Project: Indigenous Resistance and Community Care in the East Phillips/Little Earth Neighborhood

This project was created by students in the GWSS/GLBT 3404 spring 2023 class. To explore other projects created by students in this class, please visit the complete collection available at this MNT project library page.

We acknowledge that the land, Mni Sota Makoce (Minnesota), is the traditional homelands of the Dakota and Anishinaabe people, and that this stolen land is still home to the many Dakota and Anishinaabe descendants of this land, as well as Indigenous peoples from across the world who put in invaluable work to preserve and sustain the land on which we work, live, and learn on. We recognize our proximity to Wakpá Tháŋka (the Mississippi River), not far from Bdoté, the place where the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers meet and the origin of Dakota creation stories, as well as the origin of some of the greatest genocidal and settler-colonial violence against the Dakota people. We recognize that this land is scarred by forced removals, dispossession, ethnic cleansing, and remains the site of settler-colonial violence. We recognize the Indigenous relationships of care to maintain the quality of this land and the traditional cultures of the Native nations who reside here. We extend our gratitude and respect to these endlessly resilient communities, and while on this land hope to learn, protect, and support the Indigenous sovereignty and contemporary works of Indigenous leaders. We recognize that our land acknowledgment is only the first step in supporting these Indigenous communities. We hope our acknowledgments will inspire others to stand in solidarity with these communities, as well as supporting them physically and financially.

Our project intends to investigate a decolonial historic narrative regarding the history of the United States, more specifically in Minneapolis Minnesota, Little Earth/East Phillips neighborhood. Our goals are also to engage in the communities affected by colonial destruction in order to highlight how indigenous and POC communities have resisted and thrived at such intersections. As a group our positionality is not stagnant, filled with various intersections of identities and experiences of our own. However, we are all situated as graduating students from the University of Minnesota in May 2023. We have all had the opportunity and privilege to be able to study in higher education as well as to be able to take a class like Transnational Sexualities to be able to explore our shared interest in indigeneity and community care. We are all working and studying in Minneapolis, geographically situating ourselves in a colonial history of genocide, land grabs, and failed treaties in regard to the Native Tribes of the area and governmental domination at the time. The majority of our group is white. Whiteness must be addressed because it could affect how we may collect and interpret our data. We all collectively acknowledge our privilege to be able to dive into this information and historical data that does not affect just us but rather affects our neighbors, our classmates, and our city's population as a whole. We are in solidarity and hope to ethically and authentically represent the members of the community of East Phillips as well as properly contribute to Indigenous people’s history/memory of the United States (Turtle Island), Minnesota, and more specifically, the Little Earth/East Phillips neighborhood.

Indigenous/Native Music:

Check out some music from various Indigenous and Native singers/artists. Do be aware there is explicit language and themes of injustice and violence within and throughout this discography. Enjoy some new music while you learn more about our history! Link to Native playlist we created.

Before exploring our specific area of memory; which is the East Phillips/Little Earth neighborhood in Minneapolis, this timeline explores a more broad perspective of United States history from a specific indigenous and decolonial perspective. With the understanding of how colonialism and white domination have persisted in indigenous and minority communities across history, as well as the role of genocide on Native communities and assimilation into ‘Western ideals’, we may better understand the challenge these communities also have to face to this day.

Part One: 1600-1900s; Genocide From the Beginning

1607: Jamestown is founded. 104 English men and boys arrived in North America to take land and start a settlement. Jamestown became the first permanent English settlement in North America, beginning the tense and violent relationship between English colonizers and Native peoples. Relationships grew treacherous when the neighboring Powhatan Native tribe was concerned about location, scarcity of food, and water draughts in the region. Along with the many unfamiliar diseases and germs, both Native Peoples and the original colonists suffered chronic sickness and death (Indian Land Tenure Foundation).

1622-1646: ‘Peace treaties’ were met with many attempts at destroying that peace. During this period of time, just after the peace treaty of John Rolfe (Jamestown Leader/ English Colonizer) and Pocahontas (the daughter of the Powhatan Chief at the time) ended with their separation in 1622, leaders of the Powhatan organized a few attacks at the colonizers of Jamestown to prove a point of excessiveness as the English settlers became greedy with resources and food. The attacks would end with the assassination of Chief Opechancanough of the Powhatan tribe. Opechancanough’s successor would go on to sign the first treaty with the English, making the Powhatan Native peoples subject to the crown and colonial destruction (Indian Land Tenure Foundation).

