Nations Climate Conference on the americans recognize their responsibilities as a global citizens and were taking action to combat Climate Change. Thats all for now faultlines is coming up though they visit the u. S. City of houston a month after Hurricane Harvey more news for you after that stay with us. This is the place that we buy the name a movement of young women and young sons the bad and the man. All my kids and i have been here five girls and two boys. Modern im the friend. That. I love most and im going to stay now until im back. Rizzi new whitfield has lived in this house in Houston Texas for nearly seventy years than her him Harvey Melancon and august twenty seventeen. When the water started coming in the kitchen and i went in and i was balkany im gonna have some believe all you want is me i couldnt believe it i looked at the bag knowing it was just like a lake i mean so much of. One trillion gallons of water bill in the houston area over a four day period by far the most rainfall in u. S. History more than ninety people died three with the stuff like you would know all of the workers that go with it. Its just pretty good at. This time we had to keep it and we lost everything again. For. A day that i knew my mom noticed and opuss for me that i dont have writers ladislaus too hot is that most of the matter. In houston hurricane herbie hit everywhere but after the waters recede. Will there be an equal recovery. You cant go with a clean slate assuming that harvey affected everybody with you because of this. Have you gotten help from the red cross or fema or the city you know we have a witness who. Lied to the red cross and i havent heard from him and remove has denied me so youve received no assistance you know this is dont know. Are you worried about losing your home minister. Its time. To leave theyre going to recover. I have to see these haves and have nots that also translates into who gets the best of things when it comes to flood protection and who gets left out. A month after her be hit when Media Attention has moved elsewhere faultlines travel to houston just the storm will deepen the citys social and economic divide. You know something the mother that my last superman you know i want to have the last time i will give up an opponent who. Will sell you must come to me and some last time im going to leave us again i mustnt love life i mean if i was still with us on that i mean now. This is Clayton Holmes its a Public Housing development for some of houstons borst residents. A real an heiress and her family lived here. She was nine months pregnant when the hurricane hit just cape with her husband mother and four kids days after evacuating she gave birth and where you living now said one of the most of. These houses were some of the worst hit. Residents were left to look for a new place to live. And to go home out of reverend James Caldwell is a Community Leader whos helped residents clean up their homes. A health study funded by the New York Times found the floodwaters in one home here contain toxins. The levels of eco live bacteria were over a hundred times higher than whats deemed safe. In one familys kitchen they also found high levels of lead arsenic and other horrible metals. During the hurricane twenty million gallons of sewage water overflowed from plants all over the region. Reverend caldwell took us to see marias house well read here take a look at in this hall what youll see here is just like every unit in this area in this section. People dead had to get out they they left everything. That they had and you about the what that was. You see what a lot of the hole was. Three to four feet easily what when you look at this one this is someones life history everything now who they are the identity they call for a while longer while she have a lot of good options in terms of where to go or where to move to. That is still up in the air why and its not just for her but for thousands of others i will they become one their life and live with everything thats gone i would hear it. And i mean how do you read purchase regain some of the moment one how did you do that one on me without any assistance and invited thank kogan youre being denied by the head crossing team on anything thats going to help you. Maintain a normal way of life what will you be able to move back into the home. Do you know where youll go. During the hurricane cleaned homes was especially vulnerable because it sits on the edge of this waterway the buffalo by you. When you say if ever homes. Further downstream is manchester a majority Latino Community one third of the residents here live in poverty. Its located near houston shipping channel one of the largest petrochemical complexes in the world. Well over a dozen plants in the region reported spills or leaks gerry harvey. Dr Robert Bullard is known as the father of the Environmental Justice movement. Hes found that minority neighborhoods are at more risk to industrial pollution than other communities its ok to put a landfill incinerator garbage dump refinery in black and brown communities to say somehow that even in a city like houston where we dont have zoning but if you look at and map vulnerability and proximity of these dangerous facilities theyre not randomly distributed. Race maps with vulnerability and pollution maps with race and class and race is the most potent factor that determines where these were so its a located. This is where houston and channel me of it are ya know works for the texas Environmental JusticeAdvocacy Services or take up to see the tanks the storage tanks that are lying flat thats manchester the Group Believes that environmental protections are not in place for the People Living here you have huntsman chemical on the chemical. Refining texas port recycling and then twenty six lanes of Union Pacific rail transporting chemical and crude oil products. This is. It houses over ninety three steel Carbon Storage tanks of nothing but chemical and crude products you can notice the tanks themselves are right next to these homes there are homes all around these tanks were. There are so as the rains were hitting all of these tanks the floodwaters were flushing their way into peoples yards. This chair here selling memory and is in the top one percent of most toxic schools in the entire nation so all those kids theyre going out playing during recess are completely exposed. To whats going on right next to them. During Natural Disasters emergencies maintenance and start up and shut down events you have just a reckless amount of emissions that make their way into the local