Rural Roots Rising Rural Organizing Project

This is the Final Episode in Season 2 of Rural Roots Rising! We go behind the scenes of Tea, Toast, and Truth and talk with Ashland High School’s Truth to Power Club about how they pair education and action through their podcast and community organizing campaigns. If you missed last month, be sure and check out that episode to hear a shortened version of their work, Seeing Homeless. 
The transcript of this episode will be available at ruralrootsrising.org. 
More on what you heard in this episode:
Tea, Toast, and Truth is a podcast created by Ashland High School’s Truth to Power Club. You can follow Truth to Power on Facebook and Instagram. The show is produced collaboratively and is part of the club’s broader efforts to tackle important issues such as racism, mental health, the housing crisis and more.
This episode features hosts and producers Izabella Cantu, Isadora Millay, and Anya Moore discussing their response to the murder of Aidan Ellison, a Black teenager who was killed by a white man in Ashland last November. Shortly after Aidan's murder, Southern Oregon Black Leaders, Activists, and Community Coalition's leadership team pointed out that “the Black community in Ashland is less than 2% of the total population, but now makes up 100% of the homicide victims in our town.” Since then, Truth to Power organized multiple workshops on anti-racism, started work on a podcast episode and are planning a mural on Ashland Highschool to celebrate Ashland Highschool graduates who are Black Indigenous and People of Color. The mural will include Aidan Ellison and Michelle Alexander, author of the book, The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration, in the Age of Colorblindness.
You can listen to full episodes of Tea, Toast, and Truth on Spotify or Anchor FM.

Do you know a rural media maker we should connect with? Did Truth to Power’s work inspire you to take action on the issues that matter most in your community? Head to www.rop.org to learn more about Rural Organizing Project and how you can get involved or reach out to us at info@ruralrootsrising.org.
We featured music from The Road Sodas, Junior 85, and Ben Von Wildenhaus.
Rural Roots Rising is a production of the Rural Organizing Project. Thank you for listening!
Support the show

In our second season of Rural Roots Rising, we’ve been on a state-wide mission to explore community-based, intergenerational, collaborative, rural media. Join us this month as we feature Tea, Toast, and Truth, a podcast created by Ashland High School’s Truth to Power Club. This podcast is a great example of everyday people using DIY media to amplify local voices and create community-driven change.  
Rural Roots Rising is both a podcast and a radio show airing on 20 community radio stations, and it’s also an ongoing experiment in building up our media skills across rural Oregon. We’re halfway through our second season, where we’re digging deep into how rural media makers do what they do. This episode features the work of creative high school students who are willing to explore complex issues in their community, all while teaching themselves how to create a podcast for the first time! 

We’re showcasing their second episode, “Seeing Homeless.” They describe the episode as one focusing “on the struggles and biases that surround the homeless crisis.” Truth to Power interviews members of the homeless community, home free and homeless rights activists, and the Ashland Chief of Police, and ask community members to take on an active role as an ally for the unhoused community.  
Download this episode’s transcript at ruralrootsrising.org.
More on what you heard in this episode:
Tea, Toast, and Truth is a podcast created by Ashland High School’s Truth to Power Club. The show is produced collaboratively and uplifts diverse voices and offers a teen point of view.

This episode is part one of a two-part series highlighting the Tea, Toast, and Truth podcast and features hosts and producers Izabella Cantu, Isadora Millay, and Anya Moore. They interview housing rights activists and many voices from the unhoused community, along with Ashland Chief of Police Tighe O’Meara. Together they touch on the criminalization of the unhoused community and the barriers to access many people face. 
You can listen to full episodes of Tea, Toast, and Truth on Spotify or Anchor FM. 
If you are interested in connecting with other rural Oregonians who are making media and building stronger communities in your area, head to www.rop.org to learn more about Rural Organizing Project and how you can get involved or reach out to us at info@ruralrootsrising.org.
We featured music from Daniel Birch and The Road Sodas!
Rural Roots Rising is a production of the Rural Organizing Project. Thank you for listening!
Support the show

