WEBVTT - Land Without Landlords (with Noni Session) 0:00:01.040 --> 0:00:03.920 Hey, I'm Barraitune Day Thurston, and this is how to 0:00:04.040 --> 0:00:08.880 citizen with Baritune Day in season two, we're talking about 0:00:08.920 --> 0:00:12.640 the money, because, to be real, it's hard to citizen 0:00:12.920 --> 0:00:23.000 when we can barely pay the bills. When I grew 0:00:23.079 --> 0:00:25.079 up in d C in the nineteen eighties, it was 0:00:25.160 --> 0:00:31.400 known as Chocolate City because it was that black. Then 0:00:31.440 --> 0:00:33.680 I left d C in the mid nineties that went 0:00:33.680 --> 0:00:37.120 off to Boston for college, lived there twelve years. New 0:00:37.240 --> 0:00:41.559 York after that, mostly Brooklyn another twelve years. And in 0:00:41.640 --> 0:00:44.880 every one of these places, the neighborhoods I lived and 0:00:44.920 --> 0:00:47.520 the ones that felt so much like my childhood neighborhood, 0:00:48.200 --> 0:00:51.360 there was something changing. I couldn't put my finger on 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:57.240 it until I revisited my hometown, my home block, and 0:00:57.480 --> 0:01:01.720 Chocolate City didn't feel so chocolate e anymore had more 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:08.280 of a Caramelfuly. My mother had to sell our home 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:12.160 before we fully left d C. Not because she really 0:01:12.240 --> 0:01:15.200 wanted to, not because we couldn't afford the payments, but 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:18.360 because it was just too dangerous. This was the peak 0:01:18.480 --> 0:01:20.920 of the crack Wars, and she was worried about the 0:01:20.959 --> 0:01:25.360 safety of her baby for good reason. So when I 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:28.759 went back to look at our family home, my childhood home. 0:01:30.360 --> 0:01:34.319 We weren't there. The residents were a nice white couple 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:38.200 from Iowa. Sometimes I torture myself to this day looking 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:41.680 up the real estate value of that childhood home and 0:01:41.720 --> 0:01:46.360 seeing how much wealth is not in my family, and 0:01:46.520 --> 0:01:48.680 it creates a little bit of a conflict in me 0:01:48.960 --> 0:01:51.960 because I've been a part of that change in so 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:56.120 many neighborhoods. I've been the new money coming in, And 0:01:56.120 --> 0:01:57.919 to be honest, I like some of the new stuff. 0:01:58.600 --> 0:02:01.840 I am a sucker for an over priced cocktail from 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:05.480 the school of mixology. I love fancy coffee, more foam, 0:02:05.720 --> 0:02:09.239 more happy baritune day. That's my jam. But I'm also 0:02:09.280 --> 0:02:13.480 troubled by the idea that new folks coming into a 0:02:13.639 --> 0:02:18.240 culturally rich environment are part of the destruction of that 0:02:18.360 --> 0:02:22.960 very culture. That all this nice new stuff is not 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:25.800 for the people who held it down for so long 0:02:26.360 --> 0:02:32.000 in their neighborhoods, and that's not right. We've got to 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:35.560 have a different way of letting people own their community, 0:02:35.600 --> 0:02:41.200 determine that future, and have the benefits for themselves. I 0:02:41.240 --> 0:02:44.440 believe we can improve neighborhoods for the people already there, 0:02:45.000 --> 0:02:47.200 and I know someone who has an idea of how 0:02:47.240 --> 0:02:51.000 to do it, who believes that nice things, including good coffee, 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:56.440 shouldn't mean displacing long term residents because it's all about ownership. 0:02:57.720 --> 0:03:03.399 And she's at the epicenter of gentrification in the US Oakland, California. 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:07.079 You ask how Oakland could get into the condition it's 0:03:07.120 --> 0:03:11.280 in now. No one has had a moment to stop 0:03:11.560 --> 0:03:15.000 and build a future for themselves. You better believe these 0:03:15.040 --> 0:03:19.120 hedge funds have hundred and five hundred year plans for themselves. 