1700: By the end of this millennium, around 75 percent of Native peoples and Native Powhatan peoples, including powerful chiefs of more than 30 tribes, died of smallpox and other various diseases carried by English settlers and colonizers at Jamestown. These various new diseases wipe out the majority of Native peoples of the area, moving further down the Atlantic Coast and further inland to the midwest. The smallpox epidemic traveled along river systems, which served as trade routes for Native peoples (NativeVoices). 1775 - 1783: American War of Independence. To finance the war, the American rebel government sold speculative land grants to areas still rightfully occupied by Native tribes (NativeVoices).

1783: The Peace of Paris; (Treaty of Paris and the Treaties of Versailles, 1783) are the set of treaties that end the American Revolutionary War. They define the territorial claims of the United States from the Atlantic to the Mississippi River. This treaty contains no mention of Native American tribes having any rights within the U.S. (NativeVoices).

1823- 1832: The first of three court cases (the “Marshall Trilogy”) that become the foundation of American Indian law is decided. The Supreme Court rules Native Americans do not own land. In 1831, The second of three court cases that become the foundation of American Indian law is decided. Supreme Court rules that ‘Indian nations’ are not subject to state law. The third of three court cases that become the foundation of American Indian law is decided. Supreme Court rules U.S. must treat tribes as nations (History.com).

1832- 1838: Displacement and Trail of Tears. Native tribes were stripped of their rights and forced to move against their will from one distant location to another. May 28, 1830: Now President, Andrew Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act, which gives plots of land west of the Mississippi River to Native American tribes in exchange for land that is taken from them (History.com).

1862: The largest mass execution in U.S. history occurs in Mankato, Minnesota. 38 Dakota are hanged for their participation in the Dakota Uprising. Beginning in the 1850s, Dakota nations were relocated by the U.S. government to land along the Mississippi River as part of treaty agreements. But between 1850 to 1860, as Minnesota's non-native population grew from about 6,000 to 170,000, the influx of white people took crucial provisions and resources from the Dakota, and their ensuing hunger and hardship led to the U.S.–Dakota War of 1862. In a speech on September 9, 1862, Minnesota governor Alexander Ramsey said, "The Sioux Dakota Indians of Minnesota must be exterminated or driven forever beyond the borders of Minnesota." Almost all the Dakota people fled the state, hid, or were forced out (mspmag.com).

1879: The first off-reservation boarding school for Native children opens. The first students attended Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania, the country’s first off-reservation boarding school authorized by U.S Congress. The school's first superintendent, Civil War veteran Richard Henry Pratt, selects an abandoned army barracks as a school building. Pratt, who advocates “Americanization” and cultural assimilation, famously states, “Kill the Indian and save the man.” The school was designed to assimilate Native American students. During Carlisle’s operation between 1879 and 1918, nearly 200 other children were buried in the same cemetery as the Northern Arapaho boys, according to The Washington Post. Carlisle and other boarding schools were part of a long history of U.S. attempts to either kill, remove, or assimilate Native Americans. As the white population grew in the United States and people settled further west towards the Mississippi in the late 1800s, there was increasing pressure on the recently removed groups to give up some of their new lands,” according to the Minnesota Historical Society. Since there was no more Western territory to push them towards, the U.S. decided to remove Native Americans by assimilating them. In 1885, Commissioner of Indian Affairs Hiram Price explained the logic: “It is cheaper to give them education than to fight them (Indian Land Tenure Foundation).

1887: Indian Affairs Commissioner bans Native languages in schools. Commissioner of Indian Affairs J. D. C. Atkins first bans instruction in Native languages as well as the speaking of Native languages in mission schools. Mission schools on reservations are required to provide all instruction in English, and Adkins directs that missionaries who fail to comply will not be allowed on reservations. Then, the order is extended to government-run schools on reservations (Indian Land Tenure Foundation).

