The Scoop with Tanya Flanagan

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You're listening to locally produced programming created in KU NBC Studios on public radio K, u and v 91.5.

Unknown Speaker 0:16
Good morning. And thank you for joining me for the scoop with Tanya Flynn. And again, I'm so happy you decided to wake up and start your day with me. Here on the scoop where we talk about life, joy, funny moments, trending topics, and so much more. We promise to keep you in the know and find out what you know. So let's get started.

Unknown Speaker 0:43
Good Sunday morning, and welcome to the show. Thank you for waking up once again on a early Sunday morning and tuning in. We are here on the campus, okay, U N, V, of K of UNLV at K u n v radio station, 91.5 Jazz and more. And I can't help but say I feel it in a different way than I have, since the tragedy occurred here about a week or so ago. And it's something that once you come onto the campus, and you're here, you can't help but feel a little bit enveloped by it. Talking about it with my guests here in the studio this morning. I want to say before we get too deep into anything. Good morning, and welcome to to make a Henry. Good morning, Miss

Unknown Speaker 1:28
Tanya,

Unknown Speaker 1:29
thank you for being here to make it as the executive director of the abodo Collective Urban Farm project, which is taking our community by storm and doing some amazing restorative work in the community. And we're going to talk about the abodo Collective Urban Farm project today on the show this morning. And as we take a moment, and I started talking about the weight of emotion coming on campus to be here and do the show, of the tragic events that occurred, how the abodo collected, which urban form can help with healing. So we'll get into a little bit of the overall in that space as well. But I want to say thank you for being here. Thank you so much for having and for people who don't know what the abodo Collective is in the urban form or where it is. Let's jump in what give us a you know, what is it what's going on there.

Unknown Speaker 2:28
So we are a local nonprofit, be abodo Collective, we were birthed out of the needs that were exhibited during the pandemic. And so our mission is to combat multi generational poverty by providing long term solutions and support to families. So we have three pillars that we focus on, which is food insecurity, housing, and education. And so with, with food insecurity, we felt it was important to build an urban farm in the historic west side, which is a food desert, which is also a food swamp. There's a lot of fast food options, but our neighbors that don't have access to quality, locally grown produce. And so we wanted to make sure that we did that with this project. What

Unknown Speaker 3:28
I love about your project is a lot of times we'll have conversations and we talk about what's missing in the community and what families are lacking. And we talk about this desire, like it's this far off thing that can't be achieved, to take action, and not just talk about it. And you are a living breathing example of what happens when someone takes action. Rather than just talking about the change, they would like to see you are the change. And I tip my hat to you. And just say thank you. I think this is a tremendous project. I know it's located over on C Street and we are going to talk about exactly where it is and what people can do to engage with you and to support. And you mentioned I had never heard the term food swamp which that's it's colorful and it adds great validity to the problem because you do you find a lot of fast food restaurants. Historic Westside for those who don't who are not familiar is basically what would you say Bonanza to to begin with for Cheyenne. And do we go to Brooks, most people can see it will give you Cheyenne for a major crossroads. So Bonanza to Cheyenne, Rancho, two on the west side to I 15 on the east end, and so that those were the boundaries that encompass the historic west side. And it was once this flourishing, thriving community of people with businesses and restaurants and jazz clubs and people live there and you knew all of your neighbors. And over the years, like many, we didn't just call black neighborhoods in major cities. Over the years, they change. And you see the residents who initially bought the houses, they pass away and the properties were passed on to families or they didn't have any children to pass them on to, and the commitment and the loyalty to the community, it changes it face or it evolves. And as it changes face and evolves and fades away, the community fades. And so trying to hold on to what was the heart of it becomes a restorative project of those who are passionate enough to love it to come and do the work and you had that passion. And the time because you don't always have the time, or the ability to prioritize life to say, I'm gonna make this my life's work, we

Unknown Speaker 5:51
guess I'm thankful that there were others who saw the vision, you know, they saw the vision, they had the vision, and they reached me to bring it to fruition. And so I'm thankful for the co founders of the abodo Collective for providing an opportunity. I do care deeply about this community, I can remember being in this community with my grandmother's as, as we attended church, as we provided missionary services. For the second shutdown, you're going to pray for them, you're providing food, you're helping with cleaning needs. And you know, it's just something about taking care of one another, when you're at your lowest right. And I would always hope that someone would be there for me during those times. And so that's what really drives my work and my passion. I saw my grandmother's doing it. I seen how how that helped heal others when they were going through a challenging times. And I just want to make sure that I'm doing my part to continue their legacies.

