SOTRU and Ropeadope are teaming up to celebrate and support American communities – on your shirt.

Can a T-shirt be more than just a T-shirt? What if instead of just a  stylish illustration, it’s design symbolizes a place and the  stories, struggles and triumphs of the people that call that place  home? What if the shirt has a greater purpose than just being a  comfortable garment to wear?

State of the Re:Union (SOTRU) has teamed up with the purveyors of  cool at Ropeadope.com to aid community charities across the country.  Representing select cities from past SOTRU episodes, each of these  designs has been created by an artist local to that area, and  proceeds from each sale go directly to a specific charity in that  community. Featured cities include:

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Brooklyn, New York

These shirts were inspired by our Brooklyn episode, touting artwork from the local Brooklyn artist, Aerosyn-Lex, and the proceeds will benefit Urban Word NYC. These tees are the first of some quality choice threads that have the power to make friends and influence people, or at the very least inspire some interesting conversation.

Las Vegas, Nevada

For those of you out there who like to take a gamble on what they wear, then this tee is certainly worth your while. The SOTRU episode on Las Vegas, NV, exploring the unfamiliar and lackluster side of Sin City.  The local artist, Stephan Maman, created a SOTRU tee that will really get the dialogue going. The proceeds for these shirts will benefit the Shine a Light organization which provides living essentials (water, food, clothing, etc.) and services to those who live in the tunnels beneath Las Vegas.

Los Angeles, California

SOTRU’s Los Angeles episode spotlighting the city of the Angels in California, gave inspiration to the creator of these tees by L.A.’s  Jim Darling, with the proceeds helping the People Assisting the Homeless (PATH). This organization provides the tools that men and women need to help them become self-sufficient and successful at remaining off of the streets.

Austin, Texas

Another opportunity to add to your already profound wardrobe is the tee designed by local Austin, TX artist, Brandon Ortwein. This tee’s design represents some of the interesting characters that are discovered in SOTRU’s Austin episode These proceeds will directly benefit the Health Alliance for Austin Musicians (HAAM).

Will wearing one of these T-shirts help you change the world? No,  that’s still up to you. But it will showcase your brilliant taste in  public media, look good and benefit programs dedicated to making their communities a better place.

Click here to place your order today.

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About Ropeadope
Ropeadope is a record label and coveted clothing brand that uses the tee shirt as a medium for knowledge and pride. Past collaborations with Blue Note Records, Okayplayer, The Love Movement and others have been well received amongst community tastemakers and fans. Ropeadope’s message has always been one of knowing your history and supporting community. Ropeadope is proud to bring their talents to this collaboration, supporting American communities.

Cleveland, Ohio is a city that was made by entrepreneurs, but for decades, it’s been known as a city that’s a shell of its former manufacturing-era glorious self. However, Cleveland is being embraced by a new generation of entrepreneurs as a place to put their dreams in motion. This is a now a city of entrepreneurship in a range of incarnations… in their kids’ education, in the environment, even in beer. This is an hour of entrepreneurial stories, taking a look at that go-get-em-seize-your-dreams energy in a variety of forms.

State of the Re:Union wants to hear from you! Use the comment section below to let us know what you think about our latest episode, Entrepreneurs at Work.

  [podcast]http://sotrupodcasts.creativeempirell.netdna-cdn.com/Cleveland_Podcast.mp3[/podcast][/podcast]

People are few and far between in Wyoming.  Those that do live here prize tradition, self-reliance, and their connection to the land.  So when change comes to the high plains—an oil boom, a minister with new ideas—communities here are tested.   And neighbors have to strike a balance between preserving their independent way of life, and learning to rely on one another. We trek to the small towns and remote ranches of Wyoming, meeting people as they adapt to the New Old West.

Tell us what you think about our Wyoming episode, The New Old West. Just comment below to get the conversation started.

  [podcast]http://sotrupodcasts.creativeempirell.netdna-cdn.com/Wyoming_Podcast.mp3[/podcast]  [podcast]http://sotrupodcasts.creativeempirell.netdna-cdn.com/Wyoming_Podcast.mp3[/podcast][/podcast]

The Bronx has long been seen as a symbol of America’s failings.  For many people here, ‘making it’ means escaping the crime and poverty of their borough.  But some have refused to flee. This episode shines a light on the hold-outs and the dreamers, people who’ve committed their lives to keeping chaos at bay in the Bronx.

