Tammy Black, April 27th, 2024
Title
Tammy Black, April 27th, 2024
Description
In this interview, Tammy Black discusses the ways her organizations, the Manistique Community Treehouse Center and Communities Power, have attempted to mitigate and educate on the effects of climate change in Detroit. She also explains the social and environmental issues affecting the Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood, particularly stormwater flooding.
In partnership with the Manistique Community Treehouse Center
In partnership with the Manistique Community Treehouse Center
Publisher
Detroit Historical Society
Rights
Detroit Historical Society
Language
en-US
Narrator/Interviewee's Name
Tammy Black
Brief Biography
Tammy Black moved to Detroit in 1967, at the age of three, and has lived in the Jefferson Chalmers neighborhood since 2011. She founded the Manistique Community Treehouse Center in 2015, and started Communities Power in 2019.
Interviewer's Name
Doris Lanzkron-Tamarazo
Date
04/27/2024
Interview Length
30:18
Transcriptionist
Doris Lanzkron-Tamarazo: I'm Doris Lanzkron-Tamarazo. It's April 27th, 2024, and I'm here with. Please say your name.
Tammy Black: Tammy Black.
DLT: And can you please spell your name?
TB: T a m m y B l a c k?
DLT: Do you live in the city of Detroit?
TB: Yes I do.
DLT: What neighborhood do you live in?
TB: I live in the Jefferson Chalmers community.
DLT: Have you lived in any other neighborhoods while you've been living in Detroit?
TB: Yes, I have. I've also lived in the 48205 neighborhood of the city. City Airport neighborhood. And I've also lived in, I'm not sure what they call the neighborhood, but, Boston, Boston Edison neighborhood. I've lived there as well. I've also lived in, Seven Mile and Hawthorne neighborhood.
DLT: And how long have you lived in Detroit?
TB: Oh, my God, you're dating me now? [Laughter] I lived in Detroit. I'm 60, and I've been here, since I was three years old, so I guess I've been here like 56 years. 57 years?
DLT: And how long have you lived in Jefferson Chalmers?
TB: I lived in Jefferson Chalmers for going on 13 years now.
DLT: And why did you end up moving there?
TB: I ended up moving in Jefferson Chalmers because I wanted to be by the water. I wanted a space that was more like country living. And when I seen my house, I seen all of the lots that was around it and across the street. So I said, okay, this is my country life in the city. [Laughter]
DLT: And do you work in the city of Detroit?
TB: Yes, I am an entrepreneur. I'm a nonprofit leader, and I'm also a business owner in the city of Detroit.
DLT: And can you tell me about these places that you work?
TB: Well, the places that I work, I work for, and I'm the founder and CEO of Community Treehouse Center Detroit, which DBA is called Manistique Community Treehouse Center. I work there more than 80 hours a week because it's an organization which I started for people with disabilities and the community to get mental and physical well-being. I'm also an electrical contractor where I started my own company because of solar energy. We were very much into renewable energy and into climate justice. So it was a way for us to be able to ensure that people know about climate justice and also ensure that people can save on their utility bills, which also gets the education on, making our planet better. And also working with flood resiliency, to our community that has been happening for years. So those are some of our missions on top of others.
DLT: And when did the organization begin?
TB: The organization actually began, we would say incorporated in 2018. But the organization actually began in 2015.
DLT: And can you tell me about how it started in 2015?
TB: How it started in 2015 was me being a mom advocate of, people, young people, of my children who they considered slow learners, which was either they required our IEP or they were cognitively impaired or, developmentally disabled. And as a mom, no mother wants to think there's anything wrong with her child or her children. So my children were never treated as if they had a learning disability because they don't. It's just a different way of teaching them. So with me knowing that and my house being the house where all the kids loved to go, me being a foster mom for ten years and only taking the kids that nobody wanted, I had to be an advocate for the rights and the justice for them being individuals in this society and showing society that they can be just as prosperous and a part of this world as everyone else.
So I looked across the street from my house. I seen these lots that were blighted, and when I got the house, it was like a lot of blight. We started to clean up all the blight. I said, okay, I love Pete Nelson. Treehouse masters, right? So this would be a perfect spot for a Treehouse Center that will encompass mental health. That will be a place where people with disabilities can go and get employment. They can open their own business. They can learn financial literacy. They can learn how to greening and growing, you know, and just add on other things and environmental things. You know, like, say like saving their environment, climate justice. So I started looking at that and I started doing surveys around the community. My whole community, bought into my concept and idea, right. And people outside of the community as well, and foundations as well. So I said, you know what? I must be on to something good. People with disabilities are not the only one who needs the Treehouse Center the whole city and state of Michigan needs the treehouse center, right?
So when you come into this space, once it's built, when you leave the sidewalk, you leave all of your biases back there, right? All of your things that you don't believe in yourself about. All of that stays on the other side of the sidewalk. When you cross the sidewalk, you can be yourself. You can be as creative as you want. You can make as many mistakes as you want and still recover. You can have an opinion without being judged. You can have a religion without being judged. You can be a color without being judged. So it's a space where we as individuals can, like, have a place to vent and be who we want to be without being judged.
