Lesson 4: Call ‘Em Out

Broken Ground Season 5, Episode 4

Transcript

August 10, 2022

Carrington Tatum: I worry that people will see the microphone and think I’m somebody important. (laughing) 

Host: This is reporter Carrington Tatum.

Carrington Tatum: Could I just get a small black coffee please 

Host: We met him in downtown Memphis at Comeback Coffee one of the cafes he frequented while writing about the Byhalia Connection crude oil pipeline for online news outlet MLK50. 

Carrington Tatum: I tend to be a nomad when I do my reporting. And so if it’s not this coffee shop it’s another one. 

Host: When he first arrived in Memphis in November 2020, the pandemic was in full swing. So MLK50 – like many newsrooms – decided it was safer for its half-dozen employees to work on their own. The office was still closed during our interview in December of 2021. 

Carrington Tatum: Very weird time. Did everything virtually. I only met my editor in person a month or so ago, and I’ve been here a year. 

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Host: As so much national reporting is focused on the pandemic and its inequitable impact, and on racial justice issues in the wake of a police officer murdering George Floyd, Carrington takes up the environmental justice beat at MLK50.

Carrington Tatum: Environmental injustice is more difficult to see. You know, even the idea that racism can be, you know, sort of transferred through our air, our water, our soil, like, it sounds – it sounds absurd until it’s not, right? Until you learn about sort of the pollution burden that we place on some communities and not others. I mean, it’s a deadly form of injustice but it, I think it is harder to see than than other forms.

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Host: This is Broken Ground, a podcast from the Southern Environmental Law Center. I’m Leanna First-Arai, your host. Here at Broken Ground, we dig up environmental stories in the South and introduce you to the people at the heart of them. People like Ward Archer who joined the fight against the pipeline after learning it could poison the city’s aquifer – its drinking water source. 

Ward Archer: I mean, you can’t be serious. That’s what I thought. You cannot be serious. 

Host: If you didn’t catch that episode, I hope you’ll check it out. 

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Host: This season, we’re introducing you to a whole chorus of voices, each of which plays an essential role in this environmental justice story. The foot soldiers knocking on doors and attending rallies … the lawyers and scientists doing the research and collecting the data. 

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Host: In this episode, I want to introduce you to another essential voice – that of the 23-year old journalist whose dogged reporting keeps the Byhalia pipeline top of mind in Memphis. Carrington Tatum arrived in the city shortly after I moved away. He came through Report for America, a nonprofit organization that helps fill news deserts by co-funding jobs for journalists. MLK50’s mission appealed to Carrington.

Carrington Tatum: A newsroom’s mission is everything. MLK 50 stands out, and the slogan is Justice through Journalism, very blatantly, very loudly, very clearly. That’s what got me out to Memphis.

Host: Then, his editor says: 

Carrington Tatum: ‘Hey, you know, we ran a couple of stories about this community fighting a pipeline. And we haven’t checked in on that in a minute. Can you read those stories and then look into it, see what’s going on?’ 

Host: Carrington familiarizes himself with the people featured in the two articles I’d written by then. But he quickly becomes aware of some new voices.

Carrington Tatum: On social media, you kind of had these other, I guess newer faces. Their videos and posts about a confrontation at a meeting with Byhalia pipeline.

Host: He’s talking about the October meeting we heard in episode two, where Kathy Robinson and Kizzy Jones first met Justin J. Pearson.

Carrington Tatum: That was the first time I saw the clash between folks in the community, sort of bumping up against the company in that way.

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Kizzy Jones: (at meeting) It’s clear right?

Man: (at meeting) We listening for an answer.

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Host: At the time, the handful of stories other outlets are publishing about the project are mostly focusing  on the perks the pipeline company is touting – the jobs and tax windfalls they promise. On local TV news, you hear things like: 

Deidre Malone: (on TV) There are so many benefits associated with this Byhalia Connection pipeline.

Host: That’s pipeline spokeswoman Deidre Malone, prominently featured in the story. In fact, she’s the ONLY interview in this particular segment. 

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Deidre Malone: (on TV) You’re going to have hundreds of construction jobs to come into the community, um, and those dollars that are going to follow those construction workers. 

Anchor: Supporters say the proposed route … 

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Host: But Carrington’s coverage would be different from other reporters. 

