Lake Fausse Pointe State Park

Clean up project in Broadmoor

Jan 16th Painting Mid City Redevelopment Alliance

Education

Juvenile Justice

Community Organizing
Agenda

More readings

More readings

Volunteer management and fund devlopment trends

Our first team meeting will be held this coming Tuesday,
October 11th from 9:00-4:00.  We will meet at the LDSC office at
250 S. Foster Drive at 9:00 am.  From there we will travel to the new
affordable housing complex managed by the Capital Area Alliance for the Homeless
and hear from their Director, Randy Nichols.  Afterwards, we will return to
the LDSC office for a potluck lunch and will have a financial literacy workshop
in the afternoon

Hey New Orleans members! It’s time for our first team meeting. We will
meet at the First Unitarian Church, home of the Center for Ethical Living and
Social Justice Renewal, next Friday October 14th from 9-4pm. We will have Rich Campanella
from Tulane in the afternoon for a discussion on NOLA geography and history. We
will also have a potluck lunch. See below for suggestions. And we have your
uniforms! 
 
To prepare for our conversations on Friday I have attached a few
readings. 

This one  is 115 pages so if you could read Page 103 Ten Things to Remember, page 92 Love
letter to the Common Ground Clinic, page 87 From the Ground Up and Wading
Towards home which starts on page 30. I recommend reading the whole thing if you
have the time.
 
TOWARD THE JUST RESTORATION OF NEW ORLEANS: READINGS ON RACISM AND
RESISTANCE BEFORE, DURING, AND AFTER KATRINA FOR SOLIDARITY ACTIVISTS 
Prepared for Common Ground Volunteers 
Compiled by Sharon Martinas and Rachel E. Luft
 
The next reading comes from Floodlines by Jordon Flaherty. Please read
pages 3-9. The rest of the packet is great too. This was compiled by David
Ferris for last year’s October Team Meeting.

Baton Rouge April 12th 9-3pm    Tyrus Thomas Facility    Racial and Social Justice Issues
New Orleans April 15th 9-4:30    First Grace Church          Environmental Justice

"What is good work?"
For 3 days members actively reflected on their service experience thus far and rejuvenated their minds and bodies to continue their good work.
Workshop topics were Poetry; Power, Relationships and Organizing; Asset and Community Mapping, Project Planning; Burnout Prevention; Love in Work; and Budget/Time Management.

Members also participated in a service project and a raucous Talent Show.

Click here to open the webpage at google docs which has all the written material is individually labelled.

On MLK Day, the Louisiana Delta Service Corps worked with the Fight Back Center in St. Bernard. About twenty of us spent the day on an old house that looks out onto the new housing developments that are where the project used to be before the storm. This old house with its peeling white paint and old broken shutters used to be a hub for community events. The plan is to rebuild the space so that the community can use it again.

I spent most of my time on top of the roof with David pulling aluminum siding off and throwing old tiles and empty paint cans up into the air and into the huge dumpster. We wrestled with cat’s claw that had made its way to the very top of the building, cracking through the cement laying claim to the back wall and destroying everything in its mighty path. We stayed busy through the morning, enjoying each other’s company and orchestrating our actions as efficiently as possible. By the end of the day the backyard looked completely different. We tore the back patio and dog cage out and threw what we could not reuse in the dumpster. A team of gardeners removed stumps all along the side and then began the garden bed project. The group in the front learned how to build scaffolding and cleaned the front with bleach.  There is still a lot of work to be done but it was satisfying to be the inaugural group to start this large scale project.

Endasia and other community members prepared food for us and its smell filled the air as we neared lunch time.  Most of us took a piece of front lawn and enjoyed the holygrove salad, satsumas, and bbq sausage and chicken.  Endasia thanked us for coming and said this is how we should remember Martin Luther King, Jr. We shouldn’t glorify or worship him, but strive to be like him and take action as we did that day and every day we do service at our respective host sites.

I enjoyed using my body and skill to build something good. I could feel with every pull and nail that I was contributing to a place that would nurture happiness, produce joy, and create laughter. Across the street people from the neighborhood came to watch, curious atop their milk crates and chairs. It felt like being in the monkey exhibit, I wanted them so bad to come and join me on the roof, or I on a black milk crate next to them. Isn’t that what solidarity really is anyway?

Endasia gave us a tour of the new housing projects and told us what the neighborhood used to be like. The area was silent and devoid of the culture or pulse that it used to have before the storm. There are a lot of empty places in the neighborhood and Endasia said the people that used to live in St. Bernard don’t want to come back because of how different it is. There are new regulations such as a noise curfew and criminal record checks that some people feel are too rigid.

As a relatively new New Orleanian resident I don’t feel educated or experienced enough to have a strong opinion on the city’s contentious housing subject. I think it is unfair that people cannot come back to their homes. It was extremely unjust to tear down the projects (many of which withstood both Katrina and Rita and were still torn down) and not give residents the decency to get their material possessions out. I did not grow up in St. Bernard, I can only bear witness and listen to those who do call this place home and have something to say about it. It was a memorable day that got me thinking a lot about what is a home and what is necessary for a strong community. Does it matter what materials make up the walls? Who cares how many floors or kitchen appliances you own. Give me a gregarious next door neighbor with three kids and a dog. Give me a community I can fight with and cook for and love and bear witness to through the glorious and the tragic until we aren’t alive any more to do so.

Baton Rouge -
On Monday, Jan 17th, our Baton Rouge LDSC AmeriCorps members partnered with Mid-City Redevelopment Alliance (also one of our host sites) to clean and beautify Sweet Olive Cemetery on North Blvd. About 100 volunteers were present for the project, having been recruited also through Mid-City for the MLK day project. Members painted and revitalized gravesites and tombs in the cemetery, and also assisted with general cleanup of the cemetery. Sweet Olive is a very historic cemetery, and without a caretaker, many of its inhabitants are subject to natural ruin and decay. After the project, members gathered for pizza and reflection before ending the day of service.

Theme: Public and Affordable Housing in New Orleans
Required Reading
Speakers:
James Perry director@gnofairhousing.org Executive Director, Greater New Orleans Fair Housing Action Center
Tara O'Neill Policy Manager at Tulane University's Cowen Institute and formerly with the Council of Large Public Housing Authorities
Len Henry, Housing Authority of New Orleans 
 
Jocquelyn Marshall, Community Center Manager of Operations at Urban Strategies resident at Harmony Oaks Apartments
Survivor’s Village began as a tent city erected on June 2006 by residents of the St. Bernard Public Housing Development. They fight for housing for poor people and the rights of former St. Bernard residents to return to their neighborhoods.


 

Theme: Team Building
Speaker: Blythe Daigle bdaigle@brgov.com Chief Service Officer Office of the Mayor-President