DLT: Can you tell me a little bit about what you mean by climate justice?
TB: Climate justice. What I mean by that is that I understand that there's global warming. A lot of us don't understand that there's global warming, because when you're worried about your bills from day to day and how you're going to live from day to day, climate justice is the last thing that's on your mind. Okay. So once we can educate our people about, or people in general about, what, how to first save money and the energy that they're consuming for their home. Once people are relaxed about their day to day living, then we can start to talk about and have that discussion about how can we save our planet? How can we, how can we talk about air? How can we talk about the water? How can we talk about energy that we're saving? That's when we can have that conversation. That's when we can educate them. So that's what I mean by that.
DLT: And what has the organization been doing to try to educate people so far?
TB: Well, what the organization has been doing to educate people is that we've been having community engagement meetings. We have a workforce development program, which we're running right now out of out of this beautiful [A.B. Ford Community] center that you see here that we are responsible for. I'm actually responsible for all the solar panels that are on this building due to our solar energy efforts. And we're doing that program and that program encompass hiring people from, who are, who are disabled, bringing them into this solar industry, also, the community.
And we're also educating them. We're also going to different communities and talking about flood resiliency. We're talking about solar energy. We're talking about the benefits of those things. And if people don't understand, we want to have it on a level where they can understand what these things mean and how it can benefit them, and how we can work on the resiliency of the water that's coming into our community. We have to work together as a team. We have a flooding app that our community can come, and they use this app when it's flooding in our community, right? And they document these things so we can see where the flooding is happening right there. Pictures, the app, the whole nine.
I'm working with, Catherine Flowers, who's very instrumental with the Biden administration for all the flooding that's happening down south. I'm working with her as far as Jefferson Chalmers and Kresge Foundation to litigate or help with some of the things that are happening in our community with, like, flooding resiliency. So when do we talk, how do we talk to each other when this is happening? And we’re also a part of the National Weather Service where we notify each other when these things are happening. We notify the National Weather Service. We get the first reports. So we're trying to do everything that we can within our power to help each other when these actions are happening that we cannot control, with climate change.
DLT: And how did that partnership with Catherine Flowers and the Kresge Foundation start?
TB: Well, the Kresge Foundation has been a, they are the most—I love the Kresge Foundation. We love the Kresge Foundation. They’re the supporters of our concept of the Treehouse from day one. They know all the work that we've done in our community as far as flood resiliency, renewable energy, just making sure that our community and other communities, and setting a model for not only our community, but people with disabilities as well, because everything we do encompasses those with disabilities to be a part of. So, how this happened was all of our work, you know, when things happen, we're the first on the ground.
When Covid happened, we're the first on the ground with food, with seeing whose house needs to be cleaned, or who doesn't have a furnace, or who doesn't have a hot water tank. Or is our seniors okay inside of these homes that these things have happened? Do they have food? Can we go in and help? You know, we're always there to see how we can assist our neighbors, not only our neighbors within the Jefferson Chalmers community, but we consider the whole city is our neighbor, okay. So it's not limited just to our community because we're creating a model here, right?
So, with that being said, I think Kresge noticed that, and that we were working hard in that area. I think Catherine Flowers noticed that, because they came for a visit and we had some of our community members to speak and tell how they feel about all the flooding and how they feel about, you know, what's been happening, and how we've been supportive in helping them. So, it's always a big thing. It's like something that we have to do, being grassroots. You help on the ground. That's your job.
DLT: Can you tell me about the partnership with the National Weather Service and how that got going?
TB: Well, the partnership with the National Weather Service, they actually reached out to our organization, because they seen all the work that we've done. We had a meeting here at the Lennox Center. We were one of the first to have a meeting in this space, with our community to share their voices on how they feel about the flooding, what happens, how the National Weather Service can assist us when we're having these things, can they notify us if they know when this is happening? Before time? Is that possible, or do we need to be boots on the ground where they don't know it? And we're boots on the ground and we identify what's going on here, report it to them so they can get it out a little faster. So we're working on all of these tools and concepts to see what would make it easier for us to do this.
DLT: And how do you feel that the flooding app has affected the community?
TB: I feel that the flooding app is a great app because it pinpoints things. It gives us some documentation on where this is happening. How often is this happening, how much flooding there is, and pictures to show where it is. So we're sitting in front of the state legislature or we're sitting in front of the EPA. We have documentation that we can show, you know, where this is, where it's happening, what area, how much water it is. I think documentation is better than just verbal, talking. You see the proof. You see what's happening. You got dates, you got times, you got all of those things. So I think, having that documentation is powerful in coming up with the solution, because it's going to take us all to come up with the solution. Not just the engineers, not just the city, not just the water companies. It's going to take us as a group, as a collective to handle this issue.
