Razing Liberty Square

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As rising seas threaten Miami’s luxurious beachfront, wealthy property owners are pushing inland to higher ground. Residents of the historically Black neighborhood of Liberty Square—the first segregated public housing project in the South—are the new target of an upcoming “revitalization” project due to their location 12 feet above sea level. RAZING LIBERTY SQUARE, a film by Academy Award nominated filmmaker Katja Esson (FERRY TALES, SKYDANCER, POETRY OF RESILIENCE, LATCHING ON), is a character-driven verité documentary that weaves personal stories with the larger social justice narrative of climate gentrification. Foremost, it is about a community fighting to save itself from being erased in a rapidly changing Miami.

The film begins in 2017, at the very time when the first homes of Liberty Square are razed to the ground to make way for a new $300 million mixed-income development. Initially, the community is hopeful this development will be different than past urban renewal projects, but it soon becomes clear it will be yet another instance in Miami’s long history of broken promises. RAZING LIBERTY SQUARE shares perspectives from residents, community advocates, teachers, developers, and politicians— with active resistance being led by neighborhood women, including a single mother of seven who has lived in public housing all her life, the founder and principal of Liberty Square’s only alternative school, and a local environmental activist who educates her community about Climate Gentrification.

RAZING LIBERTY SQUARE provides a looking glass for contemporary issues of wide-scale significance: the affordable housing crisis; the impact of systemic racism; and climate gentrification. While focused on Miami, which is experiencing sea level rise ahead of many other places, the story of Liberty Square is a prescient reminder of what is to come in communities across the U.S. and world.

"One of [Hot Docs's] top films this year. . .The film does such a good job connecting viewers to its central characters that the ending feels like saying goodbye to friends — a rare achievement in documentaries about climate change and housing policy."
Sabina Wex, CBC Arts

"Explores the ways in which the affordable housing crunch, cultural displacement and other problems are creating a new class of Black and brown activists... determined to educate their neighbors about the connections between climate change and the housing crisis."
Gloria Gonzales, POLITICO

"This year's Change Maker Award was presented to a film that goes above and beyond in its effort to document the adverse effects of climate change, racism, and the housing crisis, and protect those who need that most."
Jury Statement, World Of Ha Change-Maker Award, Woodstock Film Festival

"The story of Liberty Square is also a cautionary tale of the future of many low-income communities in the face of climate change displacement. It's a story of racial segregation and a haunting reminder of Jim Crow laws."
Lena Simet, senior researcher and advocate Poverty and Inequality, Human Rights Watch

"Makes it seem as if solutions aren't out of reach and that paradise may not be a place so much as the people around that can come together to make it one."
Stephen Saito The Moveable Fest

"Filmmaker Katja Esson (an Oscar-nominee for the short documentary "Ferry Tales") examines how the incursion of developers brings a concomitant influx of community organizers trying to warn residents about lofty promises of affordable housing that are, for many, too good to be true."
David Morgan, CBS News

"As rising sea-levels threaten the city of Miami, one local black community fight to save their neighbourhood from property developers and climate gentrification."
Matthew Carey, Deadline

"Razing Liberty Square follows the neighborhood's residents as they combat 'Climate Gentrification' and try desperately to hold onto the community and culture that the city threatens to wrest away. 'It's a really terrific film about social injustice around climate change in Miami. Just wonderfully done.'"
Bernard Boo, Marin Magazine

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Main credits

Esson, Katja (film director)
Esson, Katja (film producer)
Bennett, Ann (film producer)
Sager, Corinna (film producer)

Other credits

Cinematographer, Hector David Rosales; editing, Flavia de Souza, Susanne Schiebler, Leigh Johnson; music, Gary Gunn.

MARC Record See Worldcat record

Keywords

Gentrification,Miami,Liberty City,Racial Justice,Environmental Justice,climate,gentrification,climate gentrification,development,urban renewal,affordable housing,structural racism,systemic racism,public housing,social justice; "Razing Liberty Square"; Women Make Movies

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