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:23.520 After the break my conversation with third generation West Oaklander 0:03:23.840 --> 0:03:34.800 Noni Session, let me fix my hair. Oh, your hair 0:03:34.840 --> 0:03:37.280 looks great coming out. I mean, you know, the messy 0:03:37.320 --> 0:03:41.040 afro is a look, but it's very messy, so I 0:03:41.080 --> 0:03:45.720 have to work on bad. Noni Session is the executive 0:03:45.760 --> 0:03:49.360 director of the East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative eb 0:03:49.560 --> 0:03:53.119 PREC fights gentrification in West Oakland by buying up real 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:56.880 estate and historically black and brown communities and then collectively 0:03:56.960 --> 0:04:01.200 owning and managing those properties within the community. Alright, so 0:04:01.480 --> 0:04:04.680 can you introduce yourself? Say your name and what it 0:04:04.760 --> 0:04:08.720 is you do. My name is Nony Session. Um I 0:04:08.760 --> 0:04:14.360 am an accidental community led movement builder, real estate developer, 0:04:14.400 --> 0:04:21.039 and impact investment galvanizer when in my actual professional training, 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:24.520 I'm trained as a cultural anthropologist who stumbled into grass 0:04:24.560 --> 0:04:28.839 roots organizing. And here we are today. Okay, wow, we 0:04:28.920 --> 0:04:30.960 are clearly going to go on a journey with you, 0:04:31.520 --> 0:04:32.960 because that was a lot of nouns. You know, we 0:04:33.040 --> 0:04:40.400 got organizer, galvanizer, developer, anthropologists, woo woo. Okay, why do 0:04:40.440 --> 0:04:43.280 you use the word accidental to describe so many of 0:04:43.400 --> 0:04:49.720 your jobs? Well, I'm essentially just this little kid from 0:04:49.800 --> 0:04:54.240 West Oakland who was raised on Sesame Street and Nature 0:04:54.320 --> 0:04:58.800 TV shows and read lots of sci fi before it 0:04:58.880 --> 0:05:02.520 was cool to read side Hi. And then I majored 0:05:02.520 --> 0:05:06.000 in Black studies and cultural anthropology, and then did my 0:05:06.080 --> 0:05:09.839 doctoral work at Cornell in Nairobi on the United Nations 0:05:09.839 --> 0:05:13.880 Development Program. And um, when I came home after ten 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:19.840 years away for grad school, the city was just crazy. 0:05:20.200 --> 0:05:22.920 West Oakland has been a hot spot for local artists 0:05:22.960 --> 0:05:27.359 and musicians. Jessica Florida shows us as gentrification transforms the neighborhood, 0:05:27.400 --> 0:05:29.560 the people who have long called it home are getting 0:05:29.600 --> 0:05:32.920 pushed out. High rents not only forced out families, but 0:05:33.040 --> 0:05:35.839 mom and pop shops. He and his companies have issued 0:05:35.880 --> 0:05:40.719 at least three thousand eviction notices. Prostitution, crime, poverty, the 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:45.640 illegal duppling, the homelessness were like second class citizens here. 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:51.400 And it was quite accidental because it started with me 0:05:51.480 --> 0:05:55.320 just volunteering because I wanted to meet some people, you know, 0:05:55.800 --> 0:05:58.400 and talk about really interesting things I had learned in 0:05:58.440 --> 0:06:02.080 grad school. And ten years later it's culminated in this 0:06:02.160 --> 0:06:04.960 work that is actually shocks me every day when I 0:06:05.000 --> 0:06:07.359 wake up. It's it's it's quite powerful for me to 0:06:07.400 --> 0:06:13.679 be involved in it. So where do you live now? 0:06:14.360 --> 0:06:16.880 I live in West Oakland. I actually live in the 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:19.080 house that I was raised in. I'm speaking to you 0:06:19.200 --> 0:06:22.440 from there right now, which is radically unusual given the 0:06:23.279 --> 0:06:27.200 extreme and accelerated racialized displacement that's taken place in my 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:30.719 city and cities like it. So I'm pretty proud of 0:06:30.760 --> 0:06:37.839 that accelerated racialized displacement. Can you define that term please. 