What did you think of Still Rising from the Ashes? Start the discussion by using the comment section below to let us know what you think.

  [podcast]http://sotrupodcasts.creativeempirell.netdna-cdn.com/Bronx_Podcast.mp3[/podcast]  [/podcast]

  After Hurricane Katrina ravaged the area, Mississippi Gulf Coast residents were forced to come together to deal with the aftermath. Then, just as they were starting to get back on their feet, the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster dumped millions of barrels of oil into the water just off their shores. Cumulatively, these events have made environmentalists out of a whole lot of Gulf Coast residents who may not have considered themselves as such… We tell an hour of stories about the fight for the natural world Gulf Coast bringing residents together, both with one another and with unlikely partners—and how, in some instances, that fight is turning out to be exactly what a community needed to survive.

We would love to hear what you think about our newest episode, Defending the Gulf. Simply comment below to get the conversation started.

 

Low and Slow – The Low Riders of Española

Despite modern stereotypes, low riders are a celebrated family tradition in Española, New Mexico. The town was even nicknamed “The low rider capital of the world” decades ago. This video is a companion to the State of the Re:Union episode, Española – The Land Remembers, and explores the incredible culture of these amazing vehicles and their owners.

Discover why this pastime is as much about community as it is about cars, check out the full episode for more information on the surprising history of low riders and share your thoughts by posting your comment below.

We’ve heard the complaint a million times: social media ironically makes us less social. Though it keeps us up-to-date with each other, online networks can also isolate us behind computer screens and disconnect us from real life. Maybe that’s why Google+ has received so much hype for its group video chat feature, which allows people to actually see and hear each other as they communicate online. Personally, though, I’m even more excited about another lesser-known Website that’s going even further to put the social back in social media.  The site GrubWithUs.com is helping people get past their computer screen barrier and connect at the best possible place: the dinner table.

A Chicago start-up, GrubWithUs uses social media to organize dinners at local restaurants for strangers who want to meet new people. I first heard about the Website when I read a great New York Times article by technology reporter Jenna Wortham, who described her own experience with the service in New York.  After visiting the website and looking at a list of dinners in her city, she opted for Thai food and bought a ticket, which usually cost about $25.  GrubWithUs works with restaurants to coordinate a family style menu for its group dinners, and after making a reservation, guests show up to eat and socialize.

Two college friends named Diashin Sugano and Eddy Lu came up with the idea for GrubWithUs when they moved to Chicago to open a pastry shop and struggled to make new friends.  “We didn’t really know anyone there, and we went to bars and lounges and did the normal thing to make friends, and it was really hard to meet people,” Sugano told the Los Angeles Times this spring when GrubWithUs expanded to Los Angeles. “And one of the social settings where we, and we think most people, feel comfortable in is over dinner — it’s one of the oldest traditions out there.” The idea caught on quickly, and today GrubWithUs organizes dinners in Chicago, New York, Washington D.C., Boston, Seattle, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Austin.

As far as social media sites go, I think GrubWithUs is on to something good. It’s using modern technology to build community beyond our computers, and people are getting excited about it. As Wortham reports in her article, more than 10,000 people have registered with the Website since it began organizing dinners last August.

At the same time, part of me cringes to think that we actually need an online social network to meet people in our communities. I’m reminded of dating Websites like Match.com or eHarmony.com that are quite effective and popular for many people out there. In her article, Wortham asks, “Do we really need the Web to make friends?” and I’d like to believe the answer is no; we can meet people randomly on the streets or though other acquaintances without the assistance of Facebook, Foursquare or even GrubWithUs.

Still, while I hope that community building never depends completely on social media, maybe it doesn’t hurt to harness the Internet for that purpose. As long as we only use social media to complement – not control – our social lives, Websites like GrubWithUs are just another fun way to meet people. At the very least the new meal-based social network has sparked my curiosity, perhaps even enough to try it out myself.

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We want to know:
1.    What do you think of GrubWithUs? Would you ever register for a dinner with strangers?
2.    Do you think we rely too much on social media to meet new people?

