddo Parish Commission
(and Former Shreveport City Councilman and Louisiana State Representative)