0:06:38.800 --> 0:06:44.000 We've lost over fifty of Oakland's black and legacy population 0:06:44.080 --> 0:06:48.200 in the last ten years. With a boom in our population, 0:06:49.480 --> 0:06:52.600 the ratio of people of color has dropped to such 0:06:52.640 --> 0:06:56.160 an extreme degree that you can't help but call it 0:06:56.480 --> 0:07:01.200 racialized displacement. Your family has been in West Oakland for 0:07:01.279 --> 0:07:06.080 how many generations? My grandparents migrated here in the early 0:07:06.200 --> 0:07:10.480 nineteen forty, So my grandparents, my cousins, my aunt's mincles, 0:07:10.560 --> 0:07:15.240 my dad, my my mom, my sisters, my brothers, and 0:07:15.280 --> 0:07:17.720 then I have another generation after me as I was 0:07:17.840 --> 0:07:21.080 a teenage mother. So I now have a very very 0:07:21.360 --> 0:07:25.760 very adult daughter living her life here as well. So 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:28.720 what does it mean to you to have so many 0:07:28.760 --> 0:07:32.400 generations from your family be based in West Oakland? I 0:07:32.440 --> 0:07:35.920 think prior to this tenure arc, it didn't mean a lot. 0:07:37.480 --> 0:07:41.320 I did not understand the privilege of being grounded in 0:07:41.360 --> 0:07:45.840 a place for generations. And when I compare myself to 0:07:45.920 --> 0:07:49.040 my counterparts who have moved a lot, or who have 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:53.880 had to live squarely in white dominated situations, I realized 0:07:53.960 --> 0:07:57.840 it was almost as if I was raised in a 0:07:58.000 --> 0:08:02.520 royal or cloistered or a situation where my identity was 0:08:02.640 --> 0:08:06.320 reinforced on a daily basis. We were well known, our 0:08:06.360 --> 0:08:10.160 life was stable and predictable, and it it really gives 0:08:10.200 --> 0:08:14.240 you this grounding to both claim and imagine a future 0:08:14.240 --> 0:08:16.520 for yourself that I think a lot of people around 0:08:16.520 --> 0:08:20.680 me haven't had the privilege to capture in their life trajectory. 0:08:23.920 --> 0:08:27.800 You use the word wealth to describe what your family 0:08:28.200 --> 0:08:31.960 gave you, and I suspect you don't mean buried chests 0:08:32.080 --> 0:08:36.520 of gold or stock certificates. How do you define this 0:08:36.640 --> 0:08:40.480 wealth that your family left for you in West Oakland? Um? 0:08:40.840 --> 0:08:46.000 I think I define it as identity right, as a 0:08:46.080 --> 0:08:52.920 well from which I can gather new creative material. I 0:08:52.960 --> 0:08:56.520 think that it really drives a lot of the underlying 0:08:56.559 --> 0:09:01.920 mission and political philosophy of my work now, and that 0:09:01.920 --> 0:09:05.520 that is the definition of culture and Black Americans as 0:09:05.600 --> 0:09:09.000 one of the clear landless people on this planet. It's 0:09:09.040 --> 0:09:12.880 one reason that we've had such complications with getting a 0:09:12.920 --> 0:09:16.720 foothold here and that we don't have a firm place 0:09:16.840 --> 0:09:21.040 to retire ourselves, to to define and build for the 0:09:21.120 --> 0:09:25.120 next generation. We are in a constant state of rebuilding, 0:09:25.520 --> 0:09:28.680 not just generation to generation, I mean day to day, 0:09:28.920 --> 0:09:32.200 month to month, year to year. So that is really 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:36.840 the definition of wealth. Can you describe your West Oakland? 0:09:37.040 --> 0:09:39.480 What does it look like, what does it smell like? 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:44.679 Who's in it? Lots of oak trees and big, wide 0:09:44.840 --> 0:09:48.280 empty streets. You know, I think as a kid, and 0:09:48.400 --> 0:09:51.840 as Black Americans, we still thought we were living in 0:09:51.840 --> 0:09:56.280 a place that would show up for us and rescue us. So, 0:09:56.480 --> 0:09:59.800 despite Oakland being empty, washed out city, we at least 0:09:59.800 --> 0:10:04.280 we're left alone to our um class identities and our 0:10:04.360 --> 0:10:08.040 daily goings on. Um. My parents were small business owners. 