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Fridays for Future #17 – Georgia’s Housing Future

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We don’t often think of manmade structures as part of the environment, and yet they are. Humans, also not often thought of as part of the environment, dwell in these structures. Many others dwell without them, something humans have termed as “homelessness” -a loss of human habitat accepted by too many of the fortunate as resulting from the moral failings of the homeless. Humans and housing are a part of our environment, whether it’s accepted or not.

This week the Georgia Conservancy hosted a panel on “The Economics of Housing in Georgia” on their weekly Facebook Live this past Tuesday May 19th at 12 noon. You can watch the 1 hour live here. If the privilege of time escapes you, please see the GreenATLiens summary below.

The Economic Impact of Housing in Georgia

This panel consisted of three presentations, one by the Georgia Conservancy, one by Bleakly Advisory Group, and one by Electric Cities of Georgia. A Q&A followed the presentations to discuss housing development issues in Georgia further.

Georgia Conservancy presentation by Katherine Moore, VP of Programs & Sustainable Growth Program Director

  • AKA Gentrification

Takeaways

The majority of Georgians’ income does not match the rising costs of housing. The difference between an affordable home for the workforce and the average home price is a staggering $159K. In the Atlanta area 30-40% of households are considered “cost burdened” or spend a third or more of their income on housing. Georgia will grow by 4 million people by 2040. Taking into consideration high home prices vs. low wages, cost burdened households, and population growth, raising the state minimum wage and lowering the cost of housing will be crucial to Georgia’s future resilience.

Bleakly Advisory Group presentation by Geoff Koski, President

Takeaways: We’re experiencing dramatic demographic and generational changes that directly affects housing in Georgia. Household size has been shrinking steadily over the decades, and our housing supply is primarily built for the American nuclear family that is no longer the norm. Younger generations prefer walkability and work from home options, which makes housing and the amenities surrounding housing more important. This market is willing to pay more to live in “walkable” areas. Investing in downtown areas has been shown to improve cities’ economic growth even more than large shopping malls.

Electric Cities of GA presentation by Mill Graves, Director of Economic Development

Takeaways: It’s important for cities to develop a well balanced tax base that’s a mix of housing, industries, retail, as well as investing in their downtown and quality of life enhancement (such as parks). Doing so will provide a more stable tax base for cities to fund programs that enhance the lives of residents. Holistic economic development required hard and soft infrastructure (see slide 5 for factors cities can control). Housing diversity is especially important given the demographic changes we’ve been experiencing over the decades of smaller households as well as expected economic hardship as a result of COVID-19 that will make more affordable housing more heavily demanded. Mixed use and walkability will be increasingly important going forward to meet the demand of residents.

Q&A Led by Nick Johnson, GA Conservancy Senior Plannter

What is example of a community or a project that you’d like to lift up for having done really great housing projects that support local economic development in a thoughtful way?

Geoff: Two that I can think of that are not necessarily Atlanta-centric are West Point and Rome, Georgia. West Point has a great historic core. Buildings had been sitting there for decades without being fully used and through concentrated efforts they now have 30 or 40 new housing units above retail in their downtown core. In Rome, Georgia they’ve done a lot on the affordable housing side and focused on downtown housing that I think can serve as a model throughout the state. (main emphasis: mixed use, focus on inner city center, walkability, affordability)

Mill: Thomasville, Georgia brought in a lot of progressive housing types into their urban development. Providing quality affordable housing within a quarter mile from downtown it’d been just a great project overall that other rural communities can aspire to.

Katherine: I’d like to give a nod to Georgia’s Mill villages and Mill neighborhoods. These are tremendous opportunities for fresh eyes. They are walkable in and among themselves. Mills can lend themselves as loft opportunities and we see this again and again across the state.

What are some ways that you can promote affordability on top of just promoting good housing policy and housing diversity.

Geoff: I’m a big fan of land banking. Granted cities and counties already have a lot on their plate trying to figure out this year’s and next year’s budget. But in a perfect world cities and counties are out there looking for ways to bank land for housing and using resources and federal government grants to buy land or even buy buy units in their historical downtown. If it’s under public control, especially if you’re controlling the housing units, you have the ability to control how much a person is going to pay for those housing units. Through downtown development authorities and other avenues land banking can then be aggressive in getting that land developed to provide housing. Once the city or the public sector controls the dirt underneath there’s a potential opportunity to impact how much a resident is going to pay for that. In doing so you have the ability to really impact what kind and what price of units are being built.

