New York City life part 1

I've been meaning to write this update since I left the UK, and then since i started Avodah, and then since i started work but will all the business and exciting things i've been up to I haven't really had a chance. However this weekend i've been ill in bed with a cold which although not overly pleasant, has given me a chance to catch up on a few things.

For those of you I haven't spoken to since I left the UK, I spent a wonderful few weeks at the end of August on a Queer Talmud (jewish text study) retreat outside chicago, then a wonderful week or so in Boston, followed by a shabbat on a singing retreat at a jewish farm in rural Connecticut. (more detail about these another time - safe to say it was a wonderful welcome into the US Jewish community).

Then Avodah started in the last week of August. For those I haven't properly explained to, I'm on a program called Avodah for the year. This program is an intensive year where you work in a non-profit job, live with other young jews doing non-profit work and have an intensive program of jewish learning throughout the year.

Avodah cohort of 2016/17 from all 4 cities

For the first time ever Avodah started with a national retreat in upstate NY, 4 cities have avodah groups and all 4 came together for this retreat. We did an interesting mix of learning on everything from different Jewish practices to anti-oppression training. I'd say it was about 100 people in total, all with different backgrounds and experiences. Avodah also brought in a few speakers including Ruth Messinger (President of American Jewish world Service) and Yavilah Macoy, an educator and musician and organiser for Jews of colour and around racial justice. These people were really inspiring in terms of the ceilings they had shattered and the way they viewed activism with a beautiful mix of pragmatism and beautiful visions at the same time.

Exploring Washington heights with fellow avodahniks

After about 4 days we split up and headed back to our respective cities for a week of city orientation. This included moving into our apartments and exploring our local areas. NYC has two cohorts, one in Bushwick, Brooklyn and the other in Washington heights which is uptown manhattan. I'm in washington heights and we have two adjacent apartments where we use both the spaces. Orientation was a bit intense but also fun, we got to go to the NYC museum and learn about various change making movements and key periods in the city's history. We got to visit congregation bet simchat torah which is the largest lgbtq synagogue in the world, as  well as meet more interesting people from the jewish and non-profit world across the city. 

Most of my Avodah house by the hudson river

We had a great Shabbat together and I began the first of my shul hopping across NYC adventures with attending 'fort tryon jewish community centre', it's a traditional synagogue in terms of its practice but radically progressive in terms of its politics, so women leading and in talitot (probably more than in most reform shuls) but an orthodox service structure. I was invited to do an Aliyah on my first visit, and the rabbi came up and chatted to all the new people there. It was an extremely welcoming environment and a different style of community to anything i've experienced before.

The next week I started work. I'm working for the Urban Homesteading Assistance board. A bit of history is needed to understand UHAB, best to look up; 

red-lining http://liberationschool.org/red-lining-and-the-historical-roots-of-housing-segregation-in-new-york-city/  

http://www.brickunderground.com/blog/2015/10/history_of_redlining  

white flight/Bankruptcy of the city http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/05/nyregion/recalling-new-york-at-the-brink-of-bankruptcy.html 

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/07/white-flight-alive-and-well/399980/ 

https://www.thenation.com/article/legacy-1970s-fiscal-crisis/ 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Bronx#1970s:_.22The_Bronx_is_burning.22

The view from outside my office building (my office is on the 20th floor)
that's the brooklyn bridge and brooklyn.

So in a nutshell (white) people were abandoning the city, and landlords were abandoning buildings in the 70s but communities of colour still remained and needed places to live, my organisation came into being to solve the problem by giving communities control of their own buildings. It came under a state law known as sweat equity and beget the creation of HDFC coops which are community run low income coops.

These are most commonly formed out of the TILL (tenant iniative something something ahhh acronyms) program which used tenant associations to form coops, whilst renovating dilapidated buildings. Since then my organisation has been working to maintain these coops, create new ones and generally push for better more affordable housing across the city.

Of course the organisation looks a little different today, and when the programs and organisations were formed in the 70s no one ever imagined the housing boom that would exist in the city today, particularly the gentrification of certain areas. Primarily there are 3 areas of work in my organisation:

 My new bike, and the cycle path I go to work along

Tenant work - organisers who work with communities to organise them into tenant associations and unions to fight for their rights and create strong neighbourhood ties amongst all residents.

Policy and Coop development - How do we create new coops and affordable housing in a different housing market? how do we react to constant changes in housing, ie the introduction of Air Bnb and their effects on affordable housing. Most recently Uhab has been accredited as a developer and acquired a revolving line of credit for the purpose of funding the transition of buildings into low income coops. 

Member services - Once buildings are coops how do we support them, organise them and help maintain them as affordable and equitable.

I'm in the member services team so work primarily with existing residents. We're working with residents on sustainability, democracy and resident advocacy. However i'm already discovering one of the great things about this organisation is everyone definitely works together. I'm partnering with the policy team to help influence the new housing policy on coops the city is currently releasing, as well as learning organising techniques from the tenant organising team to bring into the membership team. It's all fascinating, this alongside the huge diversity of backgrounds and experiences of both the staff as well as the communities i get to meet. In the last two weeks i've been to a training in the bronx, a meeting on the upper west side, a day of meetings in harlem, a tenants union meeting in crown heights, brooklyn (organisers among you look up crown heights tenants union as an amazing example of successful organising).

Leafleting and training in the bronx

I'm certainly excited to learn more from the people around me and be part of such a dynamic organisation.

On a social side i've spent a long of time hanging out with my avodah cohort, there are 24 of us so we're a fairly diverse bunch and it's been great getting to know lots of different people. I've been to a few different Jewish community events of different denominations, 'romemu' which is a large renewal community, on Shabbat a ton of brooklyn shuls are coming together for seudah, havdallah and selichot with an incredible jewish musician called joey weisenberg, so very much looking forward to that. 

Anyway that's most my news so far, what with quite a few evenings working and avodah obligations it's been a little hard to get totally settled in the city, but that should even out fairly soon. NY, much like London seems to have too much to do at all hours of the day, but as per i'm enjoying not stopping and taking in all there is around me.

Exploring 'Smorgasburg' an overpriced food festival in Williamsburg Brookyln with avodahniks! Yes the bagels here are obviously up to my standards!