DLT: Can you tell me a little bit about the Treehouse’s solar efforts?
TB: The Treehouse’s solar efforts. Well, our solar efforts is solar and everything that we can. Renewable energy. Also, heat pumps and other things and EV chargers. This will not only help to save from fossil fuel, but it will also help the community in building some type of wealth. Okay. When you don't have to pay that money in your utility bill, what could you use that money for that benefits you and your family? And I mean, people work so hard to make it on jobs day to day, 9 to 5. Just, just in this race, right? Where's the downtime? In the United States, our workers have no real downtime, you know what I mean? It's always make the money. Make the money, make the money. We gotta pay the bills. We gotta do— We need relaxation and downtime, and our people need to have that. Our young people need to learn how to be able to do that. They need to be able to learn how to save money, because it's not taught in college, how to invest, how to invest in the stock market, that maybe this little money that we can save in utility bill could transform into something that's beneficial to them later.
So that's, I think that's where the energy piece comes in. And also educating them to help save the planet, you know what I mean? The more education you get, the more you know about what's needed to stop smog, to, you know, help our water, to help us from being able to use these lines over our heads that's causing cancer and all these other things. The more we learn about it and know and are conscious of what we can do, then I think it's better, you know. Because I don't want to say that—everything that is needed for us to survive as human beings is already put on this planet. That's water. That's energy. Energy does not have to come from a line all the time. You can see it. It's coming from the, it's actually coming from the sun. So everything that we have on this planet is already supplied to us. We should use that. We should use it the way it's meant to be, use and not have to deal with the rat race of chasing money to get to do these things. To help us to live better. If that makes sense to you.
DLT: Yeah, definitely.
TB: Okay.
DLT: So what do you think the response from the community has been to these, like, education, educational efforts on environmental issues?
TB: I think the response has been overwhelming, and I'm going to tell you why I think it's been overwhelming. I am not someone that's just coming in here, or my team, or the people that I work with coming into the city saying: okay, this is what you need to do. Here's a big package for you to put solar on your home and it's going to cost you, yada yada, yada. And here they go. Then they made all the money they can and they're gone. They really don't care what happens to us. I'm here. I live here. I sleep, breathe, and eat here. This community in Detroit is my community. No matter if it's east, west, south, north. This is our community, and we have to take care of each other. And that's what the importance of learning what renewables are about. Because we need to take care of each other. We need to make sure our air is quality. We need to make sure that our homes are running with energy, without having to work like a slave to get that energy bill. We need relaxation so we can live longer and help our children to do the same and build some wealth. That's the whole goal here at Manistique Community Treehouse Center.
DLT: Can you tell me a bit about the Treehouse’s garden and its other greening efforts?
TB: The gardens? Oh my god. [Laughing] The gardens. We use our gardens, which is free to our community as long as they can come and work. And the gardens is for healthy living. Even though I'm a heavyset woman who probably eat wrong. But I eat a lot of vegetables. And I do know how to garden, so you know what I mean. I think the gardens are very important, not only to our children, but to our whole community to learn how to grow our own food. Because there's so many foods that are coming in from other places. We don't know what pesticides are on those foods. We don't know how they're processed.
Back in the old days, our parents and our grandparents— I come from sharecroppers, okay? I come from people who went in a cotton field and picked cotton with me on the back of the little croker sack, you know, and they grew everything they ate. They furnished, the pigs and all those things that they ate, they cured all of these things. So we need to go back to the old school way of growing our own, knowing where our products and things are coming from that we're putting in our bodies. I've never seen so much cancer before in my life than I've heard of these days and all of these other ailments. Those weren't happening way back then, when we had our own good food organically. So we need to go back to that, I think.
DLT: And are there any plans for more efforts with that? Expanding gardens, helping people build them at their own houses?
TB: I think gardens will go along with all of the work that we do, all of the renewable, everything that's self-sustainable for the human being will be a part of our goal. Okay. That's sustainable energy, that's gardens, that's financial wealth, that's mental health. Everything that the human being needs to give longer life and to feel good about themselves is our fight.
DLT: And what are some of the current programs that the Treehouse is working on?
TB: Right now we're working on a workforce development program for solar energy with the inclusion of people with disabilities where they learn solar installation, solar sails, community engagement and home assessments. We're also working on entrepreneurship, where our young people learn how to be—well, anybody, not just young people learn how to be entrepreneurs, open their own business, start their own dream and keep it going until they're successful at it or, you know, whatever they want to do. That's some of our programing and goals. Financial literacy is another programing and goal. Mentorship is another programing goal. Caregiving is another programing and goal because a lot of us are aging in place and we need caregivers. And those caregivers sometimes get stressed out because, you know, when you got a job, you're taking care of elderly mom and dad. You got your own family. Sometimes, that gets to be overwhelming. So somebody needs to take care of you at that point, you need to have a downtime.
