Speaker 1: Hello, and welcome to It Could Happen. Here's a podcast
Speaker 1: about the world falling apart and people who are putting
Speaker 1: it back together. Today we're joined by Jimmy and Rain
Speaker 1: from mutual A Disaster Relief. They are helping to put
Speaker 1: back together some of the parts of the world that
Speaker 1: are acutely falling apart right now. My colleague Gare is
Speaker 1: here as well. I guess, and yeah, we're gonna we're
Speaker 1: gonna get into it. We're gonna talk about the response
Speaker 1: that mutual A Disaster Relief have made too hurricane Ian.
Speaker 1: We're going to talk about how we can solve these
Speaker 1: things without necessarily giving a bunch of money to the
Speaker 1: wrong people, and people can help people in a way
Speaker 1: that is natural, organic and good for everyone. So Jimmy
Speaker 1: and Rain say hi everybody. Hello, Hey, and can you
Speaker 1: explain to us a little bit first of all, about
Speaker 1: what mutual Aid Disaster Relief is and how it operates
Speaker 1: in these natural disasters. Sure, Mutual Aid Disaster Relief is
Speaker 1: a people power disaster relief network based on the principles
Speaker 1: of solidarity, mutual aid and autonomous direct action. And we
Speaker 1: act as a Swiss army knife for the larger autonomous
Speaker 1: disaster response and mutual aid movements UH and work with
Speaker 1: UH affinity groups, local mutual aid groups UH and other
Speaker 1: disaster survivors to help form and foster a communal recovery.
Speaker 1: That sounds great, that's very inspiring. Can you explain, maybe
Speaker 1: for listeners who aren't familiar, exactly what mutual aid means
Speaker 1: in this context? Sure, mutual aid is a voluntary, reciprocal,
Speaker 1: participatory exchange among equals. It's about sharing resources, but it's
Speaker 1: also about sharing power. I'll spend a lot of my
Speaker 1: life in poverty, and I know that many people in
Speaker 1: the same experiences would rather not receive something than receive something.
Speaker 1: To the downward gaze if if something costs us our dignity,
Speaker 1: the it's not worth it um. And so mutual aid
Speaker 1: is a way to share with each other UH, where
Speaker 1: we're UM sharing as equals UM instead of a powerful
Speaker 1: giver of aid a powerless receiver of aid. And it
Speaker 1: also has the dynamic of addressing the root causes of
Speaker 1: the need in the in the first place. Okay, that's yeah,
Speaker 1: that's really that's a good description, Thank you very much.
Speaker 1: What what you've done recently, right is responded to Hurricane Ian,
Speaker 1: which most people I think will know hit Florida and
Speaker 1: I think the Carolinas after that. Can you take us
Speaker 1: through some of the work that you've been doing down there? Sure.
Speaker 1: A lot of what I've been involved in it supplies distribution. Uh.
Speaker 1: So we're um every day loading up vehicles and going
Speaker 1: doing mobile distribution to trailer parks, to public housing apartments, uh,
Speaker 1: and other communities that are hit and historically you know,
Speaker 1: left out of top down uh really models, um, and
Speaker 1: providing tarps, water, food, other essentials that people need. Yeah, sure,
Speaker 1: that's very important. What's the situation like where now what
Speaker 1: like a with ten days out something like that from
Speaker 1: when the hurricane first made landfall? Is that right? I'm
Speaker 1: not sure exactly right? Do you know? Yeah? No, time,
Speaker 1: time is not a thing when this is happening. It's
Speaker 1: just kind of like all of the days go together,
Speaker 1: or nights or both. Yeah. Yeah, that's yeah, that's totally fine.
Speaker 1: So what's it? You know? Um, in some places power
Speaker 1: is starting to get turned back on. Gas is easier
Speaker 1: to find than it was you know, several days ago. Um,
Speaker 1: but there's still, um, you know, like a lot of
Speaker 1: need for solidarity based relief. There's uh just like every disaster,
Speaker 1: there's uh many communities that are left behind, um and
Speaker 1: it's the same communities that are left behind by the
Speaker 1: disaster of capitalism and colonialism and white supremacy, and so
Speaker 1: you know, even though power is starting to get turned
Speaker 1: back on in some places, it's gonna be months or years,
Speaker 1: you know before people recover from this. Yeah, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of folks that are not UM like to me
Speaker 1: he's talking about, there's folks that are renters who you know,
Speaker 1: don't don't know what they're supposed to do with their
Speaker 1: with the apartment that they're in, the roof is caving in,
Speaker 1: and if the landlord is not responding, then what are
Speaker 1: they supposed to do. So if there's folks on the ground,
Speaker 1: they go in and they'll try to like help get
Speaker 1: the tarp up, you know, on the roof and things
Speaker 1: like that. So that's usually the kind of stuff I'm
Speaker 1: involved with when I'm when it's happening more in my area.
