In partnership with Defenders of Wildlife and Dr. Sandra Thompson, the GeoPlan Center is working to provide GIS expertise in identifying potential Family Heirs’ property within Florida’s North Star Black Heritage Region.
Identifying Potential Family Heirs’ Property within the North Star Black Heritage Region in the State of Florida – 2021 Pilot Study
Heirs’ property refers to land passed down through family by inheritance, typically without a will. More than half of all Black-owned property in the United States is heirs’ property. Over the past 90 years, significant portions of heirs’ property has been lost due to Factional Ownership and Heirs’ Property Laws, leading to a continued decline in African American land ownership.
The North Star Black Heritage Region (Jackson, Gasden, Leon, Jefferon, and Madison County) has been determined to include many vulnerable communities, providing vital opportunities for support. By identifying heirs’ property with GIS, groups such as Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS), and Dr. Thompson’s team are given the tools they need to assist heirs’ property owners.
The project will utilize the North Star Black Heritage Region as a pilot for developing a methodology to identify and rank heirs’ property from parcel data, with the goal of utilizing this knowledge to identify heirs’ property owners across Florida. Defenders of Wildlife is providing funding to the project.
