About
Bethel Ensley Action Task, Inc. (BEAT) began in the spring of 1990 with the arrival of a new and energetic young pastor to the out of the way little church of Bethel A.M.E. in Ensley, Alabama, or as the old timers called the neighborhood immediately surrounding the church, Sandy Bottom. Sandy Bottom, because years ago, as the old steel mills adjacent to the community churned round the clock to satisfy mid-20th century America’s ever-growing appetite for steel, the smoke and ash from the 250 foot chimney stacks would blanket the streets, houses and bushes with a thin layer of dust and soot. Employing more than 40,000 people at their peak in the 1950’s and 60’s, these steel mills produced a vibrant and energetic commercial district on 19th Street in downtown Ensley, supplied thousands of houses for its employees, spawned private investment that created the community’s first high rise office building, and bound together the economic and social fabric of this promising community.
Rev. Ronald E. Nored arrived at Bethel A.M.E Church in 1990, nearly two decades after the steel mills had closed. The community that he was asked to shepherd was a shell of what it had once been. The commercial district that had once bustled with noise and traffic was now quite. The steel plants themselves were apocalyptic-like skeletons of what they had once been, littered with decaying factories, aged smoke stacks, and broken down railway cars that had been left behind with the sudden plant closures. But even more disturbing to the young pastor then these abandoned industrial and commercial areas were the areas of the community in which people still lived. The homes that had once housed employees of the great steel mills were now homes to those that were simply left behind. “Railroad housing” or “shot-gun” houses were the norm throughout the Ensley community. Usually built side-by-side, these thin, long homes that earned their name from their resemblance to a double barrel shotgun, were constructed so that as one walked in the front door of the home, each of the usually three rooms was directly behind the next. In order to get to each room you had to walk through a prior. These shot-gun homes had long since outlived any healthy existence. Roofs leaked, windows were broken, and the very foundations of the houses were decaying from beneath. Barely meeting the definition of “shelter” these structures that housed members of the community, as well as members of the church, were too much for this young pastor to look past. The need was apparent and the vision was clear. What was missing however was an understanding of how to bring together all of the necessary elements required to put this vision into motion.
That missing piece of the puzzle was found in Clarence L. Brown, a member of Birmingham’s business community, a leader at Bethel A.M.E. Church and a resident of Ensley with a lifetime of knowledge about the evolution of this once hopeful place. Mr. Brown recognized early on that new strategic partnerships needed to be secured with private industry as well as the City of Birmingham itself. He had seen the ineffective “solutions” that had come and gone in the community, imposed for the right ideas, but in ways that showed an essential lack of understanding for the people of Ensley and their needs. To establish these new partnerships an education of sorts would need to begin and it would begin first with the people of Bethel A.M.E. and the residents of the Sandy Bottom community.
Together these two leaders recognized that in order to reweave the social and spiritual fabric of this frayed neighborhood, the work that needed to be done would have to begin and end with the people that called this their home. They recognized that in order to find real lasting solutions they would have to identify and implement them themselves. Essentially, this would turn the traditional power structure on its head as a grassroots organization would now tell the city and state what needed to be done, and, more importantly, that they would do it themselves. This was an appallingly bold suggestion considering that at the time they had no organizational structure, no strategic partnerships established, and, most evidently, no money.
Flash forward fifteen years and a forgotten neighborhood has been brought back from the brink. Gone are the dilapidated buildings, the disparate living conditions, and the social illnesses of drug and alcohol abuse that so often shadow communities lacking hope. In their place what you find is truly miraculous.
- View current BEAT’s accomplishments