In towns such as Lumberton and Goldsboro, America’s economic and racial inequality is brought to the fore

Amid the cluster of uniformed officials, flashing lights and shallow-bottomed boats in downtown Lumberton on Sunday afternoon, six figures stood out.

Patrice Carmichael, Clarence Hargrove and three of their children were walking slowly through the driving rain, pushing their four-month-old baby in a stroller and hauling a shopping trolley filled with clothing and food.

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The family had been forced to evacuate their apartment in the path of the expected flooding from the Lumber river. But without a car or, it appeared, any help from authorities, they were forced to walk a mile and a half to an evacuation shelter.

Play Video 1:29 Jacksonville resident canoes through neighbourhood to show extent of flooding – video

Lumberton, like the coastal cities of Wilmington and Jacksonville, has been hit hard by Florence. The Lumber river, which flows south through North Carolina, flooded during Hurricane Matthew two years ago, causing hundreds to lose their homes. More than a third of people in Lumberton live below the poverty line, and as with Matthew, and lower-income areas are likely to be hit hard by the floods.

During Matthew it was poorer communities here that suffered more than any other. In Lumberton, the south and west of the city – where much of the affordable housing is located – stands visibly lower than the more affluent downtown and north areas.

The sense of recent history repeating itself was a bitter realization for Carmichael and her family. Their apartment, a stone’s throw from the Lumber, had flooded in 2016 – and the children are still traumatized.

Where the hurricanes hit the hardest are the counties that have the highest number of black populations and poor populations Rev William Barber

“They just don’t want to go through it again. They’re OK at the moment but they were scared last night because the water was so high,” Carmichael said, as rain pounded the city, drenching the family. “We’re leaving [again] because the dam is going to break and we’re going to get flooded.”

Seven-year-old Tyrin and five-year-old Tyler walked alongside their parents, while Tyree, three, sat in the shopping cart. Four-month-old Chance, oblivious to the threat in the stroller, dozed as the family trudged.

Carmichael felt that not enough effort had been taken to prevent the Lumber from flooding lower-income neighborhoods. “They [portray] us as the poor people. If we’re so poor then why mess up our houses – because other people have money to fix up their houses. We don’t.”

A hundred miles north-east, the city of Goldsboro, which straddles the Neuse river, was also bracing for flooding. Like Lumberton, the city was inundated in 2016. Here, a quarter of residents live below the poverty line.

At the Greenleaf Christian church, volunteers planned to cook hundreds of meals for children who would likely miss school for days.

“Most of the kids in this area are on free and reduced lunch,” explained volunteer John Barnes. “Most times the only meal they get is during school time. When school is out, they may not get a meal at all.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Jacksonville resident Art Ferreiro kayaks around his flooded neighbourhood. Photograph: Oliver Laughland/The Guardian

Greenleaf is home to national civil rights leader the Rev William Barber, who left the city briefly to evacuate his elderly mother.

On the phone, Barber argued that Florence should mark a moment to discuss the state’s various forms of structural racism and economic inequality.

“Where the hurricanes hit the hardest are the counties that have the highest number of black populations and poor populations. And yet in those areas the resources and the infrastructure that could be put in before we have storms is never quite dealt with,” he said.

Goldsboro and Lumberton have large black populations and house one of North Carolina’s numerous coal-ash dumps that have leaked during previous natural disasters, sending potentially dangerous levels of mercury, arsenic and lead into freshwater sources.

“We talk about racism when Charlottesville happens, or racism when Roseanne Barr says something foolish, but what about the racism and the classism when you look at where these coal-ash sites are that leak and spill during natural disasters?” Barber said.

“What about the racism and classism that’s at work in the south when many get elected because of voter suppression and gerrymandering? And then get elected and enact policies that deny people healthcare, which is so important in the aftermath of these disasters?”

The storms are getting worse every year and I believe it’s because of what we’re doing to the environment Art Ferreiro, Jacksonville

North Carolina, which has accepted millions of dollars in federal aid issued by the Trump administration’s disaster declaration during Florence, has not expanded Medicaid, the federal health program for low-income Americans. The expansion is a key plank of Barack Obama’s signature healthcare legislation.

Meanwhile, the roads to North Carolina’s coastline – the area pummeled by Florence’s hurricane-force winds and drenched by the slow moving storm’s early rains – are partially submerged. Some evacuated homes, many missing their roofs, were still engulfed on Sunday. A graveyard by the roadside sat with water lapping halfway up the headstones.

The city of Jacksonville, newly accessible after the waters began to recede, was still partially flooded. Here only around 10% of the city lives under the poverty line and residents of the affluent Bayview Drive had taken extreme measures – kayaks and waders – to reach their flooded homes.

Art Ferreiro, a 43-year-old retired marine, paddled out along the neighbourhood, cautioning the Guardian about snakes and alligators in the water.

Flooding has never been as bad on this street as it was during Florence, he said. Ferreiro’s garage was flooded out as he’d watched Florence roll in with a sense of panic. “The storms are getting worse every year and I believe it’s because of what we’re doing to the environment, which is causing a lot of change,” he said.

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Like a majority of residents along North Carolina’s coastal counties, Ferreiro voted for Donald Trump in 2016. The president, who has dismissed climate change as a “hoax” and rolled back a significant number of Obama-era climate protections, has made no mention of the environment in his response to Florence.

Despite Ferreiro’s belief, supported by analysis, that climate change is making hurricanes worse, he said his experience during Florence has not made him change his views on Trump.

“I’m a Trump supporter,” he said. “I don’t know what his views are on climate change. I’m more concerned around the economy and just keeping my head above water. Literally.”

Many Jacksonville residents declined to discuss their views on climate change and Trump.

But Barber held nothing back. “The storms are not going to stop coming,” he said. “We are in the path of hurricanes. And the more this climate warms, the stronger the winds are going to get, the more erratic the storms are going to get. We’re going to get pummeled over and over again.”

By Monday, Carmichael, Hargrove and the children had been evacuated from their first evacuation shelter. The Lumber river had broken its dam and now the downtown area was at risk. Buses took families to Pembroke, 12 miles west.

The shelter was crowded, Carmichael said, but the children had beds – even if they had to share two small cots between four. She had no way of telling if their home was underwater, and no indication about when she could return. But she’d contacted the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and been promised a hotel room.

“Hopefully they’ll put us in a room in a couple of days,” she said down the phone. “We’ve just got to wait.”