Archives for October 2011

In the city, warm season crops like basil, eggplants and okra and still hanging on in community gardens, but a hard frost is knocking on our door.  Although more and more people are growing greens and root vegetables over the winter, this is the season when many of us put our gardens to bed for the year.  The fall of the year always leads people to ask of GrowMemphis, “what do you do in the winter?”

While it might be nice to get a four month sabbatical every year, fall and winter are actually a very exciting time for GrowMemphis.  We get to turn our energies towards all kinds of things that the growing season has kept on the back burner.  This time of year is dedicated to making the next growing season better for farmers and consumers alike.  Let me give you some examples.

• GrowMemphis has been advocating for changes in the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program at both the state and local level.  With the help of partner organizations, we will be working over the winter with the Shelby County Health Department to plan outreach and training to engage more farmers in 2012.
• Plans are underway for the 2012 Farm to Table Conference for Mid-South Producers, which will likely take place in early February.   This conference debuted last year and had about 80 attendees, despite a snowstorm the day of!
• GrowMemphis is convening the first meeting of the Mid-South Farmers Market Alliance on November 10^th to bring the growing number of farmers markets together to share ideas and resources, and talk about how we can all work together to build a stronger local food economy.

As you can see, fall and winter is just the beginning of a different kind of growing season!  Count on the fact that while our gardens rest, GrowMemphis is busy setting the stage for a better year to come.  After all, next spring will be here before you know it.

Please join us this weekend for the Gandhi-King Conference, co-sponsored by the Peace and Justice Studies Association. Register now to be a part of this national gathering on Peace, Solidarity, and Justice.

Can’t make it for the whole weekend? One day-only rates of $20 are available this year!

There are also several events associated with the conference that are FREE and OPEN TO THE PUBLIC:

Friday 7:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Film Screening: Little Town of Bethlehem in the

University Theater at Christian Brothers University. The screening will be followed by a discussion with the Director, Jim Hanon, Grammy award winning artist Kirk Whalum, who did the film’s score, and Robin Salant of Indie Memphis.

Sunday 12:30p.m. Closing Ceremony at National Civil Rights Museum, 450 Mulberry St. Please join us for a closing ceremony at the National Civil Rights Museum. We will lay a wreath at the site of Dr. King’s assassination and say a prayer for peace. Grammy award winning performance artist Kirk Whalum will provide music.

Please also join us TOMORROW at Otherlands Coffee Bar for a concert to open the conference weekend with David Rovics. $5 cover. Doors open at 7, show starts at 8. We will also be doing pre-registration for the conference at Otherlands at 7.

A full schedule of the weekend with descriptions of all workshops and presentations is available at: www.gandhikingconference.org/schedule

We have some of the best speakers this year to date:

• Dolores Huerta, co-founder of United Farm Workers of America
• Dr. Clayborne Carson, civil rights activist and scholar and Director of the King Center at Stanford University
• Nipun Mehta and Pancho Ramos-Stierle, international human rights activists and members of Charity Focus
• David Bacon, international photojournalist and activist
  *simultaneous Spanish translation available for all speakers
• Plus special musical guest, David Rovics, and hundreds of presentations and workshops to choose from.

It’s not too late to register! Local rates are available, and you can register on site in the Canale Arena at Christian Brothers University.

See you over the weekend!!

PEOPLE FIRST is an MSPJC supported partnership with residents and activists working in the Binghampton community to raise voter turn out during elections and assist in long term resident-driven grassroots community organizing after the elections end.

For the two month groups of activists and Binghampton residents have been canvassing door to door ,talking with residents and neighbors about the issues that they care about.

This Saturday, October 8th, People First is hosting the first of a series of monthly community meeting for Binghampton residents.

At these meetings we will work with the community to organize and provide support and training for a new and fully resident owned and resident driven Neighborhood Organization. Collectively this association reflecting the full diversity of Binghampton will allow residents to collectively address their issues and concerns, run their own grassroots campaigns and ensure that area residents will have front end input in any redevelopment projects in their community.  We do so hope you all will attend this first step in an ongoing grassroots effort in Binghampton.

People First Community Meeting

Join our working group to organize residents across all of Binghampton around our most pressing issues. Stand together as one community to ensure that redevelopment efforts are community driven

People First Community Meeting-Kickoff

This Thursday the 2011 City of Memphis municipal elections will take place from 7AM until 7PM all across our city. The Memphis Mayor, members of the Memphis City Council, the City Court Clerk and City of Memphis Judges will be on the ballot and asking for your vote.