Mill: I’d completely second Geoff on that one as far as a really effective strategy and one that honestly we’ve always utilized at ECG. It’s an extremely effective strategy and one I think that is going to work for those communities that are able to do it. From a bigger picture what most communities may be able to allocate some of their resources towards are really identifying redevelopment opportunities in their communities. This should be a priority for every city across the state if they can is really to identify where these redevelopment opportunities are and take a strong look at your housing.

In addition encourage specific areas that allow the types of housing that we know can be more affordable such as duplexes and fourplexes and things of that nature that for most municipalities of Georgia are not allowed by regulations and ordinances. What I’ve seen in other communities across the country is places where they’ve established areas in their downtown or within certain neighborhoods that have been historically low income allowing that type of development to encourage more affordable housing in those spaces.

Do you have any experience in land bank resources being put to use through community land trust?

Geoff: The work Amanda Rhine is doing at the Atlanta Land Bank comes to mind. I know Brunswick has set up a community land trust recently. I would look into what Amanda has been doing here in Atlanta.

Mill: Amanda’s work is a great case study. Albany, GA has one. Athens land trust could probably be a good resource as well.

How has the pandemic affected housing?

Geoff: The other shoe hasn’t dropped yet on housing and the economy. Housing prices and rental payments have held up pretty well so far. If you just look at the numbers through the beginning of May you would hardly know we’re in the middle of a a pandemic with 15% unemployment. It just seems unreasonable to think that’s always going to be the case over the next 12-18 months. So there’s a lot that remains to be seen. It will impact housing no doubt.

The demographics I talked about, they’re not going to change. We’re still going to have small households and a mismatch between our household makeup and our housing stock. That’s not going to change with COVID. We’re still going to have a tremendous amount of smaller households looking for smaller and different housing. What that looks like at the “end” of all of this I think we’re still working through that and waiting to see what happens when that other shoes drops on the economic side of housing. It’s a bit early to tell but again the demographics are going to drive the future of housing to a large degree. So, we’ll see.

Mill: Geoff you’re completely right, the demographics are always in the driver’s seat with respect to this so COVID’s not really going to change a lot of that. We’re probably going to see more renters I would imagine coming out of this and just in general communities that kind of have a monoculture of a housing product. When I got ot a lot of my communities there’s a whole lot of single family. If there’s any sort of struggle coming out of this with respect to foreclosures and things of that nature I think those communities with fewer diversity of housing types are going to take a hit. There’s a lot that remains to be seen. If anything [COVID] could potentially be an impetus to accelerate some stuff around retail evolution which we’ve already been seeing but also with housing. The biggest challenge I see is from the government regulation side to allow some of these types of housing. That for me is one of the biggest challenges moving forward and I think COVID-19 could be an impetus to really push that discussion to the forefront. Whether it’s something around your downtown built environment or just your housing a lot of people are going to come out of this worse off than when they went into it and so a lot of cities will be looking at this. andsaying what can we do to help and there’s a lot we can do on the housing front.

Geoff: You’re probably hearing and will continue to hear a lot about resiliency. The colloquial evolution of resiliency is “don’t put all your eggs in one basket.” If something fails and that’s where all your eggs are then we’re in trouble, so disperse the risk I guess you may say. Thinking about that in terms of housing is essential coming out of this. The more resilient cities, towns, and counties that have a wide variety of housing means that you’ve got a variety of housing ready to go no matter what the case whether we’re in a pandemic or not your housing stock is ready to accept the future. But if it’s all in one basket and the future heads in a different direction you’re left behind. So that’s just something to think about generally whether it’s retail, housing, your budget, whatever it may be is to think about that resiliency and how you can disperse the risk when things take a turn for the worst.

This was an extremely informative hour-long panel by the GA Conservancy, and the information shared here will be highly valuable when joining local groups such as the Housing Justice League to advocate for affordable housing.

A few action items

That’s a wrap! Hope you enjoyed this week’s Friday for Future feature on housing! Stay green, ATLiens!

Related:

Motivation Monday #15 – Tanya “Tea” Povolny

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Happy #MotivationMonday Green ATLiens!! We are headed into week ???? of Quarantine 2020 and who else is tired of staring at that English Ivy in their yard? This week’s Motivation Monday feature is Tanya “Tea” Povolny, founder of EcoLogic, an invasive plant removal service, and she is an expert on just that! 

Tea grew up moving around quite a bit before landing in Atlanta in 2016 by way of Austin, TX.  One of the things she immediately admired after growing her ATLien antennae is the ecological landscape and beautifully integrated urban forests that call our city home.  As she says on the EcoLogic website, “Atlanta’s forest is in our backyards.” 

