00:00:03.630 - 00:00:17.360

This is the creosote gate? Okay. [Audio Description: A small red house with Houston Astros signs and a brick walkway is in focus. In front of the house is a small wooden post.] No, it's not that, it's not that. Okay, that's the creosote gate.

00:00:19.100 - 00:00:37.880

Okay, I'm ready for the tour. [Audio Description: A woman with gray hair walks through a residential neighborhood. She is wearing red glasses and a camouflage shirt.] We started right here on Amboy [Street] and Giddy [Street]. We started looking. If there's anything you don't want me to

00:00:37.880 - 00:00:45.200

film, let me know. Oh, no, no, no. When you hear people talk about they swam in ditches in creosote.

00:00:45.400 - 00:00:53.900

With the sheen, yeah. The question should be, even when you look at their houses, where are the ditches? They are just embellishing stuff. You see these ditches.

00:00:55.960 - 00:01:06.800

I mean, this is where it was, right? This is where it was, yes. And I was standing on my back porch because we had built this house in 2009. [Audio description: a yellow house with a black fence comes into view. A sign reading "Amboy Street" is on the road in front of the house.]

00:01:07.720 - 00:01:16.980

And this is my third home. And never had I ever changed the air conditioning filter as much as I did here. And so I started to look out here.

00:01:17.800 - 00:01:30.200

I looked down here. And they were moving heavy equipment. And when I saw that, you could see the dust plumes from the heavy equipment. Well, of course, we had to change the

00:01:30.200 - 00:01:42.870

filters out here regularly. And I'm like something's not right. Brand new house. Changing our filter that often. And there was a filter of dirt on top of our vehicles

00:01:43.350 - 00:01:50.010

I'm like, no, something's got to be wrong. Again, you see the ditches? These are the ditches that we literally swam in. [Audio description: ditches that are 1-2 feet deep line the streets next to the houses.]

00:01:50.830 - 00:02:00.450

I mean, they're pretty deep. Yeah, you can see there's still water. Does 5th Ward have bad flooding issues? No, not over here.

00:02:00.550 - 00:02:06.830

Some places do, but not over here. We're higher. This church has been here since I was a little girl. I don't know when it was built, but

00:02:06.830 - 00:02:20.620

it's been around since I was little, though. So, again, I can't re-emphasize enough some of the people that claim that they know what's going on back here just sort of

00:02:20.620 - 00:02:25.720

jumped on a bandwagon. Okay. Not being ugly, but that's the truth of the matter.

00:02:26.920 - 00:02:30.620

Because they can't tell you this, like we can. The history of it. Absolutely.

00:02:30.800 - 00:02:35.800

See the real ditches? Yeah. I mean, these are really deep. I mean, I would have wanted to swim

00:02:35.800 - 00:02:42.520

in these as a kid, so I can't blame you guys. We didn't have pools, so this, after a good rain, this is what we did.

00:02:45.950 - 00:02:51.010

So, tell me a little bit more about your childhood. What else is it like? Growing up here, we used to call this

00:02:51.010 - 00:02:59.050

Hobo Jungle. Because we used to come in here and the fence was not here. [Audio Description: A fence with barbed wire at the top stands in front of a heavily wooded area. A ditch is present in front of the fence and before the street.] The fence, UP [Union Pacific] put the fence here after

00:02:59.050 - 00:03:08.510

we started questioning what was going on over here. So, my childhood over here was being a tomboy like I was with five brothers.

00:03:09.030 - 00:03:19.910

Coming over here, we'd climb the trees and we'd ride the trees from one, we'd climb on the branches and then just make them rock like we were riding

00:03:19.910 - 00:03:28.930

horses. So, it was a good childhood. We had children all over this community. And over the years, it's not any children.

00:03:29.330 - 00:03:36.490

The only house that has children now is this house, that gray house. And they just moved here maybe two, three years ago.

00:03:38.050 - 00:03:49.910

But other than that, it was children everywhere. I'm bringing you down here because we don't show this often for all of those who come here. Can I ask what year it was?

00:03:49.970 - 00:03:58.110

Like, when you were a child? I was born in 1957. So, like the 60s, 70s? Late 60s, early 70s.

00:03:58.150 - 00:04:01.590

I graduated in 75 from Wheatley High School. Okay. So, yeah. Honey, I'm glad to tell you how old I am. Let me show you this.

00:04:02.190 - 00:04:20.160

This is interesting. That the people who don't live out here, don't live over here, and really don't have any real issue, don't know about.

00:04:20.420 - 00:04:24.780

See all that water sitting over there? Yeah. That's UP [Union Pacific]. Past the fence. [Audio Description: The wooded area past the fence line clears out to show a small marsh filled with floodwater. Water flows from the marsh, below the fence, into the ditches along the street.]

00:04:25.340 - 00:04:33.520

Yes. Mm-hmm. And you can see the slant of where the water runs down.

00:04:33.740 - 00:04:39.780

There's water running right there. Into the ditches. Mm-hmm. The ditches flow into the ship channel and

00:04:39.780 - 00:04:43.440

to the gulf. This goes all the way to the ship channel? Yeah.

00:04:43.740 - 00:04:54.510

Wow. Yeah. Yeah. That's why I wanted to walk with you, talk with you, really give you a visual that again, people don't really know about. Wait, so. Wait, I'll show the camera.

00:04:54.570 - 00:04:59.150

So, this is all flat. This is all UP [Union Pacific]. [Audio Description: The fence curves around a dead end in the road to show a large flat area of land with little grass growing. In the distance is a railroad and a small white building.] Because it's fenced in. So, it also goes over there?

00:04:59.370 - 00:05:04.530

Yeah. I see. We don't know how they obtained that property, because it used to be privately owned.

00:05:04.770 - 00:05:09.330

Okay. Residential property. But over the years, they obtained that and fenced it in.

00:05:10.510 - 00:05:16.130

Okay. Prior to that, the only fence line UP [Union Pacific] had was right what we see in front of us.

00:05:16.370 - 00:05:25.410

All the way down here. And it wasn't that type of fence. It was rusty barbed wire. Like, three rows that had been broken for

00:05:25.410 - 00:05:32.310

years. Mm-hmm. And so, when I saw them working over here, I came in and asked, what are

00:05:32.310 - 00:05:38.730

y'all doing? Mm-hmm. And the guys that were cleaning this up at that time said, we're cleaning this off.

00:05:39.690 - 00:05:48.430

EPA says we can't build over here anymore. When was this? Probably about 2000, maybe 10, 11. Mm-hmm.

00:05:48.830 - 00:05:56.470

And so, I just logged into my memory bank. So, when I saw the construction, the moving of the equipment over here and the dust

00:05:56.470 - 00:06:04.470

plumes, there was no apparatus on the heavy equipment. Mm-hmm. They have what they call water cannons that

00:06:04.470 - 00:06:09.530

can be on the front of heavy equipment. Mm-hmm. That will minimize the dust plumes. Yeah.

00:06:09.650 - 00:06:13.270

When they're rolling in the dust. Uh-huh. They didn't have those. Luckily, they do now.

00:06:13.270 - 00:06:21.810

Which is probably why we got so much dust on our vehicles, on the carport at our house. Like, you're still getting dust?

00:06:21.950 - 00:06:24.410

Or you mean... It's not as bad. You'll still get it, but it's not as much.

00:06:24.570 - 00:06:28.870

At that time, it was quite heavy. I see. Which is why I started to question what's going on.

00:06:28.950 - 00:06:34.870

Uh-huh. So, this is my third home I've had built. Never had that occur.

00:06:35.510 - 00:06:43.370

So, yeah, this is... So, we started to ask questions. At that time, I was president of the Super Neighborhood for Fifth Ward.

00:06:43.570 - 00:06:49.730

Mm-hmm. And I had UP [Union Pacific] come down. I think this is about 2014, 2015. Come down.

00:06:49.790 - 00:06:52.670

Oh, yeah. There's a train. Yeah. Wait.

00:06:52.970 - 00:06:55.310

No. Continue. Continue. And explain to us...

00:06:55.310 - 00:07:08.080

These are some of the wellheads, too. And explain to us why... What were they doing over here? And the concern for the heavy equipment moving with

00:07:08.080 - 00:07:16.340

dust plumes in our communities. Yeah. And how it could be impacting our neighborhood, breathing it in, etc.

00:07:18.560 - 00:07:27.120

Especially because it's so flat. That's correct. And now, you hear a lot about the people that live north of here, the Sandra

00:07:27.120 - 00:07:31.120

Edwards and the IMPACT Group. Mm-hmm. They live right over there by where that church is. [Audio description: Past the fence line and the large property is a small brick church.]

00:07:31.300 - 00:07:37.240

Mm-hmm. That church started at this church. Really? They just moved over there.

00:07:37.540 - 00:07:44.080

That's what they did. This used to be Greater Mount Nebo [Church]. That's Greater Mount Nebo [Church] now. When did they move?

00:07:44.400 - 00:07:51.760

Oh, God. This was, I don't know, in the early 80s. Yeah, early 80s.

00:07:51.880 - 00:07:57.760

Okay. Okay. So, when I saw the people working over here...

00:07:57.760 - 00:08:02.240

Go ahead and ask the question. What's that green building? That's part of UP [Union Pacific]. I don't know what that is.

00:08:02.300 - 00:08:14.020

I think it's something to do with where they change trains over. But, again, you hear a lot about the north side and Lavender and across the street

00:08:14.020 - 00:08:25.500

from where UP [Union Pacific] was, the creosote operating plant. But you don't hear about this area over here. So, that's the north side.

00:08:25.880 - 00:08:27.320

Mm-hmm. What side is this? West. The south side?

00:08:27.440 - 00:08:35.100

West side, okay. This is the west side. And everything that they did did not include the west side, and you can see how

00:08:35.100 - 00:08:42.260

close we are to it. I was talking to someone about how, maybe it was you, but she was telling me about how they used to store the wood.

00:08:42.340 - 00:08:46.400

I'm going to show you a picture of that. And how that's not included in the study. It's not.

00:08:46.400 - 00:08:49.720

Is that near here? I'll show you right now. Okay, perfect, perfect. Yep.

00:08:57.340 - 00:09:04.220

Well, they eventually moved out. I don't know what Ms. Gaines, it was the Gaines family, if you ever do research on the property owners.

00:09:04.400 - 00:09:13.480

Okay. But it's G-A-I-N-E-S. All this, for the longest time no trees or anything would grow here because

00:09:13.480 - 00:09:18.140

it was black sludge all along here. [Audio description: A row of small houses is seated directly across the fence line of the Union Pacific property.] That's where you would see it? Yes. I see.

00:09:18.420 - 00:09:24.800

Yes. And along the fence line. And you see the white area?

00:09:25.140 - 00:09:31.960

Yes, ma'am. That's where the storage was. The what? The storage for the creosote logs.

00:09:32.560 - 00:09:38.000

Really? [Audio Description: An area within the property has light brown dirt showing with no grass growing.] After they were dipped over there that we hear so much about, that place that blew up.

00:09:38.860 - 00:09:47.760

After they were dipped over there, they were stored all the way down here. I feel, were they stacked really high? Let me show you a picture of them.

00:09:48.980 - 00:09:57.660

Nobody's privy to this now. Okay? Because some of those people are just opportunists to get grants or whatever.

00:09:57.760 - 00:10:02.600

So we won't share a lot of information. They do. A lot of information that we have, we don't share.

00:10:03.060 - 00:10:07.980

Yeah. Just waiting for the right people to share it with. No, absolutely.

00:10:08.240 - 00:10:15.340

You've got to be protective of your stuff. Oh, yeah. Yeah, like, for sure. This is the Rosienon house here.

00:10:16.220 - 00:10:36.290

That family's been here since I was little. One of their daughters was my age. There was quite a few of them. That's been here since the late 50s or very, very early 60s. How does it feel to look back on

00:10:36.290 - 00:10:43.010

your childhood and realize that there were so many things that you missed? God, it's interesting, you know? But it made me the person who I

00:10:43.010 - 00:10:49.130

am today. You see all that area that's flattened with no grass? It was stored there.

00:10:50.550 - 00:10:58.270

And all along here, where you see the gravel and the rocks, it was stored there. That's really close to the edge of the site.

00:10:58.430 - 00:11:03.130

That's like... Look how close we are. Yeah, it's like right across the street. And they don't include us in the study.

00:11:03.910 - 00:11:14.470

So when UP [Union Pacific] came to the church to talk about the restrictive covenants, they came to the church where I attend. Yes, I was talking to you about this.

00:11:14.470 - 00:11:21.350

Yes, yes, yes. Where the church is now. It's just a block over from that church. And they came in.

00:11:21.450 - 00:11:32.030

They offered those restricted covenants at our church. And I was begging people, please don't sign them. And they did anyway because UP [Union Pacific] gave them

00:11:32.030 - 00:11:38.010

$500 that they signed. What year was that? Oh, I have it. I'll show it to you.

00:11:38.110 - 00:11:43.330

I got it on my phone. Sorry, I know I keep asking you for years and dates. No, no, but I have a folder on

00:11:43.330 - 00:11:55.720

my phone with UP [Union Pacific]. So you see, I'm very serious about this. This is not an exercise for me. No, I mean, this is your livelihood.

00:11:55.940 - 00:12:00.580

This is your childhood too and where you're living now. You're right to be serious about this. This is a big issue.

00:12:09.530 - 00:12:16.910

August 2014. I'll give you a copy of the restrictive covenants that they signed. August 2014.

00:12:17.370 - 00:12:24.090

And was that about water rights? Yes, yes. And like I said, it was all along here.

00:12:24.190 - 00:12:31.310

These are the actual ditches that we played in. We fished in here. That's crazy. There were fish in here?

00:12:31.670 - 00:12:36.990

No, no, crawfish. [Audio Description: Ditches run along the fence line of the property. A neighborhood of houses sits directly across the fence line.] Oh, I'm sorry, sorry. That's okay. And we, because most of us over here,

00:12:37.550 - 00:12:44.470

our family, is part Creole. So, you know, we were used to eating crawfish. And we'd take them home and cook them

00:12:44.470 - 00:12:54.610

on a crisco pan. That was boiled crawfish. You eat boiled crawfish right? Yes, it's so good. Oh, my gosh.

00:12:55.530 - 00:12:59.150

Yeah, I bet that gives you chills now thinking about it. Oh, yeah. We didn't boil the sack.

00:12:59.510 - 00:13:10.010

Hey, Kiana, what's going on? We didn't boil the sacks. Like, you know, we just caught as many as we could and we boiled them.

00:13:11.010 - 00:13:20.090

Now, this guy, he rebuilt his family home. They used to sit here and face that way. So he rebuilt his family home probably around

00:13:20.090 - 00:13:34.430

2010, 11. And I'll tell you what happened. That area that I'd asked about, that I'd asked them what they were doing over there,

00:13:34.510 - 00:13:40.070

and they said they had to fence it off. You can see the secondary fence just on the other side over there. Yeah, it's in there.

00:13:41.090 - 00:13:48.910

They said that they couldn't be over there anymore. So when the guys were over there cleaning it up and putting the fence up, I

00:13:48.910 - 00:13:56.550

asked, can I have some boulders? They said, no, ma'am, we can't give you those boulders because they're part of the site.

00:13:57.790 - 00:14:05.050

But when I came back a day or two later, they put them outside the fence before they finished putting it up. Those are the boulders.

00:14:06.550 - 00:14:10.190

From inside there. Correct. Wow. He brought them over here.

00:14:10.190 - 00:14:16.590

Well, Kathy, if you want them, you can have them no, no, no. Watch behind you. Those are boulders.

00:14:16.710 - 00:14:22.270

These are big.[Audio description: Brown boulders line the driveway of a house across the street from the Union Pacific fenced property.] Yeah. They changed a little bit. Wow.

00:14:23.250 - 00:14:30.270

Those came from UP [Union Pacific] too. Because I wanted them in front of my house to keep people from running into my wrought iron fence.

00:14:30.590 - 00:14:34.330

Yeah. But that's why I walked you all the way over here so you could see how big that site was.

00:14:34.330 - 00:14:49.630

Now, let me show you this photo that very few people have. I wish Shay and Abi were here. They missed out.

00:14:57.330 - 00:15:06.730

So whenever EPA tests, you're not included. They tested my property, but I had already brought plenty of dirty in. But now, for the most part, UP [Union Pacific], when

00:15:06.730 - 00:15:15.430

they went to our church and gave the restrictive covenants, they only identified just those properties over there as having the plume. I see.

00:15:15.550 - 00:15:20.470

There's no way that it's just over there. I see. Especially when you had logs stacked up over here.

00:15:20.850 - 00:15:33.650

And part of the treatment was they would dip the log in a hot, hot, hot creosote, obviously. And from that, when they dipped it, then

00:15:33.650 - 00:15:40.510

they would stack them over here. So you figure you've got — I won't put it on camera. Okay.

00:15:40.850 - 00:15:44.250

Forget about the kid on here. Cute kid. Oh, yes. You showed me this.

00:15:44.330 - 00:15:48.890

We were talking. See how high the logs are? And so that was, like, right here, probably. Right here.

00:15:49.230 - 00:15:58.050

All the way up here. But they don't test us. And that creosote, every time they put logs on top, the creosote leaks down.

00:15:58.730 - 00:16:09.520

And where do you think it went? Right in these ditches. And then the ditches right here flow to the ship channel. So where is the ship channel?

00:16:09.700 - 00:16:12.400

Like, is it that way? It would be this way. All right. Good morning.

00:16:14.880 - 00:16:25.620

Cute dogs. Wow. And so— Can you tell me more about the fire or, like, whatever exploded?

00:16:25.620 - 00:16:38.360

The explosion? That was right down here. You can see the two rusted-looking metal bars coming out of the ground and the yellow pipes near that tree in the middle

00:16:38.360 - 00:16:43.380

of where we're standing. Yeah. Over there. That's where the plant was. [Audio description: Small white and yellow pipes sprout out in the middle of the Union Pacific property.]