Speaker 1: But there's a lot of us that are working like
Speaker 1: remote as well to help support on the ground, like
Speaker 1: doing colms and organizing supply lines through the Autonomous Supply
Speaker 1: line chain that we have and just kind of trying
Speaker 1: to mobilize more affinity groups in the local areas like
Speaker 1: food not um sitting bombs came down and helped out
Speaker 1: and did a food chair, and so just trying to
Speaker 1: get everybody who's close by to be able to address
Speaker 1: the immediate needs and start planning for the long term
Speaker 1: because Jimmy is right, it's gonna take years. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: really fascinating. I think you're right that often like and
Speaker 1: I think we should contrast actually that like that they
Speaker 1: sort of don the large global nonprofit model or the
Speaker 1: service provider model that they contrast with this, right, which
Speaker 1: often kind of floods an area with resources whether or
Speaker 1: not it needs them, and then withdrawals kind of once
Speaker 1: attention is going to when people are left to rebuild
Speaker 1: their lives kind of on their own. Right. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: time and time again, Um, from Hurricane Katrina to Hurricane Maria.
Speaker 1: You know, a rain you know, uh In in Louisiana
Speaker 1: has experienced a number of hurricanes, you know, in recent years. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, time and time again, we we we had
Speaker 1: we learn over and over again that the state is
Speaker 1: not coming to save us. The market is not going
Speaker 1: to save us. The nonprofit industrial complex, it's not going
Speaker 1: to save us. We have to save each other. We
Speaker 1: have to take care of each other from below. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's very true. I remember in Suppose eighteen,
Speaker 1: when the last seven mid terms came, there was a
Speaker 1: large migrant caravan that came to Tijuana, which is just
Speaker 1: south of where I live, and there are a number
Speaker 1: of these big international nonprofits, but they weren't actually allowed
Speaker 1: to enter the area where these people were. So you
Speaker 1: had these people in a football stadium and you had
Speaker 1: large nonprofits outside, and they cut off the water to
Speaker 1: the place where these people work. They wanted them to
Speaker 1: go somewhere else, And it was this bizarre scene where
Speaker 1: you had tens of hundreds of thousands of dollars of
Speaker 1: resources sitting outside, and then you had little children who
Speaker 1: hadn't had a drink of water that day sitting inside.
Speaker 1: And it was really illustrative to me of how these
Speaker 1: massive nonprofits can raise a ship ton of money and
Speaker 1: still completely failed people when they need help the most.
Speaker 1: So it's great that you guys are out there doing that.
Speaker 1: Can you take us through some of you You mentioned
Speaker 1: Hurricane Katrina, You mentioned being in New Orleans, like, can
Speaker 1: you take us through some of the other natural disasters
Speaker 1: and how you've helped. UM well, UH in when we
Speaker 1: first kind of got our paperwork, UM official or whatever,
Speaker 1: we had the flood in Plant Rouge and Louisiana, and
Speaker 1: it was one of the most historic floods since like
Speaker 1: the early nineteen and it barely made the news. And
Speaker 1: there were several of the major floods that happened the
Speaker 1: climate caused floods in the Midwest that UM summer that
Speaker 1: barely made the news. And now people are starting to
Speaker 1: talk about it, right, starting to talk about climate change
Speaker 1: because it's inevitable. Every single disaster is you know, more
Speaker 1: just more and more frequency or higher intensity storm, more
Speaker 1: rainfall in a shorter amount of time. And so we
Speaker 1: had that flood and we hit the ground pretty much running,
Speaker 1: just doing lots of bucking and gutting and organizing a
Speaker 1: lot of folks coming up from UH Texas and south
Speaker 1: in like New Orleans area and you know east from
Speaker 1: Florida all the way over Mississippi. UM. And then, like
Speaker 1: Jimmy said, we just kept getting hit and hit. I
Speaker 1: can't even remember everything after that. I knew there was IRMA,
Speaker 1: and we responded to IRMA. We had national colms running UM,
Speaker 1: which was really cool. People were signing up for workships
Speaker 1: and helping out on the ground while people were running
Speaker 1: around and UM getting transportation and getting people out of places,
Speaker 1: delivering supplies, helping you know, again with tarping or like
Speaker 1: things that might have happened homes UM. And then we've
Speaker 1: had Maria. I went down to Puerto Rico for that
Speaker 1: UM and helped out with some of the solar and
Speaker 1: water issues there. And then we have Laura and Harvey
Speaker 1: and I cannot even remember all of them at this
Speaker 1: point in Fiona, they just all they're all gonna keep
Speaker 1: coming either into the Gulf or they're going to head
Speaker 1: along the East coast because of the way that the
Speaker 1: climate has affected the current and the surface water temperatures
Speaker 1: in the Gulf and the Atlantic. Yeah, and like you say,
Speaker 1: they're going to have a disportionate impact on people who
Speaker 1: are already marginalized. What is it you're talking about people
Speaker 1: signing up for work? That's interesting? So do you seems
Speaker 1: like you're mostly a volunteer organization to people who have
Speaker 1: special skills. Just got up to a website and say Hey,
Speaker 1: I'd like to help, or how does that work? It
Speaker 1: happens in a lot of ways. Sometimes folks will reach
Speaker 1: out via the email on the website, um, or they'll
Speaker 1: reach out on one of the social media or they'll
Speaker 1: know somebody and be like, hey, I want to get involved.