Carrington Tatum: It’s all about whose voice you choose to amplify. It’s finding the, the person who stands to have the most consequences, and, you know, putting them at the, at the top of the story. 

Host: Ultimately, Carrington will write nearly 40 stories about the Byhalia Connection pipeline over the next year – an astonishing number for a single journalist in a 6-person newsroom. 

Carrington Tatum: To be able to stand up to injustice, to dismantle it, they have to know about it, they have to understand it. And as a result, that information is power. 

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Host: As Carrington turns his eye toward Byhalia, he hones in on some of those new activists in Memphis Community Against the Pipeline. 

Justin J. Pearson: (on Facebook video) Two blocks from where I’m standing right now is where they’re hoping to build a pipeline. 

Host: When Justin, Kathy, and Kizzy founded MCAP, they figured social media would be helpful in getting the word out. Especially during a pandemic. So they start a Facebook group, and begin posting content like this video. 

Justin J. Pearson: (on Facebook video) I know that to some people, this just looks like grass and land, but it’s really some memories here. It’s really some dreams here. It’s… 

Host: Justin becomes the defacto spokesperson. As Kathy Robinson explains … 

Kathy Robinson: Justin could get in front of that camera and talk at the drop of a dime. Kizzy and I couldn’t do that. Like you put that microphone in his face, that man could sound so eloquent. And I think with his voice, like he could appeal to the masses. 

Justin J. Pearson: (on Facebook video) They believed that even in a place like this, there was hope. There was love. There was possibility. And there was a God.

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Carrington Tatum: I reached out to Justin via Facebook. 

Host: Carrington saw those videos too.

Carrington Tatum: And said, ‘Hey, you know, I’m looking at a story over, over this pipeline.’ Set up a time to talk.

Host: At this point in the fight, MCAP isn’t just attracting the attention of a local reporter, it’s gaining support in the community – from regular folks at least.

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Kathy Robinson: Politicians are still kind of like, enh, you know, ‘Who, who the hell is Justin Pearson, Kathy Robinson and Kizzy Jones?’ You know, like whatever. So we’re like, okay, let’s have a rally. 

Host: So they plan one for mid-December. 

Justin J. Pearson: (on Facebook video) And so today at 1:00 PM, we hope that you join us at our socially distanced community rally against the pipeline. 

Host: They promote the rally on Facebook, hand out flyers with the Boxtown Neighborhood Association, and invite reporters and local elected officials. Kathy remembers one particular email exchange with a state senator they invited.

Kathy Robinson: She was telling me that these people were dotting their I’s and crossing their T’s and they had done everything correctly.

Host: Basically saying ‘Byhalia has applied for all the necessary permits, so the best we can do is make sure they follow state law as they build.’ Kathy emails her back. 

Kathy Robinson: These old people in this neighborhood, they vote you in for a reason. They are one of your biggest voting blocks in this community. Because when that community center opens when it’s time to vote, the young people ain’t rushing to get in line at seven o’clock. It’s the people like my momma, Johnnie Mae Robinson. They there before the doors open. And all you going to say is there ain’t nothing that you can do? These people depend on you. You ain’t going to try to fight for them at all? Really!? 

Host:  Kathy’s argument must have been persuasive because a short while later …

Kathy Robinson: Got a phone call! (laughing)  Right? So like I’m putting the dots together. Like, okay, calling out politicians, like that can get you somewhere. They don’t like it. Okay. I will do that then.

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Host: That state senator ended up attending the rally in person, along with dozens of other people. 

Justin J. Pearson: And the crowd is diverse, right? Cause we got like a Protect Our Aquifer group – more white folks. We got our group – more Black folk. And so it’s just like, it’s looking beautiful. 

Justin J. Pearson: (at rally) We are galvanizing as a community and I am so proud to be here with you …

Host: For those who couldn’t make it in person, MCAP also live-streams the event. A solid move, in or out of a pandemic, because it draws in other participants, including – perhaps most importantly – their U.S. Congressman. MCAP doesn’t know it yet, but Congressman Steve Cohen will quickly become one of their biggest supporters and will throw his weight behind the pipeline fight, raising concerns about the Byhalia Pipeline everywhere from Congress to the White House and every federal agency involved with the decision. 

