Welcome to the Soria City Flourishing Partnership — a bold and necessary initiative designed to support equitable economic expansion in an economically disenfranchised neighborhood, and its railroad-adjacent communities. Rather than allowing development to trigger the usual cycle of displacement and gentrification, we’re charting a different path—one that centers trauma-informed practices to build lasting, inclusive impact. By confronting the deep roots of arrested mobility, toxic stress, and adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), our work aims to interrupt the cycles of miseducation, misinformation, and community malaise that so often accompany economic isolation. Employing various network learning pathways like door-to-door canvassing, an accessible online learning portal, interactive hybrid workshops, and demonstration projects, we’re equipping residents with the knowledge, tools, and vision to shape a just future. This partnership will culminate in a strategy document to guide future environmental justice interventions—grounded in lived experience, community wisdom, and shared power. Please see the various community-based learning opportunities below.

Gillum-Young, Robinson + Harris LLC, Lead Developer

Toxins in the Soil (+Nutrients)
September 2024 - September 2025

Due to the prevalence of lead paint, unhealthy air, hazardous waste proximity, and proximity to underground tanks, Gulfport Gaslight District, Soria City and Broadmoor neighborhoods have unhealthy soil. Simultaneously, the pollinators (e.g. butterflies and bees) that support the plants that bring healthy nutrients to the soil face multiple threats that can impact their ability to thrive and survive. Included within this module, we hosted a series of workshops regarding pollinators, plants and soil; planting days of three neighborhood pollinator gardens and a pollinator pathway that links them; as well as cleanups and demonstrations to redress the toxins in our soil and Coffee Creek waterway.

Thought Leader: Elizabeth Englebretson & Megan Chevis, Mississippi State University

Combatting Flooding
August 29, 2025

In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (August 29, 2005), experts have repeatedly warned that future storms in the region are likely to be even more intense, bringing greater flooding and destruction. This module, kickstarted by our participation in local Katrina20 Week of Action activities, will feature two small-scale demonstrations of practical interventions—such as permeable surfaces and strategic landscaping—that showcase what residents can implement on their own properties to reduce storm impacts and strengthen resilience, both as individual households and as a community.

Lead Paint and Healthy Homes
September 2025

Portions of the Historic Soria City neighborhood and their railroad adjacent neighbors in the Historic Broadmoor Place neighborhood to the east have severe levels of lead paint, toxins in the soil, and other health hazards in the environment. Register now for the Lead Paint and Healthy Homes workshop to learn more about the impacts of lead paint, especially on young children, through hands-on, community-based learning. As a takeaway, participants will be provided a DIY testing kit and lead remediation cleaning kit which includes a vacuum with an attached HEPA filter.

Mitigating Particulate Matter 2.5 and Asbestos
Fall 2025

We need air to breathe, but what happens when the air we are breathing is filled with things we can’t even see with our naked eye that can pose serious health risks? “Particulate matter” contains microscopic solids or liquid droplets that are so small that they can be inhaled and cause serious health problems. Some particles less than 10 micrometers in diameter can get deep into your lungs and some may even get into your bloodstream. Of these, particles less than 2.5 micrometers in diameter, also known as fine particles or PM2.5, pose the greatest risk to health (Source: US-EPA).

Be watching for more information coming soon regarding a neighborhood scan that assesses Soria City and its railroad adjacent neighbors’ level of vulnerability and exposure to asbestos. This tour and subsequent report-out seeks to create a more robust sense of awareness to the threats to our wellbeing in the built environment, including basic education on how to mitigate them and properly remove them when possible.

As a demonstration intervention, the project will remove the asbestos from the Broadmoor historic structure located along the Gulfport Gaslight District corridor. This asbestos-covered building has been standing vacant since Hurricane Katrina, contributing to the environmental hazards the community faces. This demonstration will link educational workshops together with practical interventions to begin the transformation of this blighted property towards a healthy, vibrant community asset and equip residents to do similar work on their properties by providing them with accessible resources.
Click here to check the quality of air near your home. 

Population Growth and Community Change
December 2025

This module is encapsulated within our 5th annual At Dusk: Christmas on the Square event. Featuring holiday-inspired cuisines from the many cultures that call the Mississippi Gulf Coast home, we’ll offer space to build relationships, deepen understanding, and work toward transformative community change together. We will spotlight the often-overlooked shifts taking place in Historic Black neighborhoods, like Soria City, driven in part by a recent influx of new “non-Black” immigrant and transplant neighbors. With the global number of displaced people at its highest in recorded history, the Mississippi Gulf Coast has welcomed newcomers from nearly every continent. Many, of whom relocate due to socioeconomic realities, tend to settle in more affordable areas—often Historic Black neighborhoods where decades of disinvestment have stifled economic growth. The meeting of these long-established, culturally rich yet economically isolated communities with new arrivals can create both challenges and opportunities. Yet, when genuine relationships take root, these convergences can spark collaborative development and shared opportunity.

Marketing Violence
Winter 2026

We live our daily lives in environments that are both natural and built. The built environment surrounds us with sights, sounds, scents, and other sensory inputs that shape our brains and influence our day-to-day experiences. As The Body Keeps the Score says, “Trauma, by definition, is remembered not as a story… but as isolated sensory imprints: images, sounds, and physical sensations that are accompanied by intense emotions, usually terror and helplessness.” In the Marketing Violence “walk-shop,” we will take participants to places where these sensory pollutants are experienced daily, exploring how poor marketing practices—rooted in generations of weak enforcement of public laws, ordinances, and zoning regulations—have become normalized. We will also examine the community malaise, cynicism, and despair linked to intrusive noise, nuisance lighting, and other environmental pollutants that plague our neighborhoods. Be watching for more information.

Arrested Mobility
Spring 2026

Building on the nationally acclaimed work of Mississippi native Charles T. Brown, this module expands upon the Mobility Justice 101 seminar, hosted in partnership with Go Gulfport in Spring 2024 (funded by the Equitable Transportation Fund). It will bring together local residents, transportation and mobility leaders, and equity and justice advocates in a hybrid, community-based learning environment to explore and grapple with the implications for our community. Stay tuned for upcoming opportunities to register and participate.