Speaker 1: Um that's really grassroots. Some people are in the ground.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of folks that have gotten involved more
Speaker 1: long term because um, you know, there was a response
Speaker 1: on the ground in their area. They kind of got
Speaker 1: into it just because that's you know, what ends up
Speaker 1: happening when there's no one else around, you rely on
Speaker 1: each other and you old that community. It's kind of
Speaker 1: it's kind of just what happens. Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 1: So what's your sort of national Do you have a
Speaker 1: sense of how many people, how many volunteers you have
Speaker 1: on a nationals I'm guessing your national or international scale?
Speaker 1: Now it varies, you know, like in in times of
Speaker 1: you know, when you know, between disasters, uh, you know
Speaker 1: there's you know, dozens of people involved or you know,
Speaker 1: like a hundred or two hundred, um. But then we're
Speaker 1: very you know, participatory and UM, so when a disaster happens,
Speaker 1: you know there's a lot more people involved, hundreds and
Speaker 1: thousands of people that participate in one way or another.
Speaker 1: Like in Louisiana, we've had um a lot of different
Speaker 1: like ds A groups or s r A groups come
Speaker 1: out and help out, like mobilies on the ground and
Speaker 1: kind of come out as infinity groups and do different jobs,
Speaker 1: help out with different homes, and so really it's just
Speaker 1: like it's an network of facilitating anyone who's interested in
Speaker 1: ensuring that all of us have what we need when
Speaker 1: we know the response is going to be slow from
Speaker 1: those that are supposed to be handling that quote unquote right,
Speaker 1: And then you guys can connect people with skills or
Speaker 1: people with time to people who need help. Yeah, there
Speaker 1: really anybody who had skill of any kind or is welcome.
Speaker 1: That's great. Yeah, where can they find that people do
Speaker 1: want to sign up? I guess the easiest way would
Speaker 1: be yet, I don't know, Jimmy money. I'm on the
Speaker 1: ground a lot. Check out our website mutual A Disaster
Speaker 1: Relief dot org and our emails mutual A Disaster Relief
Speaker 1: at gmail dot com. We're on all the social media's
Speaker 1: as well, and yeah, we we love it when folks
Speaker 1: UH reach out to us and tell us how they
Speaker 1: want to be involved. I wanted to ask you there
Speaker 1: are obviously some other organizations who, like maybe I would
Speaker 1: name it, you can if you want to, who have
Speaker 1: received a lot of national press for doing helping people
Speaker 1: in times of disaster, and maybe you can explain a while,
Speaker 1: like some folks wouldn't necessarily be comfortable asking them for
Speaker 1: help or going to them if they needed help. Yeah, UM,
Speaker 1: so oftentimes, uh, you know, you know, like organizations you know, UM,
Speaker 1: you know, top down organizations. You know, they partner with
Speaker 1: you know, police or homeland security or carcetoral institutions like that.
Speaker 1: There's um a shelter after um uh, when Hurricane Michael
Speaker 1: hit the Panhandle. UM, you know, people who had warrants
Speaker 1: you know, we're we're signed into the shelter and then
Speaker 1: police came and scoop them up and brought them to um,
Speaker 1: you know, to jails, into prisons and you know, so
Speaker 1: you know, UM and also you know, even with with
Speaker 1: you know, with those you know, extreme situations aside. UM.
Speaker 1: You know, the the top down approach is patronizing, it's stigmatizing. It.
