FRIENDS OF THE COMMUNITY AGROECOLOGY NETWORK (FOCAN)

COVID 19 - New Normal & Returning to the norms: What does it mean for our communities to return to normal? What can we learn from long standing community organizing that works to establish community centricity and sustainability?

4/29/2020

As we continue to adjust to COVID 19, there appears to be a collective desire for a return to normal. Whether motivated by concerns over financial uncertainty, food insecurity, or mourning the year that could have been. Whatever the case, what exactly does it mean to return to normal from this era of COVID 19?

What does 'normal' refer to? Many of those impacted express a return to routine, work, and ways of living that center profit and productivity. What does returning to normal mean for those who haven't stopped working and are on the 'frontlines' as essential workers? Even during a pandemic profit appears to be valued over the safety of workers, families, and vulnerable inhabitants which tend to be Black people, indigenous people, and people of color (BIPOC). Our healthcare system either ignores or doesn't acknowledge BIPOC participants in the institution of medicine. If the current systems, institutions, and practices in place are harmful to us and our communities then:
What does it mean for our communities to return to normal?
What can we learn from long-standing community organizing that works to establish community centricity and sustainability?

Tierras Comunitarias "a coalition of Santa Ana residents and local organizations" are among those individuals, organizations, and communities trying to connect with their community in light of COVID 19. As their well-established form of organizing, Tierras Comunitarias works to empower people and their collective power to establish a new way of living. A way of living that is rooted in old traditions preserved through a generational passage. Tierras Comunitarias work with their community to establish a collective 'vision for a more sustainable and resilient Santa Ana".

Art by diana luz morales alvarez | IG: arte.es.medicina (click the image to see the original post on Instagram)

In a recent call for art, Tierras Comunitarias invites community members to create a vision in alignment with the coalition's well-established mission to "fight gentrification and the displacement of our neighbors by reclaiming and re-purposing land throughout the city, to meet community needs and create a sustainable Santa Ana." Community members and artists joined in to create and compile their visions. In the 'call for art' poster distributed via social media, Diana (the artist) pictures community members in connection with land by cultivating, irrigating, giving care to plants and vegetables. The imagery Diana creates reflects the very mission of Tierras Comunitarias in their efforts to reclaim, repurpose, and be more sustainable with the land. Tierras Comunitarias effort to reclaim land and offer space for community members to participate in the local community garden reflect participation in a more sustainable relationship with the land. Tierras Comunitarias invites agency into the thoughts of community members as they reflect on how they can envision a "sustainable and liberated Santa Ana" where they get to decide how to represent their community and how to address their needs. In a call for art, community members are asked to reflect on a vision of Santa Ana with sovereignty from harmful land practices which bring pollution, from skyrocketing rents which threaten community members with displacement, and sovereignty to decide what their community will look like.

What can we learn from Tierras Comunitarias?
What role does art play in reimagining a new normal?What does access to land mean to communities trying to participate in sustainable practices?

COVID 19 has placed a microscopic lens on problems like housing insecurity, the inaccessible healthcare system, and the continued value placed on profits over workers even during a pandemic.

In a recent post, South Central Farm (an organization committed to preserving "the last undeveloped parcel of Land In South Central LA!") poses the question:
"Are We Really Waiting For A Return To Normal Or Are We Ready To Build Something Different?

South Central Farm "Once the largest urban farm located in the United States, spanning 14 acres and feeding 350 families in the midst of an industrial and commercial landscape, the South Central Farm was an oasis located on 41st and Central flourishing from 1992-2006." Land access is food justice. Today South Central Farm is committed "to promote urban farming, public health, and effective participation in the planning of developments that intimately affect every one of the residents that reside nearby."

South Central farm continues to engage in community organizing that promotes learning and solidarity through events, workshops on composting, or other educational events. More personally, my family can recall being able to rely on the South Central Farm as a hub for both culture and community as a family of migrants yearning to retain indigenous practices and food like Kurhuntas.

South Central Farm like Tierras Comunitarias has a rich past of community organizing and political actions. To learn more, watch: South Central Farm: Oasis in a concrete desert

| South Central Farm Media Post 04/28/2020 | "Asking For A Friend. . . . On April 21, the United Nations projected that because of Covid-19, the number of people facing severe FOOD INSECURITY worldwide could double to 265 million. The same week, in the United States, the five-week total of job losses rose to a staggering 26 million, pushing millions more into FOOD INSECURITY. . . . Land Access = Food Justice #southcentralfarm" ................ click the image to see the original post on Instagram

South Central Farm's recent post is suggestive of its past experience with the harmful normal. South Central Farm's post asks: why return to what's normal? (and harmful to our communities) and suggests we as a collective can build something different (not something new). The practices that Tierras Comunitarias and South Central Farm promote are not new but rather old. Connected to their pasts of community organizing and community-centric traditions preserved through a generational passage. South Central Farm and Tierras Comunitarias understand that land access means food justice.

Both Tierras Comunitarias and South Central Farm invite their community members to stand in their agency and power as a collective. Their calls to action reframe the positions of their community from passive spectators to active creators in their own sovereignty.

What does is it mean to "build something different" in our own communities, a circle of friends, and families?
What does community look like for you?