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Local groups supported by the Movement For Black Lives speak about the vision for their communities
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00:00I'm your senior news and politics editor here at Essence, Malaika Javali, and we are closing out
00:05Black History Month with a bang by looking at our future. We are talking to three groups today. We
00:11are so happy they could join us to think about Black Futures Month and how we can be forward
00:16looking about Black policy. Joined with me today are the groups Equity and Transformation, Fund
00:22the People Coalition, and Action St. Louis. So how y'all doing? Good. How y'all doing this Black
00:28History Month, first of all. Hey, it's a moment to be excited. I'm Black. Every day is exciting
00:37to be Black, right? So I really wanted to pull together this panel. I'm so glad you all could
00:43join us because I feel like not only for Black History Month are we, we often focus on the
00:49past, which can be important and informative for how we work as a people, but a lot of
00:54times we tend to be reactionary. And there's so much local organizing that's happening and
01:00people can get so downtrodden by what's happening in the federal government. So the first question
01:06applies to everybody. So we can just kind of go around clockwise. And how do you all feel
01:13about the importance of local grassroots work like you all do in light of the slow pace of
01:21federal change? Equity and Transformation in Chicago, also known as EAT. And so when
01:27I think about it, I mean, I think that our work, the groundwork has always been the pathway
01:33to some levels of victory, because I don't think we've had a real, real victory yet, right?
01:39Victory for me is, you know, liberation of our people. But we have been able to create some,
01:44you know, I think, important reforms that were necessary to ease the suffering of our folks
01:49in the city of Chicago. What's that, what that looks like, you know, and I think I'm a firm
01:54believer in democracy. And if I say EAT, the way we define democracy is that if a decision is made,
01:59that impacts your life, you have a right to play a role in how that decision is made. And so for our,
02:05our goal is to ensure that as many people we can reach, understand that and get to know that they
02:14have a right to play a role in the decision making process in their communities, then that is a
02:18pathway to change, right? And sometimes we see folks activated in that process, folks that did not know
02:24that you can go down to Springfield and talk to your local legislators. And sometimes it feels like
02:29it's a, it's a, it's a million miles away. But in reality, it's just, it's just, it's literally a bus ride.
02:33Um, and you can get there and you can actually talk to the people who are making, uh, making
02:38changes. Right. Um, and so for me, I think the grassroots, the people, the communities that we
02:45center is the only way that you can create long-term change. So Toya. Yeah. I mean, similar to what Jay
02:52and, uh, and Richard said, I think local work, uh, gives hope to people and real people in real time.
02:59I think, uh, in, in local spaces, we get the opportunity to celebrate the small victories
03:05to help us feel, uh, ready for those victories that take a lot longer. Like you mentioned,
03:09the legislative process is slow, right? We, we, we can go way back to, um, 1862
03:17Emancipation Proclamation was signed, set into effect 1863, but we know there's people who didn't hear,
03:22you didn't see freedom fall a long time after that. We celebrate Juneteenth for that matter.
03:26And we see policies take, take place the same way today. And, um, and you know, that could be a
03:33little bit hopeless. It could feel a little bit hopeless, but when we are joining together as
03:36community celebrating together, taking care of mental health together and, um, and just remembering
03:42the dream together, I think that's the most important part about local spaces and local power,
03:47touching real people in real time. Giving hope to people. That is so key because
03:51since it does take so long at higher levels of government, it's easy to kind of lose sight and
03:59lose track of there being an end, but if you can do something for like a season, you know,
04:05a couple of seasons, like let's build on this, that really can motivate people to keep going.
04:11So I'm going to go back to you, Jay. And if you can just talk about your work, because, uh,
04:19the work of action St. Louis is focused on political power for black community. So what exactly,
04:25what does that look like? What is, what does that mean having political power?
04:28Yeah. So action St. Louis is a grassroots organization that builds black power for folks
04:35here in the St. Louis area. And we do that through a number of different campaigns.