Speaker 1: UM can um at sometimes provide the water, the food
Speaker 1: that that people need but oftentimes comes at a too
Speaker 1: high of a cost. Uh, and people long for a
Speaker 1: communal recovery. That's how we heal from disasters like this,
Speaker 1: from crises events is being part of, you know, a
Speaker 1: communal recovery. We're all able to pitch in and receive
Speaker 1: what we need and and give what we can. Yeah,
Speaker 1: can you tell us can you give U an example
Speaker 1: of a communal recovery, like that's something that's happened somewhere. Well,
Speaker 1: you guys have been able to assist a community or
Speaker 1: a community be able to assist a family or into
Speaker 1: Julian recovering. Yeah. Um. One one example that I think
Speaker 1: it's really representative of of our approach is UM there
Speaker 1: there there's a family who who was evicted you know,
Speaker 1: the um illegally you know, after after a disaster, and
Speaker 1: uh that you know, single mom was looking after the
Speaker 1: other single moms, making sure they had you know, uh
Speaker 1: fuel for you know, their generators to um you know,
Speaker 1: to power their their phone in different different devices, and
Speaker 1: that they had diapers, and that they had you know
Speaker 1: what what they needed to get by even though you know,
Speaker 1: they no longer had a roof over their head and
Speaker 1: so when mutual a disaster relief comes across people like this,
Speaker 1: our resources are their resources, you know. So so when
Speaker 1: we both local mutual aid groups, just the matriarchal the
Speaker 1: block who's taken care of of of the other folks
Speaker 1: on the block, mutually disastually exists to uh to share
Speaker 1: you know, um this this network of supplies and labor
Speaker 1: and you know, back up and support with with efforts
Speaker 1: like that that are spontaneous that arise after every crisis. Okay,
Speaker 1: that makes sense. The LA's the thing I really wanted
Speaker 1: to get to here was like, as you mentioned climate
Speaker 1: changes causing these natural disasters and the worst that things
Speaker 1: get than the worst that things get, and like you
Speaker 1: guys have started this organization that helps people to help people,
Speaker 1: and I'm wondering, like what a like, how can people
Speaker 1: organize to help and be How can people in communities
Speaker 1: organize to be more resilient and in the time when
Speaker 1: natural disasters becoming more and more commonplace. So one of
Speaker 1: the things that I think what Jimmy spoke to regarding
Speaker 1: like a matriarch on the black building, that community in
Speaker 1: advanced and after if it happens to just be after,
Speaker 1: which is kind of what happens a lot of times
Speaker 1: is when it's that forced um, I don't want to
Speaker 1: say forced, but out of necessity, right, Like necessity is
Speaker 1: the mother of invention, right, And so there's these iterations
Speaker 1: of what community can become. Every time there's a disaster,
Speaker 1: there's like a clean slate and there's a vacuum in
Speaker 1: which something can be created because there maybe nothing. And
Speaker 1: so if you can see an opportunity and if you
Speaker 1: if you have any kind of network on the ground,
Speaker 1: or you it spontaneously rupts, then that can be the
Speaker 1: new growth or the like or however you want to
Speaker 1: phrase it. But I think for the resiliency to happen,
Speaker 1: that solidarity in the long term is built from those
Speaker 1: networks on the ground. There's people recognizing each other and
Speaker 1: seeing each other. And I think COVID is so interesting
Speaker 1: because people have become so nuclear and like isolated the
Speaker 1: technology and then forced into these pods of technology and
Speaker 1: that was the only way people existed, and then all
Speaker 1: of a sudden there was this need to be around
Speaker 1: people like people like no, no, no, I really want
Speaker 1: like human contact. And so I think that kind of
Speaker 1: speaks to the reality of what we need to survive
Speaker 1: and that's going to be through disasters, through pandemics. So
Speaker 1: building them, building a community garden, like saying hey to
Speaker 1: your neighbor, finding out who on your street is like
Speaker 1: an elder and maybe doesn't have anybody checking up on them,
Speaker 1: Like knowing what is in your what are the resources,
Speaker 1: whether it's people, whether it's a food bank, whether it's
Speaker 1: like a water fountain, Like, what are the resources in
Speaker 1: your area? And where can you spontaneously take over areas
Speaker 1: when something happens. There's so many empty lots, different places
Speaker 1: that are you know, really on the verge of being
Speaker 1: genderfed it and when something happens, if you can help
Speaker 1: in the areas where you can maybe take over a building,
Speaker 1: that would help maintain that building for the persons who
Speaker 1: would otherwise be getting pushed out soon. Right, Like we've
Speaker 1: worked with people that allow us to set up school libraries,
Speaker 1: for example, in their areas while we're while we're doing
Speaker 1: disaster response, and we helped build that house or that
Speaker 1: community center for that school up while we're there and
Speaker 1: creating a community space for people to then run with
Speaker 1: that concept of what they wanted to build, like what
Speaker 1: they wanted to put there. The best way you know
Speaker 1: to prepare for disasters is ongoing mutual aid projects and
Speaker 1: groups and efforts. You know, the more that we can
Speaker 1: connect with each other, those relationships and those connections, they're
Speaker 1: the groundwork for uh A vibrant people power disaster response.
Speaker 1: You gotta know who's who. You gotta know what we
Speaker 1: are are able to be wanting to do. You know,
Speaker 1: what are people's strengths. It really is about that resiliency.