communities. Weve basically tracked or have been tracking. Over five Million Pounds of emissions that were released in the impacted areas. Hydrogen cyanide and so for dioxide one three including. All of these are extremely toxic and hazardous to human health there absolutely no permissible amounts. Of things like benzene the Valero Energy refinery is streets away from where children play. After the hurricane this facility reported to the state Environmental Agency that it leaked chemicals including cancer causing vincy. But no ones going to get a ticket no ones going to get a fine no ones going to. Look for it because of any of these emissions. In communities near the shipping channel theres a feeling that theres little accountability when leaks happen and after the hurricane it was a sense of urgency to change that. We call this company right here the stinky one because every time you drive through here youll smell how bad it is ive been here for thirty seven years and i know how many how many years of my life ive lost i mean i here in this in this environment but its home like you hear one florist works for a group that wants to start training residents to test air quality for themselves during Hurricane Harvey there was a big slow build the happen right over here and ill show you right now from my juggling day that australian almost half a Million Barrels of gas laying us both in the area and that goes back to what people were smelling during harvey was a very heavy petrol gasoline smell. No we had never smelled before in the area magellan said that they contain the spill but they acknowledge that there were arab nations including been seen are there are known respiratory issues for kids who grow up in this area theres a lot of people who would say their kids have asthma as was a big big thing i hear i kind of feel bad for some of the people who live in his apartment complex quite a few people live here and a lot of times people dont really understand whats going on or dont know what the dangers are. With the bucket we were doing her testing because its our our planet trying to educate the residents and how they can do samples at home and get those samples to us and we can find out exactly what it is theyre smelling and whats. He going so its a vacuum. Then i just say dissolve. You see the areas is. Weve got more than enough in there right after you can see this definitely. The right to breed is a basic human right to talk about every day occurrences and thats what makes harvey and Environmental Justice issues and that we have to address some of the preexisting conditions that that many communities have to grapple with. How fast you recover from a Natural Disaster theres a lot to do with where you live. Low income and minority neighborhoods a few are resources to help them. When you talk about who has resilience who has the money the resources and who has historically had the level of investments that go to protecting very wealthy neighborhoods you can see that theres imbalance. Greens point in North Houston is one of the poorest they were but in the city. The Shopping Mall here has turned into an emergency relief center. This lie which goes on and on and on can only be measured in the thousands and thousands of people have been out here in the sun for hours waiting to get basically food stamps this isnt the normal for Stamp Program all these people to paul five had to be affected by Hurricane Harvey. I think it was kind of wanted it. To be in the situation like i mean you. Have to understand how much revenue to lose their license when. Were not home has been three weeks just three weeks and then we got hardly headaches its problems straightest were you surprised to get moms home alone yes i was in shock and im still upset when hes going to take you cant i didnt realize we had that many people and we dont really line up i mean everybodys heard. Many of the people lined up will be seem to day in this line will close in just days whatever oh. My i feel you i know. Marina and her stepchildren have been doing what they can to help people affected by the hurricane i went. My friend is in the line he takes me a similar you know compass they have a lot of older people they need water and i dont know how to say nobody shes an undocumented immigrant so she can apply for the food Disaster Program or self even though this is the second time the home is flooded and shes lost everything i get donations move forward and what i did was my people food off. We not getting enough you know. What. Im. Getting the feeling now coming around are you serious that. This is the hand that going to fall and be honest that. This. Well you know perhaps a ballroom. Got in the front of the right if you say but after the final. Bring the losing greens point because they were in here is cheap but that comes at a cost. The majority of apartment buildings here light inside the flood so. The areas flooded at least five times since two thousand and one. Im thankful im. Going to have dinner together. Right here. And im like a river out here. Thats when i started coming in. The water to start the rice. I mean my husband we were sitting outside watching just the water go or. I was crying. We were just. Recovering from the last one. Hurt. By the name. Of your life. Youre worried about staying in this apartment and being flooded again yeah are you going to stay. When i finish you doing little go somewhere else you. Might start playing. Theres a third because where every have it ok you dont ok. Because my husband you know this is my husband my husband. And i know i have the most of my story. Among guy. Ok so i mean. You would go to sleep somewhere else or. Heres to if you noticed but theres not like Affordable Housing choices all over to. Places that dont get flooded so why. Theyre. Going to higher income. It will be a good choice for us to model here. Better find children better environment. Raise point is a poster child for vulnerability when it rains were not talking harvey rain were talking when it rains flash floods they get flooded. For the last three years were talking about a community that has been disrupted where people are losing you know everything and when you start losing everything in a repetitive way you have to ask the question why isnt something done. In some areas the greens point over one third of the population lives below the poverty line. If the aftermath of harvey is the me thing like that of Hurricane Katrina new orleans in two thousand and five housing prices will go up low income residents will be pushed out and inequality will grow. Houston is already one of the most segregated cities in america and it could get worse what about were interested like they dont have the house thing choices in houston to move out of the flood plains and thats why were building Housing Units now there are several that will be coming online you know. And they dont this year and next year the citys mayor Sylvester Turner a democrat campaigned on a promise to provide more Affordable Housing im the mayor of the fourth largest city in this country soon to be the third city is doing very very well but theres still twenty four percent of the people in my city of working poor. And they are living in the shadows of quickness and jim and what i said when i came in as a man twenty two months ago is that i didnt want to be the mayor of two cities have and have not now what we have to do is that we have to move with a greater sense of urgency to meet the need thats meant as abated by by harvey and to put people in a better place and then. So you know you can run away from it storms of this cat so you cant ignore it you can turn a blind eye to it. After the hurricane questions were raised about what if anything officials could have done to mitigate the flooding in some of the hardest hit areas. In houston people look to the Harris CountyFlood Control district which is one of the agencies tasked with reducing flood risk for the larger metropolitan area. Since harvey its been focused on recovery clearing debris making repairs and preparing for the next door. While we were in town the agency which is headed by a judge at image held a press conference for those residents who experienced the flooding two dozen fifteen. A flood in two thousand and sixteen and now flood in two thousand and seventeen are you doing enough for those residents know thats our hope or. Should the county prioritize efforts to help communities who have a hard time recovering from a party like its i think recovery is one thing mitigation is Something Else recovery there are prioritized but in terms of mitigation you know its a question of making our Community Safe and so were people who live just more question of hydrology you know so we need to look at. But critics say that approach focuses on scientific technicalities and ignores the reality that some communities have been historically neglected. Because the judge is saying theres no equity lands then those of us who are out here in the public are saying that must be an equity lens because we cannot reproduce the any quality we cannot allow money to follow money and money to power when it comes to the investments that have only made in flood protection that would be not only in morrow on ethical but we think would be illegal. Harvey was the third major flood to hit houston in as many years but it was far more destructive than the ones before. As the city tries to recover theres fear that the worst is yet to come knowing that another storm will come and another storm will come and the intensity of these strong seemed to be getting getting a bit greater we have to change course. And we have to be on in this case a city thats more prepared and a lot more recent there yet the next time around. We kind of have a code word for Climate Change in texas called weird weather so you hear people in texas talk about weird weather this and weird weather that because we really dont feel. Were talking about Climate Change frankly houston had seen the worst case storm the worst case storm is one that has a surge that comes in from the coast. The last texas was hit with a major storm surge was hurricane ike in two thousand and eight which hit the coastal city of galveston a surge storm is her horrifying because it would come up to Houston Ship Channel and we have projected at least a twenty five foot surge in the shipping channels only protected to about fifteen feet so theres forty four hundred storage tanks for all and Hazardous Substances there we think twenty two hundred of them would be flooded and we think it would be the worst environmental disaster in United States history which shut down the economic engine of the region so its a big do. You talk about thousands of lives that will be lost because of the flooding and the surge in the ways that would hit those communities that are low lying and adjacent to now theres been scenarios on that but again lifting that vulnerability and how do we address that. I think allison this mean for you this time it was real. Anything that gets in your house down here fran the first thing i dont like tank in and around they know hes in his flooded area just like louisiana they need to do and they need to do something about this too many people too many. Before we left used to and we came back to greens point mo. It was the day before the disaster food Stamp Program was going to end here so people came to stand in line overnight. When the young but. Not on this but on the bottom line come down the mountain never say die. But to me. This is. Billions of dollars in recovery aid are headed to texas to rebuild. But its unclear how much of that money will trickle down to those who need it the most. Asinine that there are in this city theres real fear that the most vulnerable residents to be left behind and. Then when to doff right now and the fight is to make sure that resources get distributed in a way this equitable and thats why i think its important that that low income people and people of color working class people rich people poor people we all work on this post Harvey Recovery in houston and get it right. In the United States rights activists are still being targeted you have enough information that you felt so good what facing surveillance from both the police and the f. B. I. This is not law enforcement. Faultlines investigates the scope of these agencies tactics and the impact on civil society. Confidential surveilling black lives at this time. News has and other than more of a liberal but the message is a simplistic and misinformation is rife the listening post provides a critical counterpoint challenging Mainstream Media narrative at this time on aljazeera the strength of al jazeera is that because we have such a bank if not poor people would come to us and actually shared information with the aljazeera team into the. Discover the world of aljazeera. The best films from across on the network of channels for the london zoo im allowed to do it but im about to be fresh perspectives and new insights. To challenge and change the way we move. Out as youre aware of this time on others. Evidence president. To explain why saad hariri has not returned