So we're looking to see how we can give a downtime to that sector of people as well. Anything that, as I said before, that creates some good mental health and physical well-being is the Treehouse’s goal. Renewables is something that's new. It's happening everywhere. It's an industry that's needed for our society. Climate justice is needed for us. So we're trying to be at the cutting edge of that. We're creating a model for that, which includes people with disabilities and this model.
DLT: And can you tell me a little bit more about that solar workforce development?
TB: Well, the solar workforce development, as I said before, it includes people with disabilities. It's a workforce development where young people or people of the community and people with disabilities learn how to get skills in the renewable energy sector. Not only skills, but they move over to our—we have partners that they can work for, or they can come and work on our other side, which is Communities Power, and work for us in that sector of renewable energies, where we're doing solar installations. We've already installed solar in 25 homes in Jefferson Chalmers. We've also interviewed 500 other people in other communities who are ready for Communities Power and Manistique Community Treehouse Center to install solar, either on their homes or community solar. I also am a consultant on the mayor's solar initiative that he has. I'm very excited about that as well. So, we're moving towards making our planet better and giving people skills to be able to be employed in something that's going to be great for us as human beings, I think.
DLT: Can you tell me a little bit more about Communities Power and what that does?
TB: Okay. Communities Power is a company that will employ people out of the community, with or without disabilities, to install solar installations for homes or commercial buildings, who will also employ individuals in community engagement, because we'll go out and educate the community about what solar is, how it works. Because a lot of people don't know that. We'll also employ people to go out and do solar sales, or they'll go out and sell the systems to homeowners who are interested, and business owners who are interested, in purchasing the system. We will also go out on the other end of that and also do EV charging stations. So those who are interested in purchasing these EV charging stations, or having them at their home, we will also service that sector as well. We will also service, those who need repair for those things as well. So that's what Communities Power does.
DLT: And in terms of renewable energy, do you mostly focus on solar or have you been exploring other types of renewables as well?
TB: Right now we're just focusing on the solar or the EV charging, but we are exploring other ways of energy. Yeah.
DLT: And earlier you mentioned the issue of air quality. Can you tell me a little bit more about that and how it affects communities?
TB: I think air quality, which I know about, I've read about and we've been trying to work on getting air quality gauges put in the community so we can know what the air quality is. I'm not an expert on that, but I know it's something that needs to happen, so that we can make sure that our air quality is the best that it can be. Because I do notice when I used to go up to my cabin up in Deerfield, Michigan, and come back down here to Detroit, the air quality was so much different than when you go up north, and when you come back down, you can start smelling the smog and all of the other different things. But you really, when you're in it, you don't notice that it's a difference. It's when you leave it and come back to it. You say, oh my god, what's happening here? So yeah, we need to get a handle on that as well.
DLT: And what would you say are the biggest environmental needs that your community is facing right now?
TB: I think the environmental need that our community's facing right now is the flooding. That's one of our big needs to handle. Because no one can continue to getting flooded out in basements and things like that, of raw sewage. And this smell, toxic, is coming through your home, and you're having to sit this stuff out and you're breathing. It's still in your sidewalks and gets all over your house, not just your basement. Then you're looking at mold, then you're looking at your draperies need to be cleaned, your carpets need to be cleaned, everything is gone, you know. Even if you have beautiful pictures of family in your basement or you had furniture, everything's gone, even in your bedrooms or where you are upstairs away from that is still—that smell is everywhere, all over your home. So you might need a whole new paint job, you know what I mean?
So it affects the whole house, not just the basement. It affects the whole community because everybody's trying to deal with this, and especially our seniors and especially our people with disabilities. They can't handle that. You know, it just gets to be a bit much. And then how many times do you replace a furnace? How many times do you replace a hot water tank? How many times do you replace drywall? How many times? What if you have people living in the basement? Their rooms are gone. My living room now looks like a box heaven. I don't have a living room anymore because things I can't put back in my basement, my living room has taken that. So all of my beautiful art that I'm used to looking at when I walk through my living room is no more. I have a little pathway that I'm walking through. So, you know, it's a bit much. You have to, we need to get a handle on it.
DLT: And do you have any future plans for more work that will be done to help with the flooding?
TB: All of our projects, right? We try to build in a flood resiliency, whether it's cisterns, rain gardens, rain barrels, trying to look at what other infrastructure we could help with that will help, you know, in different spaces that we have, or that we can help our neighbors with getting rain barrels. We have organizations that, you know, go out and do the rain barrels, like, AmeriCorps or—What is it? I've lost my train of thought as far as the name of the organization that comes doing rain gardens as well. But we have several organizations of resources that do these things, and I think they're a help, you know, if everybody could could get those things as well.
But it's nothing like when these things happen, having a plan that we all can, like, either call each other or we have a drone that's flying over that's telling us, you know, okay, this street or this homeowner can't get out of their house. They need help. Can we send somebody to do that? You know, like some type of emergency call to action? That's what we're working towards. And it's going to take some time. You know, everything you have to work through step by step. It's a plan. So yeah.
