Palm Beach County residents were asked:
Please tell us about an important moment in your life that would help someone understand what it’s like living in your neighborhood.
The stories and micro-narratives they submitted (as part of the We Are Here SenseMaker project) are listed below. Click ZOOM IN to learn more about the community member and how they interpreted their submission. NOTE: Some stories were partially transcribed by volunteers who shortened the narratives and referred to the storytellers in the third person (e.g., “her experience was” instead of “my experience was”).
Positive: My kid and the community. Been cutting hair 27 years in community. Had ups and downs. Took 16 years to get off cocaine. Depends on god. Can do better. Robert Mitchell (commissioner): Trying to get own walmart in Belle Glade. Hard for kids to avoid negative environments. Parents also have influence on kids’ growth. Not a lot of hobbies for kids to do in community because small town. Trying to make the best of it. Started working at 5. Knows how to build a house from the ground up, did a lot of criminal stuff, but prays to god. Just living life. Comes from a Jamaican family, did best to get around. Life is what you make of it, but children need guidance.
Moved here in 2013. Went to an eye doctor in 2014 who worked in Pahokee. She scattered the cataract and tried to get it out, but blinded her in one eye. She can’t find stuff in her house and scatters stuff around. Can’t get much help. Grandchildren’s mother was killed by father (drug user), one grandchild works in a clinic in NJ, the other works in transportation. Life is okay, but it could be better. Grandson has two boys, granddaughter childless. Born in Pahokee. Learnt from Aunt and Uncle, didn’t finish school because she had to pick beans. Didn’t think she’d make it to 81.
Growing up as a kid brings you joy and happiness Remembering the past makes you smile. I was always a good child. Listen choose the good never the bad
Hurricane erma was an important hurricane and it was coming closer and cooler the community had to evaluate fast which was crazy. Everyone was worried and couldn’t focus. Everyone was in panic mood. But when we came back the comity was destructed but the community people from different homes help each other with food, water, gas and more and that’s what I loved about my community
We came closest to integration in 1988, when nearly half of all African-American children attended majority white schools. Since then, districts have been casting off federal court orders like rusted shackles. The result, a Government Accountability Office report found in the spring of 2016, the number of African American and Hispanic students attending segregated schools is rapidly growing.