Soul City

by Thomas Healy

  But there was a subtext to the story, one alluded to in its subheading—“Floyd McKissick’s Soul City Is Lacking People, Jobs; The Leader Lives in Style”—and developed more fully in the article itself. It was the same subtext that had run through the News & Observer series four years earlier: the entire enterprise of Soul City was a clever exercise in nepotism, conflicts of interest, and personal enrichment. Harrigan pointed out that McKissick controlled the company that owned the land in Soul City; that he drew a salary from that company but wouldn’t say how much it was; that his wife ran the town’s sanitary district and was part owner of Soul City’s only store; that his son was planning director; and that the lake was named after his mother-in-law. Harrigan also implied that while the rest of Soul City was struggling, McKissick and his family were getting rich. “His wife drives the family Maserati,” she wrote, “while he has a Pontiac Bonneville and his son operates a Mercedes-Benz.” Her description of the McKissick home was equally insinuating. “There is a large cabinet containing silver and china in the living room. There is a big microwave oven in the kitchen and a tall stone fireplace in the sunken living room.”

  The facts were mostly correct. Evelyn did drive a Citroën SM (a Citroën body with a Maserati engine). And the family did have a microwave oven (as did about ten million other American households). But the implications were misleading at best and malicious at worst. Every private developer under the New Communities Act owned the land on which the towns were being built; the whole point of the law was to encourage private developers to build new cities with public support. Evelyn did run the sanitary district, and Floyd Jr. had taken over as planning director. But as had been pointed out repeatedly, Evelyn received no pay, and Floyd Jr. was amply qualified for his position. More to the point, it was unlikely his father could have found anyone else for the same salary. Finally, McKissick had secured millions of dollars of federal money, but much of that money benefited the surrounding area, not just Soul City. And it wasn’t just the government that had invested in Soul City; McKissick had invested nearly all his own assets in the project, too.

  McKissick was incensed by the article. In a long letter to the paper’s editor, he argued that his lifestyle was irrelevant to the progress of Soul City. What difference did it make what kind of car his wife drove or what their house looked like, especially since they had lived in a mobile home for their first five years in Soul City? He also disputed the article’s suggestion that Soul City was receiving special treatment from the federal government. “Almost every American city, hospital, large farm, railroad, and housing development is in one way or another sustained by federal money, as are many of our large and small businesses and corporations,” McKissick wrote. Besides, Soul City was sustained by more than federal money. It was sustained by private capital, including $1.5 million invested by the partners of the Soul City Company. “It is sustained also by a belief that even poor Americans and black Americans are part of the system and should be afforded the opportunity to build and to live in nice houses and decent communities, and to make a profit.”

  Not satisfied with a letter, McKissick threatened a lawsuit. But as had happened five years earlier, when the Journal compared Soul City to the tribal village of Oyo Tungi, his lawyers talked him out of it, noting that a lawsuit would only “keep the thought of the original article alive in the minds of readers.” So McKissick tried his best to put a positive spin on the article. In a letter to William White, he argued that the Journal’s attack was a form of flattery. “We must be doing something right or we would not merit the attention of the press,” he wrote. He also attempted to use the article as leverage, urging White to approve construction of another industrial building. “The only real way to answer this kind of attack is to show concrete evidence of progress.”

  A few weeks later, the News & Observer piled on with a new series by Pat Stith, who had continued to file a steady stream of Freedom of Information Act requests with HUD. The lead article reported that Soul City had met only 10 percent of its population, housing, and job goals and would need massive infusions of cash to survive. A second article declared that “Uncle Sam has treated Soul City like a favorite nephew, forgiving its shortcomings and sending more money.” And a third article charged that McKissick and his wife had “found the good life at Soul City.” Picking up where the Journal left off, it reported that McKissick’s salary had increased from fifty thousand dollars to seventy thousand dollars over the past four years, that Floyd Jr. was earning twenty thousand dollars as planning director, and that Lew Myers was being paid twenty-one thousand dollars as director of corporate and institutional development.

  Stith’s articles prompted another blistering editorial in the paper, which argued that the “sad story of Soul City threatens to discredit all manner of social programs” and that “HUD has no sustained obligation to fulfill every wish of the hustling Floyd McKissick.” Instead, the editors insisted, HUD had a duty to “take an open-eyed look at Soul City’s dubious and pessimistic prospects and to turn off McKissick’s money spigot.” In case that image wasn’t vivid enough, the paper ran a cartoon showing one HUD official pouring a sack of money out an open window while another official speaks into a phone: “Another couple-a-million? Sure, Mr. McKissick … It’s on its way.”

  McKissick did not respond directly to the N&O, but he did hold a press conference at a hotel in nearby Rocky Mount to address the recent spate of news coverage. Wearing a white beret to cover the bald spot where he had recently received eighty stitches, he argued that Soul City had made substantial progress compared to the other towns supported by the New Communities Act. And it would have made even more progress if not for repeated attacks by the N&O and the state’s congressional delegation. “I wonder, really, what we could have accomplished for the state of North Carolina … if I had had (their) ongoing assistance.”