This month’s episode continues our community media spotlight series with a behind-the-scenes interview with KPOV 88.9 FM, High Desert Community Radio station manager Bruce Morris. This episode is the second in a two-part profile of KPOV and features Bruce discussing KPOV’s early history and the role of local stations in community organizing. Bruce also shares firsthand insight on both the future of radio and the ways that community organizers can and should partner with their local stations. If you haven’t already heard it, we recommend listening to part one, Community Media Spotlight: KPOV & The Point, first.
Find out when your local radio station is playing Behind the Scenes with KPOV & The Point at ruralrootsrising.org! 
This episode’s transcript will be available at ruralrootsrising.org.
More on what you heard in this episode:
ROP Director Jess Campbell interviews KPOV’s station manager Bruce Morris and together they explore the role of community stations in providing credible information via local voices, the longevity and sustainability of radio waves and audio-based programming, and local radio as a resource for community organizers.
You can listen to full episodes of The Point at kpov.org. To learn more about Bruce’s organizing work in Deschutes County historically, listen to “Building Community Power” from Season 1 of Rural Roots Rising. You can check out more episodes of Rural Roots Rising at ruralrootsrising.org.
If you are interested in connecting with other rural Oregonians who are making media and building stronger communities in your area, head to www.rop.org to learn more about Rural Organizing Project and how you can get involved or reach out to us at info@ruralrootsrising.org.
We featured music from Deef, Monk Turner, and The Road Sodas!
Rural Roots Rising is a production of the Rural Organizing Project. Thank you for listening!
Support the show

This month’s episode continues our community media spotlight series by highlighting KPOV & The Point, a daily radio show hosted by a rotating cast of hosts at KPOV 88.9 FM, High Desert Community Radio. This episode is part one of a two-part series! In this first episode, you will hear how The Point and KPOV support and resource community organizing in Central Oregon. In our next episode, we’ll go behind the scenes with one of The Point’s hosts, KPOV Station Manager, and community organizer Bruce Morris! 
Find out when your local radio station is playing Community Media Spotlight: KPOV & The Point at ruralrootsrising.org! 
This episode’s transcript will be available at ruralrootsrising.org.
More on what you heard in this episode:
This episode is part one of a two-part series focused on KPOV & The Point. This month’s episode demonstrates how community radio stations keep our communities safer, informed, and engaged through COVID-19, paramilitary movements, and beyond. 
First, we hear Bruce Morris interview and brainstorm with Janet Sarai Llerandi, Founder and Executive Director of Mecca Bend, in March 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic was declared and was obviously disproportionately impacting Central Oregon’s communities of color. Mecca Bend is an online directory assistance program that enables the Latinx Community of Central Oregon to find the necessary resources for work support programs, family assistance, education, housing, local events, and much more.
Then we hear an episode from The Point from 2018 where Bruce interviewed Jess Campbell, Rural Organizing Project’s Executive Director, about the growing threats of white nationalist and paramilitary movements. To learn more about paramilitary movements and how rural Oregonians have successfully organized to keep their communities safe in the face of overt paramilitary violence, check out Up in Arms: A Guide to Oregon’s Patriot Movement.
You can listen to full episodes of The Point at kpov.org. To learn more about Bruce’s organizing work in Deschutes County historically, listen to “Building Community Power” from Season 1 of Rural Roots Rising. You can check out more episodes of Rural Roots Rising at ruralrootsrising.org.
If Janet’s stories about the lack of internet access in Central Oregon resonated with you, check out the Roadmap to a Thriving Rural Oregon. Rural community leaders and organizers are working together across Oregon to increase reliable and affordable internet access for rural communities. Learn more at rop.org/roadmap!
If you are interested in connecting with other rural Oregonians who are making media and building stronger communities in your area, head to www.rop.org to learn more about Rural Organizing Project and how you can get involved or reach out to us at info@ruralrootsrising.org.
We featured music from Ben von Wildenhaus and The Road Sodas!
Rural Roots Rising is a production of the Rural Organizing Project. Thank you for listening!
Support the show

Last month we introduced LaNicia Duke and her call-in program Rural Race Talks on Coast Community Radio. We recommend listening to Community Media Spotlight: Rural Race Talks first. This month’s episode, Behind the Scenes with Rural Race Talks, explores the power of learning in public with LaNicia and discusses how her radio show is an extension of her organizing. 
One lesson from this episode is that the small-town reality that everyone knows everyone means that the transformations made possible through rural organizing and media-making can be shared in real-time.
Histories of racism in rural places are also shared histories, and reckoning with, healing from, and rebuilding requires us to have these conversations and grapple together with how to move forward. LaNicia knows that process can't happen in isolation and Rural Race Talks is one way of creating a space for that work on the air. 
Download this episode’s transcript at ruralrootsrising.org.
More on what you heard in this episode:
Rural Race Talks is a live call-in radio show hosted by LaNicia Duke on Coast Community Radio carving out space to grapple with our unique legacy of systemic racism and what that means for our present in honest and sometimes messy ways. The show comes at these conversations from multiple angles–everything from how we can begin to heal from our collective, social, and generational traumas to what 2020 taught us about race. 
LaNicia is a self-identified “brown-skinned girl” and community organizer in Tillamook County, which is nearly 94% white. She considers the radio show an extension of her organizing and the real-life conversations she has off the air with her friends and neighbors. Check out full episodes of her show at coastradio.org. 
This episode has also created unexpected opportunities for collaboration and connection. In February, as we produced this episode, LaNicia also interviewed Hannah Harrod, an organizer at ROP and this episode’s host, as part of a Rural Race Talks episode. Listen to that episode in the Coast Community Radio archives.
To learn more about LaNicia’s organizing work in Tillamook County and beyond, visit laniciaduke.com. In this episode, LaNicia shared her work as a chef through Coastal Soul and about the power of food to bring people together. We also discussed her motivations to co-create the first Martin Luther King, Jr. Day events in Tillamook County which you can read more about in the Tillamook Headlight Herald. 
Interested in connecting with other rural Oregonians who are making media or building power in your area? Learn more about Rural Organizing Project at rop.org or reach out at info@ruralrootsrising.org. 
We featured music from The Road Sodas, The Library Ann’s, PC-One, and the Staple Singers.
Rural Roots Rising is a production of the Rural Organizing Project. Thank you for listening!
Support the show

Rural Roots Rising is both a podcast and a radio show airing on 19 community radio stations, and it’s also an ongoing experiment in building up our media skills across rural Oregon. In Season 2 we are amplifying rural radio shows and digging into how they do what they do in the hopes of building up our collective rural media making abilities and supporting the work of the incredible community radio stations we partner with. In this month’s episode, we tune in to Rural Race Talks from Coast Community Radio for our first ever Community Media Spotlight. 
We’re excited to feature Rural Race Talks over 2 episodes! This month’s episode includes sections of LaNicia’s show, particularly her episode from November 4th, 2020, where she models what it looks like to make space on the airwaves for meeting people where they’re at. Next month, we’ll go behind the scenes to learn more about LaNicia’s organizing and the history of her show.
Find out when your local radio station is playing Community Media Spotlight: Rural Race Talks  at ruralrootsrising.org! 
Download this episode’s transcript at ruralrootsrising.org.
More on what you heard in this episode:
Rural Race Talks is a live call-in radio show hosted by LaNicia Duke that is carving out space for rural Oregonians to grapple with our unique legacy of systemic racism and what that means for our present in ways that are honest and sometimes messy. The show comes at these conversations from multiple angles--everything from how we can begin to heal from our collective, social, and generational traumas to what 2020 has taught us about race. LaNicia is a self-identified “brown-skinned girl” and community organizer in Tillamook County, a county that is nearly 94% white. She considers the radio show an extension of her organizing and the real-life conversations she is having off the air with her friends and neighbors up and down the coast. You can listen to full episodes of Rural Race Talks at coastradio.org. You can also check out more episodes of Rural Roots Rising at ruralrootsrising.org. 
To learn more about LaNicia’s organizing work in Tillamook County, go to ruralracetalks.com and love-coalition.org
If you are interested in connecting with other rural Oregonians who are making media or building power in your area, head to www.rop.org to learn more about Rural Organizing Project and how you can get involved or reach out to us at info@ruralrootsrising.org
Did you like the music in this episode? We featured The Library Anns, Junior 85 and Aretha Franklin.
Rural Roots Rising is a production of the Rural Organizing Project. Thank you for listening!
Support the show