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Kathy Robinson: (at rally) For those of you who are unaware, we are here today  … 

 

Host: Kathy Robinson gets everybody up to speed on the pipeline.

 

Kathy Robinson: (at rally) They called us the path of least resistance. 

 

Audience: (at rally) Come on!

 

Host: During this first rally, Justin admits that MCAP didn’t actually have all that much information to share.

Justin J. Pearson: But the goal was actually to learn as much as we could from the community, like, ‘What do you all know, right, that we don’t?’  

(clapping)

Host: After the planned speeches are over … 

Justin J. Pearson: (at rally) If people can line up here, six feet apart … 

Justin J. Pearson: We open it up for public comment. Who are they commenting to? God? I don’t know. Us? 

Host: One unexpected speaker is Marie Odum, who comes up to the mic with a stack of paper in her hands.

Marie Odum: (at rally) I’m here because my father owns some land. 

Host: She explains that the pipeline company is fighting her 80-year old father Clyde Robinson for a piece of his family land in Boxtown. In fact, they’d been dragged to court two days earlier.

Marie Odum: (at rally) So they trying to take his land. (crowd reacts with disbelief) I got the paperwork here y’all. 

Audience: (at rally) Come on! 

Justin J. Pearson: Marie Odum. The last person to speak out of a line of about 25. 

Marie Odum: (at rally) My father has worked this land for 64 years. 

Audience: (at rally) Ohhh! 

Justin J. Pearson: He’s been cutting this yard for 64 years, since he was a teenager. They tried to take us to court once before, and the judge gave us 30 more days because they didn’t serve us the papers correctly. And we need some help, cause we got to go back to court.

Marie Odum: (at rally) So we need some help. 

Justin J. Pearson: Changed the movement in that moment. Because it was no longer just folks fighting the broader issue about the pipeline. It was a particular person that we were desperate to meet and get to know. 

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Host: At the end of the rally, Justin and Kathy catch up with Marie and her father Clyde. 

Justin J. Pearson: I said, “Oh, we’re going to get you a lawyer.” 

Kathy Robinson: Justin’s telling him like, ‘Yeah we got some lawyers for you.’ We really didn’t at the time, right? (laughing)

Justin J. Pearson: No clue how we were going to do that, but I said, ‘We’re going to get you a lawyer, and I promise you, you won’t go into court by yourself, come January.’  

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Host: It was risky to promise a lawyer, but Justin says he was feeling pretty optimistic, in part, because he knew the Southern Environmental Law Center had recently joined the pipeline fight. They also produce this podcast, by the way. SELC is known for its expertise in environmental law, fighting on behalf of the public and community groups – not representing individuals in court cases. But Justin had a hunch they could help. 

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Host: Meanwhile, SELC’s Nashville office was hard at work, trying to get a handle on all the facts at play. 

Amanda Garcia: It was all hands on deck.

Host: Attorney Amanda Garcia is the director of the Nashville office.

Amanda Garcia: Everybody was working on an element of the Byhalia pipeline case in our office.

Host: The team began meeting weekly to plot their strategy, to decide, as attorney George Nolan says:

George Nolan: What are the next steps? What are the big. friction points? What fights are we going to get into this week? 

Host: I should say here that the fights George is talking about are not exactly knock-down-drag out fights. More like “strongly worded letters” and ‘respectful requests for more information.’ But that’s how a legal case gets built.

Amanda Garcia: You’re really like a detective. You’re putting together pieces that the company or the defendant doesn’t want you to put together – has intentionally left separate.

Host: Because Byhalia seemed to be withholding a lot of information, the attorneys did what they often do in this situation. 

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Amanda Garcia: We submitted public records requests. 

Host: Using the Freedom of Information Act – also known as FOIA – SELC requests records from the two government agencies that need to issue permits to Byhalia before construction can begin. 

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Host: SELC knows these permits are potential game-changers: if they aren’t granted in the first place, then the company can’t build, and landowners like Clyde Robinson are in the clear. One of the agencies they FOIA is the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation, also known as TDEC. Along with many other duties, it’s responsible for protecting water in the state, so it has to issue a permit before the pipeline can cross streams or wetlands. The only catch is …

Amanda Garcia: Generally, the state doesn’t require the permit for impacts that are solely to groundwater. 