Tanya founded EcoLogic after working on several similar restoration-based efforts (including the Fernbank Forest) and discovering how important this work is to our native habitats. EcoLogic specializes in invasive plant removal, such as English Ivy and privet, relying strongly on a “light touch, heavy effect” approach.  According to Tea, sometimes she will leave a site and there will be no noticeable difference, but that’s the point.  Much of her work is tailored specifically to the space and the current native species there, so any invasive plant removal is done in such a way that they will not create a vacuum in the landscape, or cause later erosion problems in the soil.  So in fairness, it is a little more than just pulling up ivy! The overall goal of Ecologic’s work at a site is to return the landscape to an equilibrium that allows native species to flourish, with as minimal human touch as possible.  

EcoLogic is strongly based in restoration rather than conservation.  The difference is that conservation is as an effort to keep things the same, and restoration takes into account changes to the area and how to create success in a way that factors in those changes. For this reason, some spaces require aftercare, such as replanting of native species following the removal of invasive ones, or being aware of erosion factors following the removal of an invasive species. 

Tea recently began volunteering with the Georgia Native Plant Society’s propagation site and is excited to potentially grow that connection in regard to planting native species. 

Tea’s Call to Action

Of course, Tea has done quite a bit of research and field study to know our native plants so well and best understand a space’s needs.  But she advises do not let that stop you from bringing these practices into your own yard’s landscaping. According to Tea, the most important thing she would like ATLiens to know about her work is that truly anyone can do it.  Tea’s mission was founded on the desire to spread knowledge in Atlanta about how to be good stewards to our native species.  A little effort each day can go a long way, so spend a little time each day pulling out privet, or removing ivy, and you will start to see a difference. As we head into another week of quarantine, maybe it is time to #getmotivated and #getoutside to tend to some of Atlanta’s urban forest that might be in your very own backyard! 

Stay green, ATLiens! ✌️👽

Fridays for Future #16 – Atlanta’s Water Woes Part 1

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A Deep Dive into ATL’s Water Supply

When astronomers gaze into their telescopes to search the crevices of the universe for habitable planets, they are hoping to find one thing: water. Water is one of the most important elements necessary to sustain life. We use it for everything. Try to name at least one essential activity you do every day that doesn’t require water in some shape or form. Pretty difficult, right?  Because water is an integral part of our lives, local governments are constantly developing strategies to sustainably manage and conserve it. This fact is especially true for the city of Atlanta. Did you know that the city’s emergency water reserve has only enough for three days? How is this even possible, you ask? What are city officials doing to address this? To answer these questions, we need to first talk a little bit about Georgia’s watersheds. 

Watersheds. What is a watershed? A watershed is an area of land that drains all the water from rainfall and snowmelt into a common body of water. If this definition isn’t quite clear, think of an open upside-down umbrella. The rain falls on the surface of the inside of the umbrella, slides down the ribs to the center near the handle, and creates a pool of water. In this case, the upside-down umbrella acts like a watershed and collects the water into a central place. Additionally, like the ribs of an umbrella, watersheds are composed of networks of smaller waterways like creeks, rivers, or lakes that ultimately drain into larger bodies of water. They also vary in size ranging from small puddles to huge tributaries that span several states.  Georgia has fourteen major watersheds. However, for our purposes, we will discuss two: the Chattahoochee and Coosa.

Stormwater Management – Landscape and Natural Resources

(Photo Source: University of Central Florida)

Now, that we’ve learned about watersheds. It’s time to get back to Atlanta’s problem. When I think about Atlanta’s water dilemma, it reminds me of baseball. Baseball is a game of strikes and home runs. Let’s first examine Atlanta’s strikes by identifying the conditions that contribute to the city’s limited water supply. The first strike is its location. The metropolitan area isn’t in the most water rich area. In fact, almost all of the metro-Atlanta region’s water supply is from surface water, while only a small percentage comes from groundwater. Therefore, the region relies heavily on the reservoirs (A reservoir is a place where water is stored.) Lake Allatoona and Lake Lanier in the Coosa and Chattahoochee river basins, respectively. Eighty-seven percent of city’s water supply is from these reservoirs, primarily Lake Lanier.

Additionally, these reservoirs are located near the source of the river basins or headwaters and they travel down and across the state borders of Alabama and Florida. The river basins are Alabama-Coosa-Tallapoosa (ACT) and Apalachicola-Chattahoochee-Flint (AFC). All three states share the AFC river basin, while only Georgia and Alabama share the ACT river basin. Over the years, there has been a lot of debate, conflict, and litigation around how water in the river basins should be allocated and used. The clash between these states is commonly known as the “Tri-State Water Wars.” Technically, each state has water rights to the basins. However, Atlanta must limit the amount it takes from the reservoirs to avoid significantly decreasing the water flow in Alabama and Florida.  STRIIIKE ONE!

