Collaborating with Dr. Marie Garlock

Marie has been part of the environmental movement in Walnut Cove from the very beginning at the We Shall Not Be Moved event at the Walnut Cove Town Council Meeting in June 2015. She helped vision the proposal of The Lilies Project and has led many of the programs, ceremonies and healing throughout for almost a decade. Her love and legacy will continue to blossom in Walnut Cove for decades to come.

SocHx: Danielle’s RX

POLICY ADVOCACY RECOMMENDATION BY MARIE GARLOCK, PHD & INSPIRED BY DANIELLE BAILEY-LASH

Improve Social History by incorporating environmental proximity into patient notes as a standard practice for all clinicians (Read More about SocHx: Danielle’s Rx)

Introduced at Shine the Light: Celebrating the Life of Danielle Kara Bailey-Lash January 18th, 2020

This overview from It Is In You speaks for itself:

Project — A 2018-2020 grant to address coal ash through arts + parks. Creative communication partnerships to transmute 4 decades of pollution through a 150+ year legacy of Black- and youth-led movements and arts practices to achieve environmental, racial, and health justice in Stokes County, NC.

Team — ArtPlace America, National Creative Place Making led by Caroline Rutledge Armijo with team of affected community members, artists, scientists, and clergy.

To date —

• Celebrating Courage: Holy Spirit, Story + Song Workshop, co-led with Tracey Brown Edwards

• Community Story Booth for DEQ: Restoration + Respect (PDF), photography by Will Warasila, MFA, I led interviews + narrators’ text with sound design by Michael Betts II, MFA

• Dan River Blessing Ritual: Fifth anniversary of Dan River coal ash spill downstream; The Lilies Project hosted artful prayer ritual / river blessings with clergy + community at banks of the Dan River

• Epiphany Press Conference: Part 1 + 2 for DEQ —Affected families clarify costs of coal ash, their visions for full excavation + safe storage upon pond closures, ethical public policy + industrial practices

• Community Celebration: Dig It Up — dance line processional honoring people who died before they saw April 1, 2019 DEQ ruling for Coal Ash Pond Closure; acknowledging anger, sadness, betrayal held for so long by communities seeking clean water and air; celebrating “against the odds” ruling and taking a moment for joy in the long-haul

• Amen Amen Amen Amen Amen: The Life of Jester Hairston, Lilies Project Kickoff

• Creative Place-Making Celebrations: Local art installations, story series, service learning, music + wellness festival; upcoming in 2020, 2021

Lilies Project Co-Hosts Poor People’s Campaign for Ecological Justice —

• Community Press Conference — Vice President Al Gore, Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II, Community Advocates gather at shore of coal ash cooling lake for Belews Creek Steam Station Press Conference

• Ecological Justice Moral Revival (2018) see min 1:39 to 1:43 and 1:45 to 1:50 for the story of Yara Allen’s We Won’t Be Silent Anymore, sung worldwide, at The Vatican, in state capitols across the US, & dedicated to Tracey Brown o/b/o her mom Annie Brown & Stokes Co. coal ash affected communities

• Dan River Spill Moral Monday (2014), min 6:30, lyrics here and here

MORE INFO

Purpose: The Lilies Project seeks to address coal ash waste and environmental health through public parks, visual and performing arts. Further, to build and sustain community in the rural US south by celebrating Stokes County NC’s legacies of abolition, reconstruction, desegregation, and environmental health organizing that attains civil rights and racial justice against the odds, and through the power of story, song, and shared histories of change-making.

Marie’s Contributions: Joining efforts in art, science, archival documentation, health information, and community-led education and advocacy to strengthen an intergenerational sense of place. Honoring powerful models of Black-led, faith-, and intergenerationally-led organizing to celebrate, envision, and act for environmental, health, and racial justice in the rural south.