This article is part of a series created in collaboration with UPLIFT North Carolina, a program that supports rural tourism throughout the state. Since July 2023, our partnership has provided participatory workshops and mentorship, working with partners to support and develop festivals and cultural heritage tourism experiences that benefit both visitors and communities.
In 1999, President Bill Clinton traveled to Princeville, North Carolina—the first independently governed African American community chartered in the United States. Princeville’s then-mayor, Delia Perkins, greeted him, and his presence was the first visit by a president to the small town, originally named Freedom Hill. But his trip was not to attend the opening of a new museum or monument commemorating its importance. It was not to give a speech celebrating the community’s unique place in American history or engage with its citizens on their ongoing progress. In fact, no national memorial exists within Princeville’s boundaries.
Instead, the president’s stay was due to tragedy.
“The town was fully or partially submerged for ten days,” Perkins says. “Everything was destroyed. Caskets were floating in the cemetery.” In fact, it is journalistic interpretation to say President Clinton visited Princeville. “The president came to Tarboro, which is on the opposite side of the Tar River, because no one could access Princeville. It was gone.”
In 1865, freed people founded Freedom Hill on the banks of the Tar River. Within a few short years, formerly enslaved carpenter Turner Prince built several dwellings within the community, and hundreds of freedmen and freedwomen lived together. In 1885, North Carolina incorporated the town, which was renamed by its residents Princeville in honor of Prince. Due to the resilient residents of the low-lying community, the town survived a deluge of hardships. It defeated early efforts of annexation, survived economic downturns, and rebuilt after storms.
“We’ve had a lot of problems with flooding,” Perkins says. “But at the time, there was nothing like 1999. The Princeville Dike was over thirty-five feet tall. Hurricane Floyd didn’t break the dike. The water just filled up and went right over it.”
President Clinton’s visit came in the aftermath of Hurricane Floyd, which damaged tens of thousands of homes in North Carolina and is considered the worst disaster in the state’s history. For Princeville, Floyd was the final straw in a perfect storm; before it arrived, the Tar River had filled due to a smaller storm, Hurricane Dennis, which passed over Princeville (not once, but twice) days before.
Though the visit was demonstrative, the federal government took several tangible actions. The president announced significant financial support and signed Executive Order 13146 to guide federal agencies in helping the future of Princeville, establishing a council for this very purpose. Fourteen million dollars went into rebuilding, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) created a Hazard Mitigation Grant Program to support buyouts, elevation, and reconstruction of homes in flood-prone areas.
“We received a lot of love from the nation,” Perkins says. “The storm sort of put us on the map. For the first time, people saw Princeville for what it was—a significant place. And we had great hopes that helpful change would come into existence. But it didn’t.”
Located in a flood zone, Princeville’s history is intermittently woven with flooding. It was devastated again, in 2016, during Hurricane Matthew.
The community is confronting a profound question, one that is becoming more and more common in today’s climate-changing world: what happens when heritage and hazard occupy the same ground?
“We don’t leave,” says Turcois Ominek, co-founder and chief operating officer of Freedom Org, a nonprofit focused on community development and economic empowerment in historically disinvested communities. “The people aren’t going anywhere. Yes, we’ll take the fifty-three-acre site on higher ground, but we also would like to stay and revitalize the historic downtown district.”
Ominek works in Princeville and is a natural strategist and community organizer. Soon after watching Hurricane Matthew destroy her town, she co-founded Freedom Org to unite resources and citizens to channel them into saving Princeville. The nonprofit is made up of local leaders, engineers, historians, and volunteers committed to equitable recovery. Despite their shared roots, building trust took time. Years of knocking on doors, attending church meetings, and showing up to town halls helped them become a trusted and persistent voice for the community.
Ominek and her team emphasize the importance of people taking care of their heritage, land, and future. Nearby communities like Tarboro have taken notice and invited Freedom Org to help with their own resilience planning.
But Ominek is focused on Princeville, a place that is foundational to African Americans and the country. She smiles but is serious when she asks whether people would leave Jamestown if it, too, suffered from floods.
“The answer is obvious,” Ominek says. “Jamestown is important to American history. Similarly, Princeville is irreplaceable, not just an afterthought. A lot of our spaces get washed out, taken or gentrified. It’s always something of that nature. So, I was like, ‘Okay, we need to make sure to preserve the culture, not only the history.’This place has cultural currency.”
The situation is not hopeless, but it is daunting. Once-rare storms that submerge entire neighborhoods and displace hundreds are becoming more common. Due to rising global temperatures, hurricanes are not only more frequent but also wetter, bringing with them more flooding.
Princeville’s leaders and FEMA experts have determined that rebuilding Princeville again, just as it was, is not an option. But Ominek reminds us about the danger of doing nothing.
“I visited Fort Mosé, Florida, the first town of free people in the Americas,” Ominek says. “This is the first place in the Americas where freed people could legally be free and left to themselves. And there’s nothing there. No remnants of it other than a few photos. That’s what we’re looking at. That’s why we must do something.”
What are the solutions? In 1999, after Hurricane Floyd, federal and state agencies provided the leaders of Princeville with two options: the town could either accept a buyout, and its residents move, or accept levee restoration. After much debate, community leadership decided to restore the levee. But in 2016, after Hurricane Matthew, the situation became more dire and the offerings more flexible: individuals could either accept a FEMA buyout and leave or accept funds to rebuild, and rebuilding could take place either in the same area or on higher ground.
The state government also stepped in, purchasing a fifty-three-acre plot on higher ground where essential infrastructure—like the fire station—will be rebuilt. Though it’s not yet connected to Princeville’s historic core, the site stands as a symbol of resilience and possibility.