This post was inspired by the New York Times article, “Focusing on the social, minus the media,” as well as the Los Angeles Times article, “GrubWithUs looks to take social networking from the Web to the dinner table.”

During a time of great turbulence in the Detroit Public School System, one school has been cutting through the urban education stigma. The Catherine Ferguson Academy of Detroit, Michigan has become a beacon in the school system’s bleak future. With a budget deficit of $327 million, a declining enrollment and graduation rate among students, CFA has given pregnant teens and teenage mothers a fighting chance at enjoying a promising future. Through a unique approach to education, the Academy has a graduation rate of more than 90 percent, with the young mothers seeking to achieve higher education. The school’s success is attributed to the caring environment provided by the teachers and a driving commitment that is spearheaded by the Academy’s Principal G. Asenath Andrews. In addition to being educated in core school subjects, supplemental lessons are teaching these young mothers so much more than the basics. CFA students are learning about agriculture firsthand  through keeping bees, raising farm animals and learning to grow a garden. The staff create an even more fertile educational environment through limiting class sizes and providing free childcare. This progressive school has aided in the success of teenage mothers through providing them an opportunity to become responsible citizens, in addition to getting them one step further to breaking a harrowing cycle.

The school’s success was a quiet, but powerful presence in Detroit until the city’s Emergency Financial Manager, Robert Bobb, put CFA on a list of future public school closings. With this decision darkly looming over the school, the community decided that a peaceful protest was the answer for helping keep this public school mecca alive. After assembling pickets signs, teachers, students and the By Any Means Necessary protest group, the city and our nation began to find out just how important and pivotal this program has become in the community. Some students and teachers, both current and former, were prepared to protest for several days, making accommodations for their children and themselves. However, soon after their protest began the Detroit Police Department asked them to leave the building due to closure. When they did not leave, they were led out in handcuffs where they were arrested, processed and later released.

As this story caught the attention of various news media and forums, it also brought out the support of the UAW, a North American human rights union, and Hollywood actor, Danny Glover, who has been a longtime proponent of the vitality of public schools. Before the rally began, word was received that the school would remain open as a charter school. Mr. Glover was scheduled to be the feature speaker during the rally protesting the Academy’s closing and was adamant that education was a right for all, not an entitlement to a few. Although the school staying open is a wonderful thing, it is still not out of the woods. Due to the nature of charter schools being privatized, changes can be made to the curriculum, having a different outcome for future students. Many would like to see the school stay in the public school domain, but for now they see the open state of the school as a small victory.

To date, CFA plans to open the new school year on September 6, 2011, and has a few new tools to utilize in its educational efforts. Under the new charter company, the Academy will have access to new green house construction, solar energy projects, permaculture education, in addition to other educational tools. Principal Andrews remains committed to the future of the girls and the school and believes this is a “win-win” situation. You can read more about the school’s transformation on The Detroit News.

With the budget deficits consistently growing and the murky tides of our national economics having no ebb, schools around the nation continue to face the threat of closure. Funds for public schools are becoming more commonplace throughout our communities. Are supplanting public schools with charter schools the answer to providing our children with a quality education, and if so what are the ramifications that might be foreseen? If you have been impacted in any way by charter schools, we invite you to communicate your comments, thoughts or ideas.

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Throughout the month of August, State of the Re:Union will be featuring transformational schools that are enhancing the community around them.

An Update on the Atlantic Yards Development Saga

In our first season we visited Brooklyn, where the borough’s largest development project, Atlantic Yards, was getting underway. If you missed the episode, here’s a quick rundown of the story:  Atlantic Yards is a 5-billion dollar, 22-acre project that will make it the densest residential community in the country. The promise of new jobs, housing and entertainment sounded like a positive change for the community, but in order to create this new community, another had to be destroyed. In the episode, Al spoke with residents who described how their lives have been altered by having their neighborhood ripped from their hands by way of ‘eminent domain’, and others who felt that the project was the perfect way to reinvigorate their neighborhood. Both groups loved the community they lived in, but disagreed on the best way to make it all it could be.