Can the tri-state water wars be resolved? | MNN - Mother ...

 (Photo Source: Atlanta Regional Commission)

Make sure to come back for my next post where I’ll talk about Atlanta’s other two strikes and some of its home runs. Have something to add or thoughts of your own on ATL’s water supply? Leave a comment below or on our Facebook or Instagram page! See ya next time!

About the Author

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Sydney-Alyce is GreenATLiens’ Water ATLien and resident ecologist. She’s passionate about approaching problems through an ecological and sustainable framework. You can follow her on Instagram at @thesoulleaf. The full bio of Sydney-Alyce and all GreenATLiens content writers will be coming soon!

Motivation Monday #14 – Stephanie Melara

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Happy #MotivationMonday ATLiens! Meet Stephanie Melara, sustainable fashion stylist and ethical slow fashion boutique owner based in Atlanta. Originally from San Francisco and a long-time Floridian, Stephanie grew her ATLien antennae >3 years ago when she moved here with her fiancee and life partner for work.

Stephanie brought with her impressive credentials in sustainable fashion -her BA in Fashion Merchandise & Marketing from the Miami International Institute of Art & Design + >15 years of fashion industry experience where she’s pushed the envelope from within to reduce waste and improve sustainable practices. While many retailers would landfill merchandise, hangers, and mannequins without batting an eye, Stephanie organized a mannequin swap in Gainesville, FL while working at a big box fashion retailer, and has consistently made an effort to repurpose waste through the secondhand economy. It hasn’t always been easy, for many fashion retailers this is against company policy, but when a policy is unjust should it be followed?

Stephanie founded her ethical fashion boutique ShopCaliRose in 2016, partnering with L.A.-based designed Lily Chavez of Together California to design bathing suits made from bamboo and recycled plastic.

After arriving on the scene in Atlanta, Stephanie became actively involved in the OwlSwap clothing swaps on the KSU campus. Post-pandemic Stephanie looks forward to getting involved in facilitating more clothing swaps in Atlanta once it is safe to do so.

Stephanie’s passion for sustainability began with family camping trips as a child. Her Dad was really big on camping and from those early experiences Stephanie grew to appreciate nature – and by extension want to protect it from environmental degradation. Having climbed the ranks in the sustainable fashion world, the next challenge she’s chosen is to conquer sustainable built environment. Stephanie is currently completing her real estate license to become an environmental agent and looks forward to applying her passion for sustainability to that realm as well.

Stephanie’s Call To Action

Go thrifting more! Go to a clothing swap! There’s so much quality, usable secondhand fashion to go around, it would be such a waste not to tap into that overly abundant resource.

To learn more head to Steph’s ethical slow fashion boutique @shopcalirose and check out her Alive & Lovely blog at stephyymel.wordpress.com!

Fridays For Future #14 – Development without Displacement

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Bright and early on Friday, May 1, 2020 at 7:30am 158 or so people gathered in front of their computers to attend Southface’s first virtual Sustainable Atlanta Roundtable. This month’s roundtable was dedicated to a heated topic in Metro Atlanta – development without displacement. As the Atlanta Beltline and other developments have caused property values to rise , affordable housing has become a central issue for mitigating the economic and geographic displacement of Atlanta residents (1, 2, 3). Panelists Nathaniel Smith of the Partnership for Southern Equity, Donell Woodson of the Lupton Center, and Alex Trachtenburg of Southface joined moderator Michael Halicki of Park Pride for a discussion on equitable development in Atlanta.

But first, what does equitable development have to do with sustainability? If we define sustainability as maintaining an ecological balance by avoiding the depletion of natural resources, there are many linkages between environmental sustainability and equitable urban development. The first is urban sprawl. Equitable development can help prevent displacement of low-income residents and in turn prevent further urban sprawl. Increased urban sprawl presupposes car dependence, which leads to a number of environmental issues. Adverse environmental effects of urban sprawl include:

  • Carbon emissions, known to increase atmospheric temperatures, otherwise known as climate change or global warming (4)
  • Air pollution, directly harming plants and wildlife as well as humans -think increased cases of asthma and asthma hospitalizations, or the less obvious effect of increased infant mortality rates (5, 6, 7, 8)
  • Noise pollution, known to adversely affect wildlife as well as humans (9, 10)
  • Adverse public health outcomes, such as increased rates of obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease associated with a car dependent lifestyle (11, 12, 13). These adverse public outcomes make our healthcare systems more expensive to maintain, which in turn limits available funding for allocation to sustainable development, cyclically reinforcing environmental injustice.