04:40So specifically, um, I work mostly on our campaigns to seek to re-envision public safety and thinking
04:46about how can we divest from these systems that have harmed and killed and surveilled and incarcerated
04:51black folks and invest in the things that actually keep our communities safe, promote genuine health
04:56and wellbeing of our communities. Um, so we have a campaign that seeks to defund St. Louis metropolitan
05:03police department, um, police department that kills more black people for capital than any other
05:07police department in the country. Um, and invest those funds, um, that bloated police budget into things
05:14that, you know, healthcare, housing, um, education. So Richard, your work centers post incarcerated folks in
05:26Chicago, Illinois. And a lot of your work is about the informal economy. And so just kind of to take a
05:34step back a little bit, I started thinking about this more and the intersection of like incarceration
05:42in the informal economy. So basically like kind of this race and class issue with Eric Garner,
05:46because why was he on the street to begin with having to be involved in this informal economy of
05:52selling loose cigarettes. So can you talk about what is the informal economy and what kind of work
05:58do you do around that?
05:59Yeah. So thank you for the question. Um, bridge would eat. And yeah, we organize black informal workers.
06:05Our mission is to build social and economic equity for black informal workers. Um, those folks are like you said,
06:11hair braiders, childcare providers, folks selling new squares, hip hop and rap. You know, I think a lot of people
06:16missed the, missed the point. You know, a lot of our music, whether it was hip hop and rap or jazz was informal.
06:22It was not considered formal music. And we took two turntables and turned it into DJ stands and we
06:27threw parties to create cash. We've been some of the most creative people in the world. And yet,
06:33yet, and still a lot of the occupations that we have to create are informal and or illegal, right. Um,
06:39from bootlegging alcohol, right. To what you consider cannabis. Now, two big markets where black folks
06:46had a very large imprint on the informal occupations. And the second they become formalized, you see a
06:52lack of retention, right? Like you see a lack of black people represented in the ownership structure
06:58and also in some of the, in some of the workforce. So for us, where we see a lot of informal workers is,
07:04you know, like the communities that we work in, like West Garfield park, where you have like 81, um,
07:09of young African-American men ages 17 to 34 that are unemployed. Right. And so these communities,
07:15the, and in these communities, um, this has been, these folks have been unemployed for their lives.
07:20And so, uh, Toya, just, uh, bringing it to you, your work is built around cooperatives. And I don't
07:29think a lot of people are really familiar with economic cooperatives. So if you can, we're gonna
07:34get a little bit deep. If you can talk about your work, of course, what it looks like, what it means,
07:40but also like, why is it important to have this kind of alternative system under, you know,
07:45we live in a capitalist society where it's not encouraged to have like worker owned movements
07:51like this. So can you kind of contrast this work with being in a capitalist system?
07:56I do want to name that the roots of my, my personal work, Project Hustle is around organizing around
08:02the hustle, similar to the people that, uh, that rich names, you know, in New Orleans, everybody,
08:07um, is expected to work in the tourist industry, but the tourist industry ain't paying. And so people
08:12do what they gotta do to, uh, to go get some of that money. They always report to us that the city
08:17made this many billion, this many million this weekend, uh, final four weekend or whatever,
08:23if we had super bowl, right? They're always telling us that the money out there, so people go out and get
08:27it. Um, so that's, that's Project Hustle, but I'm also part of a coalition which connects us
08:32the movement for black lives. We just fund the people through Orleans and in particular,
08:37we are, we, you know, we're building the narrative. Um, and we are, uh, dreamers, lawyers, uh, community
08:44members, all, all of us, we join together to, uh, put a dent in, uh, eliminate, um, the harms that come
08:50to black bodies and get the city to, to redirect some of the funding that goes towards harming us
08:56to actually repairing, um, some of the harms that's been caused to black and brown and indigenous bodies.
09:02Um, and we'll be doing this trying to create, uh, well, not even create, but bring light to an
09:07alternative narrative, right? Um, to be told, uh, over the past five to 10 years, the city didn't
09:14invest in, uh, recreation. The city didn't invest in job development. The city didn't invest in mental
09:20health or education, right? And what we see as a result is young people find their recreation. And
09:27right now in New Orleans, it's fun to rob cars. It's a good recreation. You can make a couple of
09:32dollars and you know, it's hurting us, right? It's hurting us because it's young people that we know
09:37that's going to be in a cultural state because of it. It's hurting us because we getting robbed
09:41by our cars, you know, they robbing their own people. Um, but the reality is the city, um, did not
09:47fund, uh, the young people. And as a result, this is what we're dealing with.
09:51So all of you all are doing work around really kind of populations and communities who are affected
09:59by what it sounds like a carceral state and organizing people to think differently about it.
10:06So we can go again in this clockwise direction, but how do you feel the community is responding?
