Houston, TX - July 8th, 2025 - The Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice supports Black residents in Elba, Alabama's historic Shiloh community, in their lawsuit against the Alabama Department of Transportation (ALDOT). The residents’ primary concern centers around years of flood damages caused by a highway expansion project. Filed on July 1st by Wiggins Childs Pantazis Fisher & Goldfarb, the lawsuit claims that the state violated residents' Fifth Amendment constitutional rights by subjecting their homes, businesses, and properties to chronic floods stemming from the 2017 widening and elevation of U.S. Highway 84.
Despite formal complaints to ALDOT as early as 2018, residents say the state agency failed to act and instead exacerbated the problem by installing drainage infrastructure that funneled stormwater directly into the neighborhood flooding homes and other properties.
“We've tried to work with ALDOT and the Federal Highway Administration to get relief and compensation for the damages to our homes, businesses, and properties. Our pleas have fallen on deaf ears,” said Pastor Timothy Williams, a Shiloh homeowner, business owner, and lead plaintiff in the case. “We have no choice but to pursue this lawsuit to get back what is legally ours that has been illegally taken.”
The lawsuit follows mounting frustration after ALDOT failed to deliver on a Voluntary Resolution Agreement (VRA) reached with the U.S. Department of Transportation in October 2024. Although the agreement required the state agency to implement mitigation strategies and report progress within 160 days, the first report submitted in April 2025 showed “little or nothing had been done” to protect residents from continued flooding, a complete breach of the VRA.
“This is a textbook case of highway robbery I wrote about two decades ago,” said Dr. Robert D. Bullard, founding director of the Bullard Center. “Black residents in Shiloh are being systematically ignored, flooded, their homes, land and property illegally taken without just compensation, and pushed into debt while the state transportation agency responsible for the damage evades accountability. That’s not right.”
Before the highway expansion, Shiloh did not experience significant flooding. Today, the neighborhood frequently turns into a basin of standing water after heavy rain, damaging foundations, causing mold and sewage backups, and leading to denied insurance claims and dropped homeowner policies. Many residents are elderly, low-income, or veterans living on fixed incomes.
The lawsuit seeks just compensation for damages, including homes, businesses and property devaluation, mental anguish, and loss of use and enjoyment of hard-earned homesteads that were inherited from parents and grandparents. Shiloh residents over the decades have shown a special resilience in the face of many obstacles, including discrimination and Jim Crow segregation that permeated the Deep South. However, the brave Shiloh property owners have taken a stand not to allow their homesteads, businesses, inheritance and history be washed away by a flawed highway project.
“This is a human rights issue,” Dr. Bullard added. “It's about people being robbed of safety, security, stability and dignity because of bad design decisions and not caring about the consequences. ALDOT cared more about building a highway that would not flood than about a Black community its highway is flooding and destroying.” The Bullard Center has actively supported the Shiloh community through research, technical assistance, communications, and advocacy to hold those accountable for the man-made and preventable flooding disaster.
READ MORE ABOUT THE BULLARD CENTER HERE
Media Contact:
DeJonique G. Baptiste
Assistant Director of Communications
Bullard Center for Environmental and Climate Justice
dejonique.baptiste@tsu.edu