1890: U.S. Army kills nearly 300 Indian men, women, and children at Wounded Knee. U.S. Cavalry massacres Lakota at Wounded Knee. The U.S. Army’s 7th Cavalry arrives at Wounded Knee, near Wounded Knee Creek, South Dakota, where Big Foot’s Lakota band are camped on the morning of December 29. Women and children, numbering about 230, are in their tipis, while the men, about 120, hold council. On this morning, 470 troops surround the camp; four Hotchkiss rapid-fire artillery guns are trained on the camp from a nearby hill. A shot is fired, perhaps by accident, and the soldiers and Lakota warriors begin firing. At Wounded Knee, Indian women and children are hunted down, even as they flee. Whole families are wiped out (History.com).

1900: Native population plunges In the U.S., population falls to an all-time low. The 1890 census records 237,196 Native people—a decrease of approximately 95 percent from a population in 1491 that some historians estimate at more than 100 million (Native Voices).

Part two: 1910s-2000s; Kicked off the Reservations and Abandoned in the CitiesRedlining, Termination Policies, and the Founding of the Minneapolis AIM

Once we hit the 1910s and onward, we see a clear trend in how housing developed across the Twin Cities and gave clear preference to white immigrants having the best housing options. Racial convents became the new normal for land developers to entice white immigrants into their new housing, promising no Black, Indigenous, or other people of color would be able to move into their neighborhoods. This built the basis for the affluent white neighborhoods we see across Minneapolis today, and these covenants pushed people of color into the more polluted and industrial neighborhoods divided across the city. Reservation services were defunded throughout the 1950s which pushed more Indigenous people into the Twin Cities and divided them into these industrial neighborhoods where they were more easily able to find jobs. Finally, in 1968, the American Indian Movement was formed in Minneapolis to help unite Native American inhabitants of the city struggling with housing, employment, and policing discrimination. In 1973, they created the first low-income housing with an Indigenous preference for their neighborhood. This created a safe haven in Minneapolis for Indigenous people, called Little Earth of United Tribes Housing.

1910-1930s: Racial Covenants and Redlining.

The neighborhoods of Minneapolis were attracting many white immigrant families with stable jobs through the Great Depression into the 1930s. Many land developers put clear language into deeds that said plainly: “Premises shall not be sold, mortgaged, or leased to or occupied by any person or persons other than members of the Caucasian race” (Kaul, 2019).These have been coined as “racial covenants” that coincided with Jim Crow laws in the South and the wave of white supremacy across the U.S. at the beginning of the 20th century. Mapping Prejudice has found over 20,000 deeds with racial or ethnic restrictions in Hennepin County alone. These racial restrictions made it difficult or impossible for racial minorities in certain areas to access mortgage financing and become homeowners. The New Deal Era of the federal government ended up supporting these segregation efforts as neighborhoods with racial restrictions got the best credit ratings compared to diverse neighborhoods in a practice called redlining. As homeownership has been one of the most significant pathways to intergenerational wealth building in the United States since the 20th century, these redlining practices left deep scars in the racial and economic segregation of Indigenous, African American, Jewish, Asian American, and other racial minority populations in Minneapolis (Mapping Inequality). Racial covenants were outlawed by 1968, which made them unenforceable, but Minneapolis is still living in the legacy of these covenants today. Many of these redlined neighborhoods persist with 70-90% of the population being white residents, while the neighborhoods where Black residents were allowed to move in the 1910s are still 40-60% Black residents. Racially segregated neighborhoods generally have less access to nature, parks, medical care, supermarkets, and more underfunded schools and environmental hazards. In 2020, the city of Minneapolis has begun offering the Just Deeds Project to acknowledge and address systemic racism in housing in Minneapolis (City of Minneapolis, 2020). (Photo: Minneapolis Star, 1923)

1940-1960s: Indian termination policy.

“In 1953, the U.S. Congress established a new policy towards American Indians: termination” (National Archives). This policy eliminated much government support for Indian tribes and ended the protected trust status of all Indian-owned lands. In response to this policy, the BIA (Bureau of Indian Affairs) began a voluntary urban relocation program.” The BIA was promising better jobs, schools, and medical services (Winyan, 20202). They provided one-way transportation, a couple of hundred dollars, and promises of a better home to any Native Americans willing to move to a city. In 1955, Minneapolis opened their first BIA relocation office. The Indian Relocation Act of 1956 was a United States law intent on bringing back many Indigenous people to the city and adding vocational training in an assimilation effort to mainstream the Indigenous people into the white, American public. The Twin Cities Indigenous population boomed as reservation services were defunded and the one-way transportation left many Native families stuck in the city. By 1960, a quarter of Native Americans had relocated to cities, and by 1970 it was nearly 50% of all Native Americans (Nesterak, 2019). These relocation efforts scattered different tribal families across the United States, and combined with redlining Native Americans were pushed out of white neighborhoods and left in poor living conditions.