“The day that the first building goes up, I’m going to celebrate,” says Vanaza Brown, one of Princeville’s commissioners. “We can already see structures beginning to take shape. If everything is done right, the space will offer places to gather, things to do—and eventually, it will link back to our historic ground. The new and the old will become one.”
As a commissioner, Brown plays a pivotal role in both community engagement and infrastructure planning. She has her finger on the pulse of Princeville, deeply attuned to the town’s physical needs and emotional heartbeat.
“I’m a decision maker,” she says. “The question I always ask is, ‘What’s the best thing to do for my constituents?’ That mindset gives me clarity. Every decision rooted in that question brings us closer to a better future. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel—and we’ll get there.”
Despite the momentum, Princeville remains in a state of limbo. The involvement of federal, state, and local actors—combined with new data revealing that previous solutions are no longer viable—has created a landscape of uncertainty. Driving through town, one sees abandoned homes beside restored ones, next to houses raised on stilts. Further out, new residences sit elevated, away from the river. The patchwork of choices paints a fragmented picture of the future, where each family has made its own decision about how to face the next disaster. Unity feels elusive, and the path forward remains unclear.
It is obvious to any visitor that relying on state and federal support has not worked—not only because of how slow that support can be. There simply is not an easy solution to the problem.
“Some people have asked to drain the Tar River,” Perkins says. “There is an endangered species of mussel in the river, so we can’t do that. And FEMA’s most recent levee designs won’t work; they’ll flood Tarboro. We can’t rebuild the levee as it was, either. It wasn’t built correctly the first time around, so it can’t be fixed.”
While addressing the water is the biggest problem, it is not the only one. Abandoned houses that line the main street of the historic district are reminders that finding a way for the river and Princeville to coexist is pointless if there are no people left to occupy it.
“The people leave because they don’t know if they are safe,” Ominek says. “We must start with what the people need. They need safety—safety in knowing that they are protected when they come back.”
It was in the face of uncertainty that Freedom Org developed a three-pronged approach to help the community: economic growth, agricultural development, and historic and cultural preservation. She has found that solutions in one area often overlap with the other two. Along with this, the organization began engaging with local nonprofits and grassroots organizations, like UPLIFT North Carolina, to access resources and amplify the community’s voices.
“People need food,” Ominek says. “So, let’s consider local farmers and a collaborative farm. People need houses. So, let’s focus on a feasibility study, on getting a blueprint out. Let’s start building the community we need instead of just waiting for everything to be fixed perfectly.”
Through this vision, Freedom Org has become a driving force in Princeville’s revitalization. Its programs celebrate heritage, empower youth, and address issues like food access and housing.
Princeville Homecoming, launched by Freedom Org in 2021, exemplifies the power, relevance, and necessity of intentional community engagement. The annual celebration brings together families and friends, business owners and civic leaders, and residents from every corner of town. Attendees enjoy cultural performances and exhibitions, support local vendors, showcase services, and participate in workshops on topics ranging from lifestyle, health, and wellness to updates on Princeville’s future. In just a few years, the homecoming has become a rich representation of how community is built on moments as much as infrastructure.
“What we’ve consistently heard is that this event matters because of the deep, personal connection it fosters within the community,” Ominek says. “So, we’ve listened, and we’ve reshaped the celebration to feel more intimate—focusing on those meaningful, person-to-person moments rather than large-scale productions.”
Freedom Org’s Freedom Hill Youth Media Camp is another program that continues to grow. The four-week class connects teenagers to North Carolina’s rich African American history and concepts of environmental justice through documentary filmmaking. Students are paid, and many finish the program with a completed documentary. A few have even found distribution for their work.
“The Media Camp is in a place now where I see kids from the first year returning as camp counselors for new students,” Ominek says. “It makes me so proud. They’re the ones who will keep culture going. Mentorship is what keeps a community alive.”
This summer, Ominek attended the BlackStar Film Festival in Philadelphia, where Freedom Org brought the camp for a dynamic learning exchange. Students connected with professional filmmakers, pitched their ideas, and conducted interviews to support their creative work.
From the Princeville Homecoming to the Freedom Hill Youth Media Camp and other community-driven events, Freedom Org sees each initiative as a step toward a future where Princeville doesn’t just survive but thrives.
Like a two-part solution, grassroots programs aimed at creating a more resilient and safer town are a match with the evolving search for concrete solutions to the Tar River’s flooding. Brown, Ominek, and Perkins believe both are equally necessary for Princeville’s future.
In June 2025, the Army Corps of Engineers, which has been working with FEMA in Princeville, met with community leaders to discuss flood mitigation updates. There is not a solution yet, but the Corps has assembled an impressive team of experts. Engineers, hydrologists, real estate specialists, and cultural resource managers, with experience in several communities facing similar issues—including Wilmington, Savannah, Chicago, Nashville, and Jacksonville—are now working together, alongside Princeville’s local leaders, to address the challenges of the community.
Old plans that were once rejected, sometimes due to budget constraints, are now being reconsidered, and there is a general feeling that the issue is finally being seen by the right people. Ominek expresses hopefulness about the current situation.
“Both the state and federal governments have made mistakes in the past,” she says. “Maybe they didn’t show up the way they promised they would. But today, the people in those meetings—the representatives from FEMA, from the Corps—are not the ones who made those mistakes. We must move forward, alongside their support, and solve the issues we can solve.”
It is not enough to make Princeville safe from flooding. The people must believe they are safe, too. That starts with transparency.
“I’m excited about the future because I see it—I see the details coming together,” Brown says. “If we make the right decisions today, we are shaping the community for generations to come, and we will be better for it, stronger for it. Things here will remain unbreakable.”
Kirby Ewald is the strategic communications coordinator for the Center’s Cultural Vitality Program. She manages project communications plans and supports Center-wide communication efforts.