Listen to the story here:
Atlantic Yards Segment

One of the promises made by the project’s developer, Forest City Ratner, was the creation of construction jobs for residents of Brooklyn. But at a recent meeting, Ratner said that of the 500 workers currently employed at Atlantic yards, 60 were from Brooklyn and only 38 from neighborhoods surrounding the project.

So today, dozens of Brooklyn residents gathered to protest at the worksite. Among them, community activists who were once supportive of the Atlantic Yards project, now say they feel like “suckers” because they put their support behind the development.

You can watch a video and read more about today’s protest in the Fort Green-Clinton Hill Patch.

Listen to the whole “Brooklyn – Change Happens” episode, and see videos, pictures and letters by visiting the Brooklyn page of our website.

We want to hear from you. Let us know what you think of the Atlantic Yards development in the comment section below.

Often comprised of a simple portrait, along with a name, birth and death year, and sometimes a message, memorial murals began to sprout up all over NYC in the 90s.  Today, it might be safe to say that there’s at least one memorial mural in every neighborhood in the city.

Using audio from a larger segment in our radio episode Brooklyn – Change Happens, this video explores the culture of memorial murals and the mourning, memories and art that comprise these tributes. Discover this unique part of the famed borough’s culture through the vantage point of family members and admirers.

We were so proud to recently learn that we were awarded first place in the Excellence in Radio category from the National Lesbian & Gay Journalists Association for the Black History Month special we did about Bayard Rustin, titled Bayard Rustin – Who Is This Man? It is a true honor to have had the chance to work with so many people that worked with Bayard and that have written about him and even taught his doctrine of non-violent resistance that forever changed Martin Luther King Jr.’s approach to the Civil Rights struggle. Bayard spoke his mind and stuck to his convictions no matter what the consequences were. He was also openly gay in a time where that was met with an excruciating amount of disdain. Black, gay, Quaker . . . a number of seemingly incompatible labels that served to earn him as many detractors as admirers.

Listen to the radio episode and be sure to check out our other collateral for the episode including a video podcast from SOTRU host, Al Letson, a slideshow that features incredible Rustin pictures and an audio podcast about the music of Bayard Rustin. We are certain that this is the type of episode you will want to share with your friends whether it’s Black History Month or not. SOTRU would love to hear from you with your thoughts about the Rustin episode and the award from the NLGJA.

This was a piece written by SOTRU Radio Producer, Tina Antolini, about her time in the human-occupied tunnels running under Las Vegas. It’s an incredibly fascinating concept if you were to think of it as a diorama; tourists from all over the world in and out of the monstrous casinos and other celebrated spots that you associate with The Strip directly above people making their homes in the dark, wet, flash flood tunnels that run under the city. It feels more like something from a movie. The episode is fascinating and explores this underground world. You can listen here. Tina’s piece below, originally appeared on our website December 23rd, 2010.

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I’ve been thinking a lot about tunnels.

Entrances to an underground world, a place far away from sunlight, and, therefore, in our imaginations, they’re places that must incubate things that love the dark. Fearful things.

Culturally, we’re fascinated with the prospect of a subterranean world. Be it the hiding place of Jean Valjean, the hero of Victor Hugo’s “Les Miserables” (“…Paris has another Paris under herself; a Paris of sewers; which has its streets, its crossings, its squares, its blind alleys, its arteries, and its circulation, which is slime, minus the human form.”) or the home of monsters in “C.H.U.D.” (that would be for Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dweller), a cult film about flesh-eating underground creatures who prey on the homeless, or, on the opposite end of the cinematic spectrum, the grain-hoarding raincoat-wearing vegans of “Delicatessen.”

The truth is less glamorous and/or frightening… but equally fascinating. Among the stories SOTRU is reporting on in Las Vegas is one of the underground world beneath the casinos, the miles of flood channels that lace their way under the Strip. These are home to hundreds of people.

Many of whom have surprisingly home-like homes.

But most of these tunnel residents are forced down here because of a variety of misfortunes, economic and otherwise. Usually, one does not choose to live 30+ feet underground for the heck of it.

We’ll tell you a lot more about life in the tunnels in our upcoming Las Vegas episode… But in the meantime, I wanted to know: what’s your favorite tunnel story, real or imagined?