Blacks Buy Land In Georgia Where They Feel Safe From White People

TOOMSBORO, Ga. - A movement to create a "safe haven" city for Black families is gaining momentum on social media and in Wilkinson County. That's where 19 families just purchased nearly 100 acres of land.

The land, in the town of Toomsboro in rural Wilkinson County, was purchased in August by families now calling themselves the “Freedom Georgia Initiative.”

The city of Freedom, Georgia is more than a dream for the Georgia and Florida families who combined their resources to buy nearly 100 acres of land in Wilkinson County, Georgia. For Ashley Scott and Renee Walters, the Freedom, Georgia Initiative, is about creating a place their families and future generations can call home.

“It's about a safe haven. It's about having a place where you can be authentically black, unapologetically black and not be judged,” said Scott.

"Watching our people protesting in the streets, while it is important, and I want people to stay out in the streets, bringing attention to the injustices of Black people. We needed to create a space and a place where we could be a village, again, a tribe, again," Scott said.

“Our 96 acres is to serve for as safe haven for the 19 families that got together and purchased it and then open it up to the public to have retreats, and reunions and weddings, trails for hunting, a lake for fishing and a place for us to just breathe,” said Walters.