Unknown Speaker 7:14
I think that's beautiful. And thank you for doing that. There used to be a time where I think community was some was we're still connected. But in the decades that have passed, we were connected differently. And in that I think people really knew one another in neighborhoods, right. So you, you knew families, you knew the dynamics of those families, you were familiar with some of the hardships. And maybe it was also that we started the race and we were running the race at equal pace. And now we're not running this race at equal pace anymore, right. And we have our neighborhoods and people go home, we're very bedroom communities to some degree, sometimes people know their neighbors, a lot of times they don't know their neighbors, they come home, they and maybe no one and two on the side of them. They close the garage doors. And they go in and they don't always know. And we're all coming and going at these different paces. Whereas many years ago, when I was growing up in a neighborhood really probably was similar to the historic west side, when I think back to where my parents decided to buy a home. I grew up in Phoenix. And there was just like, the historic West that it was kind of a neighborhood where most black people moved, right. So in our neighborhood, we was just talking I ran into I had visited with a high school friend over the weekend who was here celebrating an anniversary with her husband. His anniversary actually for his fraternity, but we were talking about how your second grade teacher was the neighbor. So my second one of our second grade teachers lived around the corner from my parents. My third grade teacher lived across the street from that second grade teacher. You know, the pastor lived in the same neighborhood. So the teachers were in the neighborhood. My next door neighbor was a librarian. The one across the street was a teacher. At the end of the street. We had the piano and she taught you know, piano and an Oregon So you had these people right here pouring into you. Everybody's watching the children and everyone is knowing what is going on, with families collectively. So when we came together to support the community, you were there to make sure if someone was falling, you pick them up you everybody was watching the church side you saw when you corrected it, right? And we've lost that sense of feeling like it's okay because we are a different society it is energized in a different way now. So abodo collective about all means what for those who don't know where the word comes from and how you decided to name this project? Sure.

Unknown Speaker 9:43
So abodo is EBO is Nigerian for city and community. And so I you know, your neighbors or in your community, business owners or in your community. I love when you spoke about knowing your neighbors, because even when we interact with, they're not clients, they're our neighbors, everyone that we come in contact with or who may need services, you are our neighbor. And it really comes down to checking on your neighbors, how are you, you know, just a simple hello. You know, people need to know that we see you, you know, and also, how can we be of a support if you if you need it, you know, if you express a need, so, it's important for us not to push anything up on anyone. We'd like to meet people where they dream to be. We want to make sure that their needs are met. But we want to make sure that they're guiding that conversation, we want to do things with our neighbors, and not for them, not to them.

Unknown Speaker 10:58
Because then they are invested in their own progress. There's something that I was looking at learning about your learning about what you do, learning about the collective, and there was a quote from you on the website, that's it, sometimes a family $300 Is all it's needed to make the difference. And whether or not a family becomes homeless, or has a chance to keep trying for another day in some weeks and more days to come. And it was really like that is so small. I mean, only given day for some of us. $300 can be a significant chunk of money. But when you think about it in the grand scheme of the context, you put it in that $300 can be the difference between a family becoming homeless. And I think the other point that was so powerful to me was it talked about eradicating are addressing the issue before it becomes a full blown problem, like helping people before they find themselves in the space, the preventive is better than the reactionary who

Unknown Speaker 12:03
and that's for real. There have been times where we, we do eviction court observations. And this is where we, where we meet many of our neighbors when they are facing house lessness. And, again, oftentimes, it's it's such a, you know, it seems like this grant amount to them, but it's like, oh, they only need $300 Like we can we please stand in the gap for this family. And talking with the landlord, will you please accept this payment from us on their behalf on their behalf. Because when you do talk to the families, oftentimes they haven't moving forward, they don't have it today, they don't have it today, they have a new job, they just started, they haven't gotten their first paycheck yet. You know, late fees have accumulated like, they have the rent, they don't have to late fees, and all those things, please allow us to take care of that for them. So they can stay house, because oftentimes, it is, it is way more affordable for us to do that, than to pay for moving fees, first and last month's rent, to pay storage fees, all of those things. And it's important to keep families stable. And together, you know, students shouldn't have to change schools and have to make new friends and all of that when we can help meet that need for them. It's