  While McKissick battled the press, prominent supporters came to his defense. Daniel Pollitt, a distinguished law professor at UNC, wrote a letter to President Carter praising Soul City’s efforts, while the editors of the Carolina Times encouraged Black people “to rally around the project.” Both Pollitt and the Carolina Times had been allies of Soul City from the beginning, so their support was not surprising. More intriguing was an editorial by Bignall Jones in the Warren Record. In the ten years since McKissick announced his plans, Jones had come a long way, from skeptic to optimist to evangelist. He had glimpsed how Soul City could improve the fortunes of Warren County. He had also gotten to know the people building it. Just a few months earlier, he had attended his first cocktail party at Soul City and discovered it wasn’t much different from any other party. “It looks to me like they hold a cocktail glass the same” as anybody else, he told a reporter. Now, Jones pushed back against the N&O’s attacks. In a column headlined “Without Soul City’s Help,” he recounted all the good things Soul City had brought to Warren County: the health care clinic, the regional water system, the funding for a new sewage treatment plant. He lavished particular praise on HealthCo, which not only provided affordable medical services to local residents but also helped secure government funding for the Warren County Health Department. And although HealthCo was financed by federal grants, “no one can believe that without Soul City’s connections there would ever have been a HealthCo in Warren County and without it Warren County would be poorer.” It was true that Soul City had “not met the dreams of its founders yet,” Jones acknowledged. “But Soul City has meant a great deal to Warren County and we feel will mean more in the years to come.”

  Lew Myers sent a copy of Jones’s column to Claude Sitton, requesting that he reprint it in the N&O. Sitton declined, explaining that the paper had already covered McKissick’s press conference in Rocky Mount and that Jones’s piece would not “add significantly to our readers’ understanding of the Soul City situation.”

  The media wasn’t McKissick’s only problem. Seizing on the various news reports, Jesse Helms took to the floor of the Sena
te to once again condemn Soul City as a boondoggle that was contributing to the massive federal deficit. “Mr. President, how can such use of the taxpayers’ money be justified?” Helms asked, returning to his familiar pretext of frugality. “It cannot.” A few days later, in an interview with Stith, he declared his intention to cut off all federal funding for Soul City through an amendment to an appropriations bill for HUD. “I think it can be done,” he said. “I think there will be some problems from a parliamentary standpoint, but I think I have found a way around it.”

  As the attacks on Soul City intensified, the staff attempted to hold things together. On May 4, Dot Waller wrote a memo urging McKissick to ignore the media and Helms, both of whom were clearly enemies. Instead, she urged him to attend to business at home. The Soul City office was a mess, she pointed out, and visitors weren’t being welcomed properly. A week later, Carey fired off a series of memos complaining that the bike paths were not being maintained, that the pool was not ready for summer, and that at 8:35 a.m. on a recent morning only a few people were in the office.

  McKissick continued to search for solutions. In March, he reached out to Coors Brewery, which was scouting for a new plant on the East Coast. In May, he suggested to HUD that Soul City be marketed as a retirement community until it could attract industry. And in mid-June, he and Myers traveled to New York to drum up interest in home sales. For two days, they camped out at the St. Regis Hotel in midtown Manhattan, meeting with hundreds of Black residents eager to move to the South. They spoke with Elaine Alexander, a retired factory worker from Georgia who was “tired of the noise, the crowds, and the fear of walking the streets or into your hallway.” “I want to dig in the dirt again and go fishing when I feel like it,” she said. They met with Irene Gregory, a medical technician who lived “in one of the best parts of Brooklyn” but was still “scared much of the time.” And they talked to Ron Cornwall, a thirty-one-year-old lawyer who summed of his view of Soul City in four words: “The future is there.”

  Despite the enthusiasm, few people were willing to invest their savings in a development that was under review by HUD. And as the situation grew increasingly dire, McKissick began to run out of options. He reached out to Nigerian and Liberian officials about the possibility of establishing an African-American cultural and trade center in Soul City. He canceled disability insurance for himself and Carey, saving nearly three thousand dollars in annual premiums. Finally, he considered doing the one thing he had long refused to do. Talking with Carey in private one day, he raised the issue of the city’s name. Maybe they should change the name after all, he said. Perhaps that would buy them time and goodwill with HUD. It was a sign of just how desperate he was. Never before had he been willing to compromise on this aspect of his dream. But now, like a man bargaining for his life, he offered the only thing he had left: his soul. Carey just shook his head. “It’s too late,” he responded. “It won’t help.”

  Still, McKissick kept fighting. On June 5, he wrote to Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana. “We are involved in a difficult and massive economic development program in conjunction with a variety of governmental and private entities within our region,” he wrote. “All we ask is a fair hearing and that we not be tried and convicted in the press.” A few days later, he wrote to North Carolina’s newest senator, Robert Morgan, and Representative L. H. Fountain with a similar request. And when the Warren Record published another editorial on June 7, praising Soul City as “a good neighbor,” McKissick sent a copy to Helms and pleaded with him one last time to visit Soul City.

