Several members of the Camp 1 Rootz collective were living in New Orleans during and after Hurricane Katrina. Camp 1 Rootz communities in New Orleans, and throughout the Gulf Coast, were devastated. The hardest hit were black and poor and predominantly women. Many did not leave because there was no rescue. We had nowhere to go, we had no relationships beyond our neighborhoods, and we felt generally unable to survive outside the city. We engaged in a bottom-up organizing and rebuilding process in New Orleans, under the leadership of those hardest hit, to reestablish our community on principles of sustainability, where neighbor cared for neighbor, and where our survival no longer depended upon those who left us to die.

Fifteen years later, the need remains for bottom up organizing to build the communities we desire and deserve. Camp is a place to begin to instill these practices into future generations. 

In 2010, Camp 1 Rootz began running an annual sleepaway camp, serving children ages 7-17. Age-specific hands-on learning experiences include preparing healthy foods and snacks, daily exercises for maintaining healthy minds and bodies, and skill development in various areas through certified instructors including swimming and water safety, agriculture and urban gardening, beading, knitting, and sewing, carpentry and construction.

At Camp 1 Rootz, we view sustainable development as a creative process of harnessing existing resources within one’s environment, including the talents and wisdom of everyday people. We seek to realize this vision not only among campers, but also through our relationship with the community of Port Gibson, Mississippi, where we’ve intentionally located the campsite.

Reintroducing our children to sustainability, land, and agriculture is to further an understanding of our need to reclaim and hold on to our land, our ability to care for and protect our communities, and alternative ways of interacting in a society that fosters growth, nurturing, and development—instead of exploitation and destruction.