Unknown Speaker 13:35
really a blueprint that when I was looking at your information and learning all I could about you, it was really a blueprint for so many areas where services are provided where we said we want to help families not fall by the wayside. I thought, Oh, this preventive care, because we have so many kids, you know who are in foster care, we're always talking about keep kids out of foster care and keep families together. Like are we interviewing? Are we intervening in the preventive space? Are we only there once is a problem, we have to separate the families? And I was like, Oh, is this a blueprint to really make a difference in so many other areas. I mean, I don't want to digress to that. But it just your concept makes so much sense. In this space of trying to be helpful to enrich and build up a community. I want to make sure we're really clear and listeners learn your program. So you have three areas that you focus on. Yes.

Unknown Speaker 14:28
And so and we always use a multi generational approach. With everything we do we try to have that lens because in order to move families, you know, in order for them to have progress, and to help them make a plan for self sufficiency. You have to make sure that you're being holistic and you're working with the with the parents, grandparents, whoever the caretakers are, and also with the youngest, the youngest citizens in the household, making sure that they and educated as well. But those three pillars, we just want to make sure that people have stability. Like I said, it started off around food insecurity. And it's housing and education. Yeah. Okay, food, housing and education. And I see your point because

Unknown Speaker 15:19
they're so simple, but they go so hand in hand. And so let's just paint how basic that picture is. If I have somewhere to live, I have a safe, warm, stable space to live a roof over my home, I have food. And I have my education. But if I don't have anywhere to live, and I'm hungry, I really can't do my homework. I really can't focus on my schoolwork to focus I look at that sometimes some of food because food insecurity is an area passionate, really. If you ever just sit down on a day where you've had a long day, and you've worked hard, and you're ravenously hungry by the time you get to the meal, and I don't care how simple or grand you make that meal on that day that you're just so hungry. That's the moment when you think, Oh, my gosh, I am so hungry. And when you go to say thank you for having this food, this small resource, and it makes you think this is not that grand a meal. But think about someone who doesn't even have this meal, I don't care if you come home and you make breakfast for dinner, because all you can get your hands on are a couple of eggs. And maybe you make some pancakes or something like that. Or I don't care if you have a bowl of cereal because you're just too tired to do anything else. Think about the family that doesn't even have that small resource

Unknown Speaker 16:30
that do not have and there are so many. And even with the amount of food pantries that exist within our community, so so much there, there is still so much need. And we have families who are making those decisions. I have rent to pay, I have other bills to pay. There's other needs that need to be met.

Unknown Speaker 16:56
When you're juggling with food, yeah. And the pandemic created a whole new, whole new consciousness as a whole. It's a different, it's a different time. And we're all now and with the with the farm concept, and people can come down and you can get the food. So what are you guys growing because you're growing healthy food in a community that's basically in the desert. So people even just gardening in the desert, to some is a foreign concept, right? Because the ground is so hard. Yeah. And I know you've built it up in a different way to do it. But it's so hard. It's so dry. It's so hard. And when we talk about in other conversations that I've had on issues affecting the community, we've had conversations about heat islands, and we've had conversations about carbon monoxide and you know, exhaust fumes and asthma and the just the domino effect that is going on in the community affecting families, people of color, low income disadvantaged, because that's, you know, not everyone, but a lot of the population that you're serving is gonna be low income, disadvantaged and marginalized. They have all these challenges. And then they're in an area where resources are not as abundant. Yes, we're fighting every day on different fronts to create these resources. Here you are in the midst of the storm, trying to quiet it a bit and give people at our resources, their

Unknown Speaker 18:24
resources, access opportunities. So with our urban farm, I mean we we have grown okra, pumpkins, watermelon. There's loads of leafy greens from kale, collards, mustard, look at that smile on your face, I get excited because things can grow. At rapid rates here