This is just one linkage between equitable development and sustainable development. There are others. Now that it is clear how equitable development is connected to sustainability, captured here for you are the presentations from Southface’s Sustainable Atlanta Roundtable on Development without Displacement:

Nathaniel Smith of the Partnership for Southern Equity

Donell Woodson of the Lupton Center

Alex Trachtenburg of Southface

Q&A

Q. Nathaniel: Is there a gold standard for development without displacement an if so who’s doing it right? What is the first step or the top policy priority locally and statewide in GA?

A. (Paraphrased) There is no gold standard. Solutions in NY will be different from solutions in the Rust Belt because the communities are structured differently. The 14th St. Bridge Project in Atlanta has been a very encouraging development. Efforts around Climate and Energy with the Equitable & Renewable Cities Initiative being carried out with PSE and the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability is helping build racial equity through sustainable development. We have to undo and redesign the delivery system for affordable housing and development in cities and in regions. Right now the delivery system is driven by profit, is imbalanced, is not driven by the voices of community -and values success through production rather than creating whole, sustained communities. Focus more on people over production and profit is the way forward.

(Two more questions, uncaptured. If you have notes on these additional questions in the Q&A session please send your notes to greenatliens@gmail.com to have them added to this post)

Q. 83.2% of those in the hospital for COVID-19 are black. Recent New York Times article As Georgia Reopens, Virus Study Shows Black Residents May Bear Brunt raised legitimate questions of structural inequality and structural racism in public health. What efforts will you make to turn “lemons into lemonade” and return not to the old normal but to move forward into a more equitable and inclusive now?

A.

Nathaniel: I hope COVID-19 has helped the world understand that no matter how hard you try to avoid it, structural racism will continue to be the great sin of america. If we don’t find ways to undo that sin we will all suffer. It’s not just about COVID-19, it’s also about the 2008 foreclosure crisis, it’s about us sitting in traffic because structural racism won’t allow MARTA to expand into commuter communities. We must continue to push our white allies and advocates to be more bold and courageous in confronting structural racism and inequality and speaking truth to power. Staying on the sidelines makes us complicit. That is the space I am currently trying to create.

Alex: COVID-19 has exposed unjust systems across the globe. Hopefully people are seeing that we’re all inextricably linked. We can all be affected, we can all lose our jobs and our quality of life. How do we look at development in a way that uplifts everyone, that promotes intergenerational wealth within marginalized communities? Hopefully this pandemic will prompt more policy conversations at the local, state, and national level to achieve that.

Donell: Two thoughts: Dr. King’s thought of beloved community, which is not just theoretical but actionable. Let’s all think about place, our geographic location. Name what we love about it. Then start from that point to work our way back to the issues so that we hold our intention – that which we love in our place – and what needs to be righted. Place is where we find common unity or community. Orienting ourselves around place is the launching pad for building community.

What else do you think can be done to achieve more equitable, sustainable development in Atlanta? Let us know in the comments on this blog or our Facebook and Instagram!

Motivation Monday #13 – Natasha Dörr-Kapczynski

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Happy #MotivationMonday GreenATLiens! Meet Natasha Dörr-Kapczynski, one of Atlanta’s leading youth climate organizers. Dörr-Kapczynski is making Atlanta greener through grassroots community organizing and education centered around climate change both on and off her high school campus! Currently completing her senior year at Campbell High School in Smyrna, Dörr-Kapczynski founded Atlanta for the Planet in March 2019 and has been involved in local environmental activism since the sixth grade.

Atlanta for the Planet is an Atlanta youth-led organization working in coordination with other local climate advocacy groups to organize climate strikes, educational campaigns, and legislative advocacy efforts. Dörr-Kapczynski and her team have successfully mobilized hundreds of students to the Global Climate Strikes last fall (one of which fell on her 18th birthday), and more recently the GA Earth Day Live event taking place April 22-24.

Dörr-Kapczynski is celebrating her third and final year as president of Campbell High School’s Earth Club. In addition to managing Campbell High School’s recycling program, Earth Club is preparing the next generation of youth leaders as well as engaging the wider community through local events. Under Dörr-Kapczynski’s supervision Campbell High School’s Earth Club provides regular after-school programming at Smyrna Elementary School, engaging 2nd-5th graders in nature appreciation activities, upcycling crafts, and recycling education. This year was Dörr-Kapczynski’s second year in a row co-organizing @sustainablesmyrna’s Earth Day Festival -this year virtually due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Dörr-Kapczynski is looking forward to starting her freshman year as a Foundation Fellow at UGA in the Fall. She hasn’t yet decided on her major, but you can rest assured she’ll continue her climate activism both in Athens and Atlanta for the foreseeable future (:

Natasha’s Call to Action:
Get involved! Come to our next climate strikes and events! Follow @atlantafortheplanet for updates, or sign up for their email list here.

