Week 1: Letter to Myself

Dear Miriam,

Chodesh tov and happy summer! I’ve been at Soulardarity a full week now, getting a sense for what I’ll be doing for the next two months, getting to know the people involved with Soulardarity (staff, members, community partners) and drinking a lot of coffee in the Dexter Davison neighborhood where my grandparents grew up in (their families left during the massive white flight that occured here). On the first day, me and my boss Jackson made a Venn diagram of what I hope to learn, what Soulardarity needs and where those overlap in research projects. I’m primarily interested in learning the behind the scenes of how a small nonprofit with four staff total and lots of volunteers works. It’s really important to me to learn more about how they deal with issues of accountability (to each other as coworkers and also between the org and all stakeholders affected by their work), sustainability (dealing with burn-out, supporting each other, retaining institutional knowledge) while translating policy and ideas into changing material conditions in Highland Park (stopping DTE from having all the power, reducing energy bills, etc). Jackson has made it clear that one priority for Soulardarity is to research infrastructure since they don’t have the capacity to do that right now. They need someone to do research into how other orgs of this size stay accountable to members, and how they organize committees. Shimekia, who focuses on communications, (although everyone kind of does everything) is really interested in not just current models of community organizing, but historic examples, specifically in Highland Park of Black organizing for self determination, so hopefully I’ll get to do some research for that as well. This all coincides with the organization’s push to finalize an ambitious, visionary plan created through community feedback on how to create energy democracy in Highland Park. That plan is one of the biggest projects I’ll be working on, helping Shimekia do research on the historical context of this organizing, supporting member feedback meetings, and making sure that what I notice and learn is retained in the org. I’m trying to strike a balance between the excitement that exists here about all the potential projects and making sure that I don’t get involved in too many things to the point that when they lose the extra capacity with me leaving at the end of the summer that they get stuck in the middle of those projects.

The prompt was my perceptions of Detroit, however since I’m working in Highland Park, I’ll focus on this city. My perceptions of Highland Park from what I’ve learned so far is that people who grew up here care very deeply about their city. At a recent meeting, long term members of the Highland Park community were reminiscing— do you remember this place? That candy shop I used to go to with my siblings? etc. Over and over again I am meeting people who are really passionate about a just transition to energy democracy (making sure people have access to renewable energy in a way that doesn’t play into systems of racism and classism that often mean renewable can be connected to displacement.) Based on conversations and reading the history Shimekia has written, my other impression is that there is a deep history of corporations, city government, and the Black Legion (even more extreme than the Klan) targeting the Black community who’ve lived here and that what we are up against is the lethal and insidious infrastructure of capitalism and white supremacy. That’s daunting but I’m excited to learn more about the long history of organizing in this community, both today and in the past and help support work that’s allowing people to actualize dreams for this community’s future.

Wishing you deep learning, thoughtfulness about your actions and contributions, and rededication to the magic of community organizing.

Love,
Miriam