10:12Because these are kind of different ideas, you know, for so long, we've been told that the only way that
10:18we can live is to be in a punitive state. So how do you, what is their reaction? How are people
10:25responding to really kind of not new ideas because they've been around for a while, but kind of new
10:30in the mainstream. So I'll start with you, Jay. Yeah. I think the people want something different.
10:35I think the people see that, um, what we have is not working and it's even more so not working.
10:43It's failing us. It's actively killing us. It's actively criminalizing us.
10:47So I think the people are like, we've been putting all of our tax dollars here towards
10:53something that's harming us and ready to see, um, ready to see these alternatives, ready to see
10:59us divest from policing and jails and the carceral state to invest in and things that actually make
11:05our community safe. Um, I spent a lot of time knocking on doors around closing the workhouse.
11:12And, um, one question I asked is where do you want to see that $16 million that was put into
11:17this hellhole pretrial jail? Where do you want to see this money? None of these folks, we were knocking
11:24doors in black wards in St. Louis. None of these folks said putting more money into police and jails.
11:31People were like, you know, education. They were like potholes. They were like, you know, just a range of
11:39things, but none of them said the police, none of them said jails. Right. So I think there's an
11:44overwhelming amount of folks that want to see something different.
11:47And that's so crucial that you bring that up because we, we hear about like opinion polling
11:53and what works for politicians, but we rarely hear like, actually no black people are saying
11:58we're interested in this. Like this isn't some far out, like, you know, for a lot of us, it's not
12:05like a radical idea to say we want money to go to different places. So it's good to hear the voices
12:11of our people in sales saying that. Uh, and rich, what, uh, what about you?
12:16I was just thinking, I mean, just echoing everything that Jay brought up. Um, I think
12:23that's the goal, the role of the organizer or the revolutionary is to expand the imagination of
12:28what's possible for the people, right? Like that's, that's, that's the goal is to be able to,
12:32you know, move people beyond like, and sometimes it's small steps. It's like,
12:38I want a speed, speed bump on my block. Right? Well, let's go through, let's walk through the
12:44process on that. Right? Let's go. Okay. What do you got to file this slip at? Who do you got to speak
12:48to? And then they're like, Oh man, the speed bump pops up maybe a year later and they get this speed
12:54bump. But then like, Oh wait, hold on. I can engage in this particular system and invest some time.
13:02And at the end of the day, something will change, right? In my material world.
13:07And, and, and, and that's the goal at the end of the day of, of, of an organizer,
13:11a real organizer revolutionary is to expand that imagination, um, ignite the imagination of the
13:17people in, in ways that are state, our local government or whatever it can show up in our lives.
13:26And I think that through this process and through organizing, the other attribute is that we get to,
13:31we get to bring back collectivism, right? Bringing our folks together to make a collective decision
13:37and then standing on that and moving it, which is something that like, regardless of if policy
13:42passes or not, right? What we have done is that we have, we have, we have kind of rid out that
13:49rugged individualism.
13:50And Toya, how are people responding to some of these new ideas that your group has been putting
13:56forth?
13:57I think people are ready for something, uh, different in the spirit of, um, in the spirit
14:03of, uh, funding the police or funding the people. People are ready to fund the people. I'm reminded
14:08of a conversation I had with two women. And I was at, with my mom at a doctor appointment, two women
14:14in the office, in the waiting room who were grandmothers. And, um, we were watching the news
14:18and it was like, we do need police, but I think we need something different. I'm like, y'all right.
14:23We do need something. What else do we need? You know what I'm saying? So people are ready
14:27for something different because they know we've been trying these things for a very long time.
14:30And they just try, they just need the space and opportunity and like to get outside all the boxes,
14:35we put ourselves in to kind of drink, uh, something different.
14:38Thank you Essence fam for joining us and listening to this panel. If you want to find out more information,
14:45please read up on action. St. Louis has been, um, represented by Jay Shepard, an organizer,
14:52check out equity and transformation. Thank you rich for joining us. Rich Wallace and Toya Lewis.
14:57Thank you so much for you guys. And y'all came in from all over the city. I don't, and they mentioned
15:02it in there when they spoke, but just to be clear, we got St. Louis in the house. We got Chicago in the
15:06house and new Orleans, just all over. So Toya Lewis, Lewis on the people project hustle. Thank you all so
15:12much. And happy Black Future Month. Yes. Black Future Month for everybody.
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