Fridays for Future #13 – Local Food is Essential

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by Meredith Bowen

 

“Essential business,” it’s the hot button phrase of the hour. But what is an essential business? How do we define it? What we deem essential is strongly affected by what position of privilege we come from. Essential needs; food, shelter, safety. But let’s go back to the first word. Food. Nourishment. I think we can all agree food is essential to life. But how many of us are thinking about where our food is grown? Where is it sourced? I am going to go a step further. Locally sourced food is essential to life. 

Just after the shelter-in-place order was issued, I was having a conversation with someone about the idea of an essential business. Almost in passing, they said to me, “an organic produce farm is not an essential business.” Hold your fire, I think they meant in the grand scheme of grocery stores, pharmacies, and other vital services, a small organic farm selling high-quality produce to restaurants and members of the upper and upper middle class was not necessarily “essential”.  But why is it we see our local produce in this way? According to this directory on Farmers Markets Online, there are nearly a hundred open air farmers markets throughout Georgia. Given the amount of produce going directly to Georgians through this channel, and not including the amount sold through CSA, farmboxes or other means, we start to see just how vital local agriculture is in our state.

 Under Section 6 Part F of the executive order made by Mayor Keisha Bottoms in March farms, farmers markets, and produce stands are considered essential businesses permitted to continue running during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a powerful statement the city has made in regard to our local food systems. Of course grocery stores are essential, but if they are essential then the farms supplying them must also be essential.  But here the city is saying not just any farm, but the farms within our very community are essential. Our farmers.

And rightfully so, according to the FDA, 20% of food in this U.S. is imported. Within that 20%, 35% of it is fresh produce (source). But in the state of Georgia, agriculture is one of our main exports. It generates $73.3 billion annually, while agriculture and its related fields employ one in every seven Georgians (source). It is true many Georgia farms supply produce to hip local restaurants, but currently that supply chain is disrupted. And why is it necessary to go to a fancy restaurant to get locally grown food? And why is locally grown, fresh food only available to those of privilege? Essentially how can we make locally grown food more universally accessible?

The City of Atlanta has made one step in the right direction by doubling the value of SNAP/EBT dollars at most farmer’s markets. The city’s efforts towards increasing fresh food access are apparent in Aglanta’s 2020 Fresh Food Access Report. According to the report 52% of the city’s population lived in USDA-defined Low Income Low Access (LILA) areas. In 2020 that number shrank to 30%, due in no small part to the expansion of community farmer’s markets. While there is always more work to be done, we as a city have made a clear statement: Good, fresh food is essential, and we are going to grow it ourselves.  

Atlanta’s Low Income, Low Access (LILA) food deserts in 2015 and 2020.
The impact of Atlanta Farmer’s Markets on LILA Food Deserts

If you’re interested in adding more local food to your diet, Aglanta provides a list of options for free and reduced-price food access, paid access to food delivery, farmers markets that are open, and other ways you can get locally grown food into your fridge whether we are in a global pandemic or not.  

Meredith is GreenATLiens’ Foodie ATLien writing and reporting on all things sustainable food systems in Atlanta. She is an actor and a low-waster transplant originally from Cincinnati, OH. She will likely talk your ear off about locally grown food, carbon emissions, or animal welfare. But when she is not, she can be found hiking with her dog, kayaking, or riding her horse. Her latest obsession is the connection between growing your own food and the rich fertilizer that is manure. In short, she’s trying to grow tomatoes out of horse poop. She also does stand up comedy.

Motivation Monday #12 – Ree Shreeves

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Annnnnnd we’re back! We temporarily pressed pause on our regular postings so we could form a larger team of writers and activists to keep this thing going! So without further ado, GreenATLiens is very proud to introduce one of Atlanta’s greenest, Anamarie “Ree” Shreeves!

Meet Ree Shreeves. Ree is the founder of Fort Negrita, Atlanta’s first zero waste community outreach and education organization. Founded in 2013, Fort Negrita has evolved over the years from spreading awareness about proper recycling practices and eco-travel to becoming not only an online zero waste guide to Atlanta but also an organizer of community events, outreach to Haiti, and providing accessible upcycled, handmade items to support the transition to a zero waste lifestyle.

Originally from the D.C. area, Ree came to Atlanta in 2013 and ended up falling in love with the city. Upon completing a 30-day zero waste challenge in 2014, Ree decided there was no turning back and decided to share what she’d learned with the community. Check out this CNN article featuring Ree describing the zero waste lifestyle years before many of us had ever heard of it!