DLT: Did you have any final thoughts that you wanted to share?
TB: My final thoughts is that I am looking forward to helping to resolve some of these issues. My organization is, and the community as well, and being a part of the solutions for these issues. So, that's my final thoughts. Wanting to be a part of the solution and making sure that our community and other communities live long lives.
DLT: Thank you very much for your time.
TB: You're welcome. Thank you.
Tammy Black: Tammy Black.
DLT: And can you please spell your name?
TB: T a m m y B l a c k?
DLT: Do you live in the city of Detroit?
TB: Yes I do.
DLT: What neighborhood do you live in?
TB: I live in the Jefferson Chalmers community.
DLT: Have you lived in any other neighborhoods while you've been living in Detroit?
TB: Yes, I have. I've also lived in the 48205 neighborhood of the city. City Airport neighborhood. And I've also lived in, I'm not sure what they call the neighborhood, but, Boston, Boston Edison neighborhood. I've lived there as well. I've also lived in, Seven Mile and Hawthorne neighborhood.
DLT: And how long have you lived in Detroit?
TB: Oh, my God, you're dating me now? [Laughter] I lived in Detroit. I'm 60, and I've been here, since I was three years old, so I guess I've been here like 56 years. 57 years?
DLT: And how long have you lived in Jefferson Chalmers?
TB: I lived in Jefferson Chalmers for going on 13 years now.
DLT: And why did you end up moving there?
TB: I ended up moving in Jefferson Chalmers because I wanted to be by the water. I wanted a space that was more like country living. And when I seen my house, I seen all of the lots that was around it and across the street. So I said, okay, this is my country life in the city. [Laughter]
DLT: And do you work in the city of Detroit?
TB: Yes, I am an entrepreneur. I'm a nonprofit leader, and I'm also a business owner in the city of Detroit.
DLT: And can you tell me about these places that you work?
TB: Well, the places that I work, I work for, and I'm the founder and CEO of Community Treehouse Center Detroit, which DBA is called Manistique Community Treehouse Center. I work there more than 80 hours a week because it's an organization which I started for people with disabilities and the community to get mental and physical well-being. I'm also an electrical contractor where I started my own company because of solar energy. We were very much into renewable energy and into climate justice. So it was a way for us to be able to ensure that people know about climate justice and also ensure that people can save on their utility bills, which also gets the education on, making our planet better. And also working with flood resiliency, to our community that has been happening for years. So those are some of our missions on top of others.
DLT: And when did the organization begin?
TB: The organization actually began, we would say incorporated in 2018. But the organization actually began in 2015.
DLT: And can you tell me about how it started in 2015?
TB: How it started in 2015 was me being a mom advocate of, people, young people, of my children who they considered slow learners, which was either they required our IEP or they were cognitively impaired or, developmentally disabled. And as a mom, no mother wants to think there's anything wrong with her child or her children. So my children were never treated as if they had a learning disability because they don't. It's just a different way of teaching them. So with me knowing that and my house being the house where all the kids loved to go, me being a foster mom for ten years and only taking the kids that nobody wanted, I had to be an advocate for the rights and the justice for them being individuals in this society and showing society that they can be just as prosperous and a part of this world as everyone else.
So I looked across the street from my house. I seen these lots that were blighted, and when I got the house, it was like a lot of blight. We started to clean up all the blight. I said, okay, I love Pete Nelson. Treehouse masters, right? So this would be a perfect spot for a Treehouse Center that will encompass mental health. That will be a place where people with disabilities can go and get employment. They can open their own business. They can learn financial literacy. They can learn how to greening and growing, you know, and just add on other things and environmental things. You know, like, say like saving their environment, climate justice. So I started looking at that and I started doing surveys around the community. My whole community, bought into my concept and idea, right. And people outside of the community as well, and foundations as well. So I said, you know what? I must be on to something good. People with disabilities are not the only one who needs the Treehouse Center the whole city and state of Michigan needs the treehouse center, right?
So when you come into this space, once it's built, when you leave the sidewalk, you leave all of your biases back there, right? All of your things that you don't believe in yourself about. All of that stays on the other side of the sidewalk. When you cross the sidewalk, you can be yourself. You can be as creative as you want. You can make as many mistakes as you want and still recover. You can have an opinion without being judged. You can have a religion without being judged. You can be a color without being judged. So it's a space where we as individuals can, like, have a place to vent and be who we want to be without being judged.
DLT: Can you tell me a little bit about what you mean by climate justice?
TB: Climate justice. What I mean by that is that I understand that there's global warming. A lot of us don't understand that there's global warming, because when you're worried about your bills from day to day and how you're going to live from day to day, climate justice is the last thing that's on your mind. Okay. So once we can educate our people about, or people in general about, what, how to first save money and the energy that they're consuming for their home. Once people are relaxed about their day to day living, then we can start to talk about and have that discussion about how can we save our planet? How can we, how can we talk about air? How can we talk about the water? How can we talk about energy that we're saving? That's when we can have that conversation. That's when we can educate them. So that's what I mean by that.
