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Why is the rate of incarceration in Louisiana so high? How do we critique the way prisons are part of infrastructural solutions to anthropocenic instabilities? As Angela Davis writes, “prisons do not disappear social problems, they disappear human beings. Homelessness, unemployment, drug addiction, mental illness, and illiteracy are only a few of the problems that disappear from public view when the human beings contending with them are relegated to cages.” One way of imagining and building a vision of an anti-carceral future is practiced in the Solitary Gardens project here in New Orleans: 

The Solitary Gardens are constructed from the byproducts of sugarcane, cotton, tobacco and indigo- the largest chattel slave crops- which we grow on-site, exposing the illusion that slavery was abolished in the United States. The Solitary Gardens utilize the tools of prison abolition, permaculture, contemplative practices, and transformative justice to facilitate exchanges between persons subjected to solitary confinement and volunteer proxies on the “outside.” The beds are “gardened” by prisoners, known as Solitary Gardeners, through written exchanges, growing calendars and design templates. As the garden beds mature, the prison architecture is overpowered by plant life, proving that nature—like hope, love, and imagination—will ultimately triumph over the harm humans impose on ourselves and on the planet.

"Nature" here is constructed in a very particularistic way: as a redemptive force to harness in opposition to the wider oppressive system the architecture of a solitary confinement cell is a part of. It takes a lot of intellectual and political work to construct a counter-hegemonic nature, in other words. Gardeners in this setting strive toward a cultivation of relations antithetical to the isolationist, anti-collective sociality prisons (and in general, a society in which prisons are a permanent feature of crisis resolution) foster.

My interest in NOLA anthropocenics pivots on water, and particularly the ways in which capitalist regimes of value and waste specify, appropriate, and/or externalize forms of water. My research is concerned with water crises more generally, and geographically situated in Flint, Michigan. I thought I could best illustrate these interests with a sampling of photographs from a summer visit to NOLA back in 2017. At the time, four major confederate monuments around the city had just been taken down. For supplemental reading, I'm including an essay from political theorist Adolph Reed Jr. (who grew up in NOLA) that meditates on the long anti-racist struggle that led to this possibility, and flags the wider set of interventions that are urgently required to abolish the landscape of white supremacy. 

Flooded street after heavy rains due to failures of city pumping infrastructure.

A headline from the same week in the local press.

Some statues are gone but other monuments remain (this one is annotated).

A Starbucks in Lakeview remembering Katrina--the line signifies the height of the water at the time.

Reading:

Adolph Reed Jr., “Monumental Rubbish” https://www.commondreams.org/views/2017/06/25/monumental-rubbish-statues-torn-down-what-next-new-orleans

P.S. In case the photos don't show up in the post I'm attaching them in a PDF document as well! 

• Many of the 50,000 residents of Ironbound are overburdened by polluting facilities and air pollutants from the second largest seaport in the country, an international airport, and rail lines.

• 25% percent of the children in the community suffer from asthma, which is three times the state average.

• The technical resources developed for the Ironbound community can be used by other communities across the country to develop their own air monitoring programs in areas where pollution is a concern.

Yes they have a way in plan to help address this issue to be resolved over the next couple years. Working with the commission, the students to help create better and improved ways to deal with sewage waste. Already there is a "solids and floatables" control that has been in place, which has significantly helped reduce the space that trash and other objects to not take up space that could be used by the water flow. This has also reduced the amount of trash that was getting dumped into waterways. 

The main point of the article was that EPA researchers input portable air sensors that monitor levels of particulate matter and nitrogen oxide- pollutants that cause short and long-term health effects and are regulated under Clean Air Act. The goal was to get good on-the-ground air quality data for our environmental justice community. Data that is collected, understood, and used by those being directly impacted by the pollution. This was supported by the input of EPA air sensors installed into the communities. 

The membership is comprised of the Passaic Valley Sewage Commission working in hands with New Jersey Future. The NJ future consist of students from their own communities so boht working together, the community and the commission help build and work better together towards creating better and quick solutions. 

Yes, filing complaints in one way might help reduce pollution but it won't completely eliminate it. I think by filing complaints, it does give the issue precendence in coming to the top so people become more aware by it, but along wiht complaining people need to take action and come up with plans to resolve the complaints.