00:16:45.820 - 00:16:51.600

It's, like— Yeah. I see it right over there. Yeah. And they would take those logs from over

00:16:51.600 - 00:16:59.820

there, where they dipped them and treated them, and bring them over here and stack them. Mm. And so— People don't have a picture of

00:16:59.820 - 00:17:06.720

that. I keep saying, but y'all, they stack the logs so high. Yeah.

00:17:06.920 - 00:17:12.800

Every time they put a top layer—I mean, it's just simple math and engineering. Yeah. Put it on top.

00:17:12.940 - 00:17:17.520

Just gravity. It's hot. It's going down. Absolutely. It's going to heat up the remaining ones.

00:17:17.580 - 00:17:22.220

Yeah, absolutely. Which is probably why there's no grass growing over there. And so you would say that these were

00:17:22.220 - 00:17:27.440

probably stacked from the beginning of the facility until it closed? Oh, yeah, absolutely. Oh.

00:17:27.660 - 00:17:36.020

Absolutely. No doubt. Which is how my great-grandfather got that post in front for the gate.

00:17:36.440 - 00:17:40.080

Mm-hmm. And they would just come up here and get a log. They knew it wasn't going to deteriorate.

00:17:45.770 - 00:17:50.890

And it still hasn't deteriorated. They still haven't. That's crazy. It's really terrible.

00:17:50.910 - 00:17:59.310

So I just wanted to show you how toxic or how—that nothing has infiltrated it. Yeah. But it has eaten it up.

00:18:02.480 - 00:18:08.620

But, yeah, that's why I wanted you to come do the walking thing. Because I think you'd see—it would be a whole lot more interesting to visually see it

00:18:08.620 - 00:18:15.680

than to try to do a zoom. I mean, you're right. Like, these ditches are huge. I would totally swim in these if

00:18:15.680 - 00:18:19.340

I was a kid. And, you know, you're literally next to the site. Some of the other people that talk about

00:18:19.340 - 00:18:28.960

Creosote that you all have for the exhibition No ditches. Are you talking about the little exhibition on campus?

00:18:29.100 - 00:18:32.140

Mm-hmm. I see. Yeah. Yeah.

00:18:34.860 - 00:18:41.460

Wow. And so that church that you all are talking about, that's the one next to the Carl Walker Center?

00:18:41.920 - 00:18:44.760

No. Or which one is that? That's Greater Mount Nebo. Okay.

00:18:44.920 - 00:18:49.300

Right there. Okay. And that's the church that moved from here. Yeah.

00:18:50.020 - 00:18:56.080

I was just wondering because we went to the last community meeting, and we're going to go to the one on Thursday. Okay.

00:18:56.240 - 00:19:00.060

I won't to be there because obviously I'm having knee surgery. My brother Joe will be there. Yes.

00:19:00.060 - 00:19:11.820

And you may want to talk to him. I'll give him a heads up because he's so angry with these people who just jumped on the bandwagon and are speaking for us

00:19:11.820 - 00:19:17.960

and don't know what they're talking about. Yeah. And he was the one who had, at the last community meeting, he had the big

00:19:17.980 - 00:19:22.080

lawsuit paperwork. He had the big file. Yes. Yeah.

00:19:22.140 - 00:19:28.740

Okay. Yeah, I have those. From an attorney. I mean, like, about what?

00:19:29.200 - 00:19:33.280

Oh, it's interesting. You know, we have to wait and release it. Okay, okay.

00:19:34.200 - 00:19:40.720

This is another one of those well monitoring systems that they check. Mm-hmm. Plains, New Jersey. [Audio Description: A small well is situated in the middle of the residential road. It reads "Morris Industries, Inc. Pompton. Plains, New Jersey"]

00:19:42.560 - 00:19:49.960

These are two more that they've added. Interesting that they added these right here and got some down there. That's interesting.

00:19:50.600 - 00:19:54.640

So, you said that your parents lived here, right? Like, right across from you? Yes.

00:19:54.640 - 00:20:02.100

What was it like for them? Because I know that Fifth Ward used to be, like, a really bustling community. Oh, it was so very much so.

00:20:02.220 - 00:20:11.880

And like I said, we had children everywhere. Mm-hmm. This family had about seven children in it. There were two young children that grew up

00:20:11.880 - 00:20:21.100

to be young adults here. And next to the church, there were apartments. And every house over here had children in it.

00:20:21.380 - 00:20:27.200

Mm-hmm. It was a busy street. It was a busy street. We played jacks and marbles and hopscotch down

00:20:27.200 - 00:20:37.920

this street. Mm-hmm. All the time, every day almost, particularly marbles. And so what were

00:20:37.920 - 00:20:42.040

the families here? They didn't work at Union Pacific, did they? No. What did they do?

00:20:42.280 - 00:20:55.440

One was a bus driver. The Rosienon family was a bus driver. Most people here in this neighborhood were... they did housekeeping and I forget what you

00:20:55.440 - 00:21:06.680

call it, domestic work type work. They were porters. There was a family that lived right here. They sold tamales, hot tamales.

00:21:07.080 - 00:21:14.860

Mm-hmm. There was one guy that just cleaned up around anybody's yard, cutting roofs. What about this empty lot?

00:21:15.100 - 00:21:20.800

Was there, like, ever something here? Yeah, that's where, you may hear her name sometimes, Sandra Small. [Audio Description: A yard is behind a fence line with overgrown grass and tree limbs between the street and fence.] Yeah.

00:21:20.900 - 00:21:25.820

That's where she lived. Where's her house? It's fallen apart. They lost the property.

00:21:26.300 - 00:21:31.620

That's where she had planted all those, put all those bricks there. Because she's from New Orleans originally. Mm-hmm.

00:21:31.680 - 00:21:39.420

These bricks? Yeah, that was her, leading up to her front porch. Wow, that's terrible.

00:21:39.640 - 00:21:46.640

It's completely gone. Mm-hmm. Wow. So there were a lot of houses like

00:21:46.640 - 00:21:49.420

this that have just... Yeah. Just completely been lost? Yeah.

00:21:49.640 - 00:21:56.560

She put all those bricks along the fence there and had flower beds planted. Mm-hmm. You'll see some of, there's a lot of

00:21:56.560 - 00:22:04.260

fresh onions, wild onions, that are just there. There were two apartments here. Mm-hmm.

00:22:04.480 - 00:22:13.460

Each one of them had children, at least two to three children. The house on the end had one child. The house in the middle, there were like

00:22:13.460 - 00:22:21.400

five of them. And this house had one. And, of course, my mother had nine. You have eight siblings?

00:22:21.820 - 00:22:25.580

Well, I had, yeah. Oh. Yeah. There's seven of us now.

00:22:26.260 - 00:22:29.540

Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. It's okay. Thank you. It's the circle of life.

00:22:30.480 - 00:22:39.140

All in that little bitty house. But we were little people then, so we all fit. Yeah, it sounds like this was quite the

00:22:39.140 - 00:22:45.640

place to grow up. It was a bustling neighborhood. Mm-hmm. And where you see the new fence right

00:22:45.640 - 00:22:52.360

now, some people, we're trying to find out who owns that property, bought that property. The one like right there? Mm-hmm. [Audio Description: An empty lot is on the left of a house in the neighborhood. It is fenced in.]

00:22:52.440 - 00:22:59.820

I see. With the intent, we think, of building apartments or something, but they don't know that the property, it's not been tested, but it's in

00:22:59.820 - 00:23:03.880

a contaminated area. Mm-hmm. And there was, I'm going to make it start.

00:23:04.160 - 00:23:13.080

I know, I'm sorry. That's okay. There was a junkyard right next door, so when they dig it, I have concerns for

00:23:13.080 - 00:23:18.300

once they start to excavate it, what they're going to find. Yeah. Because it's right next to me.

00:23:18.580 - 00:23:22.820

Yeah. Because it was a junkyard with plenty of junk cars in there. Mm-hmm.

00:23:23.480 - 00:23:36.260

Yeah. So, but this was my childhood, and this street was bustling. We had a basketball goal, rimless, what do

00:23:36.260 - 00:23:46.020

you call it, with no strings, right here, that all the boys would gather in the evening and come play basketball. My mother would hide the basketball sometimes because

00:23:46.020 - 00:23:55.860

she didn't want to hear it bouncing continuously. There was a house where the green building is that had two children. There were two apartments.

00:23:56.440 - 00:24:02.900

Let's walk out this way. Okay. That's my brother's property, by the way. Mm-hmm.

00:24:02.920 - 00:24:09.940

So you all live on this street? Yeah. What was it, sorry, so you said that you moved away, or not moved away, but

00:24:09.940 - 00:24:15.460

like you lived in two different houses before this one? Yeah, I did. I moved and came back, you know, growing

00:24:15.460 - 00:24:28.200

up here, went off and got married, grew up, you know, at two other houses before, but came back home in 2009. But keep in mind, because my mother lived

00:24:28.200 - 00:24:33.380

here, I was here every day. Yeah. I mean, when you said you moved away, you were still in Houston.

00:24:33.560 - 00:24:37.420

Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Definitely. Still living in Houston, not far.

00:24:38.180 - 00:24:52.140

There was a house here, and there were two apartments, an upstairs and downstairs apartment here. There was a house just on the other side of the fence that had four children.

