Open Letter to USDOT Secretary Pete Buttigieg Calling for Comprehensive Solutions to Flooding in Elba, Alabama Shiloh Community Before Leaving Office

Open Letter to USDOT Secretary Pete Buttigieg Calling for Comprehensive Solutions to Flooding in Elba, Alabama Shiloh Community Before Leaving Office

Dear Secretary Pete Buttigieg, I understand you and your top-level appointed officials at the USDOT are preparing to leave their positions given the results of the November 5th elections. Again, I am pleading with you to fully resolve the highway flooding problem and secure funds for binding commitments to cover flood damages to homes, businesses and property in Elba, Alabama's historically Black Shiloh community before the Biden-Harris administration comes to an end on January 20, 2025. We have two months to get justice for the Shiloh community. Let’s not fail them.

Again, the matter of highway flooding in my hometown of Elba is no stranger to you and the USDOT. On February 27 this year, the Bullard Center sponsored a small delegation of Shiloh leaders to meet with Assistant Secretary Christopher Coes and high-level USDOT officials in Washington, DC.  And on April 3 of this year, you and several high-ranking members of your staff, including Assistant Secretary Coes and FHWA Administrator Shailen Bhatt, participating in our “Journey to Justice”  tour of the Shiloh community, talked with flood impacted residents, and saw firsthand the devastation left behind by six-plus years of highway flooding. It's not a pretty picture—a shameful and dark reminder of misuse and abuse of federal transportation tax dollars.

Through no action of their own, Shiloh residents are helpless as their beloved community becomes a small lake after a rainstorm—all due to racism, reckless design and expansion of US 84 highway (that began in 2018 by the Alabama Department of Transportation or ALDOT) under the first Trump administration USDOT. And worse, lack of government response to the Shiloh residents’ complaints about flooding and damage to their homes and property add to growing mistrust of government—including restrictive covenants ALDOT attached to residents’ deeds and unconscionable property settlement agreement that limit the ability of current and future residents to file actions against the state. The persistent flooding is also causing residents to lose homeowners insurance coverage, making them even more vulnerable to future economic losses due to climate change. 

There is an abundance of documentation and irrefutable evidence to show flooding was not a problem in Shiloh before the Alabama DOT (ALDOT) widened US 84 highway from two lanes to four lanes and elevated it, placing the once-flat land in the Shiloh community in a bowl and forcing stormwater downhill to flood its residents.

By applying the widely accepted “polluter pay principle,” it’s clear who caused the problem and where the responsibility for addressing the flooding problem rests.  ALDOT caused highway flooding in the Shiloh community and should be tasked with fixing the highway and also required to pay for the damages and losses suffered by the Shiloh home, business and property owners.

The hard-working Shiloh residents deserve better. They should not have their hard-earned tax dollars used to build a highway project that's destroying their community and stealing their inheritance and intergenerational wealth. It would be shameful and immoral to allow the flooding problem in Shiloh to carry over into the second Trump administration, when it could be fully resolved on your watch under the Biden administration. I doubt you would want your legacy to read, “USDOT Secretary Pete let the Black Shiloh community and homeowners drown.” Yes, racism created the highway flooding problem in Shiloh and it will require environmental justice to fix it.

The October 4 Voluntary Resolution Agreement (VRA) between FHWA and ALDOT was reached on a civil rights discrimination complaint filed by Shiloh homeowners against state agency more than two years ago. The VRA represents binding commitments to fix the highway fix the highway stormwater drainage system. It’s understandable why Shiloh residents see the VRA only as a partial civil rights victory since the agreement does nothing to resolve or compensate residents for property losses, damaged homes and businesses. This is a textbook example of highway robbery. A just solution requires putting in place binding commitments to fully compensate Shiloh residents for more the six-plus years of flood losses and damages to their homes, businesses and property, and offer voluntary buyouts and relocation for those who seek it. That’s the just, fair and equitable thing to do. 

Again, it is important the VRA fix the highway stormwater drainage problem. And it is equally important that binding commitments and an agreement to address damaged homes, property and businesses be reached before this administration ends because it is unlikely the next USDOT under a second Trump administration would be inclined to resolve highway flood damages and losses of Shiloh residents that were caused by ALDOT under the first Trump administration USDOT.

Finally, ALDOT caused the problem and ALDOT should be held accountable to pay for a comprehensive solution—not a “partial fix” as contained in the VRA. So Secretary Pete, the clock is ticking for you to step up and make the flooded Shiloh community residents whole before time runs out for them on your watch.  It's the just thing to do and the right time to do it. And you need to act with the urgency of now!