DLT: And what has the organization been doing to try to educate people so far?
TB: Well, what the organization has been doing to educate people is that we've been having community engagement meetings. We have a workforce development program, which we're running right now out of out of this beautiful [A.B. Ford Community] center that you see here that we are responsible for. I'm actually responsible for all the solar panels that are on this building due to our solar energy efforts. And we're doing that program and that program encompass hiring people from, who are, who are disabled, bringing them into this solar industry, also, the community.
And we're also educating them. We're also going to different communities and talking about flood resiliency. We're talking about solar energy. We're talking about the benefits of those things. And if people don't understand, we want to have it on a level where they can understand what these things mean and how it can benefit them, and how we can work on the resiliency of the water that's coming into our community. We have to work together as a team. We have a flooding app that our community can come, and they use this app when it's flooding in our community, right? And they document these things so we can see where the flooding is happening right there. Pictures, the app, the whole nine.
I'm working with, Catherine Flowers, who's very instrumental with the Biden administration for all the flooding that's happening down south. I'm working with her as far as Jefferson Chalmers and Kresge Foundation to litigate or help with some of the things that are happening in our community with, like, flooding resiliency. So when do we talk, how do we talk to each other when this is happening? And we’re also a part of the National Weather Service where we notify each other when these things are happening. We notify the National Weather Service. We get the first reports. So we're trying to do everything that we can within our power to help each other when these actions are happening that we cannot control, with climate change.
DLT: And how did that partnership with Catherine Flowers and the Kresge Foundation start?
TB: Well, the Kresge Foundation has been a, they are the most—I love the Kresge Foundation. We love the Kresge Foundation. They’re the supporters of our concept of the Treehouse from day one. They know all the work that we've done in our community as far as flood resiliency, renewable energy, just making sure that our community and other communities, and setting a model for not only our community, but people with disabilities as well, because everything we do encompasses those with disabilities to be a part of. So, how this happened was all of our work, you know, when things happen, we're the first on the ground.
When Covid happened, we're the first on the ground with food, with seeing whose house needs to be cleaned, or who doesn't have a furnace, or who doesn't have a hot water tank. Or is our seniors okay inside of these homes that these things have happened? Do they have food? Can we go in and help? You know, we're always there to see how we can assist our neighbors, not only our neighbors within the Jefferson Chalmers community, but we consider the whole city is our neighbor, okay. So it's not limited just to our community because we're creating a model here, right?
So, with that being said, I think Kresge noticed that, and that we were working hard in that area. I think Catherine Flowers noticed that, because they came for a visit and we had some of our community members to speak and tell how they feel about all the flooding and how they feel about, you know, what's been happening, and how we've been supportive in helping them. So, it's always a big thing. It's like something that we have to do, being grassroots. You help on the ground. That's your job.
DLT: Can you tell me about the partnership with the National Weather Service and how that got going?
TB: Well, the partnership with the National Weather Service, they actually reached out to our organization, because they seen all the work that we've done. We had a meeting here at the Lennox Center. We were one of the first to have a meeting in this space, with our community to share their voices on how they feel about the flooding, what happens, how the National Weather Service can assist us when we're having these things, can they notify us if they know when this is happening? Before time? Is that possible, or do we need to be boots on the ground where they don't know it? And we're boots on the ground and we identify what's going on here, report it to them so they can get it out a little faster. So we're working on all of these tools and concepts to see what would make it easier for us to do this.
DLT: And how do you feel that the flooding app has affected the community?
TB: I feel that the flooding app is a great app because it pinpoints things. It gives us some documentation on where this is happening. How often is this happening, how much flooding there is, and pictures to show where it is. So we're sitting in front of the state legislature or we're sitting in front of the EPA. We have documentation that we can show, you know, where this is, where it's happening, what area, how much water it is. I think documentation is better than just verbal, talking. You see the proof. You see what's happening. You got dates, you got times, you got all of those things. So I think, having that documentation is powerful in coming up with the solution, because it's going to take us all to come up with the solution. Not just the engineers, not just the city, not just the water companies. It's going to take us as a group, as a collective to handle this issue.
DLT: Can you tell me a little bit about the Treehouse’s solar efforts?
TB: The Treehouse’s solar efforts. Well, our solar efforts is solar and everything that we can. Renewable energy. Also, heat pumps and other things and EV chargers. This will not only help to save from fossil fuel, but it will also help the community in building some type of wealth. Okay. When you don't have to pay that money in your utility bill, what could you use that money for that benefits you and your family? And I mean, people work so hard to make it on jobs day to day, 9 to 5. Just, just in this race, right? Where's the downtime? In the United States, our workers have no real downtime, you know what I mean? It's always make the money. Make the money, make the money. We gotta pay the bills. We gotta do— We need relaxation and downtime, and our people need to have that. Our young people need to learn how to be able to do that. They need to be able to learn how to save money, because it's not taught in college, how to invest, how to invest in the stock market, that maybe this little money that we can save in utility bill could transform into something that's beneficial to them later.
