Developers have Black families fighting to maintain property and history
Written by Black Hot Fire Network on August 12, 2023
PHILLIPS COMMUNITY, S.C. -- The Rev. Elijah Smalls Jr. once grew okra, butter beans and other vegetables in the neighborhood where his family has lived near the South Carolina coast since survivors of slavery bought patches of their plantation after the Civil War.
Then came half-a-million-dollar homes in a nearby subdivision, overwhelming the drainage system. Runoff meant for sewers now pools in the 80-year-old veteran’s backyard, making gardening impossible.
Smalls and his relatives in Phillips Community are the many Black families still living in historic settlement communities around Charleston . . .