00:24:54.060 - 00:25:04.780

There was a house here where the trees are down. Miss Frank, that was a nice house. When she died, her son got it, and

00:25:04.780 - 00:25:09.240

then he died. And we bought it. We just sold it. You sold it?

00:25:09.480 - 00:25:14.240

Mm-hmm. Yeah. It's so sad, though. It's like, it doesn't seem like there was

00:25:14.240 - 00:25:20.320

ever anything here. Mm-hmm. It was a nice house there, and it was a nice house here, where the driveway

00:25:20.320 - 00:25:25.860

was. [Audio Description: A neighborhood street is shown with fencing around the street and empty lots being contained within the fenced areas.] We called him Mr. Robert because he would take the children in the neighborhood fishing. Oh, my gosh.

00:25:26.800 - 00:25:33.860

When would you say that, like, these houses really started breaking down and these people really started moving? In the 70s.

00:25:34.400 - 00:25:39.500

In the 70s. What was that like? I guess we didn't think too much of it because people were starting to move out,

00:25:39.780 - 00:25:44.820

and people always want to move where they think it's a better life. Mm-hmm. So we didn't think much about it.

00:25:45.260 - 00:25:52.060

Back here, those apartments back there, there were children all in those houses back there on the next street as well. Mm-hmm.

00:25:52.060 - 00:25:58.660

So we'd always call ourselves cousins because we were such a close-knit community. Mm-hmm. And so what street is that?

00:25:59.520 - 00:26:04.000

That's Wayne. Wayne? Mm-hmm. This is what we call a triangle.

00:26:05.200 - 00:26:10.980

So what do you think about this? [Audio Description: A sign in front of an empty parcel of land says "Sotheby's: For Sale"] Sotheby's selling this land. Well, we sold it to somebody. We had that one, too.

00:26:11.320 - 00:26:17.540

Oh, really? And we sold it here the last few years. But still, I feel like it's like...

00:26:17.540 - 00:26:24.480

Yeah. It's a weird feeling, yeah. Yeah, it is. But we decided to go ahead and sell

00:26:24.480 - 00:26:37.650

it because we're getting older, and our children don't care about development necessarily. Mm-hmm. So then we've gotten too old to invest.

00:26:37.890 - 00:26:43.670

And we thought about doing apartments. We even actually thought about rebuilding our house over here. Mm-hmm.

00:26:44.070 - 00:26:50.670

Which is why it was a lot more trees, and the property is kept like it is because we had it cut. Mm-hmm.

00:26:50.950 - 00:27:00.050

I see. Whoever owns it now is maintaining it. But yeah. We had all this cut down, broke down. And you see how it's kind of swampy?

00:27:00.490 - 00:27:04.910

It is. Has it always been like that? [Audio Description: Behind the fence line is a swampy, marshy area on an empty property.] We didn't know what it if it was. Mm-hmm.

00:27:19.250 - 00:27:48.370

That train is loud. So what else? I'm going to show you this. When you hear people talk about the pits. I'm going to show you. What do you mean by pits now?

00:27:48.630 - 00:27:56.530

I know the creosote pit is low, but like... The pits are so low, and it contains all that creosote and it's continuously seeping. The only time it dries up is evaporation. Mm-hmm.

00:27:56.830 - 00:28:11.280

And you can imagine what the mosquitoes are like out here, UP does not maintain this property. And this is their land? This is their land.

00:28:11.280 - 00:28:24.660

Mm-hmm. After we started making inquiries, they started putting up fences. I don't know if you heard me talk about, or my brother talk about, the fact that I went on the property taking pictures of them excavating. Yes, ma'am.

00:28:24.700 - 00:28:29.520

Yeah. That's where I went. Before the fence was up there, I walked right through there on a Sunday through those

00:28:29.520 - 00:28:42.310

woods. [Audio Description: The neighborhood road leads to a fenced area that contains a wooded area.] Wow. And I was swarmed by people from UP [Union Pacific] telling me I was trespassing. But I took my photos. So I believe in documents and documenting documents. Absolutely.

00:28:43.910 - 00:28:57.030

And when was that? Um, probably around... I've got the photos, but... Mm-hmm.

00:28:57.130 - 00:29:00.190

Probably around 2016,17 something like that. Here we go. So this is a... That's the pit. [Audio Description: Behind a fence line shows a marshy area in the woods.]

00:29:02.350 - 00:29:09.450

Oh my gosh. So if that's sitting right there waiting for evaporation, and it's got... I know it contains creosote.

00:29:09.970 - 00:29:14.350

So many mosquitoes, you're right. Oh my gosh. So go figure what that's doing to us. Absolutely.

00:29:14.350 - 00:29:24.110

What UP [Union Pacific] is doing to help the people in the community by treating this. Yeah, this is crazy. Yeah.

00:29:24.850 - 00:29:36.370

And before that, before they put that fence here, there were people dropping cars over there, over here along the side. Prostitution, all that down here.

00:29:37.090 - 00:29:40.770

Okay. There's no light down here now. There was... Mm-hmm.

00:29:40.870 - 00:29:45.790

A light. There's nothing. I see. There's no light down here now.

00:29:46.170 - 00:29:51.250

Yeah, it was probably that one. The light right there. Yeah, it was one of them. That one.

00:29:51.430 - 00:29:56.490

I see. Yeah. There's only that one there on the corner. There's nothing down here now.

00:29:58.850 - 00:30:03.130

And the closest one is down by my mother's house. Mm-hmm. It's so dark down here.

00:30:05.470 - 00:30:16.690

When Council member Jarvis Johnson was here, there was a camera up there. We started, like, the first cameras, seeing people illegally dumping, because this was a hot spot. [Audio Description: A telephone pole stands next to the fence line.]

00:30:17.170 - 00:30:20.710

Really? Mm-hmm. That's right. It used to be...

00:30:20.750 - 00:30:24.310

[illegible] Wait, can you talk more about that? I haven't heard about that. Oh, the cameras?

00:30:24.430 - 00:30:28.590

Yeah, there was a lot of illegal dumping down here. From Union Pacific or just in general? No, no, in general.

00:30:28.770 - 00:30:35.390

Mm-hmm. So people knew about it. So to circumvent that, then people... I mean, they put up the camera.

00:30:35.490 - 00:30:39.730

Hey, babe. They put the camera up here at that time. Mm-hmm.

00:30:39.790 - 00:30:44.070

We haven't had one down here since. But we don't have to dump it like we used to. At that time, we had a lot of

00:30:44.070 - 00:30:52.830

dumping and prostitution. There was nothing to come down here. I mean, oftentimes, we came and ran people off down here that would be servicing their customers.

00:30:53.190 - 00:30:56.870

At that time? What time was it? Oh, that was just a few years ago. Really?

00:30:57.110 - 00:31:00.890

Yeah. That was not long ago at all. That's crazy. As a matter of fact, you would see

00:31:00.890 - 00:31:08.370

needles and rubbers. That was when Jarvis was there. So it had to be around 2010, 2011 -ish.

00:31:11.730 - 00:31:27.310

What kind of good neighbors are they if they don't keep this place clean and even try to mitigate possibilities for mosquitoes, snakes, rodents?

00:31:27.310 - 00:31:31.530

Because you've got rats. You've got snakes. All of the above. Yeah, absolutely.

00:31:34.090 - 00:31:42.550

But we've even seen UP [Union Pacific] come riding through here. Even Richard Zientek, the guy who's with UP, there was a convoy of them coming through

00:31:42.550 - 00:31:47.470

about a month ago. And we were all sitting outside of my mother's house and trying to stop them. Of course, they wouldn't stop.

00:31:47.790 - 00:31:53.930

I took some photos of some guys that was over here just the other day. See, I do photos, photos, photos. They were taking pictures.

00:31:53.930 - 00:32:00.030

I said, well, what are you guys doing? I always act innocent, but they know who I am. And I said, well, what are you guys

00:32:00.030 - 00:32:08.930

doing now? They said they were looking at this fence for repairs. Well, that tree has been down since Harvey.

00:32:10.730 - 00:32:15.330

It's been down a long time. [Audio Description: A large tree snapped and fell within a Union Pacific fenced off property.] They're looking at it right now? Yeah, they're looking at it right now before they come to the meeting next week.

00:32:16.010 - 00:32:22.350

There are a lot of different repairs that need to be done other than just that fence. Correct, correct. How about cleaning up your property?

00:32:22.350 - 00:32:33.190

How about that? How about putting some poison out for the rats? Or how about put some mosquito repellent out

00:32:33.190 - 00:32:39.950

here in the water? I know it would be chemicals, but... That's the bare minimum. I mean...

00:32:39.950 - 00:32:52.840

Mm-hmm. So I wanted you to see all this rather than give you a video. And back when I was a little girl,

00:32:53.120 - 00:32:58.300

my great-grandfather... This is actually not a street that goes through here. It's not supposed to go through here.

00:32:58.560 - 00:33:08.600

Really? If you look at the maps and the plaques, you would see that there's no street. Mm-hmm.

00:33:08.820 - 00:33:12.920

And this property is supposed to come to the street. That property is supposed to come to the street.

00:33:13.120 - 00:33:18.920

Mm-hmm. The outlet should be this street right here. It's called Harrison [Street]. It should go right through here.

