Five years ago, the City of Seattle began collecting a tax on sweetened beverages. The tax funds children’s health and learning – and food equity programs for the city. This year, Seattle is investing $2 million in 21 community-led food equity projects. Many of them are focused on Indigenous food sovereignty.
Among those is yəhaw̓ Indigenous Creatives Collective, which received $100,000 for food sovereignty work. Last year, yəhaw̓ bought an untamed acre and a half of land, near Kubota Garden in South Seattle. Now they’re slowly uncovering and restoring the property, to create a place where community can thrive.
At a recent weekend work party, volunteers took turns with a weed whacker.
"The blackberries, it’s so thick and so very tall! In some areas, it's like probably seven - eight feet tall,” said Shameka Gagnier, who is leading the restoration work.
Gagnier said they like to take a gentle approach, taking time to discover as they go.
“There's a lot back here that when you go deeper into the forest, and there were some huckleberry, elderberry, cedar, rowan, hawthorne. You know, there's a lot of medicine back there, so I’m really curious,” they said.
Making space to grow hard-to-find foods
Another discovery deep inside the property: a dilapidated Victorian greenhouse. It’s a shadow of its former self, a jumble of broken panes and delicate wooden framing, with trees and plants poking through. But it’s still standing.
“You can see really robust infrastructure. There's like steam pipes, barn doors,” said yəhaw̓ Executive Director Asia Tail.
"We want to try to keep the trees that are growing inside of it if we can, to kind of build around them.”
She said they plan to rebuild it for use as a hybrid art studio and greenhouse, where community members could grow foods that are hard to find.
“Plants, maybe from their homelands, that they don't get to grow, usually, outside in the Northwest. We can try to grow here in that greenhouse.”
They’ll also grow foods in garden beds outside, and host workshops aimed at making healthy and culturally-appropriate foods more accessible. For example, they recently held a soil-testing workshop at yəhaw̓, to screen for toxins like arsenic and lead. Tail said pollution from Tacoma’s Asarco copper smelter still affects topsoil in South Seattle. She added that often affects BIPOC communities the most.
“So we feel like it's a really good skill for our participants, just learn what to test for, how to test for it, so they can do that at home. And then we'll also use that information to decide where we want to grow food on our site as well,” she said.
Tail said they’re still holding work parties nearly every week, just to clear the land. But the $100,000 grant from the city will allow them to integrate food sovereignty in everything they do here: helping people learn where their food comes from and how to have autonomy over what they eat and how to grow it.
Sharing nature and self-determination
Pitching in at the weekend work party was another group that has received funding from Seattle’s sweetened beverage tax in the past, Hip Hop is Green. Founder Keith Tucker brought a group of young people to yəhaw̓ help out and learn.
“I didn't know how cool this place was until I came here, I didn't know what to expect,” he said. “But this is way more than we ever thought it was going to be.”
His organization teaches holistic wellness, but based in a highly urban setting. He said yəhaw̓ is giving him ideas.
“It's so good to get out in nature — and bathe, take a bath in nature. You know what I'm saying? So that's what we're teaching the kids here,” Tucker said.
Neighbors also stopped by to help. During work parties, everyone is invited to take as many breaks as they like and along with healthy snacks, there are art supplies at every table.
Miriam Zmiewski-Angelova said she has come out to support the group multiple times. She wants to see more work of this kind, in her neighborhood and elsewhere. She said creating space for self-determination – especially around native cultures and food – is important.
“I'm not exactly sure all of what is going to be here,” she said. “But I'm really excited to see what's going to be the future of this land, and happy to support in any way I can.”
