Razing Liberty Square

Premiered January 29, 2024

Directed by Katja Esson

A public housing community in Miami becomes ground zero for climate gentrification.

About the Documentary

Liberty City, Miami, was home to one of the oldest segregated public housing projects in the U.S. Now with rising sea levels, the neighborhood’s higher ground has become something else: real estate gold. Wealthy property owners push inland to higher ground, creating a speculators’ market in the historically Black neighborhood previously ignored by developers and policy-makers alike.

The Filmmakers

Katja Esson

Katja Esson is an Academy Award-nominated filmmaker based in Miami. She has produced and directed documentaries for PBS and HBO. A Simons Humanities Fellow at Kansas University, her films have screened at MoMa and the Smithsonian, and is supported by NEA, Knight Foundation, IDA, NYSCA, Redford Center, Sundance, Ford Foundation.

Ann Bennett

Ann Bennett is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker, multimedia producer, and nonfiction storyteller for exhibitions, digital platforms, and networks like PBS, HBO, and Showtime. She holds fellowships with Sundance Creative Producing, Impact Partners, and Black Utopian Practice. Bennett is a graduate of Columbia Journalism School and Harvard College.

Corinna Sager

Corinna Sager is a producer whose projects have received an Oscar nomination, World of Change Award, and Cinema for Peace nomination. She is a Sundance Documentary Grantee, founded a film festival with the United Nations, and as professor at Pace University created the “Let’s Be Frank” discussion series about America’s melting pot.