At the start of Ree’s zero waste journey, she bought a reusable pad at Sevananda and thought to herself, “I can make this!” Always community-minded, soon thereafter Ree began organizing “pad parties,” first among friends in people’s homes, then later at Wombfest, a women’s wellness and reproductive health festival, and most recently in Haiti! Ree is not one to boast of all she’s accomplished, however the event programming side of Fort Negrita is nothing short of impressive. Are you one of Zero Waste Atlanta’s >1,700 members? Founded by Ree in 2016. In addition to building community through the Zero Waste Atlanta group and zero waste period parties, Ree has also organized community clothing swaps, Earth Day events, a 15-day outreach trip to Haiti, among other environmental education events over the years.

Having just recently completed her master’s degree in Environmental Geography from Georgia State University, Ree is currently working with the West Atlanta Watershed Alliance (WaWa) engaging Atlanta’s youth in environmental stewardship and education. Ree affirms the way forward starts with educating our youth.

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Ree’s call to action:

For beginners: Start examining your trash. Little by little, find ways to reduce your waste and ecological footprint.

For intermediate-advanced: Read this one-pager “How to Build Community” by Syracuse Cultural Workers and brainstorm ideas for how you can begin implementing them in your community.

Image by Syracuse Cultural Workers

To join Ree in the Fort and learn more ways to get involved with Fort Negrita, visit FortNegrita.com.

Fridays for Future #13 – Georgia to oppose offshore oil and gas exploration?

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The Georgia Senate is currently reviewing SR 88, a resolution sponsored by Sen. Lester Jackson (D-2) to oppose seismic testing and oil and gas drilling along Georgia’s coast. The resolution aims to protect Georgia’s fishing and coastal tourism industries, beaches and salt marshes, and marine wildlife through their opposition to offshore oil and gas exploration of Georgia’s coast (source).

There are a number of endangered and threatened species inhabiting the Georgia coastline that would benefit from the acceptance of SR 88 including the right whale, the humpback whale, the West Indian manatee, the loggerhead sea turtle, the green sea turtle, the leatherback sea turtle, the Hawksbill sea turtle, the Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle, the piping plover, and the wood stork (source).

10 Georgia Endangered & Threatened Species
to Benefit from Passage of SR 88 – Slideshow

  • Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle – endangered
  • Hawksbill sea turtle – endangered
  • Leatherback sea turtle – endangered
  • Green sea turtle – threatened
  • Loggerhead sea turtle – threatened
  • Wood stork – endangered
  • Piping plover – threatened
  • West Indian manatee – endangered
  • Humpback whale – endangered
  • Right whale – endangered

So too, would Georgia’s fishing and coastal tourism industries. The resolution itself states that Georgia’s fishing and coastal tourism sustain over 21,000 jobs annually and contribute over $1.1 billion to Georgia’s economy. Oil and gas drilling would place over 368,000 acres of salt marshes along Georgia’s coast at risk for irreparable harm to both local ecosystems as well as cornerstone industries of the Georgia state economy.

How You Can Support Resolution 88

Step 1: Identify your Georgia state senator

Were you here last week to contact your Senator about the plastic bag bill? If so, you probably already have your state senator’s contact info. If not, simply type in your address into OpenStates.org to identify your Georgia state senator.

Step 2: Contact them to voice your support

Whether you prefer leaving a voicemail or an email, we’ve got you covered. Feel free to add your own personal story to grab your state senator’s attention! Below are a sample voicemail script and email template for contacting your Georgia state senator:

Sample voicemail

Hello, my name is ________. I’m your Georgia constituent contacting you to vote YES on Georgia Senate Resolution 88. I have lived in ______ since ____ and I am a strong supporter of environmental conservation. As your constituent, I urge you to protect our environment as well as our economy from the dangers of the fossil fuel industry. Georgia’s coast is home to a number of threatened and endangered species as well as 21,000 coastal tourism and fisheries jobs. If something were to go wrong with oil and gas exploration off our coast, not only would fragile wildlife populations suffer, industries that contribute over $1.1bn to Georgia’s economy would suffer as well. Please vote YES on Resolution 88, thank you.

Sample email

Dear ____________,

My name is [first and last name] and I have lived in [area] for [amount of time}. I’m writing to voice my support for GA Senate Resolution 88. As your constituent, I urge you to protect our environment as well as our economy from the dangers of the fossil fuel industry. Georgia’s coast is home to a number of threatened and endangered species as well as 21,000 coastal tourism and fisheries jobs. If something were to go wrong with fossil fuel exploration off our coast, not only would fragile wildlife populations suffer, industries that contribute over $1.1bn to Georgia’s economy would suffer as well. Vote YES on Resolution 88. Thank you for your time.