Speaker 1: Knowing who you can count on for something like who
Speaker 1: knows about you know, wiring, who knows about plumbing, who
Speaker 1: knows about you know the streets, who knows the area
Speaker 1: the best? You know, certain members in the community that
Speaker 1: are founders in the community that others will respond to
Speaker 1: or navigate or gravitate too. I got you. Yeah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that makes a lot of sense that, Like, I think
Speaker 1: it's really interesting to contrast this with the model of
Speaker 1: like surviving natural disasters that we've seen portrayed so often,
Speaker 1: especially on like TV shows like Preppers, right, which is
Speaker 1: like I will sit on my own with a ship
Speaker 1: ton of ammunition and shoot anyone who comes off to
Speaker 1: my realm and noodle castle. But what are you gonna do?
Speaker 1: With that when your supplies right now, then when you
Speaker 1: who are you going to rely on? All we have
Speaker 1: is each other? We're not, We're not. I mean more
Speaker 1: power to the you know, outlier in the visual out
Speaker 1: there that can literally do everything for themselves. But I
Speaker 1: just don't think that's humanities function we have. We have
Speaker 1: much more UM when we share with each other um
Speaker 1: than we have individually. When we pull our resources together,
Speaker 1: we have enough for everybody. Uh. We you know, we
Speaker 1: take what is in our cabinets, you know, as far
Speaker 1: as food or sup supplies, we take what's in our
Speaker 1: medicine cabinets. We make it liberated communal uh space and
Speaker 1: supplies and and very quickly thinks snowball and uh small
Speaker 1: first aisation becomes a wellness center or a clinic. And
Speaker 1: and and that's you know the power of of sharing
Speaker 1: with each other and building building alternative infrastructure infrastructure together.
Speaker 1: And the alternative infrastructure for me is really important to UM.
Speaker 1: I think for us to be resilient, we we have
Speaker 1: to teach each other the skills. We have to start
Speaker 1: learning the ways in which we will be able to
Speaker 1: actually build back the way we want the way we
Speaker 1: foresee our communities to be whatever that looks like. But
Speaker 1: we need those skills if we are going to divest,
Speaker 1: if we are going to have autonomy. Yeah, I really
Speaker 1: like that model of thinking of your natural disasters like
Speaker 1: an opportunity to rebuild in a more a more equal way,
Speaker 1: rather than thinking of it it's the thing which just
Speaker 1: has knocks down the you know, the amount of stuff
Speaker 1: you've accumulated or whatever, instead of seeing it as an
Speaker 1: opportunity is really positive. It is an opportunity to reevaluate,
Speaker 1: is an opportunity to see each other, to see your neighbor.
Speaker 1: It's an opportunity to be more sustainable in the rebuild,
Speaker 1: which is the thing that I really struggle with in
Speaker 1: a lot of responses. Um it is just the dependency
Speaker 1: on the existing supply chains and the existing methods of
Speaker 1: transportation like that, that whole needs to be addressed for
Speaker 1: resiliency in the future. There's got to be the entire
Speaker 1: real world of how we respond in some ways in general. Yeah,
Speaker 1: divest the way we want, No, I think that's the
Speaker 1: sustain ability thing. It's just reminded me of something which like,
Speaker 1: for whatever reason, I bought one back last time. I
Speaker 1: was somewhere, but people can't see this being an audio podcast.
Speaker 1: But one of the things you often see in natural
Speaker 1: disasters is these things that are called humanitarian daily rations
Speaker 1: and it's like a it's like an m R E.
Speaker 1: And it comes in a pink packet and everything else
Speaker 1: comes in the packet, and like it's within like two days.
Speaker 1: And obviously this is a time when like sort of
Speaker 1: systems for disposing of rubbish have been overwhelmed within two days,
Speaker 1: these things and the foil packets and little brown spirits
Speaker 1: of fucking everywhere, and it's just it It always strikes
Speaker 1: me as so sad that like we've taken this time
Speaker 1: when people are in crisis, and we've made a time
Speaker 1: when also that their environment is in crisis now as well. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and a lot, and that's one of the things I
Speaker 1: struggle with um with water as well. Water is kind
Speaker 1: of like my ing. I know, the irony, but um,
Speaker 1: when whenever there's a response, there's a heavy dependency on
Speaker 1: bottled water and there's other alternatives, but it would require
Speaker 1: you know, a little bit of advanced skill training, a
Speaker 1: little bit of advanced infrastructure development, but that response could
Speaker 1: be prepared in advance and I think in in some
Speaker 1: cases there's communities, especially in the local South, where that
Speaker 1: advanced thinking about it's gonna happen, Right, It's gonna happen here, right,
Speaker 1: it's gonna it's gonna have what's gonna happen everywhere in
Speaker 1: the Gulf coast, and it's going to keep going up
Speaker 1: and up. And whether it's a fire, whether it's a hurricane,
Speaker 1: whether it's a massive tornado, whether it's to drought in
Speaker 1: a food shortage, or a pandemic, if we're not thinking
Speaker 1: in advance and be just and I don't want to
Speaker 1: sound like you know, necessarily prepper individualistic, but as a
Speaker 1: community thinking in advance, like for example, small plug but cooperation.
