Black Farmers: Pursuing BlueOval Business

 

Thomas Burrell is president of the Black Farmers and
Agriculturalists Association and advocates for Black farmers
like himself. Photo by Patricia Rogers

MEMPHIS, TN – The $5.6 billion dollar Ford Motor Company’s BlueOval City project is being built on farmland in Haywood County, Tenn., approximately 70 miles from Memphis.

While the plant is a boon for Haywood County, Thomas Burrell believes it is an opportunity for Black farmers and landowners in the area to create generational wealth by incorporating and developing the land around BlueOval City.

Burrell is a farmer from Covington, Tenn., and president of the Memphis-based 20,000-member Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association (BFAA), a nonprofit organization.

In 1991, Burrell protested the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) in his hometown for allegedly discriminating against Black farmers. The protest gained traction nationally and morphed into the historic (Pigford v. Glickman) 1999 class-action lawsuit against the USDA. 

The lawsuit alleged racial discrimination against Black farmers in its allocation of farm loans and assistance between 1981 and 1996. It was settled in 2010 during the Obama administration.

Burrell is now focused on creating long-term economic development opportunities for BFAA members who own land in proximity to BlueOval City. 

“We want real wealth creation with an initiative for fair and equitable treatment of Black farmers and landowners who have land on the $5.6 billion dollar Ford Motor Company’s BlueOval City project,” he said.

By 2025, Ford’s mega plant is expected to be the largest facility in the world for manufacturing electric vehicles and batteries. Burrell, however, is looking at the big picture. 

How can Black farmers and landowners benefit from the windfall in Haywood County and not become “victims of the overall economic development process, which often excludes African Americans?” he said.

“We're gonna have to incorporate in order to collaborate,” Burrell said. “It is hard or difficult for Ford Motor Company or General Motors or Nissan to cooperate or collaborate with an unincorporated entity.”

Most of the land that African Americans own – whether it is in Tennessee, Alabama or Kentucky – will be unincorporated, Burrell said, even though “African Americans own millions of acres in this country.”

In some cases, African Americans can’t prove that they own their land, he said, when there isn’t a clear deed or title to the property.

He said unequivocally that “nobody's gonna do business with you if you can't prove that you own it (land). If there's a cloud on a title, why would they want to do business with the person with a defective title to his property?”

Then there’s the issue of eminent domain that concerns Burrell. He said some BFAA members have been asked to surrender some of their land to extend Tennessee State Route 194 into BlueOval City.

“The issue (or grievance) is whether or not they are receiving just compensation,” he said, compared to white farmers and landowners.

However, Burrell believes generational wealth is possible when Black landowners develop a part of their land rather than sell it. “You can't give your grandchildren what you’ve sold,” he said.

“Traditionally, when we look out into the field now, we see cotton and soybeans,” Burrell said. “But if you're next door to an automobile manufacturer that's investing $6 billion, you won't see soybeans; you won't see cotton.” 

He said the new crop will be hotels, restaurants, warehouses, homes, apartments, and other development, including infrastructure. 

But first and foremost, Black farmers and landowners must incorporate “to create a building bloc,” said Burrell, using as an example a member of BFAA whose father incorporated the land before he died decades ago.

He said the member is talking to his neighbors and trying to encourage them to incorporate and collaborate on increasing their acreage to attract mega corporations like BlueOval City.

Corporations, he emphasized, will not do business with “unincorporated entities.” 

Ecumenical leaders fight for black farmers

A group of clergymen comprising The Memphis Ecumenical Action Committee announced their support for the black farmers and their plight for a reasonable settlement from the U.S. government during a press conference on Dec. 30, 2011. Some of the members are, from left, Eric Lincoln, a supporter; Thomas Burrell, president of the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association, Reverend Herbert Lester, pastor of Asbury United Methodist Church; Bishop David Allen Hall Sr., pastor of Temple Church of God in Christ and chairman of the ecumenical group; Bishop E. Lynn Brown, retired prelate of the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church and vice chairman of the ecumenical group; Joseph Trotter, a supporter; and Jesse Barksdale, a farmer and newspaper publisher. (Photo by Wiley Henry)

It was 12 years ago when the United States District Court for the District of Columbia issued a Consent Decree to settle a class action lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture for willfully discriminating against black farmers.

After Timothy Pigford vs. Dan Glickman, United States Department of Agriculture, was settled for $1.25 billion during the Clinton administration, black farmers were certain that long, overdue compensation had finally arrived as redress for some of the innumerable past inequities and injustices that some government agencies and institutions had allegedly conceded to.

However, a group of clergymen, comprising “The Memphis Ecumenical Action Committee,” are appalled that all the hard work that went into securing compensation and justice for black farmers is now being threatened by an executive order that President Obama issued in 2011.

That order, known as Pigford II, “truly nullifies and contravenes the original settlement that was Pigford I,” said Bishop David Allen Hall Sr., who expressed displeasure over the government’s “discrimination” of black farmers at a press conference on December 30, 2011. Bishop Hall is the pastor of Temple Church of God in Christ and the committee’s chairperson.

The President, Bishop Hall pointed out, moved black farmers out of Pigford I into Pigford II and included women and other minorities claiming discrimination as part of the judgment. The latter settlement was capped, he said, “which prevents black farmers from receiving their fair share of the judgment.”

In past decades, African-American clergymen were counted on to support campaigns that were waged against wanton injustices in the African American community. The ecumenical leaders, in this case, have banded together to support Thomas Burrell, president of the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association (BFAA), in his 30-year effort to undergird black farmers.

“We are gathered here today to bring attention to what we consider to be a continued act of racism against an aggrieved group of citizens,” said Burrell, who founded the BFAA in 2000 as an advocacy organization representing 10,000 of 65,000 black farmers, or claimants, across the country. The organization has offices in Memphis.

Dr. Herbert Lester, pastor of Asbury United Methodist Church, said, “When any segment of our community is denied its capacity to function as it should, then all of us are victimized by that.”

Bishop E. Lynn Brown, retired prelate of the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church and vice chairman of the ecumenical group, urged the African-American church and its members to support Burrell and the BFAA.

“We can stop this gross injustice that’s been the case,” said Bishop Brown, his voice resonating around the room.

Although he’d indicated his appreciation for President Obama, he bellowed, “We hope this will happen… and if it won’t, we will work diligently… and we will bury the opposition so deep it will take a billion pounds of baking powder to raise it from the dead.” 

Bishop Hall concluded, “We are going to push this effort forward until we do get satisfaction. It’s essential and it’s only fair.”

The group is urging the Obama administration to return black farmers to Pigford I, which is closed to new or late Black farmers claimants, and vowed to take the fight all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court if their request is denied.

“Pigford I is sufficient to enforce our rights as Congress intended under Section 741,” the group argues.