In Dallas’ food deserts, community gardens ease but don’t end food insecurity
In Dallas’ food deserts, community gardens ease but don’t end food insecurity
To be more effective, cities need to support these community gardens, as demonstrated by an innovative program in Austin, experts say.
Neyssa Shockley stands on her family s land in Dolphin Heights. “You won’t meet a person around here who doesn’t recognize my father’s name,” said Shockley, 31. Her father was James “Skip” Shockley, an activist and member of the Dallas Black Panther Party. “Community meant everything to him.” His final request before he died last May was to turn the family land into a community garden.(Nitashia Johnson)
‘What heaven looks like:’ New MLK Food Park pop-up a joyful celebration of South Dallas
Residents say the new food park in the Forest District is an example of what food can do for community building.
DayJus Hill and Tatiana Laury hold up their popsicles they got from the Frios Gourmet Pops truck at the launching of the MLK Food Park in Dallas on April 9, 2021. The MLK Food Park will be tested for a month in South DallasÕs Forest District, offering a variety of food, live music, community gardens, and play area for the kids. (Shelby Tauber/Special Contributor)(Shelby Tauber / Special Contributor)
Reclaiming the Forest Theater
After years of decline, can the theater return to its place as the hub of South Dallas culture?
Sometimes the history of a single building can tell the story of an entire city. The Forest Theater, which has stood at the corner of Harwood Street and what is now Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard since 1949, is one of those buildings. The theater’s first incarnation opened a few blocks west in 1930. It was the entertainment centerpiece of a stable, upper-middle-class and primarily Jewish community. It hosted the first-ever screening of an all-Yiddish film in 1938, and when it moved to a new and much larger home in 1949, 5,000 people attended a raucous grand opening that featured a block party and square dance headlined by the Big D Jamboree band and organist Norma Ballard. A double showing of the baseball comedy