It’s Getting Hot In Here

“Summer of Solutions” – I first heard these words from my friend Ashley Trull, from across the table in the Clark University dining hall in late April, over plates piled high with mediocre vegan cafeteria food. Summer of Solutions sounded like an amazing program, designed by and for students, working on exciting, real projects for community-based solutions to climate change. She eagerly described to me the project descriptions she had seen on the website and promised to forward the email she had received with the application info attached. But she didn’t need to forward the email. By the end of the meal, it was decided.

“We’re going!” I said, so adamantly and with such force and intention that I surprised even myself, grabbing Ashley’s hand in excitement as we rose from the table, shouldering heavy backpacks and precariously balancing our dirty dishes. “We’re going! We will go! We will raise the money and make this happen. We can make this happen – we’re going to Minnesota!” I am not one to make impulsive decisions. Neither of us had ever been to anywhere that could qualify as the Midwest, and we didn’t know anyone organizing or participating in Summer of Solutions. We barely knew what we were getting ourselves into, but it was happening – we were making it happen.

Two thousand dollars of fundraising and a few months later, I write this sitting on a mattress in an apartment in St. Paul, Minnesota. I can look out my window and wave at my next-door neighbors, a houseful of kick-ass Macalester kids – many of whom were instrumental in organizing Summer of Solutions – all of whom are amazing organizers with HUGE dreams that we are working to build into reality. Now that I am here, participating in Summer of Solutions (SOS), I realize that the moment I grabbed Ashley’s hand in April was the moment my SOS experience actually began. The “We can make this happen” ethos is at the heart of the Summer of Solutions work that is being done here in the Twin Cities. The people I am working with here are daring to dream far more expansive, limitless, richly creative dreams than many people ever dare – and we are doing the intense and challenging work of building those dreams into a reality, because we can make them happe

It’s challenging to convey the sense of excitement, empowerment, and tremendous energy that is present here. Suffice it to say that the first time I was introduced to the vision-moving-towards-reality that is ARISE (Alliance to Re-Industrialize for a Sustainable Economy), I was absolutely blown away. The deal is this: there is a Ford plant in St. Paul that is shutting down in 2009, opening up many many acres of land to be developed and leaving behind the workers who will be unemployed, a lot of useful infrastructure, and some less-than-useful toxins. The vision is this: a reclamation of that Ford site, a low-GHG emitting remediation of the toxic spaces, and the construction of a mixed-use residential (both low- and high-income) and manufacturing development on the site. The manufacturing facilities can be converted to sustainably produce solar panels or wind turbines, creating 2,000 new green jobs for workers. There will be green roofs, lots of green spaces, energy-efficient mixed-income housing, lots of public transportation, bike lanes, pedestrian spaces, a maintenance of human connection to the Mississippi River (which runs right by the site) and the integrity of the river itself, and so much more. Community gardens, greenhouses, you name it. Super sustainable development – green jobs, maybe even low-income waterfront property, new parks, new light rail, a strong emphasis on non-car transit. The most exciting part about all of this is that it is not just a dream…it is slowly chugging towards reality.

In the week and a half that I have been here, we have met with Lynn Hinkle, a leading union organizer at the Ford Plant and a visionary actor in ARISE. Lynn spoke to us about what he has done over his years organizing the workers at the plant, and where he envisions us going from here. We have also met with architects, representatives from the city of St. Paul, an affordable housing advocate and other professionals, all of whom are working to create a proposal that the city of St. Paul can’t reject and no developer would want to turn down. Picture this: a bunch of students and a bunch of alleged grown-ups who actually know how to make this happen sitting around a table covered in aerial photographs of the area and architectural plans for the design of this mixed-use, sustainable community. Visioning. Arguing about where green space should be, where the manufacturing plant should be, where the transit lines should be, and everything else. This is what goes on at Summer of Solutions – this and so much more.

I would love to share more about all of the projects that are going on here at SOS – Cooperative Energy Futures, for example, which is the development of a cooperative business model that will allow communities of homeowners to become “future-fitted” (not retro-fitted, but rather fit for the clean energy future that is coming!) for greater energy efficiency while simultaneously building community and implementing energy-use-conscious behavioral changes. I would love to write at length about the ongoing preliminary development of WeCAN (a web network for climate activists on a global scale that is designed to reflect the realities of how people organize themselves and is intended to surpass Facebook as an organizing-specific networking tool), or Grand Aspirations (the beginnings of a non-profit organization that the students here are creating to fund the climate work they want to do). Or the three weekly community potluck dinners the Solutioners enjoy together, giving rise to the idea for a cookbook called Stomach of Solutions. Or the book group we have organized for Sunday evenings, or the Environmental Justice discussions some of us lead, or the Public Speaking classes some of us teach and some of us attend, or the music that we make with our odd assortment of instruments – but I will leave all of that for others. There are more stories here that are waiting to come into being, and always more work to be done. Let’s do it – because we can make this happen.