This election season will have far reaching ramifications on the future direction and priorities of our city on issues of HOMELESSNESS, BLIGHT, URBAN POVERTY and PRIVATIZATION of city services among others. So, it is crucial that our community comes out in big numbers to make our voices heard at the polls.

Sadly, voter turnout this year has been at a historic low. At the conclusion of early voting last Saturday a total of 29,431 residents of Memphis casted votes in this election. That represents a mere 7.4% of registered voters within our city. This is shameful and disheartening but it also means that YOUR VOTE has never been more valuable

and your influence in these elections of those who most affect your dally life has never been stronger.

The difference in votes cast between many competing candidates is as low as a few hundred votes, your vote could very well make the difference.

CITY OF MEMPHIS MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS-Thursday Oct 6th

Polls open  7AM-7PM

Voter registration/poll location questions?…if you are unsure if you are still registered as an active voter in Memphis and Shelby county you can check online at www.shelbyvote.com and under the  Voter Information tab click on the page marked Am I Registered? If you have questions about your polling location please click on the page marked Where To Vote  or call the Shelby County Election Commission at 545-2600

We are under one month away from conference time, and we want to be sure that you put GKC on your calendar now so you don’t miss any of the great events we have in store this year.

Register online here to reserve your space today!

We are very excited to begin the conference weekend Thursday evening, October 20th, with a concert with political singer/songwriter David Rovics at 7pm at Otherlands Cafe. Rovics has been called “the musical version of Democracy Now!”

by the show’s host, Amy Goodman. While David tours across the country and around the world, he’s never played in Memphis before, and we’re thrilled to bring his songs and ideas to our community, as well as to conference attendees.

We’re also bringing some of the highest caliber speakers to Memphis to date. Nipun Mehta and Pancho Ramos-Stierle of ServiceSpace will open the conference at 11am on Friday October 21st with an address to both the youth conference and regular attendees. And if you are a middle or high school student, or you know one, be sure to get them to the GKC Youth Conference occurring all day Friday.Dr. Clayborne Carson of the King Center in Stanford will address the conference Friday evening followed by a viewing and discussion with the Director of the film, Little Town of Bethlehem. David Bacon opens the conference Saturday morning, and we are thrilled to be offering simultaneous Spanish translation for Dolores Huerta‘s address Saturday afternoon. And of course we’ll be joined by activists, academics, and organizers from all over the country who will share their knowledge through workshops, films, presentations, papers and more over the course of the weekend.

If you haven’t already, please register now for the conference at www.gandhikingconference.org. There are also sponsorship opportunities as well as exhibit space available, but you need to act now to reserve your space in the program booklet.

• There are now day rates available. Register now!!
• Videos of last years conference are being uploaded daily here.
• Volunteers are needed to do everything from staffing registration tables to helping guide participants around campus. You are given free conference admission in exchange for their service. Sign up through this page to reserve your spot.

Register now! We look forward to learning and sharing with you October 21-23 at GKC!

For more information, please contact info@gandhikingconference.org or call (901)725-4990.

It has been a full year for the GrowMemphis neighborhood community garden program.  To give you just a taste of what we’ve been up to: we hosted workshops on winter growing, bed preparation, and tomato diseases; gardeners pitched in to grow thousands of seedlings that were given to community gardens and sold at our annual plant sale; we raised funds to help start two new garden projects; and student volunteers came from Kansas and Florida to lend a hand.

Collectively, community gardens grew thousands of pounds of food for neighborhood residents, family members, friends, students, food pantries, and more.  Most importantly, in community gardens this year, children tried new foods, watched butterflies, and caught snakes.  Neighbors met each other for the first time.  Vacant land was reclaimed and restored.  Clearly, we have much to celebrate.

GrowMemphis invites you to join in that celebration at our 5th Annual Fall Harvest Party.  Green Leaf Learning Farm at Knowledge Quest (featured in the current edition of Edible Memphis Magazine) will host the celebration onSaturday, October 15th from 2:00pm to 5:00pm with a ribbon cutting ceremony with honored guest County Commissioner Henri Brooks at 3:00pm. Knowledge Quest is located at 1027 Arnold Place in South Memphis.

The grill will be hot and we’ll have hotdogs, hamburgers and veggie options for everyone.  Please bring a side dish or dessert to share.  Youth gardeners from Green Leaf will be giving tours of the Learning Farm.  Keeping in spirit with the community gardening movement, children are extremely welcome.

If you have any questions or would like more information, contact josephine@midsouthpeace.org or call Josephine at (901) 725-4990.