0:10:08.080 --> 0:10:10.240 My mother ran a board and care home for development 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:14.440 lee disabled adults, and so I was really safe on 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:16.920 the same streets that most people were not safe on. 0:10:17.320 --> 0:10:19.880 Nobody bothered this little black kid. I would go to 0:10:19.960 --> 0:10:22.720 bookstores and hang out for hours. I would go to 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:26.320 West Oakland Public Library to that like quiet, warm, muted 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:29.640 space and lay on the floor and read book after book, 0:10:29.720 --> 0:10:34.400 and then skip down these wide, empty, silent boulevards. It 0:10:34.480 --> 0:10:37.920 was open space for me. It was a super quiet, 0:10:38.200 --> 0:10:45.199 safe space. And describe your West Oakland today, my poor babies. 0:10:45.559 --> 0:10:48.240 You could call that stretch of road homeless Lane. It's 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:50.920 an encampment that has grown so large you can see 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:53.080 it's spilling out onto the roadway. There are hundreds of 0:10:53.120 --> 0:10:56.720 similar tense cities across Silicon Valley, all within a few 0:10:56.760 --> 0:11:00.320 miles of the world's most profitable tech companies. All of 0:11:00.360 --> 0:11:05.640 those wide open boulevards. They're stacked neck high with tents 0:11:05.760 --> 0:11:11.120 and lots of discarded hoarded goods. But it's sporadic. Right. 0:11:11.240 --> 0:11:15.440 If you don't know West Oakland, Google with its racialized 0:11:15.600 --> 0:11:19.440 and class algorithms, will direct you right around those hot 0:11:19.440 --> 0:11:23.720 spots of neglect. The funny thing is the boulevards are 0:11:23.760 --> 0:11:27.440 still wide open, the skies are still huge, so there's 0:11:27.440 --> 0:11:32.959 still this hopefulness. Um, while we stand next to start poverty. 0:11:33.320 --> 0:11:38.360 How do you explain the change in the West Oakland 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:41.360 of your youth versus your description of the West Oakland 0:11:41.400 --> 0:11:44.040 of today. What happened? You know? It was it was 0:11:44.080 --> 0:11:46.080 a ghost town when I was growing up because it 0:11:46.120 --> 0:11:48.240 was in the middle of of the Reagan years and 0:11:48.280 --> 0:11:53.760 benign neglect. For decades, we have piled deficit upon deficit, 0:11:54.320 --> 0:11:57.960 mortgaging our future and our children's future for the temporary 0:11:58.000 --> 0:12:01.440 convenience of the present. When what is benign neglect? That 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:05.120 was an economic policy of the Reagan years. That was 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:07.600 when you started to see a lot of money and 0:12:07.679 --> 0:12:11.160 resources pulled out of urban cities. And that is really 0:12:11.480 --> 0:12:15.559 what accelerated urban decline and the loss of value in 0:12:15.679 --> 0:12:20.240 urban communities which could then be preyed on by speculators. Right, um, 0:12:20.400 --> 0:12:22.800 folks had a plan for Oakland that most of us 0:12:22.840 --> 0:12:26.920 were not privy to. It's a hot market, and um, 0:12:26.960 --> 0:12:32.439 there's very little care and forethought in planning for lives 0:12:32.480 --> 0:12:35.760 that have been led here for generations. So it's a fearful, 0:12:35.880 --> 0:12:39.400 insecure place under the surface of these bride white boulevards. 0:12:41.080 --> 0:12:44.640 What's a hot market? What does that mean? That means 0:12:44.880 --> 0:12:48.280 that after I watched my neighbors across the street be 0:12:48.480 --> 0:12:52.200 removed by the share of the house with two tiny 0:12:52.240 --> 0:12:54.760 eight by eight bedrooms, the house immediately sold for one 0:12:54.760 --> 0:12:59.360 point four million. That's a hot market. So what's what's 0:12:59.440 --> 0:13:03.640 your home ownership situation? Are you renting? Are you owning 0:13:03.720 --> 0:13:06.960 in this home that you're living in yourself? Well? Interesting enough, 0:13:07.559 --> 0:13:12.480 in the subprime lending of the late eighties and early nineties, 0:13:13.000 --> 0:13:18.200 my mother also lost this house. My amazing maternal uncle 0:13:18.559 --> 0:13:21.720 bought it to keep it from going back on the 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:25.840 speculative market, and we paid all the expenses, but he 0:13:25.960 --> 0:13:29.920 maintained it as the owner of record until someone could 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:34.400 get another mortgage, and that has just been recently. Me 0:13:35.080 --> 0:13:38.520 and I closed escrow on my childhood home September three 0:13:38.760 --> 0:13:43.240 of twenty The whole family breathed a sigh of relief. 