So that's, I think that's where the energy piece comes in. And also educating them to help save the planet, you know what I mean? The more education you get, the more you know about what's needed to stop smog, to, you know, help our water, to help us from being able to use these lines over our heads that's causing cancer and all these other things. The more we learn about it and know and are conscious of what we can do, then I think it's better, you know. Because I don't want to say that—everything that is needed for us to survive as human beings is already put on this planet. That's water. That's energy. Energy does not have to come from a line all the time. You can see it. It's coming from the, it's actually coming from the sun. So everything that we have on this planet is already supplied to us. We should use that. We should use it the way it's meant to be, use and not have to deal with the rat race of chasing money to get to do these things. To help us to live better. If that makes sense to you.
DLT: Yeah, definitely.
TB: Okay.
DLT: So what do you think the response from the community has been to these, like, education, educational efforts on environmental issues?
TB: I think the response has been overwhelming, and I'm going to tell you why I think it's been overwhelming. I am not someone that's just coming in here, or my team, or the people that I work with coming into the city saying: okay, this is what you need to do. Here's a big package for you to put solar on your home and it's going to cost you, yada yada, yada. And here they go. Then they made all the money they can and they're gone. They really don't care what happens to us. I'm here. I live here. I sleep, breathe, and eat here. This community in Detroit is my community. No matter if it's east, west, south, north. This is our community, and we have to take care of each other. And that's what the importance of learning what renewables are about. Because we need to take care of each other. We need to make sure our air is quality. We need to make sure that our homes are running with energy, without having to work like a slave to get that energy bill. We need relaxation so we can live longer and help our children to do the same and build some wealth. That's the whole goal here at Manistique Community Treehouse Center.
DLT: Can you tell me a bit about the Treehouse’s garden and its other greening efforts?
TB: The gardens? Oh my god. [Laughing] The gardens. We use our gardens, which is free to our community as long as they can come and work. And the gardens is for healthy living. Even though I'm a heavyset woman who probably eat wrong. But I eat a lot of vegetables. And I do know how to garden, so you know what I mean. I think the gardens are very important, not only to our children, but to our whole community to learn how to grow our own food. Because there's so many foods that are coming in from other places. We don't know what pesticides are on those foods. We don't know how they're processed.
Back in the old days, our parents and our grandparents— I come from sharecroppers, okay? I come from people who went in a cotton field and picked cotton with me on the back of the little croker sack, you know, and they grew everything they ate. They furnished, the pigs and all those things that they ate, they cured all of these things. So we need to go back to the old school way of growing our own, knowing where our products and things are coming from that we're putting in our bodies. I've never seen so much cancer before in my life than I've heard of these days and all of these other ailments. Those weren't happening way back then, when we had our own good food organically. So we need to go back to that, I think.
DLT: And are there any plans for more efforts with that? Expanding gardens, helping people build them at their own houses?
TB: I think gardens will go along with all of the work that we do, all of the renewable, everything that's self-sustainable for the human being will be a part of our goal. Okay. That's sustainable energy, that's gardens, that's financial wealth, that's mental health. Everything that the human being needs to give longer life and to feel good about themselves is our fight.
DLT: And what are some of the current programs that the Treehouse is working on?
TB: Right now we're working on a workforce development program for solar energy with the inclusion of people with disabilities where they learn solar installation, solar sails, community engagement and home assessments. We're also working on entrepreneurship, where our young people learn how to be—well, anybody, not just young people learn how to be entrepreneurs, open their own business, start their own dream and keep it going until they're successful at it or, you know, whatever they want to do. That's some of our programing and goals. Financial literacy is another programing and goal. Mentorship is another programing goal. Caregiving is another programing and goal because a lot of us are aging in place and we need caregivers. And those caregivers sometimes get stressed out because, you know, when you got a job, you're taking care of elderly mom and dad. You got your own family. Sometimes, that gets to be overwhelming. So somebody needs to take care of you at that point, you need to have a downtime.
So we're looking to see how we can give a downtime to that sector of people as well. Anything that, as I said before, that creates some good mental health and physical well-being is the Treehouse’s goal. Renewables is something that's new. It's happening everywhere. It's an industry that's needed for our society. Climate justice is needed for us. So we're trying to be at the cutting edge of that. We're creating a model for that, which includes people with disabilities and this model.
DLT: And can you tell me a little bit more about that solar workforce development?