  Dear Senator Helms:

  I cordially invite you to visit Soul City in order that you might see what we have accomplished thus far and our objectives in the immediate future. I am sure you will agree that first-hand information is better than reliance upon press reports. I have also extended an invitation to Senator Morgan and Representative Fountain to visit us at the time of your visit.

  Much of the information you have about Soul City we believe to be distorted and I would welcome the opportunity to present additional facts for your information—facts which do not and cannot fit into a letter or form.

  Enclosed for your information are two recent editorials from THE WARREN RECORD, along with news stories about a resolution by the Warren County Chamber of Commerce and Democratic Party supporting it.

  Thanking you in advance for your cooperation.

  Very Truly Yours,

  F. B. McKissick Sr.

  Helms did not respond to McKissick’s letter. Nor did he ever visit Soul City. Soon there wouldn’t be much left to see.

  * * *

  WHILE MCKISSICK WORKED frantically to rally support, the HUD task force went about its work, reviewing McKissick’s five-year development plan and hiring Avco Community Developers, a California consultant with experience in new towns, to evaluate the project. At first, it looked as though Soul City might get another reprieve. In early April, McKissick met with the task force and laid out a four-step plan that included approval of the remaining $4 million in bonds, additional infrastructure grants, funding for two more industrial buildings, and a campaign to improve the town’s public image. The task force was impressed; in late April it approved Soul City’s 1979 budget and tentatively decided against foreclosure.

  Then, on June 21, Avco submitted its report. Although Soul City was not yet broke—it still had $1 million in the bank, plus $4 million available in unissued bonds—the report concluded that it was no longer financially viable under any conceivable restructuring program. The authors pointed to a number of problems that had hindered the project’s success: the economy, the location, the lack of amenities. But one problem stood out: the city’s name. “The average prospective white buyer sees Soul City as having a negative connotation,” the report stated. “He conceives of it as a community built by Blacks for Blacks and is concerned that he would be living in an alien atmosphere.”

  The next day, the task force met again and reversed its earlier decision. Soul City was no longer a financially acceptable risk, it concluded, and thus not eligible for further assistance from HUD. Harris accepted the group’s conclusion and directed White to develop a plan for acquiring Soul City, either by deed or through foreclosure proceedings.

  Although McKissick had no warning of the decision, he had grown nervous when officials at HUD did not return his calls the previous week. “When you call the federal government, and you can’t reach nobody, you know something’s up,” he said. Still, he was caught off guard when three members of the HUD task force walked into his office at 12:30 p.m. on June 28—seven years to the day since the loan guarantee had been announced. “We hate to tell you this, but we’re here to tell you that we’re withdrawing,” one of the members said. With his quick temper and sharp tongue, one might have expected McKissick to erupt in anger and profanity. But he kept his cool, listening to the officials and then ushering them out the door. When they were gone, he called his staff together and broke the news. The mood was grim, recalled Dot Waller. “It was like someone had passed away, like the entire staff had died.” For Floyd Jr., it was also awkward. A producer from 60 Minutes was on-site working on a story about Soul City, and he spent the entire day showing her around without mentioning what had happened. It was a pointless deception; the producer would hear the news as soon as she turned on the television or read the paper the next day. Floyd wasn’t even sure why he did it. Maybe it was because the news didn’t seem real, and by not sharing it he could pretend for a few hours more that it wasn’t.

  Jane Groom was out of the office when the announcement was made, having driven to Henderson to run some errands and pick up lunch. As she drove back to Soul Tech I, she noticed how beautiful the day was, with white puffs of clouds in the sky and wild roses growing along the side of Soul City Boulevard. She parked her car in the lot and headed for the employee entrance. A familiar voice called out behind her. “Hey, Jane, wait up.” It was Lew Myers, walking quickly, briefcase in hand, a grave expression on his f
ace. “It’s over,” he told her. HUD was closing down the project. Construction would cease immediately, and they would all soon be out of work. Groom was speechless. “I just couldn’t believe it,” she recalled. “I was like, ‘But why? We’re just beginning.’”

  The official announcement came later that day, at a press conference in Washington. Speaking to a room full of reporters, assistant secretary Bill Wise explained that HUD would pay off the $10 million in debt, then seek to negotiate a takeover of the land owned by the Soul City Company. Asked why the project had struggled, Wise did not blame McKissick. “The lesson is it is very tough to develop a new community from scratch and particularly in a rural, isolated area.” William White, who joined Wise at the podium, agreed with that assessment. “This has been very difficult,” White said. “The man put his life into it. But an analysis of our options showed clearly there was no way for the project to succeed.” When reporters pressed him to say whether the project had been mismanaged, White demurred. “It’s not a question of mismanagement. The area itself just didn’t work out. There was not enough of a market to draw from.”

  As for what would happen next, White wasn’t sure. “We’re hoping to work out with McKissick a friendly foreclosure,” he told reporters. “I don’t know how he will react.”