00:33:19.220 - 00:33:27.540

But my great-grandfather, because he owned the properties... I'll tell you where the houses was. My great-grandfather had built those houses along

00:33:27.540 - 00:33:37.100

with my mother's house. Mm-hmm. And he siphoned water from the railroad to get water over here in the community.

00:33:37.560 - 00:33:47.300

And he laid down shells and rocks to have a street, an outlet here. Mm-hmm. Well, since then, over time, it's warped into

00:33:47.300 - 00:33:57.200

this. Wow. And it really shouldn't be. See the street right here where it's blocked

00:33:57.200 - 00:34:02.220

off with chains? That's Harrison Drive. Harrison Drive. Mm-hmm.

00:34:02.300 - 00:34:10.960

You won't see it unless you look at A plaque. That's crazy. So all this property should be part of

00:34:10.960 - 00:34:17.020

what we're paying our own personal property, what we're paying taxes on. Mm-hmm. And it's not.

00:34:19.400 - 00:34:30.560

Yeah, he owned this property, and he sold it off as platts. And I had a great aunt, Patience, that had a little house way back here.

00:34:31.140 - 00:34:37.820

My great-grandfather, when he built this house, there was a barn back here where they had the pigs and the... I was a little bitty girl.

00:34:37.980 - 00:34:43.060

Mm-hmm. The pigs and the chickens. And they'd come out here, and my grandmother would ring the chickens' neck.

00:34:43.360 - 00:34:51.920

And then we'd have chickens, obviously, fry some chickens. But yeah, it used to be houses back here. [Audio Description: An open residential area is not fenced, but has overgrown grass and fallen trees. The interviewer and interviewee walk on the road in front of the land.]

00:34:52.720 - 00:35:03.540

And we don't understand today how UP [Union Pacific] was able to acquire that property. Because, see, we bought these properties in auction. So how is it that they were able

00:35:03.540 - 00:35:11.440

to acquire all of that, and it didn't come up for auction? And so they acquired this property since you were a little girl?

00:35:11.720 - 00:35:18.480

No, no, no, since 2014. Oh. So we started questioning what was going on. So this is really recent property.

00:35:18.500 - 00:35:23.140

Yeah, look, and you can tell how new the fence is. Yeah, you're right. As to, you know, how long it's been

00:35:23.140 - 00:35:27.200

there. Look at the poles. It's still pretty silver. There's no rust on it or anything.

00:35:27.520 - 00:35:33.410

Mm-hmm. No. Wow. Wow.

00:35:33.410 - 00:35:37.610

And remember, I told you I walked over there through the woods over there? Uh-huh. There was no fence there.

00:35:37.670 - 00:35:43.610

That's why I was able to do that. So that was after 2014. Yeah, because you said that was 2016. Somewhere.

00:35:43.770 - 00:35:49.410

Yeah. Somewhere in there, yeah, 2015, 2016. Yeah, that they started. Because when we called about it and started

00:35:49.410 - 00:35:57.350

questioning them about what was going on over here, that's when the fences came up. Wow. That tells you anything.

00:35:57.630 - 00:36:12.020

I've got dates on my photos. So what do you think should happen in the future? I think that because my aunt that lived

00:36:12.020 - 00:36:21.700

here, that was my great aunt, and she got a cancer. I think that my husband has cancer right now.

00:36:21.900 - 00:36:31.200

Sorry to hear that. Thank you. But I think that because of the contamination, and we know, we know it's probably more

00:36:31.200 - 00:36:39.560

severe than what's actually been stated. But I think because of the concerns that people in the community, we're not talking about a lot of places, a lot of houses.

00:36:40.180 - 00:36:49.620

I think that UP [Union Pacific] should offer, offer, not buy us out, they should offer to buy us out. For those that want to move, to be

00:36:49.620 - 00:36:52.440

able to move, they could afford to do that. Absolutely. Yeah.

00:36:53.140 - 00:37:04.060

So that's what I think should happen. Let us move and start anew. And the argument can be made, hey friend, the argument can be made, well, if you

00:37:04.060 - 00:37:11.700

all were so concerned, you could move. Well, yeah, we could. But then our house, all that's paid for. Why would I start anew?

00:37:12.040 - 00:37:20.480

Grew up right here, 67 years, I'm 68. Why would I start anew? Yeah. What did you, what did you think of

00:37:20.480 - 00:37:31.320

Mayor Sylvester's Strikeforce team and the relocation plan? The relocation plan? I didn't think it was a bad idea. However, what I told the mayor, it did

00:37:31.320 - 00:37:43.140

not, they were addressing people who were renters. And because it's a high-flight renting area, all three of those houses are renters. Even if you go further down in front

00:37:43.140 - 00:37:51.940

of the plume, those are all rental properties. So what is the criteria to relocate those people? Is it going to be that they have

00:37:51.940 - 00:37:56.160

to be here 10 years or more? 15 years or more? Yeah. But they weren't addressing that.

00:37:56.540 - 00:38:05.960

I see. And then some of the people that were identified, they voided 40, 41 properties, as to, they were identified to relocate.

00:38:07.820 - 00:38:17.920

The people were excited. But how long those people hadn't even paid their taxes. Yeah. And then, on top of that, they had

00:38:17.920 - 00:38:30.500

inherited properties. So, with that inherited property, they weren't accustomed to paying homeowner's insurance, flood insurance. So it wasn't just get up and pick

00:38:30.500 - 00:38:37.360

up and go. And if they moved, then they would have to have, if they moved into one of the properties they were trying to identify to

00:38:37.360 - 00:38:47.000

move them to, they would have to pay insurances and taxes. Yeah. So that was kind of like the car

00:38:47.000 - 00:38:59.240

That ran the course, in a sense. So the people who were excited about moving at that time sort of backed up, realizing that they started listening, oh, well, we're going

00:38:59.240 - 00:39:04.420

to have some more expenditures. And if you don't pay the taxes, you're going to be out of there in three or four or five years anyway. [Audio Description: The interviewee, Mrs. Kathy Blueford-Daniels, sits on a boulder in the front yard of her parents' house.]

00:39:04.660 - 00:39:16.540

Yeah, absolutely. If you're not paying the taxes on a home you're in now that is valued a lot less than the property that they would

00:39:16.540 - 00:39:25.400

have moved to, then that's just creating failure. And so who owns these properties that these people are renting from? Various people.

00:39:25.900 - 00:39:32.000

Oh, yeah. Various people. Some have been in families for a while, like the Goffney houses up there on Liberty

00:39:32.000 - 00:39:39.940

Road, which is right there on Liberty and Whipprecht. They've owned that property since forever. And they've got a tenant.

00:39:40.140 - 00:39:44.180

I think Ms. Goffney said she's got a tenant that's been there like 20 or 30 years. Wow.

00:39:44.520 - 00:39:52.200

Yeah. So I could see her being one to be identified, to be relocated, but not some of the other ones that came in flight

00:39:52.200 - 00:40:02.080

for a year, two, three, and was gone. Because they wouldn't have had the same effects. When I mentioned to you that I built this house in 2009, we brought in tons

00:40:02.080 - 00:40:14.760

and tons and tons of dirt. So when UP and EPA was testing my property, they tested the first six, seven inches. But that was the dirt that you bought.

00:40:15.220 - 00:40:26.080

Yeah. The testing for any of these properties should have been at least one foot lower. And so, again, part of it, I believe,

00:40:26.280 - 00:40:37.540

is to minimize responsibility. Absolutely. And to minimize the true impact, a possible impact of where the contamination actually is.

00:40:37.700 - 00:40:44.780

Like we hear about the plume over there. Well, UP identified that as the plume, those 100 properties. So do you think that with all that

00:40:44.780 - 00:40:51.600

standing over here, that that's the only part of the plume? I mean, it's just common sense. Where they had those logs over here, the

00:40:51.600 - 00:40:58.640

plume's not there in those properties. There's no way. No way. And the axis of the Earth goes from

00:40:58.640 - 00:41:04.660

the sun rises over here and sets over here. So it's going to turn this way. That's a good point.

00:41:05.720 - 00:41:11.460

I didn't think about that. It's not north and south. It's going to be east and west. That's a good point.

00:41:13.560 - 00:41:24.700

And the railroad, where the creosote logs were stationed and remained stagnant as they processed them, was along the rail line that runs east and west.

00:41:25.880 - 00:41:31.360

Wow. I know that you, a lot of people have talked about being able to smell the creosote.

00:41:31.380 - 00:41:36.540

Oh, yeah, we smelled it. It was just so standard. Oh, honey, we were right here on top of it, so of course we smelled it.

00:41:36.560 - 00:41:41.940

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it was just like we hear the train. After a while, when you listen to them

00:41:41.940 - 00:41:49.500

over a period of time, they become hypnotic. Yeah. So we were so accustomed to smelling the smell.

00:41:49.620 - 00:41:56.180

Some days it was more than others. Yeah. Stronger than others because they were processing more creosote.

00:41:56.420 - 00:42:04.180

But, again, those types of logs are the reason why they were processing it because there were — It was this log. Uh-huh.

