Green Daily

This post is part of a series about environmental justice, or EJ for short. The easiest way to understand EJ is to ask: Broadly speaking, are the costs of environmental degradation distributed consistently with the benefits? For instance, are the countries who are creating the most CO2 emissions suffering the lowest air standards? For a more in-depth definition, visit the EPA, Justice Net, or the Sierra Club.

This New York Times article about the Gullah/ Geechee people's fight to keep their land in Sapelo Island, Georgia, brings up some of the more difficult aspects of environmental justice. Who doesn't think it would be wonderful to live in a beautiful place? Sometimes in our quest to do that we over look those who already live there, whether they are human or more-than-human.

The members of the Hog Hammock community on Sapelo Island are fighting a battle familiar to anyone who has lived in a coastal area: rising property values based on second home and vacation property prospecting. Sapelo, accessible only by limited ferryboat shuttle, has maintained its salt marsh ecosystem, anthropologically valuable shell middens, and its cultural heritage more than most islands. Nearby Hilton Head, Tybee, and St. Simon's islands have all been nearly razed over in builders' attempts to get the most vacation homes possible on the desirable island real estate.

The problem is that as we develop real estate on islands like this, we take away just what makes them attractive. Building too close to the water endangers very delicate sand dune ecosystems. Bright lights along the coast scare away sea turtles, who come ashore to lay their eggs. For the Gullahs on Sapelo, development also endangers the way that they have always lived.

These islands, though, have a history that has been both well-documented and, according to some, unfairly appropriated by outsiders. The Gullah / Geechee people, descendants in part of West African slaves, have preserved some unique language and cultural practices -- one of which is the beautiful basket weaving famous also in Charleston's downtown market. This cultural preservation has come in the face of a number of challenges, not the least of which is higher and higher real estate prices.

In a world with limited land and a population that continues to grow exponentially, where do we find the balance between preserving culture and history and the "free market" property system? Is it possible that we don't place appropriate values on all the values a piece of land can contain?

Read more about the Sapelo Island Cultural and Revitalization Society.