January Newsletter from ALP: The Move and Beyond

Dear Community,

This month, we say goodbye to our former home, the historic Miss Major-Jay Toole Building which housed generations of organizers and held grassroots groups focusing on manifesting social change for our communities. Each year, fewer of us have been able to sustain there because of the escalating cost of rent and shifts in economics that impact our ability to thrive. Building strength through collaboration and ritual and honoring each other’s work is how we have been building resilience during this part of the Restoration Period.  

After a challenging year, ALP has found its equilibrium. Displacement because of gentrification is a personal subject for everyone in this organization. It is an extension of colonial practices that have been traumatizing and killing  our ancestors for generations. So our challenge is not a new challenge, and in fact, it strengthens our resolve to put our hearts into the work of building our communities in resistance to this force that harms our lives.

We are returning to our Brooklyn home, a sacred space that has held many generations of struggle in the work toward liberation. As we return, we are taking care to restore the space and create safety and comfort for each other in how we want to re-inhabit our own history together, in a new formation.

We are proud of all of our community members, and curious new attendees, who participated in our moving parties and created so much joy with us in a time period that was inevitably stressful. Community made it work. And the organizing of all those hands at work is something our dedicated staff was responsible for. We moved mountains. We put the movement in moving! We got it done!

We're also appreciative to everyone who joined us at our Fuck You, Gentrification party and helped usher us out of Manhattan with a bang. We participated in a ceremony to close the space and set new intentions for the future, laughed, danced, held each other, and raised nearly $3,000 to support ALP's transition.

Currently, we're examining where we are replicating structural oppression inside of our community and addressing that information with loving kindness, and with an actionable plan for concerted change. It’s hard work. We have to become vulnerable in order to reshape ourselves into a form that fits what the future hold for us. This is the nature of regeneration. It starts with vulnerable transformation, and it doesn’t stop. We’re learning new ways of being with each other in this bittersweet time.

In Solidarity,

Janhavi Pakrashi
Communications Coordinator

The Day Against Hate is an opportunity for communities across New York to come together, learn concrete upstander skills, and begin to build the relationships we need to protect ourselves and each other from hate violence. Hate violence is rising. Jewish, Muslim, Black and Brown, immigrant, and LGBTQ communities — all of us have a shared interest in defeating Islamophobia, anti-Semitism, xenophobia, racism, homophobia & transphobia, and all forms of identity-based violence.

By participating in the Date Against Hate, residents of New York City will take another step away from fear, and toward each other. None of us is responsible for the bigoted ideologies that undergird hate violence, but all of us have the ability to fight back. By becoming upstanders, we can take greater responsibility for the safety and character of our city, and ourselves.

Events will be hosted at locations throughout the five boroughs, at times throughout the day on February 13, 2020. RSVP and we will send you information about a day against hate location near you. Register early, as capacity will be limited.

OUR WORDS: BLACK LGBTSTGNC PERFORMANCES, INSTALLATION, & VIDEO

Performances, installation, and video projection combine to create space for Black LGBTSTGNC stories curated by ourselves. Produced by Acacia Rodriguez in partnership with the Audre Lorde Project.

"Our Words" is part of Myrtle Avenue Partnership's Black Artstory Month. Black Artstory month 2020 salutes Fort Greene and Clinton Hill African-American artists and activists that creatively and courageously wielded their words in pursuit of a higher cause through the SOME WORDS festival. The title for Black Artstory Month 2020 is inspired by Audre Lorde’s poem Coal. Myrtle Avenue’s Black Artstory Month is an annual series, begun in 2013, that elevates and celebrates this neighborhood’s long-standing history as a haven for Black artistry, with past themes including Brooklyn style, healing, notions of home, and remembering.