00:42:04.520 - 00:42:18.380

I'm going to go up. So this is the log that they stole from [the railyard] — So you said that didn't used to be fenced in, where they stored the

00:42:18.380 - 00:42:24.580

poles? No, it had a — It was the wires. It was the wires, yeah. It was three wires, three bobbed wires, one

00:42:24.580 - 00:42:30.400

in the top, middle, like a cattle wire kit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And over a period of time, when we were kids, I mean, that was all— Yeah.

00:42:30.400 - 00:42:40.060

It was torn down and it was rusted out. So, yeah, that's what they had until they put this thing in. Yeah, so that's an example of whenever you

00:42:40.060 - 00:42:53.830

guys would go and take some of the wood. I don't know why they're honking. Yep, that's an example of our history over

00:42:53.830 - 00:42:59.550

here. But, yeah, the right thing to do — The lady that lived in the house behind my storage house, she died of cancer.

00:43:00.730 - 00:43:12.770

So the right thing to do would be to offer— Not say you need to, but offer people an opportunity to buy out. That way, given—I'm on three lots.

00:43:13.090 - 00:43:20.230

So my opportunity to be bought out would be more than a person on a single lot. Yeah.

00:43:22.090 - 00:43:29.470

Yeah. I've never seen a car like that. Oh, you haven't? A three-wheeler?

00:43:29.530 - 00:43:38.990

No. Swing shots. Oh, my gosh, that's crazy. With the motorcycle, but two wheels up front

00:43:38.990 - 00:43:43.410

and one in the back. Yeah. Sling shots. It's a motorcycle, but two wheels up front and one in the back. Yeah. Slingshots. Wow.

00:43:44.250 - 00:43:47.790

Where are you from? I'm from Kentucky. Are you? I'm from eastern Kentucky.

00:43:47.890 - 00:43:55.050

Are you really? Close to the Blue Mountains? Yeah, so I'm really interested in environmental justice with the coal mining industry.

00:43:55.290 - 00:44:02.630

I don't know if you've heard of Black Lung, Coal Miners Lung. So I think it's been really fun for me to see the difference between this inner

00:44:02.630 - 00:44:10.550

city — Poor neighborhoods, basically. But it's the same thing, you know? Poor, vulnerable communities that are being taken advantage of.

00:44:10.690 - 00:44:17.910

Oh, yeah. It's the same thing. And see, the people like here—like, I looked at the 1920s census.

00:44:19.170 - 00:44:24.750

And, you know, of course, they do them every ten years. And, of course, they interviewed my great-grandfather here.

00:44:25.130 - 00:44:32.970

In the census? Yeah, in 1920, yeah. And the names on the census, there were a lot of Jewish names.

00:44:32.970 - 00:44:43.050

Uh-huh. And—what was the? Oh, God, I can't remember the other group that still lived out here.

00:44:43.130 - 00:44:48.330

So a lot of the people, again—you know, we're talking about history here. We've been here. Family has been here.

00:44:48.470 - 00:45:00.930

Now, this is one, two, three, four, five generations right here. But—oh, what do you call it? What's the name?

00:45:00.930 - 00:45:06.890

It wasn't Greek. I said Italian. Did I say Italian? There was a lot of Italians here out

00:45:06.890 - 00:45:12.030

there in the 20s. Yeah, you said Jewish names. Yeah, Jewish and Italian because they worked on the railroad.

00:45:12.950 - 00:45:19.150

And they could walk to work. And they could walk to the ship channel to work. You could walk to the ship channel from here?

00:45:19.290 - 00:45:28.750

Well, they did. Wow. Yeah, so it probably was—on Clinton [Street], it probably was maybe two miles, two and a half,

00:45:28.870 - 00:45:37.090

three miles. You know, you hear a lot of times these—just in general, these really bad—you know, like these waste management.

00:45:37.350 - 00:45:42.750

They'll move into a neighborhood that's really poor and vulnerable. And they'll say, oh, we're going to offer jobs for the community.

00:45:42.990 - 00:45:48.890

But a lot of times, the community never gets the jobs. I mean, was that kind of like it here in Fifth Ward?

00:45:49.190 - 00:45:55.990

Or was it a lot of people then who just came? Well, then—no, no, no. Then—because it was property that was heir property.

00:45:56.210 - 00:46:05.350

So families remained here. Once they moved here in the 40s and 50s, then they remained here. And the families kept the property until the

00:46:05.350 - 00:46:13.430

older people died. And once the older people died, the younger people didn't retain it, didn't pay the taxes, or moved out and didn't pay the taxes.

00:46:13.530 - 00:46:21.290

So that's how a lot of this property was able to be bought up. You know, like I said, you know, we've kept this property in our family.

00:46:21.610 - 00:46:34.550

So we're not planning on selling. We just have to keep the taxes up. And with this property, my instructions are for my heirs, my grandson and my heirs, to

00:46:34.550 - 00:46:46.090

pay the taxes and keep it. And then we're only—when I talked about people walking to work at the Ship Channel, we're only probably a mile from Clinton [Street].

00:46:46.430 - 00:46:55.810

And then you'll have the East River on Clinton [Street]. And people are buying up these properties to put these apartments and townhouses on because of

00:46:55.810 - 00:47:10.250

the access to the East River project. You know, people used to walk back in the day downtown to work. So, you know, we're—even with traffic, all the people

00:47:10.250 - 00:47:18.290

that's moved here from out of town. Yeah. Sorry, sorry, sorry. The traffic, it used to take us 20

00:47:18.290 - 00:47:26.670

minutes to get from here—and I had to go to work in the 70s—over off of MLK [Street] and Griggs [Street]. It would take me 20 minutes to get

00:47:26.670 - 00:47:30.050

to work. I wish. At 7 o'clock in the morning. Oh, my gosh.

00:47:31.670 - 00:47:37.310

And—but now—and people moved here. They're not friendly. They drive like they have New York and California.

00:47:38.410 - 00:47:45.290

We used to let people over. And when people got over, they'd raise their hand and say thank you. Have you ever seen anybody doing that?

00:47:46.090 - 00:47:52.830

Raise their hand and say thank you? When you— And they're your neighbors? If I let you in on the freeway, I motion for you to get in.

00:47:52.870 - 00:47:58.330

And you get in, then you're supposed to raise your hand and say thank you. Yeah. They're not doing that.

00:47:58.390 - 00:48:02.310

Is that what you're saying? No. That's gone. But it used to be pretty prominent.

00:48:02.470 - 00:48:05.190

We do that in Kentucky a lot. Yeah. Well, yeah. You from—yeah.

00:48:05.330 - 00:48:10.230

Kentucky, they probably do. But East Coast and West Coast, they didn't do it. And you can tell a lot of people

00:48:10.230 - 00:48:14.650

here from East Coast and West Coast. You can almost tell the drivers. Californians are coming in. Yeah.

00:48:14.750 - 00:48:20.150

So bad. Yeah. So you mentioned, like, paying property taxes. Has gentrification been an issue?

00:48:20.430 - 00:48:23.230

Oh, yeah. It is. It absolutely is. That's who's getting these properties.

00:48:23.330 - 00:48:28.510

The name that you saw down there, that Martha Turner properties, people have lost it. Yeah. Soft abuse.

00:48:29.250 - 00:48:32.870

Yeah. Or lost it or sold it. Yeah. That's crazy.

00:48:33.150 - 00:48:37.630

Yeah. That's how we were able to get one for auction and the other because we knew the family.

00:48:37.790 - 00:48:44.870

The family expired because we knew the neighborhood. I don't know if you were there. No, you weren't at the last meeting when we were over at Carl Walker.

00:48:46.330 - 00:48:53.650

And with EPA, I think that's just a bunch of hocus. I mean, a bunch of bullshit. The ones that come from Dallas because, one,

00:48:53.770 - 00:49:02.910

they're not from D.C. Now, of course, things are going to change. But the ones from Dallas that came in here and present themselves as EPA, and they

00:49:02.910 - 00:49:12.570

are EPA, but they don't understand the real community. Yeah, they don't understand the real community. So the people who are leading the EPA

00:49:12.570 - 00:49:16.850

meetings are from Dallas? Yeah. What's her name, the woman? Luckett.

00:49:17.250 - 00:49:21.270

Yeah, Casey Snuckett. Casey Luckett. Yeah, Casey Luckett-Snyder or something like that? Mm-hmm.

00:49:22.370 - 00:49:30.450

Yeah. And Brian Weiss, I think that's just a waste of time with him coming. Well, he's like the communications guy, right?

00:49:30.530 - 00:49:36.650

Or like, yeah, the community outreach director. It's all stupid. Or, I don't know. And the thing about it is, like I

00:49:36.650 - 00:49:45.390

told them, y'all leave here and you go back to Dallas. So you're not here in the community to really feel the pain and the pulse of

00:49:45.390 - 00:49:53.550

the community. You have to be here to really understand why we're so angry, why my brother is so angry, Joe Ballard is so angry.

00:49:53.890 - 00:50:02.770

You have to grow up here and understand the people that have lost. The young man that worked in that house right behind the gray house, he was an

00:50:02.770 - 00:50:14.470

officer with the sheriff's department. He got cancer and died. And his wife, not long after that, not that it was contagious, but yeah, they

00:50:14.470 - 00:50:22.290

got the cancer and died. Right behind my house, there was a family. It was a set of twins, Charles and Charlene.