Speaker 1: Jackson is thinking about building um their own water infrastructure
Speaker 1: so that they are not going to be dependent on
Speaker 1: just municipal water, which is yeah, I mean why not
Speaker 1: even if it's small scale, why not start developing community
Speaker 1: owned micro grids, water treatment facilities. Why is it just
Speaker 1: capital large capital? Like Jimmy said, we're stronger together. So
Speaker 1: if we pull together in these communities stout just like
Speaker 1: old school see essays we can do that, then we can.
Speaker 1: Essentially it's an it's another opportunity divested to build it ourselves.
Speaker 1: We can do it before, we could do it after.
Speaker 1: But I think for resiliency for me, finding ways around
Speaker 1: those existing models and supply lines is critical to avoid
Speaker 1: the gap in the disaster and the response. Yeah, talk
Speaker 1: us through a community on water sustainable water project like that,
Speaker 1: like what does that look like, what are the what
Speaker 1: are the components of it? It would So that's a
Speaker 1: fabulous question, um. But it's also when that I personally
Speaker 1: can't answer. I can because I'm not the entire community.
Speaker 1: So there's so many questions that are involved with that,
Speaker 1: like who's gonna who's committing to maintain it financially, operationally,
Speaker 1: maintenance wise, you know how many people a is it
Speaker 1: going to be be used by? How frequently is it
Speaker 1: intended for all the time? Used for just as a
Speaker 1: response in a backup. So there's a lot of things
Speaker 1: that are involved there. And also financial structures. There's so
Speaker 1: many different ways that I can get set up um,
Speaker 1: And like Jimmy knows, I do not like to involve
Speaker 1: myself with money aspects. I'm just straight hammers and like
Speaker 1: you know, solar um. But there there's a lot of
Speaker 1: the good examples of community owned my grigrids for solar,
Speaker 1: and that's really the I don't know that there's that many,
Speaker 1: especially in the US community owned water systems, but if
Speaker 1: you look internationally that is likely different. Um. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: as far as solar, that's a pretty common thing. Diversity. Well,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of different ways micro goods can get
Speaker 1: set up and who could own it. So again it
Speaker 1: depends on the scale, right, like who's going to fund
Speaker 1: the operation at the beginning, if you have a few
Speaker 1: angel downers that want to do it, or if you
Speaker 1: have a community that's willing to pitch in an equal
Speaker 1: amount per person, you know, and how much they want
Speaker 1: to use for it. So you calculate how much you
Speaker 1: need for each person's use, you know, what's the distribution area,
Speaker 1: how many camels do you need, and how are you
Speaker 1: going to get it to everybody? Are they going to
Speaker 1: have battery binks for autonomous use? Are they going to
Speaker 1: be like tied in? So there's it's a lot of
Speaker 1: models that you could do. So as so money goes
Speaker 1: hurricane just before Hurricane Ian, Hurricane Fiona Hitto rico um
Speaker 1: and it wiped out you know, for for a time
Speaker 1: the whole Islands power grid, but the autonomous off grid
Speaker 1: solar infrastructure that was built up at the central state
Speaker 1: point of Mutual the Mutual Aid centers across the island
Speaker 1: stay the lights stayed on, and they were able to
Speaker 1: continue powering their communities through autonomous infrasture infrastructure. Oh yeah,
Speaker 1: that's really cool. I know some indigenous nations and on
Speaker 1: the West Coast certainly have their own micro grids as well. Nice. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's as smaller scale, like how many people are in
Speaker 1: the community. Sorry, yeah, the smallish scale. I think like
Speaker 1: maybe a few hundreds, maybe a couple of thousands something
Speaker 1: like that. That's good. Yeah, it's an area of interest
Speaker 1: I know for other Indigenous people for very obvious reasons.
Speaker 1: But yeah, that's really cool. If someone was interested in that.
Speaker 1: Like let's say I'm at home with my community and
Speaker 1: I hear this and I'm like, hell, yeah, that's what
Speaker 1: I want to do. Can they reach out? Can they
Speaker 1: reach out to you and be like, hey, help me,
Speaker 1: help me join together these fifteen prius car batteries or
Speaker 1: we would you be able to help them with the
Speaker 1: like planning stages of that or is that beyond the
Speaker 1: scope of your work? UM, so my my main area
Speaker 1: of knowledge is around water UM, and I dabble with
Speaker 1: solar a lot. But there are a lot of folks
Speaker 1: in the network who have insane skills. Like we have
Speaker 1: people working on all kinds of projects, so many cool things.