Host: Groundwater – meaning the aquifer. As SELC had discovered through its own mapping research, the crude oil pipeline would zig zag through a drinking water wellfield, and near breaches in the aquifer’s protective clay layer that make it especially vulnerable to pollution. Surely that would change the way TDEC weighed its permitting decision, right? … Actually, no. When SELC finally got responses to their FOIA request from the two permitting agencies:

Amanda Garcia: The information that we got showed an alarming lack of awareness. And I was shocked that neither had apparently any even idea that this pipeline would run through a drinking water wellfield. Let alone, you know, any inclination to stop it from doing so.

Ward Archer: We were pretty much begging them not to approve it.

Host: Ward Archer from Protect Our Aquifer couldn’t believe it either.  

Ward Archer: Do you realize we have an aquifer? You know, you, you’re not even considering it. ‘Nope, can’t consider it because it’s not part of our job.’ 

Host: So when TDEC ultimately approves the state permit, Amanda and Ward are disappointed, but not surprised. 

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Host: But the pipeline isn’t a done deal yet. Because it will span so-called “Waters of the United States,” Byhalia also needs FEDERAL permission to cross all the creeks, streams and wetlands in the pipeline’s path. And the company is pursuing a single, streamlined permit for all of them. It’s called “Nationwide Permit 12” and it’s issued by the Army Corps of Engineers. 

Amanda Garcia: Nationwide Permit 12 allows pipeline developers to get permits without going through a full public-facing evaluation, without having to put a draft permit out for public comment without having to, you know, understand or look at alternatives. So it’s really a way for pipeline companies to sneak under the radar.  

Host: SELC writes a detailed letter to the Army Corps laying out all of the reasons they should deny the permit – including environmental justice concerns and worries about the aquifer. While they await the Army Corps’ response, SELC turns its attention to another cruciall piece of the pipeline puzzle: the landowners. 

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Host: Even if he pipeline company gets the federal permit, it still needs to acquire land rights along the pipeline’s path. If it can’t secure those, it has to re-route. And that may be enough to kill the project. But the clock is ticking. At this point, Byhalia Connection has already spent more than a year in hush-hush negotiations with individual residents for rights to cross their land. There might not be many holdouts left. As Kizzy Jones saw it:

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Kizzy Jones: Byhalia was trying to take people’s property, but tried to make it sound good. Offer you this money and you can still stay here, but you can’t build on it.

Host: The pipeline company wanted landowners to sign so-called “easements” that would give the company permanent control over a piece of their land. Folks like Clyde Robinson who refused to sign were threatened with lawsuits. Believe or not, that’s legal …we’ll get more into why in our next episode. In the meantime, MCAP and SELC wanted to help, so they set out to find other landowners who’d yet to sign.

Justin J. Pearson: George and I and Amanda were on the phone, uh, and sending emails back and forth about which land owners, uh, have been sued and where did they live? 

Host: This is Justin.

Justin J. Pearson: And it was literally going out there into the community, knocking on the door saying, Hey, I know you don’t know me, uh, but I understand that you’ve been sued. Or if you don’t know that you’ve been sued, you have. All the way to Kathy and Kizzy and folks going on Facebook and trying to find people online that way. 

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Kizzy Jones: I couldn’t sleep. And I work at night, but I couldn’t sleep.

Host: Kizzy says the adrenaline of the fight was keeping her up.

 Kizzy Jones: I was literally up maybe 18, 20 hours a day. 

Host: But she put that time to good use, researching property records.

Kathy Robinson: Kizzy, like, man, she’s a monster on the Shelby County land banking thing. She can tell you anything about the land, property, anything. So Kizzy was like our navigator. 

Host: As MCAP went house to house, they found a number of residents who had already signed easements, some receiving paltry payment in exchange. Kathy remembers meeting a woman who co-owned land with her cousins. 

Kathy Robinson: Some of them got checks for like 300 bucks. One time payments. And they were saying, okay, these people about to make billions. 

Justin J. Pearson: One person said, you know, my, my piece was so small, it wouldn’t have made a difference. All of this makes a difference, you know?

Host: Kizzy remembers one particular man who had already signed because he felt he had no other choice. 

Kizzy Jones: He was like, ‘I felt like my back was against the wall. I didn’t have no money to fight this company. So yeah, I took the money.’ They preyed on the poor. That’s not right. It’s not right at all. 

