Greening of Flint: Mama E and the Mayor
Michigan State University faculty and students are producing a documentary on a vision of Flint as a healthier, greener city. It will show the challenges of bringing fresh produce to a food desert, feeding schools, providing educational options and battling bureaucracy.
On Wednesdays through July, Great Lakes Echo will run a segment expected to become a building block of the finished story. You can help.
The Greening of Flint main page is where to post questions, suggest interviews, make comments or offer suggestions to help producers tell the story of a city trying to re-grow its roots literally and figuratively as a model for post-industrial revitalization. It also contains links to each of the published segments and tells which ones are coming up.
This week:
Central to the urban agriculture efforts and the move toward sustainable economic development in Flint is the debate on “shrinking the city” because of the large inventory of vacant, overgrown lots and abandoned homes. Estelle Holley or Mama E lives in one of Flint’s dead zones or no-service sections of the city. In this clip, she and Mayor Dayne Walling are on the same side of the debate.
Related stories:
Urban pioneers turn vacant lots verdant in Detroit
Inmates harvest food, savings, education and jobs from jail gardens
Growing Power sprouts in Wisconsin
Farm to Spork: Kids see fruits of partnering schools with farms
Shifting carbon from roads to roofs
I’m left with the impression that they just don’t get it…Mama E more than Walling in this case… It’s hard to quantify that statement, and frame in a context that’s helpful to the development of your documentary… Perhaps the best way to put it is neither of them, nor most of anyone else in this discussion, is one the same page (let alone the same side of the debate)and nothing is being done to change that–though I think things like this documentary are a part of improving everyone’s knowledge and education on the matter.
Again, the notion of what ‘green’ is raises its head. She says “the city wants to make it a greener Flint.” I’m curious as to how she would support and back up that statement. What makes her say that? I’d like to see how she’s connecting her statements, understanding and experience to the mayor and his statements, understanding and experience. Who’s accountable for the ignorance?
LikeLeave your response!