1938-1963: Reade Manufacturing Co. produces, stores, and ships arsenic-based pesticides out of their industrial plant in East Phillips, contaminating the soil outside about 600 nearby homes (Stanley, 2019).

1968: American Indian Movement founded in Minneapolis

In March 1968, President Lyndon B. Johnson sent a letter to Congress concerned for how termination policies had affected Native Americans. Native Americans across the United States were facing a 40% unemployment rate, 50% high school drop-out rate, and a life expectancy of 44 years old (Nesterak, 2019). Johnson’s proposal didn’t go anywhere in Congress, so shortly after, a group of Native activists in Minneapolis formed the American Indian Movement, or AIM.

They were aiming to create better conditions for Native people who had been forced into relocation and fill in the gaps that the federal government wasn’t serving. They started with the AIM patrol, an effort to police the police, by documenting police brutality against Native people in Minneapolis. Then, they expanded into protesting employment and housing discrimination, and defending treaty rights across the U.S.. They joined another activist group, Indians of All Tribes, in occupying Alcatraz Island in 1969. AIM famously occupied the Bureau of Indian Affairs offices in Denver in 1970, Mount Rushmore in 1971, BIA offices in Washington, D.C. in 1972, and the town of Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1973. They exchanged gunfire with federal officers for 71 days in Wounded Knee, and two Native men died, Frank Clearwater (Cherokee and Apache) and Lawrence “Buddy” Lamont (Ogala) (Treisman, 2023).

At the same time, they were running programs in the city that could directly help Native people. They helped create the first and only Indigenous preference Section 8 housing, called Little Earth of United Tribes Housing, to help unite Indigenous people across the Twin Cities.

They ran the first Indigenous-controlled school in the country, Heart of the Earth, alongside their sister school, Red School House, from 1972. Heart of the Earth was classified as a charter school in 1999, and came to be closed in 2008 after financial discrepancies (Relerford, 2008). These were bold, transformative steps in educating Native students in our current educational system.

1970s: Mainstreaming Native children.

Once relocated to the cities, many Native families struggled with poverty, as much or more than they did on the reservation. Social services began removing Native children from their homes in the city and on reservations at disproportionately high rates. As many as a third of Native children were forcibly removed from their homes and placed with non-Native families (Nesterak, 2019).

1975: Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act

Congress passed the Indian Self-Determination and Education Assistance Act in 1975 to bring the termination policy era to an end. They gave tribes more autonomy in how programs and services would be provided to them by the federal government. This has led to a significant restructuring to the leadership behind the BIA (U.S. Department of the Interior).

1978: ICWA

In 1978, Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act to prevent Native children from being given to non-Native families and provide more preference to tribal and familial relations. This act failed to address reunification efforts and caused lasting damage to a generation of Native children lost from their families and culture. After over 40 years, ICWA is being challenged in front of the Supreme Court who will reach a decision on whether or not to overturn this act as soon as the summer of 2023. Read more here.

1973: Little Earth of United Tribes Housing, Little Earth was founded in 1973 and remains the only indigenous preference project-based Section 8 rental assistance community in the United States. It has 212 housing units on about 9.4 acres in the East Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis. With nearly 1,000 residents, it holds representation of over 38 tribal nations within the population.

1975: Minneapolis American Indian Resource Center founded. In 1975, the American Indian Resource Center opened in the East Phillips neighborhood to provide educational and social services to the Indigenous community. They serve over 10,000 community members annually, and provide cultural protection programs through art and intergenerational programming (MAIC). They will be opening their new building in 2024.

1985: Minnesota Indian Women’s Resource Center. MIWRC began working as a nonprofit outpatient treatment center focused on giving Indigenous women access to care that allowed them to continue in childcare without seeking out-of-the-home care (MIWRC). This was part of the ongoing effort to stop having Native children taken by Child Protective Services.

1994: State health officials discover high levels of arsenic in soil and groundwater during a Hiawatha construction project. (Epding, 2022).

