HAYWOOD COUNTY, Tenn. — Tennessee's newest car manufacturer is revving up construction on its plant, BlueOval City, in Haywood County. The state of Tennessee is using eminent domain to take over land to connect the new multi-billion dollar Ford plant to the interstate.
Black farmers and landowners in the area say the Tennesee Department of Transportation (TDOT) is only offering them a fraction of what their land is worth.
About a year after the Ford Motor Company broke ground on its future $5.6 billion electric truck plant, residents in Fayette and Haywood County said signs of economic growth are becoming more obvious.
Still, they said that growth is coming at the cost of their real estate.
"We want to see BlueOval transform our little small community into what we know it’s going to be in the future," Ray Jones, the owner of a historic water spring in the area, said. "However, there have been some drawbacks.”
Those living around the new Ford site say the problem is that a road will go right through property owned by their families — in some cases for generations.
"It made me feel like [I] was losing a part of what belonged to me for so long," Rosa Whitmore, an 82-year-old who lives in a ranch-style house built on land that adjoins Ray Jones’, said.
Some farmers and landowners near the Ford plant's new campus are excited by the project but say, just like Jones, the state is lowballing them.
“The offer that they made was less than $10,000 for the entire property and the mineral spring," Jones said.
Jones, a retired school teacher who now directs the Boys & Girls Club of Brownsville, TN, said he was served with an eminent domain lawsuit earlier this year — an attempt by TDOT to acquire the water spring that has been in his family since 1930 located on a road that's now named after his great-grandfather.
"I am a descendant of an African American mineral water spring," Jones said. "My great grandfather, Wesley Jones, discovered this spring and it was one of the greatest things that have ever happened in West Tennesee and across the nation. People came from all over the United States to buy this water."
The BlueOval project which is about 2 miles from his property, he thought would provide an opportunity to revitalize his family’s nearly 100-year-old business. Instead, it has ignited a legal fight between the TDOT and landowners in this largely Black farming region.
"I think the state should do the right thing, meaning TDOT, and make sure that these people have access to their property and give them fair value for their property," Haywood County commissioner Jeffery Richmond said.
The Ford plant is expected to employ nearly 6,000 people directly and many more in surrounding communities.
Jones says he does not blame Ford, he blames the state.
“From family member to family member, from generation to generation — how would you feel if this happened to you?" Jones asked. "How would you feel if this happened to you? How would you feel if you were just stripped of something that was God-given to you? This mineral water spring is a natural God-given spring — man didn’t make this spring.”
Black landowners united against history of land loss & devaluing
For decades, laws and interstate highway systems, have contributed to Black landowners losing their land and the potential generational wealth attached to it, according to a study published by the American Bar Association.
The study estimates that some Black landowners, in times past, in 17 (mostly southern) states that comprised over 90 percent of all Black-owned farmland lost land worth about $326 billion in total.
Haywood County community members said Tuesday the state's use of eminent domain in 2023 is no different than in decades prior.
About ten miles away from Whitmore-Miller’s and Jones' property, Marvin Sanderlin and his family are also fighting with the state to keep their land or sell portions of it for a higher price.
According to TDOT, they are currently working to acquire 31 tracts of land in the area and Friday, April 21 Sanderlin called a meeting to unite his neighbors as they seek their "fair share."
"The land lock — the cheap price they are paying us," Sanderlin said. "We [are] not fighting the road. We know the road [is] coming, and we want a fair price for our land."
In a statement to ABC24, TDOT said the following:
"TDOT is excited for the new economic opportunities and prosperity Blue Oval City will bring to West Tennessee. While the department makes every effort to avoid private property when maintaining or building existing or future highways, TDOT may be required to make a formal request to purchase individual property for road projects for the best-engineered solution. TDOT follows federal and state law to maintain the standard process for purchasing property at fair market value based on third-party independent appraisal reports."
Mr. Jones tells ABC24 he expects to have his first official court hearing concerning eminent domain in July of 2023.