Simply accessible to tens of millions of residents, Kenneth Hahn Park is much more than a spot to unwind for Camille Samuels, a fellow of Environmental Justice with Black Ladies for Wellness, a South Los Angeles-based schooling, empowerment and advocacy group.
“It’s a classroom, a therapeutic floor and a battlefield for environmental justice,” stated the 26-year-old Ph. D candidate in Cultural Anthropology on the College of California, Irvine.
Kenneth Hahn Park, which is near each downtown Los Angeles and the Pacific Ocean, is surrounded by over 30 completely different communities and is the place Samuels, who just lately moved from the East Coast to California, started having picnics with buddies and creating private recollections.
“Particularly once I was ready out visitors to return right down to O.C. (Orange County), or simply wished to kill time or it was a fairly day and I simply didn’t need the day to finish fairly but, earlier than going again, I’d spend a number of time hanging out within the park,” she acknowledged.
Since then, Samuels has moved to L.A. and lives proper down the road.
“The park is in my neighborhood, my yard, and it continues to be a spot the place I carry guests, when buddies go to, household from out of city,” she acknowledged.
“I at all times make a cease right here for myself, simply picnics, walks, hikes, issues like that. And that’s actually remodeled on this previous couple months, working at Black Ladies for Wellness,” stated Samuels. Since beginning that job, she has realized so much in regards to the ongoing marketing campaign in opposition to neighborhood oil drilling in South L.A. and was educated to the truth that she lives subsequent to the most important city oil subject in the whole nation, she stated.
“This park was once part of the oil subject, I realized. There’s a number of environmental justice historical past tied into this park. The bowl was previously a dam that collapsed and flooded,” she acknowledged.
That compelled her to concentrate on Kenneth Hahn Park when the chance arose for her to turn into an environmental justice fellow at Black Ladies for Wellness. Her purpose was to be taught extra in regards to the historical past and inform it by an environmental justice lens, heart Black residents who stay close to the park, seen the house rework, and the way it impacts them, in line with Samuels.
Most just lately, she’s hosted group engagement occasions on the park, resembling for Earth Day, April 22.
“That was actually beautiful. It was a yoga class. We had a beautiful teacher come lead us in some stretching and meditation, mindfulness,” stated Samuels.
The occasion additionally featured a workshop and presentation on a few of its historical past, realized by her analysis, she acknowledged. She discovered that a lot of the attendees lived inside 2 miles of the park and rather less than half hailed from multi-generational L.A. households.
“Everybody left saying they realized one thing new. In order that was actually cool. That occasion was actually beautiful,” acknowledged Samuels.
She hosted the workshop close to the pond towards the entrance of Kenneth Hahn Park. Proper behind her visitors, on yoga mats with snacks close by, one might see open grass and bushes, however simply behind them had been the oil derricks, Samuels identified.
“The photographs from the occasion are insane … You could have girls stretching. Everybody’s having enjoyable, having a good time, and that’s the truth of residing the place we stay, the setting that we name residence right here in South LA,” she acknowledged.
Continued Samuels, “We don’t quit our enjoyable and our pleasure, however on the similar time, the truth is that there’s oil drilling occurring round us. There’s the airport, the freeways, there’s all this stuff which can be impacting our capability to stay as wholesome as we as we may be. … Personally, I like spending time within the park. For my birthday this 12 months, one in all my buddies and I did a picnic within the park, and it was simply actually candy!”
Her most memorable moments in Kenneth Hahn Park are instances when she’s there along with her buddies.
“I feel the stability between with the ability to have these massive occasions and people simply actually small, intimate moments make the park one in all my favourite locations, for certain,” she added.
(This story was produced with the assistance of the LA Parks and Inexperienced Area initiative coordinated by LENS and Ethnic Media Providers.)