TB: Well, the solar workforce development, as I said before, it includes people with disabilities. It's a workforce development where young people or people of the community and people with disabilities learn how to get skills in the renewable energy sector. Not only skills, but they move over to our—we have partners that they can work for, or they can come and work on our other side, which is Communities Power, and work for us in that sector of renewable energies, where we're doing solar installations. We've already installed solar in 25 homes in Jefferson Chalmers. We've also interviewed 500 other people in other communities who are ready for Communities Power and Manistique Community Treehouse Center to install solar, either on their homes or community solar. I also am a consultant on the mayor's solar initiative that he has. I'm very excited about that as well. So, we're moving towards making our planet better and giving people skills to be able to be employed in something that's going to be great for us as human beings, I think.
DLT: Can you tell me a little bit more about Communities Power and what that does?
TB: Okay. Communities Power is a company that will employ people out of the community, with or without disabilities, to install solar installations for homes or commercial buildings, who will also employ individuals in community engagement, because we'll go out and educate the community about what solar is, how it works. Because a lot of people don't know that. We'll also employ people to go out and do solar sales, or they'll go out and sell the systems to homeowners who are interested, and business owners who are interested, in purchasing the system. We will also go out on the other end of that and also do EV charging stations. So those who are interested in purchasing these EV charging stations, or having them at their home, we will also service that sector as well. We will also service, those who need repair for those things as well. So that's what Communities Power does.
DLT: And in terms of renewable energy, do you mostly focus on solar or have you been exploring other types of renewables as well?
TB: Right now we're just focusing on the solar or the EV charging, but we are exploring other ways of energy. Yeah.
DLT: And earlier you mentioned the issue of air quality. Can you tell me a little bit more about that and how it affects communities?
TB: I think air quality, which I know about, I've read about and we've been trying to work on getting air quality gauges put in the community so we can know what the air quality is. I'm not an expert on that, but I know it's something that needs to happen, so that we can make sure that our air quality is the best that it can be. Because I do notice when I used to go up to my cabin up in Deerfield, Michigan, and come back down here to Detroit, the air quality was so much different than when you go up north, and when you come back down, you can start smelling the smog and all of the other different things. But you really, when you're in it, you don't notice that it's a difference. It's when you leave it and come back to it. You say, oh my god, what's happening here? So yeah, we need to get a handle on that as well.
DLT: And what would you say are the biggest environmental needs that your community is facing right now?
TB: I think the environmental need that our community's facing right now is the flooding. That's one of our big needs to handle. Because no one can continue to getting flooded out in basements and things like that, of raw sewage. And this smell, toxic, is coming through your home, and you're having to sit this stuff out and you're breathing. It's still in your sidewalks and gets all over your house, not just your basement. Then you're looking at mold, then you're looking at your draperies need to be cleaned, your carpets need to be cleaned, everything is gone, you know. Even if you have beautiful pictures of family in your basement or you had furniture, everything's gone, even in your bedrooms or where you are upstairs away from that is still—that smell is everywhere, all over your home. So you might need a whole new paint job, you know what I mean?
So it affects the whole house, not just the basement. It affects the whole community because everybody's trying to deal with this, and especially our seniors and especially our people with disabilities. They can't handle that. You know, it just gets to be a bit much. And then how many times do you replace a furnace? How many times do you replace a hot water tank? How many times do you replace drywall? How many times? What if you have people living in the basement? Their rooms are gone. My living room now looks like a box heaven. I don't have a living room anymore because things I can't put back in my basement, my living room has taken that. So all of my beautiful art that I'm used to looking at when I walk through my living room is no more. I have a little pathway that I'm walking through. So, you know, it's a bit much. You have to, we need to get a handle on it.
DLT: And do you have any future plans for more work that will be done to help with the flooding?
TB: All of our projects, right? We try to build in a flood resiliency, whether it's cisterns, rain gardens, rain barrels, trying to look at what other infrastructure we could help with that will help, you know, in different spaces that we have, or that we can help our neighbors with getting rain barrels. We have organizations that, you know, go out and do the rain barrels, like, AmeriCorps or—What is it? I've lost my train of thought as far as the name of the organization that comes doing rain gardens as well. But we have several organizations of resources that do these things, and I think they're a help, you know, if everybody could could get those things as well.
But it's nothing like when these things happen, having a plan that we all can, like, either call each other or we have a drone that's flying over that's telling us, you know, okay, this street or this homeowner can't get out of their house. They need help. Can we send somebody to do that? You know, like some type of emergency call to action? That's what we're working towards. And it's going to take some time. You know, everything you have to work through step by step. It's a plan. So yeah.
DLT: Did you have any final thoughts that you wanted to share?
TB: My final thoughts is that I am looking forward to helping to resolve some of these issues. My organization is, and the community as well, and being a part of the solutions for these issues. So, that's my final thoughts. Wanting to be a part of the solution and making sure that our community and other communities live long lives.
DLT: Thank you very much for your time.
TB: You're welcome. Thank you.
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Citation
“Tammy Black, April 27th, 2024,” Detroit Historical Society Oral History Archive, accessed March 20, 2025, https://oralhistory.detroithistorical.org/items/show/1013.