Part 3: 2000-2023; Fighting for Environmental Justice in East Phillips

The residential areas of East Phillips, particularly Little Earth of United Tribes, are currently bordered by an asphalt plant, a foundry, and two major highways. There was also an arsenic deposit until the late 2000s, whose chemical-laden soil blew around the neighborhood contaminating residents’ air, water, and soil for nearly 30 years before federal intervention. At the site of this former arsenic plant, now the Roof Depot building, lies a site of potentiality for East Phillips; residents and organizers have worked tirelessly since 2014 to purchase the site and convert it into an urban farm. Their largest obstacle in achieving their vision has been the City of Minneapolis, which has repeatedly violated its own laws and commitments to the community by proceeding with attempts to demolish the Roof Depot building and build a Public Works yard in which 880 vehicles (some of them diesel) would come in and out every day. This development directly violates the 2008 MN Statute 116.07 protecting East Phillips from further cumulative pollution, the Southside Green Zone Goals established in 2018, and the city’s 2020 resolution declaring racism “a public health emergency.” Residents in East Phillips suffer from some of the highest rates of asthma and heart disease in the city, and lives have already been lost to the many years of toxic pollution. The East Phillips Urban Farm represents a much-needed step towards a sustainable future for this beautiful and resilient community. It is imperative that no more lives are lost, the rights of Indigenous communities are recognized and honored, and the City of Minneapolis stands by their commitments to justice and supports East Phillips in building a radical model of sustainability and community care which could serve as a blueprint for environmental and racial justice in countless other communities across the US.

2000:

Minnesota Department of Agriculture plans to address the arsenic site; note in this graphic included in the fact sheet they published that the residential area is bordered by an asphalt plant, a foundry, a former incineration site, and an arsenic deposit, whose contaminated soil blew around the neighborhood, contaminating residents air, water, and soil for nearly 30 years before federal intervention (Minnesota Department of Agriculture, 2000). What the map only partially shows is the two highways (35W and Hiawatha) which border the neighborhood on three sides. Many of these pollution sources remain today.

2008: East Phillips resident and at-the-time MN legislator Karen Clark passes Statute 116.07 subd. 4(a), A.K.A the Clark/Berglin Environmental Justice Law, in the MN Senate. The statute is intended to protect East Phillips from further pollution, stating that the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency must conduct a cumulative impact screening for any facility seeking an emissions permit within the neighborhood, and may deny permits that would increase cumulative pollution in the neighborhood. (Hazzard, 2021)

(Read the statute on p. 6 of this document!)

2007-2011:

The federal government cleans up the majority of the arsenic deposited by the plant but is unable to reach the soil underneath the Roof Depot building, which remains contaminated today. (Stanley, 2019)

2014: The East Phillips Improvement Coalition (EPIC) discovers the owner's plans to sell the Roof Depot site while launching a project to relocate Smith Foundry and Bituminous roadways (two major historical pollution sources in East Phillips). Unwilling to allow another polluting entity to enter their neighborhood, EPIC bands together with the community, and the East Phillips Urban Farm project is born. (Pass, 2019)

2015: The plan for the East Phillips Indoor Urban farm is fortified through community meetings, investors are sought and secured, and the plan is unanimously approved by 150 members at the 2015 East Phillips annual meeting. Organizers begin negotiations with the owners of the Roof Depot to purchase the site. At this time, they discover the city’s interest in the site, which had been established nearly 10 years prior but never disclosed to or discussed with any East Phillips residents. (Pass, 2019)

2016: EPIC receives a grant from the MN Department of Employment and Economic Development to help plan and develop the urban farm and the East Phillips Neighborhood Institute (EPNI) is founded to be the entity responsible for the project. The city threatens eminent domain and the Roof Depot owners withdraw from negotiations with EPIC; The Minneapolis City Council votes 9-4 to allow Public Works to purchase the building, and they purchase it for $6.8 million. (Pass, 2019) (Stokes, 2023).

