Speaker 1: Well that wasn't very good. I'm Robert Evans, host of
Speaker 1: the podcast you're listening to, and ashamed of, probably because
Speaker 1: that was Jesus Christ. Garrison. Come in here, fix this,
Speaker 1: Fix this Garrison. Um, this is it could happen here
Speaker 1: a podcast about the fact that the world was folding apart,
Speaker 1: as embodied by me falling apart. When I try to
Speaker 1: introduce the show, see I tied it in. Yeah, A
Speaker 1: good job, thank you, thank you. Well it is it is.
Speaker 1: It has to rhyme. It's like it's like the Star
Speaker 1: Wars movies. YEA. Our guest today is Melissa sidera founder
Speaker 1: and director of Polo's Pantry, a mutual aid food distribution
Speaker 1: project in Los Angeles, California. A. Melissa, thank you for
Speaker 1: coming on and talking to us. Thank you so much
Speaker 1: for inviting me. I'm pleasure to be here. I apologize
Speaker 1: for the introduction, but I honestly it's better. It was
Speaker 1: better than I usually do, so if you can back
Speaker 1: that up. Okay. So I'm an l A native, and um,
Speaker 1: I've been doing community organizing for probably like close to
Speaker 1: a decade, doing a lot of community work for a
Speaker 1: long time, and a few years before the pandemic. Actually,
Speaker 1: I started to organize with a lot of grassroots organizations
Speaker 1: in l A, working with a lot of houseless folks
Speaker 1: UM all over l A, and kind of clock pretty
Speaker 1: early that a lot, you know, a lot of a
Speaker 1: lot of groups were burning through their budgets spending it
Speaker 1: on food. And so since I worked in kind of
Speaker 1: the food industry, I started to kind of poke around
Speaker 1: and figure out that we could get a lot of
Speaker 1: these things donated to us UM and pretty much started
Speaker 1: building a roster like building, kind of like a rulodex
Speaker 1: of UM other organizations, non profits, UM, food banks that
Speaker 1: we could rely on. So almost kind of created sort
Speaker 1: of like an Alphian system UM for these groups who
Speaker 1: are working with houseless folks to get food every week. UM.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to figure out a way to make
Speaker 1: a steady and reliable system so that our own house
Speaker 1: neighbors would get food and that organizers across l A
Speaker 1: wouldn't have to worry about it. And so that's pretty
Speaker 1: much how POLO started. Officially started in two thousand eighteen.
Speaker 1: I was organizing with a group called Katon for All
Speaker 1: and UH. They do a lot of political advocacy and
Speaker 1: mostly rooted in like, um, kind of you know, human
Speaker 1: rights for our houses, neighbors. If you don't know Katon
Speaker 1: for all, look them up. They're awesome, follow them fantastic Adan. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And you know, I actually was because I was already
Speaker 1: doing a lot of mutual aid work in skid Row
Speaker 1: around that time and really kind of felt at some point,
Speaker 1: um that you know, like, yes, it was great that
Speaker 1: I was going out there with teams getting hot meals
Speaker 1: out and hot beverages whatever people needed to people, but
Speaker 1: I just was so down on what the conditions, seeing
Speaker 1: all the conditions that they were living in, and I
Speaker 1: just wanted to meet other activists and other folks um
Speaker 1: who could really figure out how you connect people to
Speaker 1: services and and just really you know, anyone working in policy.
Speaker 1: That's so that's really changing things for people out there.
Speaker 1: And so I wanted to take sort of my advocacy
Speaker 1: and like my work a step further and connected with
Speaker 1: activists all the rail day. So that's sort of like
Speaker 1: my organs really rooted a lot of activism and organizing.