00:50:22.710 - 00:50:30.690

Charles and Charlene. Mm-hmm. Cynthia, there was another brother here. There was five of them.

00:50:31.150 - 00:50:36.880

All of them are dead from cancer except one. I mean, it's terrible. And they were younger than me.

00:50:37.240 - 00:50:41.700

Well, one of them wasn't, but they were younger than me. It's terrible. Yeah.

00:50:42.680 - 00:50:49.220

And, you know, we don't know that that's the real cause, but we don't know that it's not. Yeah, I mean.

00:50:49.500 - 00:50:56.900

That's the issue. Is it over a period of time? You hear them talking about the vapor? Vapor intrusion.

00:50:57.220 - 00:51:00.020

Intrusion? Mm-hmm. Where are these houses sitting? How are they sitting?

00:51:00.740 - 00:51:05.300

Low. But they're sitting up, so if there's any vapors, where are they going to go? Up.

00:51:05.620 - 00:51:12.500

Through the boards and through the house. I see, I see. Had mine built on piers and beams. Where are they going to go?

00:51:12.780 - 00:51:19.100

From the bottom to the floor, through the exhaust system. Mm-hmm. All the water that's sitting stagnant.

00:51:19.540 - 00:51:27.200

All that. When it rains, and that was one thing I was hoping for, there would still be enough water left that you could see how it

00:51:27.200 - 00:51:41.320

runs off and flows across these streets. So, obviously, it's carrying contamination from one property to the other. And for them to test six inches, think

00:51:41.320 - 00:51:46.900

about it. We've had storms. We've had floods. We've had hurricanes.

00:51:47.680 - 00:51:58.240

All that exchange of dust and water over the period of time. So, you're only going to do six inches. We've had more than six inches of dust,

00:51:58.820 - 00:52:07.760

dirt build up in four or five years. Yeah. So, it would have to be tested. To do a true testing of it, the

00:52:07.760 - 00:52:12.080

soil, it would have to be at least a foot. Absolutely. At least.

00:52:13.280 - 00:52:20.140

So, that's just, and that's another reason why we're so angry with the EPA. And it's just insufficient. Yeah.

00:52:20.140 - 00:52:31.380

So, it's not a true tell of what's actually lurking under the topsoil. Because that's all it is topsoil. And it's all that they're testing is topsoil.

00:52:36.320 - 00:52:43.860

You see those silver containers? Those are my raised garden. Because I dare not plant anything in the ground.

00:52:44.400 - 00:52:54.340

Yeah, I mean, yeah. And underneath that silver container is cardboard. To keep, once I fill it with dirt, to keep it from having a contact with

00:52:54.340 - 00:52:58.240

the soil. Yeah. And when I was a little girl, let me say this, too.

00:52:58.540 - 00:53:04.300

There was a house here, an old, old house. But it had fig trees. Everybody around here had some type of fruit

00:53:04.300 - 00:53:14.300

tree. Fig trees, or plum trees, or peach trees. My great grandmother had an apricot tree. And with the red seeds.

00:53:17.200 - 00:53:21.760

The ones with the red seeds. Plum granny. Yeah. Everybody had fruit trees.

00:53:22.400 - 00:53:32.810

None exist now. None. Everybody had fruit trees. Yeah, I think, I was talking to Emily

00:53:32.810 - 00:53:39.170

Foxhall, the reporter. She was telling me about the story of the woman who lived with the fig trees. And people would try and eat them and

00:53:39.170 - 00:53:47.590

she'd run out and be like, don't eat the figs, don't eat the figs. Yeah, we're afraid of them now. So, like I said, I had lemon trees.

00:53:47.810 - 00:53:55.650

There's a lemon tree parked on the side of my house. And it used to produce the biggest. It, of course, died off after the freeze

00:53:55.650 - 00:54:06.930

2011 - Yuri. But it hasn't beared fruit yet. But my idea now is to keep my, because I'm growing potatoes in this one.

00:54:07.130 - 00:54:12.310

And I'm going to grow a few other things in the other ones. But my objective is to keep it from meeting the soil.

00:54:12.670 - 00:54:22.960

Yeah. And my next thing is to put a chicken coop over here on the fence between those two trees. Not that I'm country, but that's the way

00:54:22.960 - 00:54:28.160

I grew up. Well, chickens are easy and you can eat their eggs. That's why I'm going to get chickens.

00:54:28.360 - 00:54:31.860

We have chickens at home. Do you really? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I have to fence them in because,

00:54:32.340 - 00:54:39.300

one, because of my dog. But two, because we have hawks over here all the time. Yeah, yeah.

00:54:40.560 - 00:54:44.280

Yeah, we also have hawks at home. Yeah. So I'm not going to have a whole lot of chickens.

00:54:44.420 - 00:54:50.140

I'm only going to have three. So I don't want anything to happen to those three other than laying eggs. Yeah, for sure.

00:54:50.760 - 00:54:58.600

But I'm going to enclose them. Do you have foxes? We haven't seen foxes, but we did have coyotes.

00:55:01.000 - 00:55:09.340

You've got to watch out for those. And they're inside UP's fenced-in area. And I'll tell you what we believe happened. I had a little chihuahua, and the foxes

00:55:09.340 - 00:55:16.280

would howl at night. And he was a little bodacious thing. He thought he ran the neighborhood. And we were going in the RV, and

00:55:16.280 - 00:55:21.620

he was here. And he would go from my mother's house to—he was an inside dog, but he'd come outside and think he ran in the neighborhood.

00:55:21.940 - 00:55:30.020

Little old bitty something. He thought he was—we called him a thug. But I think it rained that Saturday night. We came back that Sunday.

00:55:30.800 - 00:55:41.560

And my brother said that he had been scratching over there trying to get in, and he wouldn't get up and let him in. And when we got back Sunday, we couldn't

00:55:41.560 - 00:55:47.980

find him. We looked in the neighborhood, but we believe the coyotes got him. We really believe the coyotes got him.

00:55:48.060 - 00:55:54.800

I mean, coyotes have gotten up. Foxes are what's in Kentucky, but they've gotten their chickens. Yeah, so it's— We have a lot of

00:55:54.800 - 00:55:58.820

armadillos, though. Really? Oh, God, yes. And possums.

00:55:59.060 - 00:56:01.940

Oh, my God. And raccoons. We have a lot of raccoons. Yeah, possums and raccoons.

00:56:02.020 - 00:56:10.140

Most of them live over there in UP [Union Pacific]. Over there in UP [Union Pacific]. I mean, that's the safest haven for them. They're fenced in.

00:56:10.620 - 00:56:24.500

No dogs can get in, and so who's going to bother them? I think that one day once we develop a relationship with UP [Union Pacific], I'd like to go

00:56:24.500 - 00:56:31.980

over there and try to see if we have— if there are some holes for the coyotes where they were and hopefully find my dog's collar.

00:56:31.980 - 00:56:40.720

You know, it would be upsetting, but it would validate that that's what happened to him because he wouldn't go to anybody. He wouldn't go to anybody.

00:56:41.780 - 00:56:48.200

Yeah, you need closure. Yeah, yeah. Do you think that you could develop that relationship with UP [Union Pacific]?

00:56:48.440 - 00:56:53.040

I mean, Richard drove by and didn't even say anything. He wouldn't stop. We called his name.

00:56:53.080 - 00:56:58.340

He wouldn't stop. It was a convoy. It was like four or five cars passing through here.

00:56:58.520 - 00:57:02.880

We were all sitting on a porch, and I went, I said, Richard. He turned around and looked. Joe was out here, too.

00:57:03.140 - 00:57:09.820

He turned around and looked. So he knows we called his name. We saw him. But whoever he was with, I guess he

00:57:09.820 - 00:57:15.320

needed to keep moving. Wow. But yeah. No, I don't think so.

00:57:15.620 - 00:57:27.820

Not with me. Like I said, they knew. At that time, I had a little red car, a red car that they were quite

00:57:27.820 - 00:57:35.980

familiar with, and yeah, when they see a red car coming up. They knew who it was. Yeah.

00:57:37.860 - 00:57:46.440

Wow. Yeah. Well. So that's more than the average person knows

00:57:46.440 - 00:57:51.980

out here, what's really going on, what started it all. You see how close the trains are. And the other thing I want to add,

00:57:52.240 - 00:58:02.720

too, I'm going to have to walk all the way around the back, but if you drive, when you leave here, if you would drive back the other way we just walked

00:58:02.720 - 00:58:13.460

from, you'll see the house to the left that sits right at the property edge -- creosote. They're testing that property. But you'll have to turn on the next

00:58:13.460 - 00:58:18.600

street, turn right. That's Wayne [Street]. Okay. Prior to that, there was another street that

00:58:18.600 - 00:58:33.140

was called Kirk Alley that's closed off, vegetation, overgrown, et cetera. When we walked to school, high school, we walked across those railroad tracks to get to

00:58:33.140 - 00:58:40.860

Wheatley. There were only two railroad tracks. So when you leave here and you go, you'll see the area that's full of vegetation,

00:58:41.280 - 00:58:50.580

and there's something put up there for like taking motors out or whatever. But you'll see the area to the left that I'm talking about, and that's the way

00:58:50.580 - 00:59:05.220

we walked to school every day, to and from, and we'd go across railroad tracks. So once you come out on Wayne [Street], back to Liberty [Street], headed back to, I assume you're

00:59:05.220 - 00:59:10.900

going back to school? Yeah, I go on 69th. Okay. Well, you're going to turn left on Waco [Street].

