- Coming up next on "Black Issues Forum" we celebrate women's history month and decades of breaking barriers, and a special one-on-one.

- [Narrator] In 1987, Congress officially declared March as National Women's History Month.

A special presidential proclamation is issued each year which honors the extraordinary achievements of women in America.

- Don't go too far.

We'll be right back to talk all about it.

[upbeat music] - [Announcer] "Black Issues Forum" is a production of PBS North Carolina, with support from the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.

Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting PBS NC.

[upbeat music] ♪ - Welcome to "Black Issues Forum" I'm Kenia Thompson.

In celebration of Women's History Month, we've got a special one-on-one conversation with a very familiar face here at "Black Issues Forum" La'Meshia Whittington, executive Director of the Green Majority and professor at North Carolina State University.

She's one of our trusted guests.

And she's here with us to talk a little bit about Women's History Month, the past, present and future, as well as the impact women have had here in North Carolina.

Welcome to the show, La'Meisha.

- Thank you Kenia, thank you for having me.

- Of course, we're so happy to have you.

For those that may not know you and may not have seen you on this show, just share a little bit about what you do and the inspiration behind the drive in your work.

- Absolutely, well again, I appreciate being able to once again be on "Black Issues Forum" and if folks are familiar with my journey, just being here in space with you all, you know, I formally wore a hat for three years, we'll talk about a little bit more.

But I have since transitioned to now serving as Executive Director of the Green Majority which is a nonprofit organization, a 501 C4.

But it's a sister organization to an already established powerful nonprofit called Democracy Green, which I was proud to serve as a founding member five years ago.

So in the wake of Hurricane Florence, I was one of part of the rescue crews that dispatched direct aid actually rescued 250 people out of flood torn waters during Hurricane Florence.

So from there, there was this movement that was birthed where now we operate between advocacy, governance and policy.

How do we advocate for the funding and the resource support to our most marginalized impacted communities that are facing the most environmental injustices, because we are an environmental justice organization.

But how do we prioritize policies, not just symbolic measures, but actual policies with enforcement, to ensure that our communities aren't consistently being targeted, as they have been for generations, by corporations that don't have our communities front of mind when it comes not just to economic prosperity, but community health, not creating disparities.

So we've done everything from actually filing a petition and a lawsuit to the EPA standing against a corporation that contaminated our largest watershed here, the Cape Fear River, all the way to actually doing direct relief and aid and paying rent for folks, making sure folks could stay in alternative housing like hotels in the midst of pandemic.

So it spans, we go into communities and we do direct education workshops.

Last year, we were able to help a community in Sampson County receive a 13 million grant to actually establish water for the first time, running water through the local municipality for the first time for this community.

That's just some of the things that we do.

So very proud to be able to serve in that capacity now.

But you know, it's my heart's work, Kenia.

- Yeah, and that's just the tip of the iceberg with all the things that you do.

You've been recently appointed by Governor Cooper to serve on the North Carolina Water Treatment Facility Operations Certification Board.

Talk about, I think I already know the answer, but how'd you get involved in that?

And then a little bit more about why that's important, especially here in our minority communities.

- Sure, so for me, I come from a long line of Afro-Indigenous folks deep in the Appalachian Mountains.

And so a part of our tradition, we are sustainable, come from a long line of sustainable farmers.

I'm a water and land protector, is what we essentially call ourselves.

And a water and land protector means that I grew up understanding natural resources, that protecting the earth is protecting ourselves.

Our land and our lives are tied in the pursuit for liberation.

And we saw that historically.

The extraction of land and our people happened during the slave trade.

And so that outgrowth of my community and many communities like ours was this instilling within our people that when you grow up you can't forget where you come from, you have to remember your people.

And what that means is prioritizing the protection of natural resources.

And so it's an honor to be appointed to such a board.

I was also appointed to the Environmental Justice and Equity Advisory Board by Secretary Biser, NC DEQ.

And those compliment, because it's all about how do we ensure that our natural resources aren't contaminated?

Because our biodiversity, our people, we drink from our well water, we drink from, again, our water sources, whether it's local municipalities and city governments.

And so being able to be in a position now to support water treatment plant operators, and ensuring that we don't have to have boiling water advisories anymore.

You know, we've heard this around North Carolina.

There have been a slew of water advisories for the past five to 10 years that's telling folks, there's something in your water.

We haven't been able to cleanse it out, make sure it's purified, make sure it's actually sanitized from the water treatment plant, so you need to boil it.

Well, we wanna impede that.

And so that's a part of the process and how I got into that, just being a water keeper, prioritizing, making sure that it's been a part of my advocacy for years, is that when our water's polluted, we're polluted, we're poisoned, and that's where health disparities start.

If we can't drink our water, you know, that's the source of life.

And we have to make sure to prioritize that.

So just very honored to be in that space and continue that work.

- Yeah.

And you know, I think that's one thing we kinda take for granted, that water is just gonna be clean and be there.

But like you said, that is the source of our health.

And so when we talk about a lot of this justice work that you do, I've seen you advocating for so many, not afraid to say the things that need to be said.

What sparks this fire for advocacy?

And how has that influenced this work that you do?

- So Kenia, in honor of Women's History Month, I have to give honor to the matriarchs that taught me well, my mother, Sonya, who's also the executive director of Democracy Green.

So it's a family effort.

And my grandmother, now an ancestor, Ms. Rebecca.

And so their investment in me and my brother, for years, they took me in community.

I remember my first memory.

They say, you know, your first age of consciousness.

I was four years old.

And I recall being in this facility that was an old house.

And I saw my mother and my grandmother cooking.

And what I came to realize was that my mother was the first organizer of a transition home for returning citizens.

And so they were actually there cooking and cleaning for folks who had just been released from an incarceral state and was now, you know, being reacclimated into society and so their support wasn't just cooking and cleaning.

They actually helped to fundraise.

They actually helped to get the building infrastructure up, and it's still there 30 years later.

And so going there, we didn't have a lot, but they always said, "You know, if you have a little, you still have a lot."

And that means you need to share and pass it forward.

And I just recall growing up and going to, you know, sitting at the elder's feet and going to Miss Annie swinging on her front porch and her saying, "You know, pretty as as pretty does," and telling me that, you know, you have to look at things at a deeper inspection.

Those are the life lessons that I learned from matriarchs over and over and over again.

And so that passion for justice was seeing it carried forth every single day as a practice in my life thanks to my mother, thanks to my grandmother.

And even seeing my mother, she's the reason that I went into environmental justice work.

She protested against a corporation coming into our predominantly Black community of landowners.

And so her protest at the mic at a city council meeting and joining other activists, she was one of the only Black women in the space, they defeated the corporation.

And I knew then that if I just simply stand up, speak truth to power, stand in my power, stand in my authority, and stand in my love and conviction for what is right and what is wrong that it can work out successfully in our favor.

And so that's why that you gotta... You hear it come out a little bit, right?

[laughs] - I hear, but it's a beautiful story of legacy, right?

- That's right.

- You're not a stranger to leadership roles.

You were with Advance Carolina.

You were able to accomplish so much there.

Talk a little bit about that and then this transition to The Green Majority.

- That's right, so you know, I served as the Deputy Director for Advance Carolina and as the Deputy Director of Programs for North Carolina Black Alliance for three years.

And just that investment, it was just a passion and an alignment to join a powerful statewide organization to be able to build that Black political and economic power that I had seen growing up, but just seeing a formation and a organization was groundbreaking.

And being one of the, you know, three to four directors, I was able to organize myself out of a job.

That's what I call it.

And that was the vision.

It was saying, okay, if there was a purpose in my journey, what would that purpose be?

It would be to hire folks from community.

It's what we did.

It would be to invest in community and actually give many grants and actual funding from us to other community organizations that couldn't receive funding.

We do that.

And so doing all of that and seeing that over the evolution of three years has been a powerful testimony.

We were able to, you know, achieve vetoes on bills that almost made a protest, you know, the right to protest into a felony conviction that would have impacted college students.

That would've impacted our churchgoers that are, you know, marching souls to the polls.

Anything could have been deemed a protest because it would've been up to the discretion of the local law enforcement, and we didn't need that gray area.

We didn't need that ambiguity for our communities.

Or if my mother, if I say that she went out to protest an environmental injustice corporation would wonder if that would have been deemed illegal.

And then she would have a felony conviction, felony charge that led to conviction just for saying, "I don't want this in my backyard."

And so being able to be in a space in that organization to stand against such impactful nefarious legislation, we did that, and so being able to advocate for folks to have funding from the HOPE Program and connecting community members with state leaders and local elected leaders to be able to connect those dollars, we did that.

Being able to be there at the utility moratorium and keeping people's lights on, we did that.

And so the community and the folks that are still working at the organization is a proud legacy of that Black tradition.

And so being able to step now into, you know, this role of being Executive Director of The Green Majority is the next iteration so we can all be partners in this pursuit because one just isn't enough.

We have to all, that's right.

- Beautiful - We're all in this together.

- All together.

Well, one thing I learned recently about you is that you use both sides of your brains because you are also musically talented, which I'm like, how much more can you do?

And then there's also some music royalty in your family, no?

- That's right, that's right.

I appreciate that.

That's absolutely right.

So my great cousin, Etta Baker, Piedmont blues, she's now an ancestor, but her and her sister Cora, who doesn't always get the accolades, they actually learned their picking style from their father.

And so my great cousin, you know, she taught Bob Dylan, was actually his teacher, Taj Mahal.

So we talk about the tradition of arts and music.

It's in my family, but it's in our cultural tradition in the US South, like, it's what we do, and it's really the rhythm to our justice.

When we talk about rhythm and blues, where do you think the blues came from, right?

And so we have a rhythm to bring out the syncopation and the pain in an artistic way that moves folks forward.

When we sing songs in protest tradition, "We shall overcome."

Okay, that rang not only here, but then it rang in Ireland when they were moving for their freedom because they heard our freedom songs and then our people assisted them in curating theirs.

We heard that at Tiananmen Square when the students in China were protesting in a very violent way.

We heard at the Berlin Wall, "We shall overcome."

And so the art tradition, you know, I'm very proud to be a part of the Black Southern legacy.

And so I am a musician.

My brother and I are both classically trained.

I play eight instruments, and we actually have our own music school, The Scale Academy that we actually changed up, paused during pandemic, but have taught music for 15 years.

Not to date myself, but it's been a long time.

And it's just the love and it's the passion of being able to go deep into community and bring hope, to bring relief.

When storms come through, in schools children still have PTSD when they hear rain hit on top of the tin roof.

And to be able to create music and to soothe those wounds, that's the purpose.

And so yeah, so that's the other side of me.

[laughs] - The other side.

One of the many sides.

So many accomplishments, but there was once a time where women didn't have opportunities like these, and many have fought the good fight for us to sit here, to get to sit here, and even for me to be in this seat was once a privilege.

As we saw in the earlier clip, Women's History Month was established in the late 1980s.

And since then, women have been advocating for equal pay, reproductive rights, gender equality, and so much more.

La'Meshia, let's talk about why our history, women's history is so significant, and what's the meaning behind this month?

- Oh, the meaning behind this month is identifying, elevating, yes, history, but you know, I always tell my students that history doesn't mean it's over, that it's done.

History was the foundation by which modern and present day systems move, right?

It had to be built at some point, but we're still moving in activation.

And one thing that we're moving is we're still benefiting from the labor, the intellectual property, the passion of women.

Women, we build economies and we sustain them.

And so even though, you know, our value cannot just be measured around our labor, absolutely not.

That is not the measure of our worth.

Honey, it is not, but when we talk about the labor force and also give honor to stay-at-home mothers, stay-at-home parents, we can't even quantify.

That is immeasurable, the amount of tireless labor that is happening behind the scenes that continues to hold up America, this nation.

But if we hyper-focus just on the labor force, annually, women here in the United States produce $7.6 trillion - - Wow.

- to the GDP.

- Wow.

- $7.6 trillion.

And in one year, women who work for wages, for pay rather, earn more in one year than the entire GDP for Japan.

- Wow.

- We're just 5.2 trillion.

So when we talk about, so if we stop working for one single day, one single day, - - Yeah.

- the US would lose $21 billion.

North Carolina, $586 million in a day.

- Wow.

Wow.

So, you know my next thought was gonna be, have we been erased, right?

Not only as women, but as Black women.

But when you give us a stat like that.

No!

- That's right.

Well, and I think that's the thing.

Our presence, our labor hasn't been erased because the economy's moving forward.

Sometimes we need economic justice.

We need social welfare justice.

We need reproductive justice.

But as far as our imprint and our impact, it can't be rendered silent.

However, our story has been.

When we talk about the history of Black women in the broader landscape, we oftentimes connect the Women's History Month to, you know, the movement in the 1980s that was inspired at outgrowth of the '60s and '70s, right?

When we're talking about California and what led to the, you know, the observation of Women's History Month, okay, that was informed by the Civil Rights Movement.

Even one of the leaders, Laura X, decided to completely remove her last name into patent in her quote after Malcolm X, and her emancipation.

But if we continue to back that up we're then connected to the women's suffrage movement and Sojourner Truth, who asked, you know, "Am I not a woman?"

But the reason she asked that question was because before the women's suffrage movement in 1830, was the first Boston female anti-slavery society created by African American women.

Who were actually protesting in Boston and Philadelphia and New York, and they created these societies and then made it interracial so that other races and allies could join that movement for liberation.

That was actually the first, on record, women's liberation movement to protest, first for anti-slavery, right, policy, abolition and emancipation, and intuitively evolved into voting rights.

- [Host] Wow.

Wow.

- So where's that history?

- Where's that history?

- Broadly told.

- Yeah.

And, you know, you've dropped some names already but let's talk about some Black North Carolina trailblazing women, past and present, and then who's someone that you admire most?

- Oh, that's a difficult one.

- I know.

- You know, I think through, you know, Congresswoman Eva Clayton.

I just want to give her honor.

I love to give folks flowers when they're still here.

And so, her being the first Black woman, right, elected to Congress on behalf of North Carolina, and the first Black person since reconstruction, to be elected into that congressional seat here for North Carolina, I'm gonna give her honor, right?

I wanna give honor to Ms. Dolly Burwell.

She's the mother of the Environmental Justice Movement.

So when we talk about the global movement of environmental justice and climate justice, it began here in North Carolina, 40, now going on this year, 41 years ago.

But that was birthed by a Black woman and other Black women and their children, ideating around how to stop a lethal contaminant to come into their home.

And then now it's turned into a global movement, by which we now have billions of dollars being allocated from the Federal Government.

We now have policy with enforcement for the first time that is beginning to look at how to regulate corporations, because we don't have really, we don't have strong policy around corporate accountability.

That started with a Black woman.

And when I say who I admire, I'll say this again, there's so many women, but I have to say my mom.

[laughing] I just have to say this.

And nine and a half too, is in a obligatory sense but in a recognition, she's an Executive Director, but she was the first Black woman in the US South, arguably the United States, that actually was the sole owner and acquiesced a Korean beauty supply store.

- Wow.

- That dealt in imports and exports, internationally.

And created an actual wig bank through that beauty supply store to provide wigs and actual care for folks going through chemotherapy and alopecia in our community.

So I have to give honor to my own people because it's a part of the tradition.

We're not an anomaly, and I say as a Black community, as Black women, we're not a monolith.

We're individual.

But we have to give honor in different categories.

Nina Simone.

Let's talk about it.

Fletcher, North Carolina.

When I say Etta Baker, okay, this is the mountains standing up.

But Congresswoman Clayton, that's Eastern North Carolina.

So there's so many names that we could go down the list.

So many inventors that we could talk about when we talk about Black Women's History Month.

Look, I'm gonna put that in there.

Did you hear that?

Did you hear that caveat?

As we're talking about this, we have to talk about the numerous amount of inventors, both in North Carolina and nationally, that oftentimes doesn't get the accolades.

When we discuss 3D imaging and printing, when we talk about the text fundraising technology, all Black women.

When we talk about cataract surgery, Black women.

When we talk about the founding of Los Angeles, that was done by ancestor Biddy, who was enslaved, was forced to march 2000 miles with her three children.

to California.

- [Host] Wow.

- Won her freedom papers in a lawsuit and then became one of the wealthiest Black women and landowners in California.

And then become a philanthropist and funded daycares, schools, hospitals, for Black community, and actually seated what is now known as Downtown Los Angeles.

- Wow.

So much history.

- So much.

- So much that we're not taught too.

- That's right.

- Yeah.

Well, although we've come far and have made great strides, there are some who will say that we still have a lot of work to do.

That issues like Roe v. Wade provide an opportunity for the government to overreach.

The fight continues, not just for us, but more importantly for our daughters.

La'Meshia, what are some of the current policies that are quite frankly, barriers to continued progression for us?

- Right, so I always say all issues are women issues, right?

All issues are our issues.

And so when we look at, right now, we are still in the throes in North Carolina of redistricting issues.

Locally, when, you know, I talk with community, I speak with community, I'm always saying, you know, "Be hyper-vigilant with your local elected officials, city council members, county commissioners, and then you can go up to your senators and your representatives, but be very clear how your voting maps are being drawn."

Because there is lawsuits going on right now.

We think that the drawing process is over.

It's not.

And why is that important?

It's because if we are choosing representation and who our representatives are elected, right, who they become, okay, they make the difference between the wage gap, whether that's going to continue or not.

Are they advocating for the mitigation of the wage gap?

Are they actively talking about creating a equitable environment?

For workplace, are they talking about what are the maternity support needs that's actually at a place's employment?

If your representative isn't talking about that they're not talking about our issues.

But then if we can't elect those folks because our votes are predetermined, then it doesn't matter if we show up at the ballot box.

So we have to be engaged with redistricting.

When we talk about actively supporting women that are still in an incarceral state, the legislation that we have to prioritize is also looking at, there was recent legislation that was passed.

Governor Cooper signed this, I believe it was last year, that finally made it illegal to to require women incarcerated to give birth while shackled.

Okay, that was just happening.

- Wow.

But then what is the policy outgrowth that we need to advocate as next steps to ensure, well, what is the environment by which they're giving birth?

- [Kenia] Mm hm.

- Okay, shackles is the bare minimum.

So when we talk about also being very hypervigilant we have to talk about, again, reproductive justice.

We have to talk about pro-democracy from redistricting.

We have to talk about farming and land, our environment.

There are bills that are moving right now, farm bills, energy bills, that is going to make it increasingly hard to hold corporations accountable.

So if your water - [Kenia] Mm hm.

is contaminated, guess what?

That's going to impact high infant mortality rates which we already have in the black community.

- Wow, yeah.

And, you know, so as you well know, the fight continues and it's it's gonna continue through the generations to come, right?

So, all these barriers, you you're gonna get tired eventually [laughs] and we have to start shaping the young ladies, the little girls who look up to us, as you did to looking up to your mother and your grandmother.

And you know, whether we want to admit it or not, we're role models and we're setting examples for them.

How do we prepare our younger generation to take the baton and keep running the race in some of these really important and critical topics and issues?

- Yeah, you know, from being in community and and being an educator, first we have to meet the needs of the young girls who are struggling in public school.

- [Kenia] Yeah.

- Private school and the like.

We have to make sure that there is housing support.

Right, the basic needs.

And then when we make sure there's basic housing support, there are actually healthy foods.

We're a food insecure state.

80% of North Carolina's food insecure.

Our children come from these communities.

I came from a rural area.

- Yeah.

- Okay, these are the issues that young girls are dealing with every day, and who is ensuring that, not only are they protected, well fed, but then the next step is well-informed.

- [Kenia] Mm hm.

- We're showing up to the civic process also means bringing the civic process to them.

- Yeah.

- When we, there are so many great volunteer programs that are actively happening that I do wanna give you know, honor or to that are actively engaging.

When we talk about, you know, "Raise Up" that is actually investing in, you know, families that are dealing with incarceral state.

When we're talking about these other organizations whether it's the Boys and Girls Club, they're actively engaging in community.

But for us to inspire - [Kenia] Mm hm.

is also to lead, to be - [Kenia] Yeah.

in spaces to say, okay how can we break down the barriers of participation for you no matter what the age is to actually be able to go to that city council meeting, to go to that county commissioner meeting.

- Yeah.

- And so I think at the same time it's making sure that basic needs are met.

- Yeah.

- And then we can talk about how to engage.

But if folks are hungry, if little girls are starving, if little girls are not being sheltered in place how can we really engage and invest the education they need to be civically engaged to shape the policy that they need for their future to ensure future generations aren't in that deficit?

- Yeah.

A little over a minute, which I don't know if there's even enough time to do this question justice but Equal Rights Amendment has been yet to be added to the Constitution.

Why has it not been, and would it make a difference?

- Okay, so will it make a difference?

Absolutely, so when we talk about why hasn't it been, there's always a political side, two sides of the fight.

And so when we talk about this constitutional amendment, it was the intention nearly a hundred years ago to talk about the incorporation of fairness and equity for all genders.

- [Kenia] Yeah.

- Right, no matter what.

And the fact that that isn't, just the fact that we've been fighting all these years for that to be enshrined, and that both sides of Congress, Congress can fight.

That's what's been happening, is one side has politicized versus the other side, when really this we're talking about our lives here.

- Yeah.

- And when we talk about passing and enshrining it as a constitutional amendment, that ensures that legal protection.

So if there is, you know, unfair employment practices - [Kenia] Mm hm.

- when we talk about the wage gap in the fact that we see that women are paid less.

- [Kenia] Yeah.

- This will actually help to give a legal precedence to be able to impact in the court of law, - Yeah.

to hold to task folks that actively - So much.

discriminate against women whether it's in the - Yeah.

places of employment or otherwise.

- So much to cover, La'Meshia Whittington, and thank you so much for being here with us as always.

So much knowledge, and so we're so grateful to know you and to have you here.

- Thank you, Kenia.

[Kenia laughs softly] - We invite you to engage with us on Instagram using the hashtag #BlackIssuesForum.

You can also find our full episodes on pbsnc.org/blackissuesforum and on the PBS video app.

Thank you for watching.

I'm Kenia Thompson, I'll see you next time.

[upbeat music] ♪ [music ends] - [Voiceover] Black Issues Forum is a production of PBS North Carolina with support from the Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation.

Quality public television is made possible through the financial contributions of viewers like you who invite you to join them in supporting PBS NC.