Unknown Speaker 18:48
and it's different to the flight. People don't always know that when you grow things fresh. Like that freshly grown tomato that you get up the garden is a completely different flavor from the tomato even though even though it's grown, it's a different flavor from the grocery store. Yeah,

Unknown Speaker 19:03
it's different. And we don't use any pesticides. And our Master Gardener, Cheyenne, Kyle really puts our heart and soul into the soil that is there at the abodo urban farm. And it's one of those places where we're growing it. We have gardening classes to show you how to grow it. We also have gardening classes and we show you how to harvest we have pop up markets on Saturday mornings where you can come and purchase the items that we do have. And that's all donations base because we don't want anyone to feel like they can't afford it. And if people can't afford it, we're gonna give it to you anyways because we want you to have you know access to it. That's why we're here. And we also collaborate and partner with like the chef chef project, and we do, we do chef demos on With the food that is grown there at the Urban Farm camp, and we give you the nutrition information on the various vegetables. So we're working on different programs for this upcoming year that I'm really excited about. Because we do want our neighbors to be able to grow in their own yard or on their balconies, as well, on their patios, as well.

Unknown Speaker 20:23
And I know you grow year round, do you guys do? You mentioned chef project and some other classes? So is there a season that's a busy season for you in terms of engaging in or like right now, we have nice winters. But for some of us being outside is cold, too. Even though we have these really nice winters when the sun is that the sun is gone. It's like it's really winter, and it's freezing. But is there a period where people come into the space for an ongoing events calendar? Or what are some of the things you're doing in this space that people would not expect? That's creating culture and bringing people together? What can people look forward to?

Unknown Speaker 21:02
Oh, I'm glad you asked. So we've we've had so many different events, around gardening with our gardening classes, but also different fundraisers for our farm. We had a comedy show, to get a comedy show out there. Yeah, we've had comedy shows, lip sync challenges. We had a holly jolly festival over the past weekend, where we had Santa there. And we had gardening classes, we had a partnership with the Lincoln dynamic Foundation, where we did a warm for drive to make sure that our neighbors had access to blankets, coats, hats, all of those things. But we also one thing I'm really excited about. Because we're busy, like all year long, spring, spring, spring and fall are more busy than summer, summer, it gets a little gets a little warm. And it's hard to go. We love

Unknown Speaker 22:06
our summer nights. So I mean, it's that when you get creative, and you kind of just have to flip the script a little bit like well, I would imagine spring and fall are like the major seasons of high traffic in the gardening space of engaging because people can get outside and really enjoy the weather. And then winter is like we have that, you know, sort of anomaly winter that it's a little warmer than most not as warm as the Phoenix desert but warmer than Chicago and New York, for sure that you don't want to go outside at all. And then you have summer that's just you know, blazing. And that's part of it. Like we talked about the heat islands and oxygenating the air. So when you plan, you put oxygen you put life into your community. And you change your perspective, because it's something to come outside and see something beautiful, yes, in a place that usually is a dirt lot. And there's nothing there. But now in this space, there's something beautiful and people are there and they're happy and they're smiling. And this is greed, creating, you know, happy hearts and just a different disposition. And that changes to have you noticed that change just the communities and members of the communities desire to embrace their own community differently.

Unknown Speaker 23:20
Yes. Just being there in the space. Like it's just a little over a year ago. It was just a desert. There was nothing there. There was nothing there. And over this past year and few months, we've been able to add six, sorry, 26 raised garden beds, we have 26 fruit bearing trees, we have a nice event space.

Unknown Speaker 23:49
So tell me about the fruit before you can go that can people come and get what kind of fruit can someone because let's make some mouths watering.