Sincerely,

[Name]
[City, State, Zip]

Step 3: Share with others

You can share this post with its voicemail and email templates using the Facebook and Twitter share buttons below, or you can visit our Instagram page and share on the gram. Stay green, ATLiens!

✌👽️

Motivation Monday #11 – 74K ATLiens Fighting Climate Change & More with MARTA

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Thank you, MARTA Martians!

Happy #MotivationMonday, GreenATLiens! Today’s Monday Motivation is the >74K MARTA Martians who make the city greener and the air cleaner every day by riding MARTA! Here’s a quick rundown of how MARTA Martians are helping reduce traffic, slow down climate change, and improve local public health.

MARTA & Traffic

Can you imagine another 74 THOUSAND cars on Atlanta’s interstates during rush hour? Neither can we. According to the Texas Transportation Institute, public transit users shave 32% off the time people spend in traffic on average (source). Taking public transit isn’t just good for alleviating traffic, it’s also good for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and for improving public health outcomes.

MARTA & Climate Change

According to a 2017 EPA study, transportation accounted for 29% of the U.S.’s greenhouse gas emissions (see below). No other sector, not even energy, surpassed transportation’s GHG emissions. Personal vehicles accounted for 59% of U.S. transport emissions. By contrast, rail accounted for 2% and “other,” which includes buses, accounted for 4%. The fuel efficiency of public transit allows transport of a greater number of people at lower emissions rates than car travel. MARTA riders, or MARTA Martians, are taking positive climate action every time they board, in addition to helping reduce traffic and improve local air quality.

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MARTA & Public Health

Air pollution is known to be a trigger of asthma (source). While the national average for asthma prevalence among children hovers at 7.5% (source), the most recent data available from the Georgia Department of Public Health reports 13.9% of Georgians ages 0-17 have been diagnosed with asthma (source). It’s worth noting that asthma prevalence and asthma hospitalization rates are higher for black and Latinx children than for white children (source). Public transit’s positive impact on public health was demonstrated during the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, when fewer people in metro Atlanta drove cars and more used transit. Child emergency room visits for asthma dropped by as much as 45% (source).

Image source: Environment America Note, although cars do not emit ozone, cars’ CO2 emissions heat the atmosphere, increasing problematic ozone levels (source).

Riding MARTA doesn’t just help Atlantans breathe easier. Air pollution from cars is linked to a number of other health problems including heart attack, stroke, cancer and mental health problems (source). Mothers exposed to air pollution are at a higher risk of low birth weight, pre-term birth and stillbirth, which disproportionately impacts women of color (source, source). For older adults, long-term exposure to particulate pollution has been associated with an increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia (source).

Thank you to all you MARTA Martians out there taking climate action on the daily and improving traffic and public health for all ATLiens in the process!

✌️❤️ 👽

Sources list 

“Asthma Surveillance.” Georgia Department of Public Health, 2016, dph.georgia.gov/asthma-surveillance.

Bishop, Kelly C, et al. “Hazed and Confused: The Effect of Air Pollution on Dementia.” NBER, National Bureau of Economic Research, 30 Aug. 2018, www.nber.org/papers/w24970.

“Burden of Asthma on Minorities.” AAFA.org, Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America, 2005, www.aafa.org/burden-of-asthma-on-minorities/.

Casale, Matt, et al. “Trouble in the Air.” Environment America, Feb. 2020, environmentamerica.org/feature/ame/trouble-air.

“Facing the Facts about Atlanta’s Air Quality.” Southern Environmental Law Center, 2005, www.southernenvironment.org/cases-and-projects/fact-sheets/facing-the-facts-about-atlantas-air-quality.

“Fast Facts on Transportation Greenhouse Gas Emissions.” EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, 16 July 2019, www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/fast-facts-transportation-greenhouse-gas-emissions.

“FastStats – Asthma.” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 19 Jan. 2017, www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/asthma.htm.

Mehra, Renee, et al. “Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Adverse Birth Outcomes: Differences by Racial Residential Segregation.” SSM Population Health, El Sevier, 28 May 2019, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6545386/.

Montgomery, William K. “Cars and Air Pollution.” ADEQ, 2008, www.adeq.state.ar.us/air/planning/ozone/cars.aspx.

“What Triggers or Causes Asthma?” AAFA.org, Oct. 2019, www.aafa.org/asthma-triggers-causes/.

Wickert, David. “Atlanta Gambles on MARTA Expansion amid Declining Transit Use.” AJC.com, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 13 June 2018, www.ajc.com/news/local-govt–politics/atlanta-gambles-marta-expansion-amid-declining-transit-use/df7NwwbopQmkuueHHJm40I/.