00:59:11.380 - 00:59:16.500

Okay, yeah. Don't go straight to, it's going to try to take you to Liberty, I mean to up Liberty to Quitman [Street].

00:59:16.680 - 00:59:20.160

Okay. Don't go that way. Turn left at the light, the first light. Okay.

00:59:20.240 - 00:59:24.880

Turn left. As you're going across the first light, you're going to go across a bridge. Okay.

00:59:25.000 - 00:59:35.160

When you go across that bridge, you'll see all that concrete over there they've incorporated. Remember, there was only two railroad tracks when I was walking to school in the 70s,

00:59:35.320 - 00:59:45.840

and now they have all that property. Wow. Including streets where there used to be houses of people that are just on the other

00:59:45.840 - 00:59:49.860

side. They've incorporated all that. Wow. Yeah.

00:59:51.780 - 00:59:55.900

So you'll see it. You don't have to stop, but you can visually see it. I'll look, yeah.

00:59:56.080 - 01:00:04.000

Yeah, look to your left. Okay. You'll see boxcars, and sometimes we can hear them taking the boxcars off at night, and

01:00:04.000 - 01:00:09.100

you can hear them over there talking and singing, the guys that are unloading the boxcars because it's so quiet over here. Yeah.

01:00:09.400 - 01:00:16.400

But, yeah, we hear all that. So, yeah, that's the gist of how this started. This was the genesis of it.

01:00:16.480 - 01:00:26.680

When I say the genesis of it, when I speak about it, this is what started it because of all the dust that was compiling on my car and changing out the air

01:00:26.680 - 01:00:39.560

filters and what the people who was clearing the property over here told me about not having to utilize that property anymore that was fenced in because EPA said they couldn't.

01:00:39.880 - 01:00:48.800

You said that was 2014, 2012? About 2014, yeah. Well, yeah, about 2013, 2014, maybe even sooner because he moved over here.

01:00:49.140 - 01:00:57.320

We moved in 29. So it might be between 11 and 13 that that happened. And who else was there whenever that started?

01:00:57.620 - 01:01:04.140

It was definitely you. My brother, Dwight. Your brother? I mean, Joseph, Joe, the big bald head

01:01:04.140 - 01:01:08.800

guy. Yeah, and so then how did you get people to join you? He started knocking on doors.

01:01:08.920 - 01:01:17.840

He went and talked to Ms. Sandra because I had a knee problem even then, but he went and talked to Ms. Sandra. Ms. Sandra and my brother started driving out

01:01:17.840 - 01:01:25.780

and notifying people that there was a problem and we're looking into it because we had been talking about it. I was a member of TOPS at that

01:01:25.780 - 01:01:29.300

time. Like I said, I was president of Super Neighborhood. We had been talking about it.

01:01:29.540 - 01:01:38.820

I had been asking the questions about it, but nothing was sticking. So we started to keep raising awareness. When I started working for Senator Miles in

01:01:38.820 - 01:01:43.600

2017. Senator Miles? Boris Miles. His office is over there on Lyons [Avenue].

01:01:43.920 - 01:01:52.440

I started working for him in 2017. And when I started working for him, then I started talking to him about the creosote concerns at that time.

01:01:52.800 - 01:02:00.600

Nothing's been tested. And so he said, creosote, what's that? And so he brought in TCEQ and started having meetings.

01:02:01.960 - 01:02:08.080

Yeah, 2017. Yes. And with the communities. Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee had the meeting over

01:02:08.080 - 01:02:13.940

there at Wheatley. I talked to her about it. So we were sounding the alarm and raising the interest.

01:02:14.660 - 01:02:22.860

And then from that, then other people started saying, oh, creosote, oh, I used to live over there. And then again, there was no criteria to

01:02:22.860 - 01:02:30.260

establish where we were going to concentrate our efforts because the community, for the most part, couldn't get together. We couldn't get together because you had all

01:02:30.260 - 01:02:37.180

these little silos. Really? Yeah, you had these silos that, again, started. Some started working with UP [Union Pacific].

01:02:37.720 - 01:02:41.020

Really? Yeah. I mean, you said that some people took the restrictive covenants.

01:02:41.100 - 01:02:50.060

A lot of people took the offer. But, I mean, you don't know any better, you know? Well, out here in this area, $500 is

01:02:50.060 - 01:03:01.540

a lot of money to some people. And then some people who had bigger properties got up to $1,000. But in my mind, if UP [Union Pacific] is offering

01:03:01.540 - 01:03:10.500

you $500 to $1,000, then there's an issue that you don't want to settle with. Absolutely. But, you know, I understood, so I'm not

01:03:10.500 - 01:03:19.080

speaking bad on that because I understand the need. Okay, okay. So I'm not putting that down at all.

01:03:19.200 - 01:03:33.520

But I'm just saying that you would rationalize that if they're offering you this, then there's got to be a problem bigger than $500. Why are they offering you money or whatever?

01:03:33.580 - 01:03:36.540

Correct. Okay. Correct. And that's what happened.

01:03:37.240 - 01:03:44.540

And I think that's why a lot of people, and that's the properties where they identified as the, quote on quote, plume. Okay?

01:03:45.140 - 01:03:47.440

Over there. Yeah. Where the church is. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:03:47.540 - 01:03:52.340

That's what they identified as the plume. I'm like, guys, the plume? What about over here? Yeah.

01:03:53.280 - 01:03:57.700

What about over there? Yeah. What about all along that railroad track east to west?

01:03:58.180 - 01:04:05.160

They didn't want to incorporate it. Because that means the responsibility is greater. Absolutely. That's correct.

01:04:05.580 - 01:04:15.420

That's absolutely correct. And if I only test six inches, then I can say, well, it's subdued enough that it sank down and the threat is not

01:04:15.420 - 01:04:21.840

there. Yeah, the threat's still there. Because we talk about, again, vapor intrusion. Absolutely, yeah.

01:04:21.860 - 01:04:35.780

And then with the level of soil that's over the years that has been resurfaced from whatever reason, be it water, be it wind, you're not going to get a true reading

01:04:35.780 - 01:04:44.780

of what's really beneath these properties. No. That's just common sense. But again, $500 to $1,000 is a

01:04:44.780 - 01:04:52.120

lot of money. And the people over here, for the most part, we weren't offered anything, and we didn't try to accept anything either.

01:04:53.820 - 01:04:58.620

So I tried to get them once. You asked me about how did we get people to sign up. We started knocking on doors.

01:04:58.620 - 01:05:13.080

My brother was riding out, and then we started meeting over here at the church on Love, off of Love Street and Crane [Street]. And people started coming, the families represented.

01:05:13.160 - 01:05:19.320

We started reaching out to families we knew that used to live over here, like the Suttons and the Roseinons. We knew these people.

01:05:19.360 - 01:05:25.520

Yeah, exactly. You grew up with them. Right, right, and they moved out. So we started reaching out to people, and

01:05:25.520 - 01:05:36.980

just some of the same ones we reached out to came in and started another group. I even brought to the Super Neighborhood meeting at that time Roger Cantu, who was with

01:05:36.980 - 01:05:43.880

Lone Star Legal Aid at that time. Yes. And there's a young lady named Chrishelle Palay. You probably never heard her name.

01:05:44.580 - 01:05:53.760

Super, super smart. She was working with Texas Low Income Housing. I met them at TOP. And all of us together, collectively, started doing

01:05:53.760 - 01:06:01.900

research about what was going on with creosote. So I started researching creosote. She had some of her employees that was working with her meeting over there.

01:06:02.020 - 01:06:10.280

And then other people started, more and more people started coming. People saw opportunities, okay. And then UP [Union Pacific] told them there's grants available.

01:06:10.720 - 01:06:15.120

Oh, boy. I bet they regret that. Huh? I bet they regret that.

01:06:15.140 - 01:06:20.940

Oh, they don't regret it. They did that on purpose to dangle carrots. Because what they're going to say is, we're working with the community.

01:06:20.940 - 01:06:31.700

We're working with organizations to help support them. That's what they're going to say. Because these organizations, some of these communities have gotten those grants through UP [Union Pacific].

01:06:32.020 - 01:06:41.420

Wait, so basically you're saying that Lone Star Legal Aid and some of these other organizations have been, UP [Union Pacific] told them, oh, Lone Star Legal Aid, you can apply for this grant.

01:06:41.480 - 01:06:46.560

I don't know if they told Lone Star. I'm not saying that because I don't think that they were part of it. I don't think.

01:06:46.560 - 01:06:54.120

But other groups. Other groups. I don't want to call names. No, it's okay.

01:06:54.620 - 01:07:00.160

I'm not saying that Lone Star Legal Aid did that. I'm just saying that as an example. Because now I see what you're— Stop the

01:07:00.160 - 01:07:01.460

camera and I'll tell you who they are.