Speaker 1: So I would say, yeah, reach out, um, because that's
Speaker 1: kind of what the network is. It is a lot
Speaker 1: of really cool people trying to just make positive change.
Speaker 1: It's super awesome skills. A lot of folks have pretty
Speaker 1: cool skills. Yeah. In the beginning of this interview, you
Speaker 1: mentioned how you felt like times just kind of slowed
Speaker 1: down or like it's all kind of blurred into one. Um.
Speaker 1: Is that like a common feeling whenever these things happen
Speaker 1: and people are on the ground, the type of otherworldly
Speaker 1: nous or how everything feels so stretched out? How does
Speaker 1: that kind of like what's your experiences with with that feeling? Um? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that feeling is part of the trauma, right,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of trauma associated with the work, and
Speaker 1: you know, those conversations happen a lot, and it's um really,
Speaker 1: I mean personally, I won't speak for everybody obviously, but
Speaker 1: personally I've feigned a lot of UM. Support just in
Speaker 1: our collective network, everybody's UM I feel really focused on
Speaker 1: the same thing, so I personally gain strength from that.
Speaker 1: But I think there is a lot of UM. I
Speaker 1: feel like you can get a lot of hopelessness sometimes
Speaker 1: right like you start to see the the long term
Speaker 1: need and the fading of the spotlight because the next
Speaker 1: disaster happens. And I mean there's literally still people in
Speaker 1: ban Rouge who still have houses that haven't been fully
Speaker 1: rebuilt and that was from the food. And there's still
Speaker 1: places that don't have electricity in Puerto Rico right now,
Speaker 1: and it's been like, you know, I don't know what
Speaker 1: over a month. So you know, Flint, Michigan, just like
Speaker 1: name of thing. Right, So I think, my, my, I
Speaker 1: don't think I could do this work without the or
Speaker 1: of other people who do this work who have that
Speaker 1: same UM feeling, who who experienced that. And the time.
Speaker 1: The time work I think is partly for me again,
Speaker 1: partly exhaustion, partly trauma, UM, partly UM like excitement. There
Speaker 1: is so much excitement right seeing seeing and seeing the love.
Speaker 1: Like I don't want to make it sound all bad,
Speaker 1: like there's like beautiful moments every day with the love
Speaker 1: that you have on the grountain with everybody, um, and
Speaker 1: so yeah, go for it often. Um. You know, Dorothy Day,
Speaker 1: after the San Francisco earthquake over a century ago, said,
Speaker 1: while the crisis lasted, people loved one another. And what
Speaker 1: oftentimes we experience after a major crisis or disaster is
Speaker 1: is that our lives before we're disastrous. You know that
Speaker 1: capitalism and colonialism, in the isolation and alienation and the meaninglessness,
Speaker 1: drudgery of the work and selling ourselves to the highest
Speaker 1: bidder so that we can survive, you know, Um, all
Speaker 1: that is an ongoing, invisible disaster. And in in the
Speaker 1: moment where the the ruins are around us and we
Speaker 1: see them, you know, we we come together in a
Speaker 1: way that that draws on on on that feeling of
Speaker 1: solidarity and love and and those those ideas of a
Speaker 1: better world that we that we protest for, that we
Speaker 1: march on the streets for that we you know, envision
Speaker 1: coming you know sometime in the future in a microcosm.
Speaker 1: They exist here and now, in in these local pockets
Speaker 1: of people taking care of each other against all odds.
Speaker 1: That true. Yeah, I think that's really that's really well put,
Speaker 1: Like it's sort of it made me reflect on like
Speaker 1: I've reported from it and worked in lots of natural disasters,
Speaker 1: and like that time when the like alienation, boredom, and
Speaker 1: despair they associate with everyday drudgery under capitalism goes away
Speaker 1: and you have a purpose and everyone's working together and
Speaker 1: you know also on like Twitter dot com all the time.
Speaker 1: It's very and and in time stretchies at the same
Speaker 1: time compresses it's it's very addictive in a sense, like
Speaker 1: it feels wonderful and hopeful, and then it's the feeling
Speaker 1: that an uprising tries to replicate. It's it's the it's
Speaker 1: this moment of peak experience that makes you. It forces
Speaker 1: you to fall out of the kind of the drudgery
Speaker 1: of collapsing capitalist infrastructure, and you're forced to actually live
Speaker 1: around people. And it's the weirdest feeling. And it happens
Speaker 1: when horrible things happen, like disasters like wildfires, hurricanes, or
Speaker 1: it happens people getting shot. Yea to the moment of
Speaker 1: like national uprising as well, Like it's the same, it's
Speaker 1: the same function and for a brief moment, you're able
Speaker 1: to actually live the things that you like preach um
Speaker 1: and you're able to see them get applied in the world.
