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[Music]

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my name is duron chavers i am the

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founder and director of happily natural

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day

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i

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am the founder of this festival

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you know the happily natural day

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we've been doing it for almost 19 years

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uh it was probably back in uh

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2004 or five when i started uh meeting

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african-american farmers they would

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bring their produce

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to the festival we started talking more

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talked about food security

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and uh one of the questions that was

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posed to me is that what would you do if

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the grocery stores closed

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and it was really hard for me to answer

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the question i didn't know what i would

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do

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so right after that we started doing

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pop-up farmers markets

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connecting communities that had limited

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access to healthy food

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to

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the farmer like by bringing the farmer

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directly to those neighborhoods and

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selling produce

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while working with those farmers i

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started feeling guilty

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because these were older men like my

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grandfather's age you know i'm in my 20s

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they had to be in their 60s 70s right

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um

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i started feeling like well dag if

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something happens to

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this brother

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you know who's bringing like two 300

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pounds of produce every week

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uh into the city

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uh this whole program has to stop

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because we don't have a connect we don't

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have a way to get the produce so out of

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those conversations and out of that

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guilt

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i started my first garden in 2012 right

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and

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yeah it was those relationships that

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pulled me

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into this work i kind of tell people i

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fell backward

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into gardening it wasn't something that

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i was seeking out to do it was something

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that you know called me to it by virtue

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of just the evolution of the work

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[Music]

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the biggest inequity

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that i see in richmond is

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just wealth inequities

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growing up in richmond i grew up on

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south side

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um

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you know when i learned about redlining

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or what have you

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it was one thing for somebody to say

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like this is where

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you know

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the homes where people that didn't get

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redline live

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there's another to like grow up in those

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communities and then be

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working in spaces that took me

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into those neighborhoods where the

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redlining didn't happen

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and seeing just the disparity in how

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real it is when you see it in the built

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environment

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you know like who has access to the

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river

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who has access to green space and what's

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the quality of those green spaces

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the food conversation

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is one where it was really apparent like

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kerrytown had like four grocery stores

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within one block while on the side of

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town that i grew up grew up at

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you know you could walk five miles and

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there's no grocery store on the main

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artery right

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um so that

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wealth disparity

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you know was one of it's one to me is

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one of the priority uh diaspora

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disparities and one of the most elusive

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you know for us to try to cut across

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when people talk about

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you know racial

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inequity is like when we start to talk

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about money

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and who has it and who doesn't have it

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is all of a sudden people start you know

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losing

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focus and they lose grass so the

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tangible solutions that could be

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done so uh yeah i think the wealth one

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is the most stark and the most the most

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important to for us to address

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[Music]

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so

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a racially equitable equitable richmond

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to me uh

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looks like

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communities of color black and brown

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folks african people of african ancestry

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having ownership

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having land

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uh having control

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over the systems

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that they're most impacted by

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and so

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because my work lands squarely around

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food systems

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the way i articulate is like

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we should we have to now we should we

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have to have control

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over

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our local food system and when i say we

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i mean black people and the communities

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that they live in should be the

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producers

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distributors

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uh restauranteurs or whatever you want

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to call it product makers

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of the food it's like the most important

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thing it's like something that

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everybody's gonna do like no matter what

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but at the same time

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i also feel like

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you know

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housing like land

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is really for me

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the one thing

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that can help equalize

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you know

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the equity conversation it could

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equalize

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the control piece the power piece

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and because we don't have land

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we don't have housing

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because we don't have land we don't have

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food we don't have

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farms because we don't have land we

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don't have commercial properties you

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know i mean all the things

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that

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equal a healthy community

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it all comes down to who has control

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over the land and we just don't have

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that control so in my mind

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you know

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land redistribution

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land ownership

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community land trust like all of that

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work

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can help pull

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community power back into the hands of

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the folks that are experiencing

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you know these racial inequities like

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black people

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if we had that had those elements then

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we could start to forge

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you know the reality

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that we want to see for ourselves

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[Music]

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i'm inspired by the work of new

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communities inc

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shelley sherrod and charles sherida down

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in atlanta

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i'm also inspired by the work of

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organizations like the

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agrarian trust

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up in boston

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both of those organizations have been

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focused on how do we do housing and

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agriculture

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together so that people have access to

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food and sovereignty while at the same

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time they're they're they're housing

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stable right and they have ownership of

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their homes

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uh in their neighborhoods or in their in

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their areas

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the unique thing about the agrarian

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trust is that this is a white led

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organization

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that aspires

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to

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work with local communities to raise the

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money for land acquisition

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and you know the community trusts

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community land trust models at the

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community land trust as a non-profit

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owns the land

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and keeps that in the community control

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and then you know you as a community

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member can own the home

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you know uh forever long you want to own

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it

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and i think that that's uh

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a really cogent

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strategy is having white folks use their

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privilege

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and use their access to wealth and their

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access to capital

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to

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uh

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redistribute land back into the hands of

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black and brown communities um

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and i feel like that's the work that

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we're like been venturing into

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here in in the city working with the

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maggie walker community land trust as

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they raise money to purchase land so

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that we can build neighborhoods that

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have

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farming centralized as a form of

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entrepreneurship and

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access to green space

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for for families here and here in our

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region

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like to use the word equity and i say

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people i mean like white folks like to

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use the word equity

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as a placeholder

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uh but i think when we as black people

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and other oppressed minority or quote

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unquote minorities use the word equity

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we're really alluding to justice to us

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getting towards a just

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reality right

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you know equity is just a stepping stone

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like having

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solutions that take into consideration

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the historical

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uh

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problems

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and

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what fractured our communities and like

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putting things in place to address those

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things is one thing

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but i feel like the other thing is like

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we're all striving for

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justice

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you know what i mean for our communities

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to be whole

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in light of all of the

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uh oppressions that we face uh over over

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over the last

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you know 400 years or what have you

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i feel like it's important for

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um

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quote-unquote allies

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to realize that this is not a work that

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you can like step your foot into and

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when it gets too hot pull it out

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because

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you know as black and brown people we

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don't get that luxury right from

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microaggressions to macro

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systemic racism issues we're always in

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it

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i would implore

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uh

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uh folks to use their privilege

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so

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that we can

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grasp towards and latch on to justice

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like latch on to justice instead of

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latching on to diversity or

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inclusion

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like what is the just thing what is the

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work that your organization can be doing

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to undo

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all of these isms

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that have created these inequities that

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we've been talking about over the over

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the course

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of uh the last couple weeks and the last

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couple of months um and even that have

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been addressed in the uh racial equity

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essays like there's so many different

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spaces so find your space

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and root yourself in it you know what i

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mean like i feel like sometimes we jump

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into this work

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and folks don't really

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believe that we can undo this thing you

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know what i mean

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so use your power use your privilege

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to reach for justice

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and

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let's undo this thing

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i'm hoping that everyone gets some

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inspiration

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from this project

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and um i hope

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folks find

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themselves in their work

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centered in it you know whether it be

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through the videos or the podcasts or

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the essays like i think there's

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something for everybody to

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learn from and be inspired by

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[Music]

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you