Unknown Speaker 23:58
We had a nice we had a nice tree planting event with the community. So many of our trees are babies. They're about a year old. But we did have peaches. There's peaches, there's limes, there's lemon. There's apple tree out there fig. Notice 26 There's an orange tree now you know thanks to the NFL Super Bowl host committee we just got six new trees that are already bearing fruit

Unknown Speaker 24:28
so because I love lemons, you know I'm coming to get I'm coming again, lemons, Meyer

Unknown Speaker 24:33
lemons, they are beautiful and we can't wait to have you I can't

Unknown Speaker 24:37
wait to come and get those fresh lemons that just gonna taste delicious in my water and my tea. I literally I was probably take fresh lemons and squeeze them over everything. I cook with them all the time. I like them in beverages. I like to cook with my lemons. I love I love the smell and the fresh aroma that lemons bring to the room as Love lemons, even when I squeeze it out, I've been I rub lemon juice all over my hands, because I just love the way it smells. And it's like aromatherapy, it's this natural aromatherapy, it is so wonderful. Do you guys plan to go down the path of when you talk about holistic approach products that you can make for health benefits from some of the natural ingredients, I'm sure you have herbs and spices, and you have lemons. And so yes, you know, because a lot of times when you're in the community that we're talking about, you know, have money to go buy those products that claim they do all this stuff. And we've also gotten away from passing down lessons of life. So mother wit, as they used to call it many years ago, okay, where you learn how to make things out of whatever sugar or baking soda or witch hazel or whatever, but there are so many, you know, where Carol's daughter has come from and, and a lot of the beauty businesses that are thriving come from natural things. So they're just so open that holistic space to help people create standing

Unknown Speaker 26:06
back in tuned with our, with our roots, with our culture, with our history, that's something that's really important. And we will have those different classes because there are there are people here that are making amazing things, we work with a local with someone that makes you know, she makes juices, you know, and she used some of the produce from our, from our farm. And also she will bring back the scraps to compost. Okay, so that was like this whole closed loop, you know, system that we are creating right there in the historic west side. And so very much so looking forward to the different classes and working with herbalist. How

Unknown Speaker 26:52
many people know how to get to you how to, you know, reach out and learn more and coming connect with the Urban Farm, because we're coming into our final few minutes. And I want to make sure we also share it with people where exactly where you are, how to get there, and how to just learn more about what's going on if there's a events, calendar, or whatever. Yes, thank

Unknown Speaker 27:12
you so much. And so we are located at 1300, North Sea street 89106. So right in the heart of the historic West Side, for more information about us, you can visit our website at www dot abodo. That's OB o d o collective, that org. And we're also on social media under those same under that same name, abodo Collective. And so I'm looking forward to you can sign up, if you would like there's more information on our website, we do have, you can sign up for our newsletter there. And

Unknown Speaker 27:52
I'm signed up for that newsletter because I want to stay connected. And I know a lot of you have a lot of partners. And we're really into our final stretch. But there are community agencies out there that you're partnering with. So anyone who might be out there interested in a unique and different and fresh way to engage with the community can reach out to you as well. And do I mean this is a space where companies that might be looking to do some team building can do something different with their team members that come to the abodo farm, urban farm and just engage in it refresh the mind a bit differently.

Unknown Speaker 28:30
So conversations around the fire pit, like we have fire pits out there. And those conversations are beautiful. And we're looking forward to some different spring events that we have. You know, hot off the press, we're doing a book festival. We're doing a Book Festival in April. And so I really want you all to stay tuned for that, because that's gonna be amazing.

Unknown Speaker 28:54
I'll be looking for looking for that and seeing if there's any special any authors guest authors who might come in and do some reading of their initial pages with some local folks who might have some stuff out there that people can take with them. We are down to our final seconds. Thank you to make a Henry, Executive Director of the abodo Collective for coming and joining me this morning on the scoop here on K you envy public radio 91.5 Jazz and more to everyone out there. I hope you've learned and you will engage Stay Healthy Stay well stay safe. And thank you have a great week.

Unknown Speaker 29:27
Thank you

Unknown Speaker 29:32
I want to thank you for tuning into the scoop with me Tony Flanagan and I want to invite you to get social with me I'm on Facebook and Twitter. My name is my handle TA and YAFL a na GA N You can also find me on Instagram at Tanya almond eyes Flanagan and if you have a thought and opinion or a suggestion, don't hesitate to shoot me an email to tonya.flanagan@unlv.edu Thanks again for joining in. Stay safe and have a great week.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai