The Honnold Foundation’s Community Fund provides solar installs for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color-led nonprofits in the most polluted regions in the United States. Two of HF’s Community Fund Partners, Bridging Communities and Congress of Communities, recently completed their solar installations.
Today, we’ll celebrate a successful install, while asking an important question: How is a city in the midst of such a celebrated revival simultaneously experiencing such persistent inequity?
Detroit, Michigan has a power problem. Historic summer storms have exposed Detroit’s aging infrastructure in dramatic fashion. In July and August, repeated floods and power outages left businesses, homeowners, and renters displaced, with millions of dollars in damages, and powerless for up to a week at a time.
Frustrated customers have been offered little to no assurance that there’s an imminent fix. Meanwhile, Detroit’s energy burden and environmental injustices persist. In 2020, many low-income residents spent over 10% of their monthly income on their energy bills, compared to the national average of 2.5%. Low-income Detroiters are also the most likely to suffer the consequences of local utility providers’ pollution. Detroit’s River Rouge coal plant closed its doors in May 2021— but families near the facility have felt the consequences of the nation’s 3rd most polluted zip code since 1958.
In the coming years, extreme weather events will only increase in scope and frequency, and Detroit’s energy infrastructure may not be able to keep up.
Detroit’s River Rouge Coal Plant
Photo by Lester Graham, Michigan Radio
We had the chance to visit our Community Partners at Bridging Communities and Congress of Communities a few weeks prior to their solar installation via the Honnold Foundation’s Community Fund. Ironically, Bridging Communities was in the midst of a power outage.
Both grassroots nonprofits offer vital services to their communities— youth leadership training, elder care, housing support, public 24-hour access to a community fridge, community organizing, and more. But neither organization can provide those services without access to electricity.
That’s where we come in.
Thanks to funding from the Honnold Foundation’s Community Fund, Bridging Communities and Congress of Communities were equipped with a combined 40kW of panels— an investment that will save nonprofits an estimated $160,000 in the next 20 years. And, equally important, the next time power outages sweep Detroit, neither organization will miss a beat.
Congress of Communities’ future headquarters.
Bridging Communities’ Team
Private investment in the city’s core has left national outlets wondering if Detroit is in the midst of a major comeback. But a closer look reveals that the city’s revival has masked growing inequities, mostly along racial lines.
The dramatic influx in wealth has only benefited a few— many of whom are nonnative Detroiters. According to a 2021 report from Detroit Future City, only 12 of Detroit’s 297 neighborhoods are considered middle class. “Black Detroiters’ median income — $33,970 — has only increased by 8 percent in the last 10 years, while white Detroiters’ income has increased by 60 percent”.
Maria Salina, Executive Director of Congress of Communities, looks to local youth leadership for inspiration and solutions to these growing inequities. In fact, reimagining a historic Detroit home as a sustainable, eco-friendly office was an idea that emerged from Congress of Communities’ Youth Leadership Council. From solar panels to study nooks, open floor layouts to modular furniture— their youth team thought of it all. Congress of Communities’ youth leaders graduate to attend top tier schools: Yale, Harvard, Princeton, to name a few. After graduating, youth leaders, and their ideas, return to Detroit primed for significant leadership roles throughout the city.
Meanwhile, Phyllis Edwards, Executive Director of Bridging Communities, knows how youth leaders can fundamentally challenge status quos for the better. But she also knows that, in Detroit, it’s easy for emerging leaders to give up and give in to the nagging suspicion that regardless of personal action, inequity will persist. To these youth leaders, she shares hope:
Phyills Edwards and team celebrate a successful solar installation.
“I was talking to some young African American men the other day, and they said, “nothing’s changing.”
I asked: Do you remember the first time you ate a hamburger?
“Well, no - we grab hamburgers all the time,” they said.
“I remember the first time I bought a hamburger at a restaurant — the first movie I saw a movie in a theater. I remember because they were the direct result of the advocacy of the generation before me, and significant moments for my generation.
The truth is, a lot has changed. My generation got us into restaurants. Now, your generation is taking the next step — exposing the injustices that make sure that our former struggles were not in vain— using social media to expose what people of color have known and fought about all along. Each generation will leave its footprint. it’s up to each of us to decide how we impact that footprint.”
Detroit has a Power Problem— and it will take diverse, visionary leaders to fix it. Solar installations for these nonprofits may not fix everything, but we agree with Congress of Communities’ Youth Leadership Team: it’s the right place to start.
Our partners work in diverse ways, but they’re united by a common vision— a better, brighter future for all of us. Make a gift today and join us in working towards a brighter world.
Special thanks to Garrett MacLean for installation photography.
Interested in learning more about Detroit? Here are a few resources to get started: