Category: 2013

Today was our second day of service and we continued our work with Green Opportunities and the inspiring DeWayne Barton. We started out the morning with DeWayne explaining his reasons for starting the organization and how after hearing neighborhood kids shooting guns near his house, he knew he had to create real change. He decided the only way to create that change was through the help of the community and  working through grassroots movements. After unveiling more of DeWayne’s very complex and mysterious character our team went back to GO headquarters and got a tour of the Reed Community Center.

The Community Center is being built by community workers, using green materials, and is going to be used as a training center for community workers. Following DeWayne back to the Peace Garden, he pulled over to the side of the road and got out of the car to talk to us. He saw a renovated community building that contracted to outside workers instead of employing one of the 22% of unemployed members of the community of Asheville. DeWayne was clearly still outraged that this had occurred and that the town had allowed outsiders to come take jobs that could have been given to members of the community to assist their own community. This outraged man has more passion and loyalty to a community than I have ever seen in my life.

At GO headquarters we also spoke to Anthony, a GO employee and leader who helped incarcerated individuals get back on their feet and back to work. He spoke to us about the importance of community and the importance of finding people sustainable jobs.

We visited the Pisgah Community Garden and talked to a few members of the GO Training Team (GOTT). They were chasing chickens and planting seeds. Intrigued by working with actual members, myself and a few other members of our team stayed at this garden, while others spent the day back at the Burton Community Peace Garden with DeWayne, creating art and tightening up the space. The rest of us stayed to help the GOTT in the community garden. I chose to shovel dirt for the new crops. The rest of our team that was in the garden went to plant seeds, I shoveled with eight GO members and got to talk to them one-on-one. We joked, and laughed and broke a sweat getting to know each other in the cold weather. I talked to them about their lives, many of them under the age of 24 and already with children. They talked about the importance of making a steady income and how there are certain standards they follow at work like no sagging pants and no using your phone. They also talked about their love and dedication to DeWayne. There was a distinct type of loyalty and appreciation that they all seemed to have for him. DeWayne had even explained that once you joined GO, you were family.

Reconvening at the Peace Garden after a hard days work I got to walk around and see the art my team members created. The garden that once seemed kind of creepy and unwelcoming now seemed like a place to learn and reflect and call home. I was surprised that DeWayne had invited the input of our team members to create entire pieces of art in his garden. It was touching that he had that kind of trust in us. After talking to him about community movements and particularly about his opinions regarding the Iraqi War, I no longer questioned his work, instead embracing his every idea and helping in the Peace Garden as much as I could even in our last half hour there.

Saying goodbye to DeWayne and to GO was difficult. While I am eager to canvas and to work with another grassroots movement in a completely different way, I know that I will never have another experience like the one I had with DeWayne and with Green Opportunities.

Our team had a fantastic reflection and really seemed to have a better sense of resolution after last nights discussion of confusion and conflict. Our team seems to be getting a long a lot better too, bonding well and laughing a lot. I am shocked that it is already half over. I love Sweet Peas Hostile and adore the city of Asheville. While I will be sad to leave this town I have begun to call home, I am also eager to bring back some of these ideas to Lafayette and to Easton. I would love to inspire individuals in Easton to work towards sustainable jobs through the impact of artwork and community works.

Our second day of service proved to be a whirlwind of activities that kept us constantly moving throughout the day. After breakfast and bundling up for the day (it’s been around 30 degrees out and snowing down here), we headed out for another day of service with DeWayne and Green Opportunities. Around 9 am, we headed back to DeWayne’s peace garden, where he gave us a brief overview of how GO got started. The organization, and the peace garden in particular, was started in response to the number of youth in the community who were dealing drugs on the streets. DeWayne wanted to provide these kids with a more positive job opportunity, so he set out with the process of developing GO to help provide training and job placement for underprivileged community members.

Our knowledge of GO was expanded by a tour of the WC Reid Center, a building with big plans related to GO which is currently under construction. The center was originally a school and later became a community center in the seventies as a result of desegregation. Because of a lack of funding for necessary renovations, there were plans to tear down this center. The combined efforts of GO and the Housing Authority saved the center, which is now being renovated. Once we were fitted with neon green hardhats, we were taken on a tour of the center and filled in on its intended use. GO plans to use this center, slated for completion in June 2014, as its new headquarters. Office space and program training rooms are the key features of this building, which will allow for GO to continue its mission of training community members for green jobs within the community.

As we walked through the center, I personally could envision what the completion of this building would provide for the organization. After hearing about the difficulties that GO has in finding space to train its members, I could understand why they needed this space in order to continue their mission. I felt that I connected with this construction site in a way I had struggled to in DeWayne’s peace garden. This building was a more tangible way for me to understand the goals and future of GO as an organization, while DeWayne’s garden was a more individualized, artistic method of connecting with individuals in the community.

Our tour ended with conversations with GO office staff Anthony, DeWayne, and Marilyn, where we learned about the differences between the various programs GO has to offer. They train members in weatherization of buildings, culinary arts, sustainable gardening/agriculture, and other programs as well. Some of this training comes with nationally recognized certifications, which can be used to find stable jobs for these GO members. We got to meet some of these GO members on our visit to the Pisgah View garden, a second community garden in the area. This space was more focused on vegetable gardening rather than the elaborate sculptures of DeWayne’s peace garden. It was really interesting and enlightening to meet community members undergoing the GO training we’d been learning about, and I really appreciated the chance to see the program in action.

After lunch (which we enjoyed back in DeWayne’s garden), our group split into various projects. Some members continued with spreading mulch throughout the garden, while others worked on creating and/or altering existing sculptures. I was part of the group that returned to the Pisgah View garden, where we assisted in laying down fresh soil for planting, harvesting some of the vegetables, and weeding the existing vegetable beds. As for the group members who stayed at DeWayne’s garden, they met another man named Jonathan Santo who came to visit the garden and played music for the group. He even gave us a CD of his music, which allowed for the other half of the group to experience his work.

Our reflection tonight allowed us to decompress from the multitude of experiences we shared today. To summarize all of the conversations we had would take all the space available on this blog! Overall, though, I feel that we got a better understanding of the community that benefits from GO and the peace garden. By learning about the situations the community faces and how they’re related to environmental sustainability, I feel that we were better able to understand GO’s mission and how they go about accomplishing it. I greatly enjoyed our service today and will be saddened to leave GO, as we are volunteering with another organization for the rest of our time in Asheville. I’m looking forward to the new set of experiences we’ll get to encounter in the next two days of our service.

Starting our service today was more incredible than any of us could have imagined. We knew about GO! from their website but our community partner Marilyn Bass blew our minds with information, stories, and progress that Green Opportunities (GO!) has achieved in the low-income communities in Asheville. I will leave our blogger for the day to describe more about our activities, the Peace Garden, and what we learned about Environmental Justice in Asheville thus far.
What I really wanted to talk about was our reflection session last night. It began with a team builder called “Who am I?” led by Camila and Julia. We all had people or character’s names taped to our foreheads and went around asking the group about our person trying to guess who we were. It was our first game-type activity on the trip that really resonated a feeling of bonded fun among the members. We followed with Zsck and Anh’s reflection activity – a personal journaling time and sharing circle. This allowed us to reflect on our expectations for our trip, set some personal goals, think about our first impressions of Asheville, and then combine all of our thoughts together as we shared. I really enjoyed the actively engaged conversation that began about the role of service in the Environmental Justice movement, about social inequity, and the touches of what I am sure will turn into discussions about multicultural competency. Many of us were eager to see how downtown Asheville differed from the outer-parts of the city. We have questions about demographics of the county and how the wealth is distributed. Our adventures around the peace garden today taught us a lot about these topics; I cannot wait to learn more!
That’s the tid bit I wanted to share for now. Thank you for reading.