Let's Be Real: A New Economy Project Podcast New Economy Project

Producers’ Note: This series of interviews was conducted before the COVID-19 outbreak. While we engage in mutual aid efforts and digital organizing, we think it’s important to continue releasing stories about community-led institutions that can support New Yorkers through our current crisis, and make NYC neighborhoods more resilient going forward – as we build a new economy that works for all.

The next four episodes of Let’s Be Real focus on the NYS Community Equity Agenda, a statewide coalition that is calling for economic development that is community-led and grounded in community wealth-building and racial and economic justice. Each episode zooms in on an Equity Agenda priority, from promoting community-controlled financial institutions to ending wealth extraction throughout New York.

This episode, we sit down with Melissa Marquez, CEO of Genesee Co-op Federal Credit Union, a cooperative, member-owned, financial institution based in Rochester, NY. In our interview, we discuss the Equity Agenda’s recent victory, securing the first-ever funding for New York’s Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFI) Fund, the importance of building statewide power to fight entrenched economic and racial injustice, and why the Equity Agenda coalition is fighting for transformational change.

For more information on organizations and projects featured in this podcast:

New York State Community Equity Agenda

Genesee Coop Federal Credit Union

Hosted by Juleon Robinson | Produced by Sarah Ludwig & Juleon Robinson | Graphic by Ben Hagen

In this episode of Let’s Be Real, we speak with Elizabeth Yeampierre, executive director of UPROSE. Founded in 1966, UPROSE is Brooklyn’s oldest Latinx community-based organization and has been deeply involved in the climate justice movement for decades. In our interview, Elizabeth discusses what it means for the organization to be community-led, how all organizing in a frontline community is intersectional, and how UPROSE’s community solar project provides a cooperatively-owned alternative to the extractive economy.

Hosted by Juleon Robinson | Produced by Sarah Ludwig & Juleon Robinson

In this episode of Let’s Be Real, we speak with Dominga Payano, a tenant organizer with Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition. Dominga represented the organization in the statewide Housing Justice for All Campaign. In an interview recorded just weeks before the campaign won a landmark victory—with the Legislature’s enactment of the strongest tenant laws in New York history—Dominga reflects on how she got involved in tenant organizing, her vision for housing justice in the Bronx, and what’s to come.

In this episode of Let’s Be Real, we speak with two organizers—Fahd Ahmed from DRUM (Desis Rising Up and Moving), and Sasha Wijeyeratne from CAAAV: Organizing Asian Communities—from the Neighbors Beyond Amazon coalition. Reflecting on the landmark victory to keep Amazon’s second headquarters, or HQ2, out of New York, Fahd and Sasha discuss the power of community organizing, what this victory means for the communities and members that work with their organizations, and what’s next for the coalition as they continue to fight for economic development that prioritizes people over corporations.

When the last remaining bank branch on the Lower East Side closed its doors in 1986, local activists took matters into their own hands and organized to establish a non-profit financial cooperative, the Lower East Side People’s Federal Credit Union.

This episode features a conversation between New Economy Project co-director Sarah Ludwig and Linda Levy, the credit union’s longtime CEO. They discuss how the credit union got started, and Linda shares her experience organizing for financial justice and the cooperative economy in New York City.

New Yorkers Speak Out: Kenneth Lovell & Patrick Lovell by New Economy Project