0:13:43.400 --> 0:13:46.479 I'm breathing it for you. I can feel the stability 0:13:46.559 --> 0:13:48.720 under your feet. What do you mean when you say 0:13:48.880 --> 0:13:52.800 speculative market? You were able to keep your family home 0:13:53.360 --> 0:13:57.960 out of the speculative market. Well, you know, we're currently 0:13:58.000 --> 0:14:01.800 living under a financial game that's been in development for 0:14:01.840 --> 0:14:06.520 a long time but is really accelerated, and that everything 0:14:06.600 --> 0:14:10.120 around you is a commodity, the air you breathe, the 0:14:10.120 --> 0:14:14.520 water you drink, and so how currency is currently traded 0:14:15.200 --> 0:14:19.480 is on a speculative basis of its future value. It 0:14:19.640 --> 0:14:23.880 is a gamble or a bet on the future price 0:14:24.040 --> 0:14:28.480 of a commodity item. It's actually meant to drive up 0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:32.800 the value. It's the artificial creation of scarcity in order 0:14:32.920 --> 0:14:37.800 to create excess capital. And so when you speculate on housing, 0:14:38.280 --> 0:14:43.480 you're buying something, you're holding it in reserve from the market, right, 0:14:43.600 --> 0:14:48.480 Meaning you're keeping housing away from people often empty and 0:14:48.880 --> 0:14:53.680 wait for the rise in its value to create excess 0:14:53.840 --> 0:14:58.200 profit for yourself. And through that speculation, you're raising the 0:14:58.240 --> 0:15:01.920 costs and making it inaccessible. Um, it sounds to me 0:15:02.280 --> 0:15:06.480 like what's happened in your area, and it's not limited 0:15:06.480 --> 0:15:08.720 to West Oakland for sure. I'm from d C. I 0:15:08.800 --> 0:15:11.520 used to live in Brooklyn, Boston, like everywhere you look 0:15:11.560 --> 0:15:14.960 in many parts of the world, housing is not being 0:15:15.000 --> 0:15:18.160 treated as a place for people to live, but rather 0:15:18.800 --> 0:15:21.000 as a place for people to park their money and 0:15:21.040 --> 0:15:24.240 make the money grow, raising money rather than kids inside 0:15:24.240 --> 0:15:26.720 of these homes. Uh Is that is that a fair 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:29.280 rephrasing of what you just said? Yes you could. You 0:15:29.280 --> 0:15:32.040 could name them bread and Chad and it would really 0:15:32.080 --> 0:15:36.880 be reflective of what's going on. So, so what is 0:15:36.920 --> 0:15:41.680 the impact on people when housing is withheld from the 0:15:41.760 --> 0:15:43.200 market for those who want to live in it to 0:15:43.240 --> 0:15:46.080 those who want to profit from the value of the 0:15:46.240 --> 0:15:49.640 increasing you know, financial worth of that housing. Well, I 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:54.040 mean you circled us back around to accelerated racialized displacement, 0:15:54.320 --> 0:15:59.160 because not only does speculation become this increasingly tight loop 0:15:59.280 --> 0:16:03.040 of accelerating the cost of land and housing, but it 0:16:03.080 --> 0:16:06.120 means that a very specific class and group of people 0:16:06.440 --> 0:16:09.560 are not only going to be pushed out of their 0:16:09.560 --> 0:16:12.960 current housing and access to future housing, they then have 0:16:13.160 --> 0:16:16.360 to lay on the sidewalk as they watch that housing 0:16:16.560 --> 0:16:20.680 being either held in reserve or in some manner developed 0:16:20.880 --> 0:16:25.400 for new populations that are the demand of the current 0:16:25.480 --> 0:16:28.960 labor market, which focuses in on tech. So as seven 0:16:29.000 --> 0:16:32.520 thousand people scrape and scrabble for a living, they watch 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:36.520 new folks have fifty dollar branches right outside of where 0:16:36.680 --> 0:16:41.160 their children used to play and eat their meals with 0:16:41.440 --> 0:16:45.760 the landscape of affordable housing right now in Oakland? What 0:16:45.960 --> 0:16:49.960 is the landscape of affordable housing? Well, it's the I 0:16:51.640 --> 0:16:55.800 It eats me inside out when people use the language 0:16:55.800 --> 0:17:00.440 of affordable housing, tell me why you made. As of 0:17:00.560 --> 0:17:06.040 two thousand and seventeen, the average Black Oaklanders salary was 0:17:06.119 --> 0:17:09.760 thirty six thousand dollars. That same year, the average White 0:17:09.800 --> 0:17:14.919 Oaklanders salary as eighty thousand dollars. Almost all affordable housing 0:17:15.000 --> 0:17:18.520 as it exists right now is not for the very 0:17:18.760 --> 0:17:23.080 folks who are rent burdened or on the actual sidewalk 0:17:23.240 --> 0:17:27.960 sleeping every night. And those affordable housing developers who are 0:17:28.760 --> 0:17:34.400 trying to produce affordable housing that serves those at that 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:39.240 median income of thirty six thousand dollars are finding that 0:17:39.720 --> 0:17:45.040 they are hog tied in terms of leveraging state and 0:17:45.160 --> 0:17:48.960 federal subsidies and bond money, and so all of that 0:17:49.119 --> 0:17:53.000 capital that comes from state, federal money bonds still gets 0:17:53.000 --> 0:17:57.120 cloistered among those who are not from the very populations 0:17:57.200 --> 0:18:02.280 affected by rent burden and rent blight. It's a game. 0:18:03.240 --> 0:18:06.160 It's a game. It's a game. It's a shell game, 0:18:06.200 --> 0:18:10.480 if you will. My understanding of shell game is there's 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:14.960 some trickery involved, that you're covering up the fact that 0:18:15.040 --> 0:18:19.000 something's not really under those shells. There's some deception of 0:18:19.680 --> 0:18:22.080 So bring me to the moment, because I can. I 0:18:22.119 --> 0:18:24.639 can feel the energy. You got me all fired up. 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.280 I'm like, yo, they're not telling this story the right way, 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:31.080 but it's emotional. This has had significant impacts on people's 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:36.120 lives and their ability to live, and you took some 0:18:36.160 --> 0:18:42.520 steps to end that game. So what does the East 0:18:42.560 --> 0:18:46.840 Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative do around housing? The East 0:18:46.840 --> 0:18:50.800 Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative is a democratically lad people 0:18:50.880 --> 0:18:58.320 of color, multi stakeholder cooperative that supports Black, Brown and 0:18:58.400 --> 0:19:07.320 Indigenous Oaklanders in collectively organizing, financing, stewarding long term land 0:19:07.359 --> 0:19:10.679 and housing in Oakland in the East Bay. Although we 0:19:10.720 --> 0:19:15.439 are not an affordable housing developer, we develop permanent and 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:20.960 affordable land and housing for people to live in dip 0:19:21.000 --> 0:19:24.240 back into generation after generation, and through our by laws, 0:19:24.280 --> 0:19:28.560 we restrict ourselves from ever selling it or using it exploitatively. 0:19:28.800 --> 0:19:31.600 So there's a guarantee of permanence and the future for 0:19:31.680 --> 0:19:37.760 people who invest in our revision. So you have created 0:19:38.640 --> 0:19:44.359 a different way for people in a community two own 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:49.439 land and buildings and housing in their community. And the 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:57.440 results is what what's different? The result is the rebuilding 0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:04.160 of a community. What is happening in Oakland and cities 0:20:04.240 --> 0:20:08.600 like it is unchecked speculation, where the city is allowing 0:20:08.680 --> 0:20:13.679 folks who actually don't understand community development to stick buildings 0:20:13.680 --> 0:20:18.439 in arbitrary open spaces and then sell off the fractions 0:20:18.560 --> 0:20:21.960 to people who are unconnected to the outcome of the 0:20:22.000 --> 0:20:25.720 place in which they buy the item, the idea even 0:20:26.560 --> 0:20:31.439 and so there is a weird disconnection between where and 0:20:31.480 --> 0:20:34.679 how you build what and who and what it's built for. 0:20:36.800 --> 0:20:40.280 After the break, what happens when instead of a corporate 0:20:40.320 --> 0:20:43.280 developer owning the real estate and the community, it's owned 0:20:43.320 --> 0:20:55.800 by the people. What actually changes? Hi, I'm no need 0:20:56.359 --> 0:20:59.840 and I'm Greg. We're part of b B pre Per 0:21:00.280 --> 0:21:04.800 real Estate Cooperative. First, we get local residents, You me, Greg, 0:21:04.840 --> 0:21:08.000 your mom, your neighbor, to invest a thousand dollars apiece 0:21:08.200 --> 0:21:11.240 into our collective fund with a lot of people that's 0:21:11.280 --> 0:21:14.119 a lot of money. Then EB prec uses that money 0:21:14.160 --> 0:21:16.480 to buy up properties in Oakland and the East Bay. 0:21:16.720 --> 0:21:19.359 We've already picked out properties where long term tenants are 0:21:19.400 --> 0:21:21.600 in danger of being pushed out, and once we buy 0:21:21.640 --> 0:21:23.920 the property, the people who are already live and work 0:21:23.960 --> 0:21:28.000 there get to stay. I think I understand how your 0:21:28.040 --> 0:21:32.159 approach is different. It is grounded in the community. It 0:21:32.280 --> 0:21:35.920 is collective with the community. The ownership sounds like it's 0:21:35.920 --> 0:21:39.440 distributed among the community, not just in the single hand 0:21:39.480 --> 0:21:43.359 of one rich corporation or maybe even one very wealthy individual, 0:21:43.400 --> 0:21:45.440 as is the case with many a building. Why did 0:21:45.440 --> 0:21:49.720 you choose the co op model not the nonprofit model 0:21:49.880 --> 0:21:55.119 for this land and housing need. Well, well, there's a 0:21:55.160 --> 0:21:57.639 couple of reasons. One is sort of a core underlying 0:21:57.680 --> 0:22:01.920 philosophical and political reason. Folks like W. E. B. Dubois, 0:22:02.280 --> 0:22:05.440 Fanny lew Hammer, we just thought, you know, if we 0:22:05.480 --> 0:22:08.640 had land to grow some stuff, only then it would 0:22:08.640 --> 0:22:11.960 be a help too. They were not civil rights activists 0:22:12.000 --> 0:22:16.200 first and then coopers. They were co operas first and 0:22:16.280 --> 0:22:21.080 then became civil rights activists. So we founded Freedom Bombs 0:22:21.920 --> 0:22:26.280 in nineteen nine. The plan of the thing is that 0:22:26.440 --> 0:22:32.240 it didn't grow to produce enough. The people just won't 0:22:32.240 --> 0:22:35.760 know what. From the date the change dropped off of 0:22:35.840 --> 0:22:40.280 us after emancipation, we knew that cooperative and collective economics 0:22:40.280 --> 0:22:45.160 for our answer. On the North Carolina Coast, we had 0:22:45.280 --> 0:22:51.480 over a hundred hectares of cooperative land for which over 0:22:51.560 --> 0:22:55.680 the next hundred years we were judicially an extra judicially 0:22:56.000 --> 0:22:59.720 dispossessed of that land. But we've always known the solution. 0:23:00.040 --> 0:23:02.520 And what I try to communicate to people is that 0:23:02.600 --> 0:23:05.680 we work on this sort of individualistic rhetoric. But even 0:23:05.680 --> 0:23:09.240 if you look at hedge funds, you look at speculative development, 0:23:09.520 --> 0:23:15.480 those are collectives of people combining their economic and political 0:23:15.640 --> 0:23:19.520 power to create an outcome. So that's number one. Collective 0:23:19.560 --> 0:23:22.359 economics is the way of the world. Just those of 0:23:22.440 --> 0:23:26.000 us who are on the ground scrabbling don't understand that. 0:23:26.000 --> 0:23:28.720 That's an important point because I think a lot of 0:23:28.760 --> 0:23:35.160 folks here collective economics, cooperative economics, that's communist MAO with socialist, leftist. 0:23:35.800 --> 0:23:40.639 But a corporation is a collection of people's interests, aligned 0:23:41.040 --> 0:23:45.399 boards of directors, shareholders. So we're all operating as a 0:23:45.480 --> 0:23:48.480 part of some collective, whether we name it that or 0:23:48.480 --> 0:23:52.479 not exactly exactly, So tell me what it looks like 0:23:52.720 --> 0:23:55.960 on the ground. What have you accomplished, what have you done? 0:23:57.840 --> 0:24:01.240 So we're very new and we're have a grand vision. 0:24:01.520 --> 0:24:05.280 So right now we are the owners of two land 0:24:05.280 --> 0:24:08.280 and housing acquisitions. So our first is a multi unit 0:24:08.320 --> 0:24:14.480 building that has teachers and lawyers and activists and gardeners 0:24:14.480 --> 0:24:18.880 who live there. Multiple gardeners. You have multiple gardeners. Gardeners. Yeah, yeah, 0:24:19.000 --> 0:24:21.600 we're in Oakland, Like urban gardening is the deal right now, 0:24:21.920 --> 0:24:27.120 don't play um. And they're very busy, active people. One 0:24:27.160 --> 0:24:30.080 of them is the founder of Community Democracy Project, which 0:24:30.160 --> 0:24:32.800 is working to change the city charter in Oakland so 0:24:32.840 --> 0:24:36.320 that Oaklanders can participate in defining the city budget. Another 0:24:36.440 --> 0:24:38.919 is a founder of the first People of Color Cooperative 0:24:38.960 --> 0:24:42.400 coffee roaster in Berkeley. Right, these are folks who are 0:24:42.560 --> 0:24:46.520 working in and for our community, and now they pay 0:24:46.600 --> 0:24:49.760 rent at about eight hundred and twenty bucks when most 0:24:49.760 --> 0:24:53.520 people are paying fifteen hundred to twenty hundred for the 0:24:53.560 --> 0:24:58.920 same square footage. Our second acquisition is a single family 0:24:59.040 --> 0:25:03.119 home in Berkeley, League, California that has a detached dance 0:25:03.160 --> 0:25:07.440 studio and there were housing two black women artists, one 0:25:07.520 --> 0:25:11.960 who's formerly homeless with a daughter, and the interview was 0:25:12.080 --> 0:25:15.560 really about their vision as opposed to them being able 0:25:15.600 --> 0:25:18.240 to pass the credit check and show us that they 0:25:18.280 --> 0:25:22.440 hadn't been a victim of other predatory housing situations which 0:25:22.520 --> 0:25:25.800 often result in evictions. Right. And in addition, those two 0:25:25.840 --> 0:25:29.120 women who are now living in this amazing, beautiful shingled 0:25:29.119 --> 0:25:32.119 house in Berkeley, they are now launching a business out 0:25:32.160 --> 0:25:35.760 of the dance studio for an additional stream of income 0:25:35.840 --> 0:25:39.320 because they are active members of the arts community. Right, 0:25:39.920 --> 0:25:45.359 this is transforming people's futures. And so our current acquisition 0:25:45.400 --> 0:25:47.600 and this is this is our biggest one yet, and 0:25:47.640 --> 0:25:50.720 we're we're really going out on a lamb to really 0:25:50.760 --> 0:25:53.840 show the proof of concept for this motto. It's on 0:25:54.000 --> 0:25:57.760 historic Seventh Street, which has been the heart of the 0:25:57.800 --> 0:26:00.719 gutting of Oakland. And so we're take in this historic 0:26:00.800 --> 0:26:03.760 corridor that used to be called the Harlem of the West, right, 0:26:03.960 --> 0:26:06.840 some of the greatest acts in Black history, and it 0:26:06.880 --> 0:26:10.119 was a bustling black business district. It's been a ghost 0:26:10.119 --> 0:26:13.359 town for thirty years and people have tried over and 0:26:13.400 --> 0:26:17.200 over again to restart that corridor. And so we're acquiring 0:26:17.359 --> 0:26:21.360 Esther's Orbit Room Jazz and supper club, and we're creating 0:26:21.520 --> 0:26:26.480 three footprints of commercial ground floor space for a co 0:26:26.600 --> 0:26:29.760 op where one part is intended to be a performance 0:26:29.840 --> 0:26:32.800 venue and a bar, the middle part is a cafe 0:26:32.840 --> 0:26:35.160 and coffee shop where the young can come do spoken 0:26:35.160 --> 0:26:39.280 word and open mic and open jam. And the far 0:26:39.400 --> 0:26:43.119 right spaces of fine arts and movement arts gallery. Above it, 0:26:43.160 --> 0:26:45.600 there are three units of cooperative co housing where we 0:26:45.640 --> 0:26:49.680 will be grounding black arts housing cooperatives in to start 0:26:49.680 --> 0:26:53.119 to ground the community back into the actual physical space 0:26:53.160 --> 0:26:55.600 of the street. And we have a back parking lot 0:26:55.680 --> 0:26:58.040 that's part of this acquisition and really wide, like a 0:26:58.080 --> 0:27:00.280 seven ft wide sidewalks were going to be grounding the 0:27:00.320 --> 0:27:03.040 Freedom Farmers Market, which is a black farmers market. It's 0:27:03.080 --> 0:27:07.200 been displaced again and again over the last like nine years. 0:27:07.600 --> 0:27:11.399 So Esther's Orbit Room Cultural Revival Project is the first 0:27:11.440 --> 0:27:14.760 acquisition among many for what we have named the Seventh 0:27:14.800 --> 0:27:19.119 Street Cooperative Cultural Corride or revitalization Plan. It is a 0:27:19.160 --> 0:27:22.520