On Tuesday, the U.S. Department of the Interior, at the prompting of state officials, announced that the 11-mile stretch of Great River Road along the west bank of the Mississippi River would be withdrawn from consideration as a National Historic Landmark District. This prestigious designation would have enshrined protections against industrialization for the last stretch of rural land between Baton Rouge and New Orleans.
Now, the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality (LDEQ) sees the agricultural River Road landscape as prime pickings for new industrial development.
“It is indeed a time for us to celebrate,” said St. John the Baptist Parish President Jaclyn Hotard. “This is a wonderful day because we’re sending the message to everyone that the river region is open for business.”
The governor also rejoiced about the Department of Interior’s decision. “If you really want to lift people out of poverty, you get them work and increase job opportunity,” said Gov. Jeff Landry. “I appreciate DEQ’s work to protect Louisiana’s environment while considering new projects like the Greenfield Grain Elevator, that bring jobs to Louisiana.”
The governor’s statement struck at the hearts of some residents in St. John Parish, who spent the last two years fighting to keep Greenfield from building its massive grain terminal – with an elevator as tall as the Superdome – within the small town of Wallace, a traditionally Black town settled by Black soldiers who returned home after fighting for the Union during the Civil War.
The land was nominated for National Historic Landmark consideration as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reviewed pending permits to build Greenfield Louisiana LLC’s massive grain elevator and export terminal.
In October, after a year-long study, the National Park Service recommended the 11-mile stretch of River Road in St. John the Baptist Parish as a good candidate for consideration as a National Historic Landmark.
“The history of St. John the Baptist Parish’s west bank reveals how interconnected farming and manufacturing have been across U.S. history,” read the Park Service’s study of River Road. Despite innovations that brought changes—irrigation and updated rice threshers to local farmers, a cotton gin and ice factory to the town of Wallace, a vegetable-packing house in Edgard, a canning factory in Lucy, and rows of sugar mills along River Road, with railroads to transport the sugar – River Road’s landscape has stayed stable throughout the years, the study noted.
“Here, agriculture remained primary even as industry transformed it,” Park Service historians wrote. “This district is therefore of national significance for how it informs the national story of industrialization, a history too often disconnected from agriculture.”
The historic preservation process for development requiring federal permits is guided by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. The act requires that federal agencies, like the Army Corps, take into account the effects that historic and archeological sites face from potential construction projects.
In August, when Greenfield announced its intent to terminate plans for the project, the Park Service asked the Army Corps whether it intended to withdraw consideration for the National Historic Landmark.
The Army Corps declined, reasoning that the answers to the questions posed within the historic context study would streamline future environmental reviews in the area.
Future environmental reviews may have seemed inevitable to Park Service historians, as they looked across the Mississippi to the river’s highly developed East Bank. “Petroleum and natural gas industries developed along the river in the postwar era, but it was really after 1965 that chemical plants emerged in astonishing size and numbers,” the historians wrote. “Where sugarcane once grew, the petrochemical industry now processed, refined, and stored hazardous materials. These sites provided jobs for River Road residents but at a high cost.”
The National Park Service recommendation is viewed differently by Aurelia Giacometto, LDEQ secretary, who said that for the past six months – since the Park Service had deemed Great River Road and the Community of Wallace eligible to become National Historic Landmark Districts – all potential development had halted, across 22,747 acres along the river’s West Bank.
“Eight days after President Trump was sworn into office, Louisiana’s Department of Environmental Quality requested that the new Secretary of Interior reevaluate this determination and we asked them to withdraw their decision,” Giacometto said at an invitation-only press conference held by the Port of South Louisiana.
Last week, Joy Beasley, Associate Director for Cultural Resources, Partnerships, and Science for the National Park Service, told the Army Corps that the October decision to grant eligibility to the historic district was “premature and untimely.”
The withdrawal letter is based on a “hair-splitting” procedural technicality, said Chris Cody, associate general counsel at the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
The decision to withdraw the recommendation for eligibility is rooted in the fact that the recommendation was published without a pending permit application, because Greenfield had pulled their permit request months earlier.
Brian Davis, executive director of the Louisiana Trust for Historic Preservation, said that the decision was based solely on timing. “It doesn’t mean that the West Bank and the village of Wallace aren’t eligible or historic.” It just means that they were not facing a pending construction permit, he said.
In Reserve, at the headquarters of the Port of South Louisiana, many local officials expressed gratitude for the change and hope that the withdrawal would lead to future development along the West Bank of the Mississippi River in St. John Parish.
But Cody said that the Section 106 requirements have not changed—and that all new federal permit applications for properties along River Road will promptly restart the historic preservation process.
Even if Greenfield restarted its plans for the land in Wallace, the company would be required to undergo the same Section 106 process.
And on Wednesday, it seemed like the company was keeping its options open. “While this recent ruling does not change Greenfield’s decision to suspend the grain terminal project, Greenfield remains committed to the Community of Wallace and its potential for development,” said Lynda Van Davis, counsel and head of external affairs for Greenfield.
But the “open for business” announcement frightened some environmental advocates living in the community of Wallace and historic preservationists across the state.
Joy and Jo Banner, co-founders of The Descendants Project, and natives of Wallace who led the fight against Greenfield, saw the unprecedented National Historic Landmark eligibility withdrawal as an attempt to diminish the contributions and significance of Black history, culture, and well-being.
“The fact that the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality sought this review of the designations signals that there is no intention from our local and state governments to protect our communities from environmental harm,” the Banner sisters said in a statement.
Sandra Stokes, chair of advocacy for the Louisiana Landmarks Society, said that the 11 miles in question are an indisputably rich reflection of the history, culture, and resources of Louisiana and the nation. To be studied for an entire year and found eligible for National Historic Landmark status was “a unique and very esteemed honor,” she said. Like Cody, she believes in the strength of the existing historic preservation review process.
“When did we lose sight of the value of our history and culture?” Stokes asked. “Just drive the east side of the river to witness what greed looks like, and how ugly and destructive we can be to historic, generational communities.”