Eight years after the discovery of the Sugar Land 95 forced Fort Bend County to confront one of the darkest chapters of its history, a new development proposal is raising fears that more unmarked graves could still lie beneath the ground.
The Sugar Land Planning and Zoning Commission voted 7-0 on June 17 to table a rezoning request that would have cleared the way for a proposed single-family neighborhood on 42 acres near the James Reese Career and Technical Center after residents, historians and civil rights advocates warned the site could contain additional burial sites tied to Texas’ convict-leasing system.
The tract sits adjacent to the cemetery where construction crews uncovered the remains of the Sugar Land 95 in 2018. Researchers later determined the remains belonged to 94 men and one woman forced into Texas’ convict-leasing system, which leased prisoners, most of them Black, to private landowners who profited from their labor. Many never survived their sentences…