Speaker 1: And I think a lot of us getting away from
Speaker 1: that just being a peak, right and having to come
Speaker 1: back down because I'm really he is to build that resiliency, right,
Speaker 1: to to create it so that the lights don't go
Speaker 1: out and we just keep rolling and if they do
Speaker 1: go out, you know, we've got a backup plan, Like
Speaker 1: you know, there's a wood burning stove and we make
Speaker 1: some pizza. I don't know, but you know, I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: the peak shouldn't be a peak, there should be just
Speaker 1: a shift. So how do yeah, so how do we
Speaker 1: how do we keep that right? How do we rebuild
Speaker 1: and keep that momentum that that that net for each other? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's I think, yeah, yeah, I think Lennon had an
Speaker 1: answer to that that it did not work out the best. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh and we're still here, yeah, yeah, here we
Speaker 1: are listening to podcasts. But yeah, I think that was wonderful.
Speaker 1: I really enjoyed that. I think your point, just to
Speaker 1: close out that discussion about like how you guys have
Speaker 1: a network that supports people. Some of the most profound
Speaker 1: depression I've experienced has been not like directly around disasters
Speaker 1: or conflict, but coming home and feeling useless. So I
Speaker 1: think that like checking in on people and continuing to
Speaker 1: feel like you're pushing in a positive direction, Like more
Speaker 1: people will experience a natural disaster after listening to this
Speaker 1: and have done before listening to this, and next year
Speaker 1: will be bigger than this year and it will get
Speaker 1: worse until but like you will feel elated and that's okay,
Speaker 1: and you will feel devastated and that's okay. And checking
Speaker 1: it on people is super duper important. And speaking of
Speaker 1: that network and making connections, where can people find in
Speaker 1: support the work that you all do, all and Jimmy
Speaker 1: that you can go to mutual Aid Disaster Relief dot
Speaker 1: org or on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, mutual a Disaster Relief
Speaker 1: on Twitter it's mutual Aid Relief and our email is
Speaker 1: mutually a Disaster Relief at gmail dot com. I would
Speaker 1: love for more people to join uh this movement, you know,
Speaker 1: both mutual a Disaster, leave their local Mutual Aid project
Speaker 1: um and and and other other similar efforts or start one. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a question. We get a lot is like, oh,
Speaker 1: you guys talk about mutual aid and stuff, but there's
Speaker 1: really nothing in my area. There's I don't I don't,
Speaker 1: I don't know what what it's to do, Like, okay,
Speaker 1: well maybe there's fix that problem. I mean, like, do
Speaker 1: you have any like resources to help people kind of
Speaker 1: figure out how they would absolutely. On our website mutual
Speaker 1: a Disaster Relief dot Org, there's a resources tab and
Speaker 1: one of the sections is mutual aid about you know,
Speaker 1: diving into the subject of what is mutual aid and
Speaker 1: how to form a group or a project UM and
Speaker 1: in other resources along those lines. We also have a
Speaker 1: newly formed uh mutually toolpit relief Toolpit that's on our website.
Speaker 1: So if there are local mutual aid groups, UM, this
Speaker 1: is a public form, so there's a big bold like
Speaker 1: warning about it and happening it's public. For intention we
Speaker 1: have our own obviously like internal threads, but this is
Speaker 1: more like for folks who maybe haven't ever plugged into
Speaker 1: mutually before, like being able to see where's all the
Speaker 1: different mutually projects and what they're doing. So UM again
Speaker 1: we talked about the resiliency, so this is kind of
Speaker 1: our attempts to be able to map for each other
Speaker 1: UM away where we can see what every where where
Speaker 1: everyone is that's interested in responding and doing what they're doing.
Speaker 1: So if it's a funale Bombs group or like whatever
Speaker 1: your mutual aid things that you're doing, if you want
Speaker 1: to join onto that. Um that's a fun way to
Speaker 1: so you might be in your area if everybody start
Speaker 1: stilling it out fantastic. Thank thank you so much for
Speaker 1: taking time out of the stretched out or fis concept
Speaker 1: of linear progression of time to talk with us about
Speaker 1: the fantastic work that you are all a part of.
Speaker 1: Thanks for having us appreciate it. It could Happen Here
Speaker 1: is a production of cool Zone Media or more podcasts
Speaker 1: from cool Zone Media. Visit our website cool zone media
Speaker 1: dot com, or check us out on the I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
Speaker 1: You can find sources for It could Happen Here, updated
Speaker 1: monthly at cool zone Media dot com slash sources. Thanks
Speaker 1: for listening.