DALLAS — It has been a long battle for residents living in the Southern Dallas neighborhood of Flora Farms.
That battle continues as Dallas City Plan Commission decided Thursday not to vote on rezoning the area.
Many residents spoke at the zoning hearing including Marsha Jackson. She and her neighbors fought since 2017 to get Shingle Mountain, huge piles of discarded shingles at the former Blue Star Recycling site, knocked down. In November, the City of Dallas announced that the toxic mountain had been fully cleared, but that was only half the battle.
Jackson lives feet from another industrial company and believe pollutants from that company has impacted her health and her community's health. It is currently zoned as an Industrial Research District, but residents requested at the hearing for the area to be rezoned as agricultural or commercial to stop industrial plants from coming in and operating.
“We want to remove some of these injustices close to the residents. We are not against business, but what we are against is these injustices next to the residents that should not be here,” said Jackson.
Many who spoke at the meeting said the matter has gone on far too long. They called it ridiculous and a form of environmental injustice and racism as the area is predominantly made up of minority residents.
The City Plan Commission rescheduled the vote to March 21.