2017: City Council Member Alondra Cano praises the Urban Farm project before an audience of nearly 300 community members, highlighting its alignment with the Green Zone goals and the Resilience Minneapolis Project. Meeting turnout was nearly double the largest annual meetings put on thus far, demonstrating early on community investment in the project. (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023)

2018: The City of Minneapolis designates East Phillips as part of the Southside Green Zone (Epding, 2022). Green Zones are areas of the city with “high levels of environmental pollution and racial, political, and economic marginalization” (City of Minneapolis, 2023), where the city has committed to working with residents to achieve environmental justice and decrease pollution.

2020: Several months after the murder of George Floyd, the City of Minneapolis issues (Resolution 2020R-193), vowing to work with communities most impacted by structural racism to alleviate inequalities such as disparate health outcomes.

2020: EPNI files a complaint against the City of Minneapolis, demanding that a thorough environmental impact assessment and statement be conducted and provided for the Hiawatha Campus Expansion Project and that MN Statute 116.07 (the 2008 bill protecting East Phillips from further cumulative pollution) be enforced. (EPNI vs. City of Minneapolis, 2020). The city moves to dismiss the lawsuit and threatens to disband the Community Environmental Advisory Committee and the Southside Green Zone Advisory Committee for their support of the East Phillips Urban Farm. (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2020).

September 2021-September 2022:

Picture is from EPNI Slide Overview

January 6, 2023: The MN Court rules against EPNI in a ruling that was meant to determine whether the city of Minneapolis had comprehensively filled out an Environmental Assessment Worksheet (EAW). EPNI argued that the EAW was incomplete and inaccurate, and was the product of bias. EPNI immediately appeals this decision (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023). Read more about the non-precedential opinion of this court case.

February 6, 2023: Rally at the Courthouse to appeal the prior decision made on Jan 6, 2023

February 13, 2023: “MERA” case In this case, the court denies the request of EPNI to put a hold on demolition until all other court cases are won by the state. Effectively, this allows the city to begin demolition even though there are still ongoing court cases about the legality of the demolition (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023).

February 15, 2023: Rise and Repair Rally at State Capitol, a rally to help support Indigenous rights and bring awareness to the effects on the climate and land (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023).

February 23, 2023: Minneapolis City Council votes 6-6 on a motion to postpone the demolition. A two-thirds majority was needed. Protestors continue to set up camp on the Roof Depot site to occupy it (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023).

February 23, 2023: Nenocaasi Camp. A ceremonial and prayerful occupation of the Roof Depot Site (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023). At 6:15 pm, the police department surrounds the camp, detains Indigenous women and community members during the ceremony, and the camp is forcibly disbanded by a large police force ordered by Mayor Fry. Force was used unjustly and no rights were read to protesters. Listen to local activist, Rachel Thunder of Nehiyo (Plains Cree), speak about it below.

February 24, 2023: Continuation of “MERA” case. The Court accepts the request to put a temporary pause on demolition (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023).

February 26, 2023: Mutual Aid Defend the Depot Block Party for East Phillips (Defend the Depot Instagram). A community gathering with speakers, music, and free food and groceries. A spirit of resilience was in the air.

March 2023: The city is trying to negotiate with EPNI, but cannot promise reduction of pollution and suggests that the building will still be torn down (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023).

April 21, 2023: The city says they are willing to sell EPNI the Roof Depot Site if they can secure funding. EPNI will need to secure funding from Legislation (Hazzard, 2023). Continued support is needed. Read more here.

Part 4: Future: East Phillips’ Vision for Sustainability and Community Care

Graphic is from EPNI Slide Overview

For many people in the East Phillips Neighborhood, their desire to fight for environmental justice in their community comes from a desire to protect their families. Nicole Perez, a community member lovingly dubbed the “angry grandmother,” states “It was very hurtful because, you know, I’m very close with my grandbabies and I just want better for my family than what I had or, you know, I want my kids to have so much more. And so I’ve had my family very close. My daughters are in college, so we don’t have like the means to move out of Little Earth right now. And so, you know, it was scary,” said Perez (Lopez, 2023). People should not have to move out of their own community to be able to achieve health. Without health, it is very difficult to be able to achieve your full potential which every human is deserving of. The members of the East Phillips Neighborhood have had enough of being trampled on by a city and a nation that clearly does not care about their health and livelihood. Fighting for change became a fight for their lives, a wish for health and equanimity. Their resistance is born of and is for, a hope of a new future that honors the way that their community and their land. If you go to a Defend the Depot event, you will realize this quite quickly. There is a tangible spirit of unity and acceptance in the air. People laugh and cry together. Native speakers share their pain and their joy. Outsiders are welcomed with love and incredible openness. Food, hand-made by the community members, is shared, enough for hundreds of people. There is a place to give and get groceries, all completely community-based and free. Community elders share their wisdom and their vision and invite everybody to witness their ceremonial drumming. Younger generations sing and sell their handmade clothing. There's a place for everybody there, and to show up just as they are with their sadness, anger, and joy. This is the vision of the roof depot. A place of gathering and a place of community care.