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Host: Both Kizzy and Kathy actually have their own stories of family land loss. Remember Kathy’s Great Grandma Leara, the gardener? 

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Host: She grew up in Oxford, Mississippi where Leara and her siblings inherited 30 acres of land when their father passed. 

Kathy Robinson: I guess there were locals that wanted to buy it. Of course my family didn’t want to sell. And so what some of the, uh, whites did was told them that either they had to fence the land in or sell it, which of course this is 30 acres of land. She was basically a day worker. I mean, she didn’t have money to put a fence up. 

Host: So Great Grandma Leara was forced to sell her family’s land, surrendering the generational inheritance for her children and grandchildren. As Kathy knows, it’s an experience shared by innumerable Black Americans since Reconstruction ended in the 1870s.

Kathy Robinson: At one point, Blacks owned millions of acres of land in the United States. And now we don’t even come close to that. So we look at those type of tactics and now we see how we’ve gotten where we are. 

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Kathy Robinson: That’s one of the sad stories, and I think what really meant something to ME as I started to fight this fight. 

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Host: Needless to say, the pipeline company wasn’t talking about  generational land loss. Instead, it was publicizing its own generosity.

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Carrington Tatum: Byhalia pipeline arrived in Memphis with gifts in one hand and plans for a crude oil pipeline in the other, and called both community investments. 

Host: That’s Carrington Tatum, reading from an article he wrote about the donations from Byhalia.

Carrington Tatum: But what is charity to the Texas corporation is manipulation to critics who see it as a tactic to buy support and weaken opposition to the project. 

Host: As Carrington reported, the Byhalia Connection Corporation pumped more than a million dollars in donations into local organizations in Memphis and Mississippi, including churches, schools, and food banks.

Carrington Tatum: The company said they did that to be good neighbors, to be community partners, but not everybody in the community saw it that way.

Host: Carrington’s article was titled, “Charity or Manipulation?” 

Carrington Tatum: That was a very difficult story to write. And I say that because there’s a lot of nuance, because I think historically, like, the news has tried to find one spokesperson for an entire community, but it’s like, people are not a monolith. Black communities are not a monolith. 

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Host: In the story, he references a report produced by the NAACP. It’s called “Fossil Fueled Foolery.”

Carrington Tatum: They identify what they see as tactics that fossil fuel companies use to manipulate communities into accepting projects such as these. And one thing they mention in there is charitable donations. 

Host: Other tactics in the report include exaggerating the level of job creation – check; co-opting community leaders and organizations – check; understating the harms of polluting facilities – check … all tactics seen in Memphis. But according to Carrington, it was the donations themselves that perhaps caused the greatest stir among community members.

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Carrington Tatum: They were not only critical of the company for doing the charity, but critical of some organizations for accepting the donations from this project.

Justin J. Pearson: Yeah! If you want to exploit poor folk, you use money. 

Host: That’s Justin. 

Justin J. Pearson: It is a global pandemic. A lot of nonprofits didn’t survive, a lot of for-profits didn’t survive. So they went around the community, giving $5,000 checks, $25,000 checks.

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Host: The largest check, a quarter of a million dollars, went to the aquifer research program at the University of Memphis, which later said it couldn’t officially take a position on the pipeline. Aside from that sizeable sum, Justin says most of the donations targeted Black-led organizations.

Justin J. Pearson: Most egregiously, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People of Memphis, the NAACP, took $25,000. 

Host: So I just want to reiterate this dynamic. While on one hand, the national NAACP was uncovering tactics used by pipeline companies to win support, the local chapter was accepting a sizeable donation from Byhalia. Money that they promised to use for, quote, “projects focused on uplifting the Memphis community.”  Unquote. But Justin thinks the money served a more important purpose. 

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Justin J. Pearson: To silence the organization. We just call it what it is – it’s all hush money. Right? Because somebody gives you something, you don’t then feel like, oh, I can speak out against it. It’s an obvious tactic to silence people, uh, before they get a sense of what’s going on. And that exploitation before information, it just runs so rampant in these fights.

NAACP Speaker: We’ll wrap you all up at 6:15 then we’ll give the opposing side, then we’ll wrap up the meeting …

Host: In an effort to dampen some of the controversy surrounding donations, the local NAACP chapter invited MCAP to a virtual meeting with its membership to discuss the topic. 

Kizzy Jones: (at meeting) You guys, we’re tired. 

Host: Kizzy Jones spoke.

Kizzy Jones: (at meeting) And they’re using us to tell you all and tell the citizens of Memphis that it’s okay. ‘We gave them this money.’ It’s not right. We are against it, we don’t want it here. You ought to be on board with us. 

Host: The NAACP also invited someone to speak in favor of the donations. 

Deidre Malone: (at meeting) Thank you Mr. President … 

Host: A former chapter president herself, who you can probably guess is Byhalia spokesperson Deidre Malone.

Deidre Malone: And it’s been brought up several times that Plains has made a contribution to the NAACP. Absolutely we have. And that money has gone to organizations that have needed assistance with COVID-19 and there is nothing wrong with that …

Host: Presumably, there were no strings attached to the donations. But the pipeline company spent months promoting the donations on Facebook and Twitter. 

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Host: They also posted the recipients’ names on their website – though at least two organizations later asked to have their names removed. 

Justin J. Pearson: There were some people who, I believe, who could give the money back, who should have. But because of the financial straits that people are in, I also recognize it’s a privilege to be able to give it back. 

Host: For the organizations that couldn’t afford to return the money, Justin said this: 

Justin J. Pearson: Take the money, and don’t lose your voice. Now that you know, speak up and speak out. It’s reparations. 

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Host: While the community is wrestling with donations, Byhalia is pouring more money into marketing campaigns.

MS State Rep Manly Barton: (from video) I’ve said this many times – a pipeline is almost the perfect investment …

MS State Rep Bill Kinkade: (from video) Welcome to Byhalia!

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Host: Carrington Tatum sees these ad campaigns roll out, and community donations pile up, and thinks of the power imbalance.

Carrington Tatum: You know, a landowner can’t buy commercials and ads in the newspaper and billboards to say, you know, ‘I don’t want this pipeline.’ The news can be their only platform. 

Host: With that in mind, Carrington combs through property records, uncovering 34 families who’ve already signed easements in Shelby County. He writes an article about a man named Joseph Owens, who says he was offered “pennies and peanuts” for one tenth of his family land. As so often happens in these cases, he couldn’t afford a lawyer to fight the company off in court, so he signed the easement.  

Carrington Tatum: As he said, it was gloomy for him. And I think that was a sort of turning point where I was like, oh, this, this is a perspective on this issue that hasn’t been shared. And so I often think back to that interview. 

Host: Throughout his reporting, Carrington keeps looking for people who support the pipeline. 

Carrington Tatum: The pipeline company says there are supporters, right? That’s something they told county commission, city council, told me. I asked them to introduce me to some folks. They said they weren’t clear about what my intentions were. So did not meet a resident, was not introduced to a resident or a landowner in Memphis who said I’m excited to have this pipeline. 

Host: What Carrington did find was a confident pipeline company. 

Carrington Tatum: You know, the project seeming – seeming – inevitable at the time

Host: And residents who felt the battle was already lost. 

Carrington Tatum: There were some folks who they felt like there wasn’t a way for them to stand up to a multi-billion dollar corporation. I mean they sort of just had to take their lumps, per se. I think there were other folks who were never, never cool with it. You know, they were always like, you know, I’m gonna fight it, we’ll figure out how. 

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Host: Next time on Broken Ground, we meet one of the landowners who decides to fight … 

Scottie Fitzgerald: They took me to court. I didn’t even know it. 

Host: … and the lawyer who steps up to represent her pro bono.

Scott Crosby: People had already signed. This thing was pretty much close to having a right of way.

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Pria Mahadevan: Broken Ground is a podcast by the Southern Environmental Law Center, one of the nation’s most powerful defenders of the environment, rooted in the South. It’s produced by Emily Richardson-Lorente, Pria Mahadevan, Leanna First-Arai, and Jennie Daley, with assistance from Eli Motycka and Ko Bragg. Our theme music is by Eric Knutson. Special thanks to Ward Archer, who provided archival audio for this episode. To learn more about SELC, MCAP or Protect Our Aquifer, head to Broken Ground Podcast dot org. And if you enjoyed this episode, we’d love it if you’d subscribe and write us a review on your favorite podcast app. Thanks for listening!

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