Speaker 1: So I see I see a lot of I'm not
Speaker 1: sort of your standard kind of or nonprofit I really
Speaker 1: see things in the lens and as a community organizer,
Speaker 1: and so that's why our our work pretty much exploded
Speaker 1: during COVID. I'm kind of interested for for starters because
Speaker 1: you're you're you know, this is um a mutual aid
Speaker 1: project as opposed to kind of a charity project, and
Speaker 1: what do you what do you see as being the
Speaker 1: dividing line there? Well, for you know, for a lot
Speaker 1: of for us, you know, it's very easy for for
Speaker 1: folks to kind of see the work that we do
Speaker 1: as part of the kind of charitable food system because
Speaker 1: obviously we're you know, UM mutual aid. It's the difference
Speaker 1: really is that obviously, UM, you know, there there's a
Speaker 1: there's a reciprocity between the two of you, UM, between
Speaker 1: between neighborhoods, between individuals, between organizations of sharing resources with
Speaker 1: each other. UM and charitable obviously is a it's only
Speaker 1: one way, right, there's only like one person giving. But
Speaker 1: for us, UM, the way we picked our partners, I mean,
Speaker 1: we're we are ready part of this nucleus of kind
Speaker 1: of a coalition of or doing this work. So it
Speaker 1: was just ready very easy for us to kind of
Speaker 1: share resources with each other. So I was doing food
Speaker 1: and some folks were doing hygiene kits, other folks were
Speaker 1: doing tents, other folks were doing tarps or whatever, and
Speaker 1: so there was so much you know, kind of mutualid
Speaker 1: and activity going on. And so that that's why we're
Speaker 1: we're really kind of rooted in that UM and that
Speaker 1: thinking as far as as opposed to charitable ors that
Speaker 1: basically just set up somewhere and give, you know, give
Speaker 1: give stuff out to people. And so we have look
Speaker 1: a part and part of my advisory circle are a
Speaker 1: lot of houseless neighbors UM houses leaders in our community. UM.
Speaker 1: I also take a lot of advice from UM Indigenous
Speaker 1: organizers UM black community leaders in different neighborhoods that we
Speaker 1: work in. So our work is really informed by the community.
Speaker 1: And so we basically asked folks, hey, you know, like
Speaker 1: what can we do UM and plug into to work
Speaker 1: that UM that already exists in those in those areas.
Speaker 1: I hope, I hope that means sense. But that's kind
Speaker 1: of how I feel about what we do. And and
Speaker 1: as an as an organizer, because I think we get
Speaker 1: a lot of questions from people who are interested in
Speaker 1: starting mutual aid projects in their own areas, and one
Speaker 1: of the questions we often have it is like well
Speaker 1: how do I how do I do that? Right? UM?
Speaker 1: And Yeah, I'm interested in like like if you could
Speaker 1: kind of walk us through the steps when when Polo's
Speaker 1: pantry got started, Like what is what was the kind
Speaker 1: of order of operations that you had to go through
Speaker 1: to get this this up and running. I think the
Speaker 1: first thing to do is really too For me, it
Speaker 1: was already kind of being part of grassroots UM or
Speaker 1: so I was part of a few of them UM
Speaker 1: and so it's really important to UM to kind of
Speaker 1: identify the needs of a community first before setting up
Speaker 1: your organ So I feel like I already had an
Speaker 1: idea of you know, of of what certain orcs needed,
Speaker 1: UM which areas, how many and so kind of identifying
Speaker 1: the needs first kind of UM number one and and
Speaker 1: and to do that you really have to connect with
Speaker 1: grassroots organizations, local ones in your area. So you know,
Speaker 1: I recommend really just kind of doing researchers. Always folks
Speaker 1: doing that kind of stuff all over. If you're into
Speaker 1: political advocacy, there's folks that do that. There are folks
Speaker 1: who are more food justice oriented, Like I would recommend
Speaker 1: going to a local food bank or soup kitchens to
Speaker 1: have also, Like I've been doing that for years and
Speaker 1: I've met a lot of people with kind of similar
Speaker 1: values mine. UM. So just kind of pretty much identif
Speaker 1: fin one, what you'd like to do, what you're good
Speaker 1: at UM, and then essentially research UM, you know, kind
Speaker 1: of opportunities to tap into a local organ doing that
Speaker 1: work and then essentially start organizing with them. Right. I
Speaker 1: don't I don't recommend to build like to build an
Speaker 1: order prior to not having this kind of knowledge, because
Speaker 1: I feel like it's really crucial to sort of kind
Speaker 1: of map out first what the community needs instead of
Speaker 1: you building mutual aid organization based on you know whatever,
Speaker 1: because I feel like it's it's important to work through
Speaker 1: things from the ground up. UM. That way, you feel
Speaker 1: like the work is impactful. That way, the community is
Speaker 1: leading and informing your work. And so that's that's kind
Speaker 1: of like how I I approached the line. So look
Speaker 1: for a local organ so kind of sit and organizing
Speaker 1: for a little bit and then him there once he
Speaker 1: once you guys identify what it is UM and start
Speaker 1: to kind of have an idea of of the demand
Speaker 1: or the need in that area, then start to reach
Speaker 1: out to say for me, for for food. A lot
Speaker 1: of local, um, local chains will weill we'll pretty much
Speaker 1: if you if you tell them what you're doing, um,
Speaker 1: a lot of them will support you. So I actually have.
Speaker 1: I started with just going literally to my local Ralphs
Speaker 1: and telling the manager. They're like, hey, this is what
Speaker 1: I'm doing. I'm starting this or you know, wasn't Ralph's
Speaker 1: being a local grocery store in Likes Angeles area. A
Speaker 1: lot of I didn't know what Ralph's was before I
Speaker 1: moved to l A. So I just wanted to be like,
Speaker 1: she's not just like rolling over to where buddy Ralph's house, like, yes,
Speaker 1: you got some food? Yeah? Sorry, yeah, so that Ralph's
Speaker 1: out here in l A. So most places, yeah yeah
Speaker 1: yeah I will. More folks said, not everyone is down
Speaker 1: for that kind of stuff, but somehow you'll you'll really
Speaker 1: end up on one that's really you know, that is
Speaker 1: really unkind. I think most folks have to realize that
Speaker 1: this this this kind of work is not it didn't
Speaker 1: happen overnight like building like building uh, you know, like
Speaker 1: a reliable network of people to donate to you is.
Speaker 1: It takes time. So but I think if if you
Speaker 1: hit kind of larger chains, you will get UM, you know,
Speaker 1: you'll you'll you'll get you'll start to get a steady
Speaker 1: supply from them. Do you have any kind of advice
Speaker 1: for um, when you're actually approaching you know, manager at
Speaker 1: a Ralphs or something, somebody who works for Like, what
Speaker 1: do you have like I don't know, like a script,
Speaker 1: but kind of a rough guy to like, Here's how
Speaker 1: I try to start these conversations. Here's some ways I
Speaker 1: try to phrase for things, because that could be useful
Speaker 1: for folks. You know, I actually have like a form
Speaker 1: letters I could share later maybe you can, right, yeah, great,
Speaker 1: UM that you know that they can use to um,
Speaker 1: you know, if they're if they're going to UM solicit
Speaker 1: folks with that stuff. And I think a lot of
Speaker 1: mutual aid organizations to have that kind of UM kind
Speaker 1: of literature, that kind of form so UM, I think
Speaker 1: just basically kind of letting them know who you are,
Speaker 1: who you're serving, UM, how often which demographic is going
Speaker 1: to that's usually really important. UM. What what helped me though,
Speaker 1: was I was as I started to get more serious
Speaker 1: about about doing the food work, I connected to you know,
Speaker 1: some some community partners and I actually UM turned Polos
Speaker 1: into a fiscally sponsored org so we moved from being
Speaker 1: just fully grassroots to being fiscally sponsored. That basically means
Speaker 1: we're operating under the five O one C three number
Speaker 1: of another organization of a larger organization. So that that
Speaker 1: was that open so so many opportunities for us. It
Speaker 1: really allowed us to be able to access larger amounts
Speaker 1: of food and really help out a lot of a
Speaker 1: lot of a lot of smaller organs that needed to
Speaker 1: get their food programs off the ground. And so UM
Speaker 1: that is something I recommend if you're if people are
Speaker 1: serious about it, to define a community of community partner
Speaker 1: who who isn't established five and one C three that
Speaker 1: they trust UM to see if they if they know
Speaker 1: if they can sign on to to be a physical
Speaker 1: sponsor UM. That I think is one of the quickest
Speaker 1: ways to be able to UM to really kind of
Speaker 1: establish yourself as as far as getting larger amounts of
Speaker 1: food then and by that I mean getting pallets of food,
Speaker 1: not just cases, but literally pallets of food delivered to
Speaker 1: wherever you are. As soon as we did that, that
Speaker 1: completely changed the game UM. And and I think I
Speaker 1: did that because I knew I had so many friends
Speaker 1: who were doing mutual aid that needed so, you know,
Speaker 1: just so much stuff from from groceries to um, you know,
Speaker 1: fresh produce, and it wasn't and it wasn't you know,
Speaker 1: it didn't stop in food. We were getting you know,
Speaker 1: hand sanitizer, we were getting tense, we were getting all
Speaker 1: sorts of stuff, you know, and so um. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that's what I recommend for folks were serious about food
Speaker 1: is to really again start to build a relationship with
Speaker 1: local businesses, um that they that they like food businesses
Speaker 1: and really telling people this is what I'm doing. If
Speaker 1: you're if you know, if you're if you're you know,
Speaker 1: if you are, what support us, you know, like this
Speaker 1: is um, you know, these are these are the days
Speaker 1: that we need food or whatever, or these are the
Speaker 1: times that we'll need food and just let them know
Speaker 1: that you know, you're you're happy to pick it up
Speaker 1: or that you're happy to because there's there's I think,
Speaker 1: at least for California, we're starting to change law like
Speaker 1: policy and law behind food waste, and so I think, um,
Speaker 1: something's going to change. In the January of two where
Speaker 1: a lot of food waste basically going to decrease because
Speaker 1: it's going to be much more difficult. The city is
Speaker 1: going to make it much more difficult for for businesses
Speaker 1: to just get your stuff. UM. They're they're really pushing
Speaker 1: them to UM to separate them. But anyway, regardless, you're
Speaker 1: helping the business really UM move, you know, move food waste,
Speaker 1: and and most of them and a lot of employees
Speaker 1: too that I've talked to UM just you know, just
Speaker 1: our heart work. And every time they have to clear
Speaker 1: out you know, a full full tray or just trays
Speaker 1: and trays of of of of a perfectly fine food.
Speaker 1: So yeah, there's there's a video going viral on Twitter
Speaker 1: right now of of like someone working at Dunking Donuts
Speaker 1: and just like dumping display hundreds and hundreds of donuts
Speaker 1: into the garbage. And then that happens. That happens every
Speaker 1: single day. You know. I have I have friends who
Speaker 1: used to work on Whole Foods and they would tell
Speaker 1: me just just how heartbreaking it was, just the amount,
Speaker 1: just the massive amount of that's being wasted. Yeah, it's evil,
Speaker 1: it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's a
Speaker 1: thing that in the more difficult days ahead, as you know,
Speaker 1: things like well like we under in a lot of areas,
Speaker 1: like the crop was half of what it normally is
Speaker 1: this year. That's going to continue. One day we will
Speaker 1: look at videos of Duncan Donuts dropping an entire day's
Speaker 1: worth of donuts into the trash and use it as
Speaker 1: a pretext to bring executives to trial. And it's going
Speaker 1: to be like like like a war crime. Yeah is
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean, honestly though, as someone in food
Speaker 1: um um, you know, like the food system is changing
Speaker 1: massively in so many ways. I feel like the one
Speaker 1: kind of good thing that happened in the pandemic is
Speaker 1: that lawmakers were able to identify that the way snap
Speaker 1: or or um cal fresh pretty much food stamps were
Speaker 1: not enough really to um, you know, to feed families
Speaker 1: and feed people. It's not nearly enough, though, but at
Speaker 1: least it kind of pushes the needles where we need
Speaker 1: where we needed to go um. And I think I think,
Speaker 1: having having been so focused and so like in the
Speaker 1: center of mutual aid work in l A, I'm able
Speaker 1: to kind of broadly tell you know, tell um really
Speaker 1: tell lawmakers too that hey, you know, there's so much um,
Speaker 1: there's so much meat out there, but the community themselves
Speaker 1: have built alternate food systems to be able to care
Speaker 1: for themselves. I feel like my hope really is to
Speaker 1: be able to have to kind of hyperlocalize our food
Speaker 1: systems that way. Neighborhoods and really like communities are are
Speaker 1: essentially dictating their own you know, their own needs. They're
Speaker 1: they're basically bringing in the resources that they want. They're
Speaker 1: bringing in the kind of food that they want, you know,
Speaker 1: and um, and really just working towards the real kind
Speaker 1: of food food sovereignty where people are able to to
Speaker 1: get the resources themselves. And and for me, I feel
Speaker 1: like mutual aid scares a lot of people because again
Speaker 1: it really is the sort of like, um, the reason
Speaker 1: why we were able to a lot of communities were
Speaker 1: able to to survive COVID. You know, we're still doing
Speaker 1: it and it's still ours so deep in it. And
Speaker 1: and even like I try to tell students to and like,
Speaker 1: you know, um, mutual aid isn't just food or whatever.
Speaker 1: It's also like say your dad is a pickup truck
Speaker 1: and your neighbor needs to move, I don't know their
Speaker 1: dining room table across town. Like that is a form
Speaker 1: of mutual aid UM or Like there's there's so many
Speaker 1: things that especially a lot of immigrant communities that I
Speaker 1: that I work with. This this form of care, community care,
Speaker 1: you know, has existed forever, and it's just somehow elevated
Speaker 1: itself during the pandemic because, as we know, the safety
Speaker 1: net just wasn't enough. It didn't it didn't it really
Speaker 1: didn't help me, you know, it didn't really help a
Speaker 1: lot of communities, and so this system essentially kept people afloat.
Speaker 1: And now we're trying to figure out how to really
Speaker 1: create better ways to sustain it and to really create
Speaker 1: better ways to get the resources directly to communities that
Speaker 1: need them. So that's kind of where I'm at. I'm
Speaker 1: working with other folks trying to figure out how to
Speaker 1: how to keep the sustainable and really have more agency
Speaker 1: over what kind of food and what kind of ad
Speaker 1: you WoT. How have people that have been needing to
Speaker 1: access mutualating the food, how have they been learning about
Speaker 1: your organization? UM I think honestly, all this stuff really
Speaker 1: happened by word of mouth. I think because I was
Speaker 1: I was already part of this huge coalition UM that's
Speaker 1: part of of the Sophie Knows a Cat for All.
Speaker 1: There's a group called street Watch. There's a group called
Speaker 1: crowd Game, There's a group called like There's there's all
Speaker 1: these different folks that basically are in our wide coalition.
Speaker 1: I haven't had to really advertise much like people just
Speaker 1: sort of like just kept telling others like, hey, you know,
Speaker 1: like Melissa and Polos and her team were doing this
Speaker 1: and um. Also as a COVID response, I created another
Speaker 1: um um uh like COVID initiative called Homemade Meals and
Speaker 1: and that is the partnership with another organization called Yikes.
Speaker 1: And so as of today, I think we're close to
Speaker 1: seventy meals UM. That's all community lead. Yes, so we
Speaker 1: so we this smart of UM. We essentially created a
Speaker 1: system where we uh we work with people who are
Speaker 1: who are cooking homade meals in their homes and connecting
Speaker 1: them to drivers. And so we have about six different
Speaker 1: UM organ partners. So one of them is obviously it's
Speaker 1: the same people Kaytown, street Watch, Covenant House. They work
Speaker 1: a lot with Homeless Youth um L a can or
Speaker 1: in skid Row UM and a bunch of other mutual
Speaker 1: aid groups in different areas of l A, so I
Speaker 1: recognize UM. At the beginning of COVID, a lot of
Speaker 1: my houseless neighbors were telling us that they were scared,
Speaker 1: like because a lot of a lot of businesses were closing,
Speaker 1: a lot of corner stores, restaurants, UM that the the
Speaker 1: food access completely shut off for them during at the beginning,
Speaker 1: and I started to freak out. I was like, how
Speaker 1: we're going to get food to people? And so UM
Speaker 1: some friends who run UM basically they weren't kind of
Speaker 1: like a youth kind of youth focus or UM wanted
Speaker 1: to activate their you know, activate their community. They're like, hey,
Speaker 1: how can we help? What can we do? So we
Speaker 1: created this program basically that you know, figure out like, okay,
Speaker 1: well a lot of people want to have volunteer, but
Speaker 1: they can't leave home, So why don't they cooked meals
Speaker 1: at home? And then we'll just pair them with drivers
Speaker 1: who can pick it up safely. And so we just
Speaker 1: started doing that. We created this system too, and and
Speaker 1: I think we honestly, I thought we were just gonna
Speaker 1: do it for two months, but now we're what like,
Speaker 1: in nineteen months later, seventy five thousand nails over a
Speaker 1: thousand volunteers, like it's been wild. Actually, Jane Expert, she
Speaker 1: would be angry if we didn't state that. So Jamie, UM,
Speaker 1: Jamie actually is UM. It's one of our o G
Speaker 1: like like cooks, Like she started with home and made
Speaker 1: meals from the very beginning. UM, she's kind of one
Speaker 1: of our That's kind of how we know her. UM.
Speaker 1: It's because she found she found that program UM. And
Speaker 1: it's been a while, it's been it's been so amazing
Speaker 1: to to really activate so many people across l A
Speaker 1: to cook for our houses neighbors. And so I haven't
Speaker 1: even fully digested our team hasn't even fully digested that
Speaker 1: the real impact of that. But it's been seting five
Speaker 1: thousand meals UM made by the community for our for
Speaker 1: our houses neighbors. So so so that's yeah, so that
Speaker 1: I don't know, like I feel like and I truly
Speaker 1: believe there's just so much just so much power and
Speaker 1: the people and really trying to figure out ways to
Speaker 1: continue to you know, to create UM better systems where
Speaker 1: where we can redirect those resources you know, UM to
Speaker 1: us and UM you know like really kind kind of
Speaker 1: break down these systems where you know, because because even
Speaker 1: people were telling me, like folks who are like, you know,
Speaker 1: these sort of big institutions, food institutions have been around
Speaker 1: for decades or even folks UM from like yeah, from
Speaker 1: like running food dogs since the eighties were like, you know,
Speaker 1: how are you able to move so fast? I'm like,
Speaker 1: that's mutual aid. That's like, that's mutual aid. Then our
Speaker 1: ability to not have to run through so much bureaucratic
Speaker 1: crap and red tape is a reason why we were
Speaker 1: able to, you know, to to to create such huge
Speaker 1: impact because people believed in what we did and you
Speaker 1: know and helped support us, funded us UM and we
Speaker 1: essentially just you know, just hit the ground running. We're
Speaker 1: able to figure out what people needed on the ground
Speaker 1: and just just got it to them. That's what That's it,
Speaker 1: you know, and we'll figure out if if we don't
Speaker 1: have it, we're gonna keep you know, we'll ask around
Speaker 1: for folks who have it. Like UM. There's a group
Speaker 1: called SILA there. It's silver like UM and my friend
Speaker 1: Kat who's one of the co founders. She they also
Speaker 1: worked with with UM with Houseless Folks and they do
Speaker 1: uh incredible work, like you know, providing showers providing hot meals,
Speaker 1: providing UM referant services for folks. UM. She she was great,
Speaker 1: I getting hygiene kits and so that's that was started
Speaker 1: me to wil between each other. Like she needed hot meals,
Speaker 1: so I gave that to her on Saturdays, and then
Speaker 1: I needed like hygiene kits, and so that's kind of
Speaker 1: like the basis, yeah, exactly, like I literally will give
Speaker 1: her two hundred meals, She'll give me two hundred hydging kids.
Speaker 1: And that was like that throughout the pandemic, Like we
Speaker 1: just would share resources and people thought we were this
Speaker 1: huge org, but essentially it was just you know, literally
Speaker 1: like we're friends and I talking to each other like hey,
Speaker 1: what do you have today? What do they have coming
Speaker 1: in today? And we just essentially kind of built this
Speaker 1: sort of cloud like sort of inventory. Right, so it's
Speaker 1: like Polos has a thousand meals and like Seela's got
Speaker 1: five hundred Hygian kids, and like you know, street Watch
Speaker 1: as like fifty tents and like a hundred tarps. So
Speaker 1: it's like we all were like, hey, you know, there's
Speaker 1: there's a houseless man on the corner of like Sunset
Speaker 1: or whatever that needs like blah blah, blah, and so
Speaker 1: we essentially just you know, just grab and go like
Speaker 1: Poles has meals and like street Watch has tents, like
Speaker 1: Kate Towns got like the tarps. So y'all just again
Speaker 1: beautifully just sort of started to like build this sort
Speaker 1: of sort of out like inventory of stuff and it
Speaker 1: just worked and it's still working. So um and it's consistent,
Speaker 1: Like is what what we're bringing up or at the
Speaker 1: beginning is talking about how consistent you're able to you're
Speaker 1: able to have done this work, which is if you're
Speaker 1: an l A resident, you know that you know the
Speaker 1: city's support is never consistent, so having that consistency is
Speaker 1: so vital. Yes, yeah, I'm not thank you. And it's
Speaker 1: it's a lot of hard work, just so much that
Speaker 1: people don't see. Obviously, there's so many, so many things
Speaker 1: that people don't see. There's a lot of organizing behind it,
Speaker 1: just literally a lot of community building, a lot of meetings. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that again, like the bulk of mutual aid
Speaker 1: is relationships and trust, you know, like that that's that's
Speaker 1: really it. That's how you breathe life into your system.
Speaker 1: And it's like, you know, you have to have you
Speaker 1: have to continue to like nourish relationships, you know, between
Speaker 1: yourself and other organizers, between yourself if you're running an
Speaker 1: order between yourself and another organ UM. And and really
Speaker 1: that's how we've been able to, you know, to to
Speaker 1: reach so many people, is because we focused on making
Speaker 1: sure but you know, UM, it's so easy to to
Speaker 1: burn out in this work. But again, we also have
Speaker 1: to make sure that we take care of each other, UM.
Speaker 1: And we focused on making sure that we're checking on
Speaker 1: each other two and so I you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: hard to fully explain what how to even teach that
Speaker 1: you know, how to how to how to properly relationships,
Speaker 1: but I feel like that's that's such a key part
Speaker 1: of creating a really robust mutual aid network. UM. And
Speaker 1: that's at least the experience that we had youse. Yeah,
Speaker 1: were the work that you've done and what you've been
Speaker 1: able to accomplish is very impressive and is something that
Speaker 1: people a lot of people can aspire to. UM. Is
Speaker 1: there any like resources online that you can point to
Speaker 1: if someone's wanting to get into this type of work, UM,
Speaker 1: or any any like any kind of like advice to
Speaker 1: get started in your own city or to like look
Speaker 1: for stuff that's doing this similar that that's like that's
Speaker 1: doing a similar thing. Um uh wow, let's see who
Speaker 1: has um gosh, that's a really really really good question. Um. Well, well,
Speaker 1: first I hope that people have read Mutual Aid by
Speaker 1: Dean Spade. Um. Sure, that's a really good book. Um.
Speaker 1: And and from there I would read I would read
Speaker 1: The Black Panthers Social Programs. I got a lot of
Speaker 1: I got a lot of my um my inspiration from there. Um.
Speaker 1: And really that's that's really those those two things to
Speaker 1: kind of start as just sort of like your um,
Speaker 1: your primers um. And then if you want to kind
Speaker 1: of get deeper into food Justice, um uh, they're's a
Speaker 1: really good book. Are you get ready? Years ago it's
Speaker 1: almost I think it's literally called food Justice one on one. Okay,
Speaker 1: let me see it's really called it rely call food
Speaker 1: Justice one on one. Yeah, there's there's quite a few,
Speaker 1: but but one that's one, and then there's another there's
Speaker 1: a one book um I read called More Than Just
Speaker 1: Food um. And then it's it's pretty by Yeah. I'll
Speaker 1: give you guys my top five and that really canna
Speaker 1: helps sort of um like shape my thinking. You're on
Speaker 1: food justice. So that's it's written by a guy named
Speaker 1: Garrett Broad and he essentially like kind of lays out
Speaker 1: sort of how the industrial food system kind of created
Speaker 1: this huge crisis that we're in, and you know, like
Speaker 1: how there's there's really kind of an abundance of food everywhere,
Speaker 1: but obviously it's gettributed, yes exactly, and so and and
Speaker 1: and also kind of lays out how food justice you
Speaker 1: know activists UM who are in mostly low income communities
Speaker 1: of color help really build community based kind of solutions
Speaker 1: to these problems. And so that's really kind of where
Speaker 1: my thinking and my my lens comes from is because
Speaker 1: I am a child of l A, I'm able to
Speaker 1: understand what different neighborhoods need UM based on because I
Speaker 1: either grew up there, work there, have family there, you know,
Speaker 1: what's school there, or just have friends or other organizers
Speaker 1: who live there. And so say, if you know, I,
Speaker 1: I didn't grow up in Ball Heights, but I have
Speaker 1: friends who did. And so like, if I'm trying to
Speaker 1: build out a food program or mutual aid program and
Speaker 1: Ball Heights, I'm not going to just walk in there
Speaker 1: and be like, all right, we're gonna do it at
Speaker 1: you know, Yeah, you're not gonna take over there there
Speaker 1: they're saying exactly. But I think that's one thing I
Speaker 1: think I really want to for people to really especially
Speaker 1: for for for young people who want to get to
Speaker 1: food justice, Like you really have to really honestly do
Speaker 1: your research first and let the media leaders lead, um
Speaker 1: lead lead your program with you, right. And And there's
Speaker 1: a difference between like making community connections and then trying
Speaker 1: to like take over, right, there's a very very two
Speaker 1: very different things exactly. Yeah, you don't want to be extractive, right,
Speaker 1: you don't want to be extractive. You don't want to
Speaker 1: be coming in and you know, and and and really
Speaker 1: like you know, try to like show up with like,
Speaker 1: you know, solutions where there they weren't informed at all
Speaker 1: by the community. And I keep trying to stress that, Yeah,
Speaker 1: is there anywhere that people can support you or at
Speaker 1: least follow you online to keep up with the work. Yes, Um,
Speaker 1: I'm very active on Twitter. Um it's uh, we're at
Speaker 1: Polos pantry, so that's p O l O, s UM
Speaker 1: p A and p R why. And then I'm also
Speaker 1: tweeting as myself as an organiser. It's under m E
Speaker 1: smelling music as M E L L E music. UM,
Speaker 1: and that actually that handled for me everywhere, just like
Speaker 1: my personal so I I tweet from there a lot.
Speaker 1: I tweet a lot about food justice work I feel
Speaker 1: and all our all our work in l A I tweet,
Speaker 1: I retweet a lot of our MOVEM network and coalition work. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Just thank you for coming on to the show to
Speaker 1: talk about though justice and the work you've been doing. Um,
Speaker 1: it's great to hear more examples of people from around
Speaker 1: the country than hopefully you know, around the world getting
Speaker 1: involved in in this type of work. UM. Anyway, I
Speaker 1: think that it wraps up us today. You can follow
Speaker 1: this show on Twitter and Instagram at Happened Here pod
Speaker 1: and cool Zone Media. UM, subscribe to the feed, leave
Speaker 1: a hive star review or whatever. Anyway, that's that's that's
Speaker 1: the show. Bye bye, everybody, say bye everybone, Bye bye everyone,
Speaker 1: by everyone. It could Happen Here as a production of
Speaker 1: cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from cool Zone Media,
Speaker 1: visit our website cool zone Media dot com, or check
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Speaker 1: media dot com, slash sources, Thanks for listening.