Gulfport holds meeting on controversial road project. Some Black neighbors call it ‘useless.’

Gulfport will not conduct an environmental impact statement (EIS) to review the controversial “Interconnecting Gulfport” proposed road project, according to an engineer with the firm contracted to design the project.

The city proposes building a road extending Airport Road westward from its current intersection with U.S. 49 through a patch of undeveloped wetlands. Its route would traverse a new overpass over Interstate 10 before ending in currently undeveloped land on the north side of the interstate, with access to Daniel Road and Canal Service Road.

The city says the road would ease congestion on U.S. 49. But residents of Forest Heights and Turkey Creek, two majority Black communities downstream of the proposed road, have long charged that the project would exacerbate existing flooding problems in their communities.

A public hearing was held Wednesday at the Gulfport Premium Outlets mall, where the city presented its plans. The meeting was attended by city officials, including Mayor Billy Hewes, as well as engineers from Neel-Schaffer, the firm designing the road.

Steve Twedt, Neel-Schaffer’s South Mississippi area manager, told the Sun Herald at the meeting why project designers won’t conduct an EIS.

An EIS is a type of review required under federal environmental law for projects of a certain size and impact. Its requirements are more stringent than those of an environmental assessment (EA). On the Interconnecting Gulfport website, the city has released a “Preliminary Environmental Assessment” for the project.

“This project doesn’t rise to the level of needing an EIS because it doesn’t have any significant impacts,” Twedt said. “This project, any impact it has is not significant.”

Activists have accused the city of using the road project as a way to facilitate development on the currently inaccessible wetlands west of U.S. 49.

These charges brought on an ongoing federal civil rights investigation within the Department of Transportation, which funded the road project.

Public comments

On the Interconnecting Gulfport website, which contains the plans for the road, Wednesday’s hearing was advertised as a venue for residents “to view project exhibits and to speak to representatives concerning the project.”

Attendees could ask questions, see maps of the development displayed on tables and record comments. There were no microphones or other means for attendees to address officials before the room as a whole.

But Louie Miller, director of the Mississippi Sierra Club, told the Sun Herald, called the public hearing a “con job” because the format didn’t allow for comments to be presented to attendees.

“This is a complete con job in the sense that this is not a public hearing,” Miller said. “If it’s a public hearing, you’re here to hear what the public says.”

To Sammie Wiseman, a Turkey Creek resident and an organizer with the National Council of Negro Women, the event format suggested the officials didn’t plan to use any of the public input provided.

“This is just a useless meeting, because everything has already been done. You have plans, you have your data,” she told the Sun Herald, gesturing at the tables with plans.

But Twedt said he plans to use the input provided regarding the design of a stormwater mitigation pond.

“I want some public input so that we can kind of see what people would like [the pond] to look like,” Twedt told the Sun Herald. “Would they like it to be a recreational area or do they want to fence it off? Are they concerned about, you know, kids getting in the pond?”

Howard Page, a member of the North Gulfport Community Land Trust who opposes the project, said not conducting an EIS is a “ludicrous idea” for a project of this size, and with so many local opponents.

Twedt said the current plan for the road project already accounts for environmental factors.

“Everything is able to be mitigated. Like we’re filling some wetlands, we’re able to mitigate that through wetlands banks,” Twedt said.

This story was originally published July 13, 2022 at 9:22 PM.