“The community’s ready-to-implement warehouse renovation plan includes an indoor urban farm, job training, housing, a bike repair shop, a cultural market, rooftop solar, and much more. It would be cooperatively-owned, generating financial equity and affordable fresh food for the neighborhood” (East Phillips Neighborhood Institute, 2023).

The specifics of the urban farm include using indoor growing techniques and technology like aquaponics, bringing fresh and affordable food to the community, which is currently a food desert, year-round. This would also generate sustainable jobs all year round. There would also be community spaces, farmers markets, and cultural markets which are extremely important as East Phillips Neighborhood is extremely diverse and supports 38 different tribes.

Graphic is from EPNI Slide Overview

Community Care and a Queer Vision

One of the most engaging parts about the plan for Urban Farm in the East Phillips neighborhood is the opportunity for replication in the future. If this Roof Depot project is successful, it will be able to feed the neighborhood, including children, families and elders. This is not the first time that the neighborhood has come up with innovative ideas to promote food security in East Phillips. “Years back, [Cassandra Holmes] helped fund a small farm where neighborhood kids get paid to grow food and sacred plants like sage and sweetgrass. Every summer, the farm bursts with sweet apples, glossy stalks of corn, and hearty potatoes, adding food security to Little Earth. Its success led a diverse group of residents to the more ambitious urban farm plan. They’ve been working at it for years” (Jones, 2021). The whole idea for the farm is intertwined with the idea of community building and community care, an idea that is often linked to queerness. Community care is a popular idea in critical disability studies and queer studies, as institutions and government organizations have often forgotten about these populations, leading them to care for each other through community networks. Likewise, this neighborhood has had to reckon with the fact that the city of Minneapolis and the government is not coming to its aid even though they have caused much of the harm. Community is their best hope for a better future where they are truly seen and heard. Not only this, but this farm, if successful, can stand as a model of replication for other communities around the country.

To read more about Cassandra Holmes’ vision for their neighborhood read here.

How can you help?

Show up for the National Day of Awareness for Missing & Murdered Indigenous Women and Relatives at the MN Capitol on May 5th from 2-4 pm.

Support the cause directly: Donate to Support Legal and Organizing Costs

Support local businesses and Indigenous artists:

Powwow Grounds: (https://www.powwowgrounds.com/) “Pow Wow Grounds has been caffeinating and feeding the American Indian community in Minneapolis since 2010.” 1414 E Franklin Ave, Minneapolis, MN 55404

Thunder Beadwork: https://www.etsy.com/shop/thunderbeadwork/ Thunder Beadwork features art created by local activist Rachel Thunder of nehiyo (Plains Cree).

Birchbark Books & Native Arts: https://birchbarkbooks.com/ Eco-chic, independent shop offering hand-picked titles plus Native American books & crafts. (Look out for books by the owner, Ojibwe author, Louise Erdrich!) 2115 W 21st St, Minneapolis, MN 55405

Woodland Indian Crafts: https://www.facebook.com/woodlandcrafts1980/ 1530 E Franklin Ave, Minneapolis, MN 55404

Gatherings Cafe: https://www.maicnet.org/gatherings-cafe/ A local cafe serving fresh food and “healthy indigenous inspired meals to the elders of South Minneapolis” 1530 E Franklin Ave, Minneapolis, MN 55404

OWAMNI: https://owamni.com/ Full-service Indigenous-run restaurant 420 South First Street, Minneapolis, MN 55401

For a more extensive list of Indigenous-owned businesses around Minneapolis and the greater Minnesota area please visit: https://mspmag.com/arts-and-culture/general-interest/indigenous-owned-businesses-to-support/

Check out social media, current events, active community groups, etc:

Native Youth Arts Collective (@native.youth.arts.collective on instagram) Minnesota Indian Women’s Resource Center (https://www.miwrc.org/) Indigenous Peoples Task Force (https://indigenouspeoplestf.org/) East Phillips Urban Farm Instagram @eastphillipsurbanfarm Defend the Roof Depot! Instagram @defendthedepot Minnesota Native News Website (https://minnesotanativenews.org/) The Red Nation Podcast (https://www.patreon.com/redmediapr)

Stay Up-to-Date: Link Tree to @East_Phillips_Health

Meet some members of the community:

Nicole Perez: Nicole Perez (of the Red Lake Nation) lives in the Little Earth Housing complex in the East Phillips neighborhood. After experiencing much despair due to loved ones and family members of hers experiencing health problems due to pollution in the area, she began to actively speak out. She is a fierce defender of her neighborhood and often labeled as the “Angry Grandma.” Both her and her son volunteer with EPNI (Lopez, 2023). https://healingmnstories.wordpress.com/tag/nicole-perez/ https://minnesotanativenews.org/family-community-rally-to-protect-little-earth-and-east-phillips/

Cassandra Holmes: Cassandra (Niiwin Muck-Wa Ikwe – Four Bears Woman) was born at Little Earth and has lived there nearly all of her life. She is part of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of Ojibwe. She became involved in environmental justice work and fighting for the rights of Indigenous people in East Phillips after her teenage son, Trinidad Flores (Mihkosew Muskwa Inepowee- Red Bear Standing) lost his life due to toxic pollution, along with several other young people in the community who were suffering from diseases they weren’t born with. She is a board member at EPNI, an activist and community leader, and works with Little Earth’s Urban Youth Farm and Safe Communities of United Tribes, which works to reduce neighborhood crime, strengthen relations with police, and empower youth leadership at Little Earth. Holmes is committed to protecting life in East Phillips and building a safe and sustainable community for new generations.

Links to other celebrations and local artwork opportunities:

• Semilla Center for Healing and the Arts
• Mentoring Peace Through Art
• The Alley Newspaper — Minneapolis American Indian Center Mural
• Project for Pride in Living — Elevating Community Voices Through Earth

Questions, “Queerys” and Future Prompts for readers/viewers:

After viewing our project, I hope you as a reader come out with not only a better understanding of an Indigenous history of Minneapolis and colonization, but a greater understanding of what needs to be done to secure a better future for Indigenous people, the East Phillips neighborhood, and our communities in general. I hope this has inspired you to ask the tough questions about what needs to be done within your own community to help populations that are often overlooked or undervalued.

From listening to a Lakota elder, I have learned that many Indigenous people face intense trauma due to colonization, white supremacy, and patriarchy. Though this is particularly common in Indigenous communities due to a uniquely brutal and demoralizing history; colonization, white supremacy, and patriarchy affects most everyone in our current society. Though it is not our fault, it is our responsibility to examine how these lenses affect our lives and those we interact with. When we start to heal ourselves and deconstruct the looming and destructive tendencies that can seem to control our lives, we can be a better steward to other people, our communities, and the earth. It is my hope that everybody who seeks freedom may claim it, and freedom is only freedom if it liberates all people.

Because of this, we would like to emphasize the importance of self-care and rest as an act of political deviance. From this place may you have the energy and drive to help not only yourself, but others.

Book recommendations for healing racialized trauma (for all people):

My Grandmother's Hands: Racialized Trauma and the Pathway to Mending Our Hearts and Bodies by Resmaa Menakem The Seven Circles: Indigenous Teachings for Living Well by Chelsey Luger & Thosh Collins New Poets of Native Nations edited by Heid E. Erdrich Indigenous Community: Rekindling the Teachings of the Seventh Fire by Gregory A. Cajete, Ph.D. Coyote Wisdom: The Power of Story in Healing by Lewis Mehl-Madrona, M.D., Ph.D.

Book recommendations for learning more about Indigenous Past, Present, and Future:

An Indigenous Peoples’ History of the United States by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz God Is Red: A Native View of Religion by Vine Deloria Jr For This Land by Vine Deloria Jr What Does Justice Look Like: The Struggle for Liberation in Dakota Homeland by Waziyatawin Violence over the Land: Indians and Empires in the Early American West by Ned Blackhawk

See link for a full list of references and sources used: Sources