"Unity Park" - Film Screening

In addition to the film's screening (15 mins) you will also hear from Mayor Knox White, Heath Dillard (Visit Greenville SC CEO), David G. Salyers (Owner of Roam and Former Chick-fil-A founding CMO), the film's Directors (Evan Rogers & Knox White Jr.), as well as TEDxUnityPark Speakers!

Attendees will get 20% off for TEDxUnityPark: Momentum on 11/19 using code: UNITY20

Synopsis:

Dr. Stacey Mills describes an awakening that was undertaken by the community in partnership with the City of Greenville through a meaningful series of workshops over the course of a decade. Outcomes included, among other realizations, that of many opportunities in the community’s grasp.

“We’re saying you have to take note of this process. It involved ten years of public planning.” Dr. Stacey Mills, Chairman of the Urban League of the Upstate Board of Directors

Unity Park was the site of a women's prison, two trash incinerators, a crematorium for dogs, a blighted wetland, a junkyard for the city police, a shooting range, and a (predominately black) public works department built in a flood zone.

For generations, the 60-acre site was a dumping ground for hazardous waste, downstream from a coal tar plant. Cancer rates around the site were soaring. None of this was incidental: the site was a man-made wasteland - a liminal zone - for separating black and white neighborhoods in the City of Greenville, South Carolina.

At a time when the public is often made to feel powerless, the story of Unity Park is an empowering true story illustrating structural change in action.