Marc Peeples, 32, said he returned to the half-abandoned neighborhood in Detroit where he grew up to create a garden, chip away at food deserts and teach children the value of urban horticulture. Credit Wayne Lawrence for The New York Times. Featured Image
[dropcap]DETROIT [/dropcap]— For nearly two years, a man tilled an overgrown park in a half-abandoned Detroit neighborhood into a tiny urban farm, filling the earth with the seeds of kale and spinach and radishes. He was black. [mc4wp_form id=”6042″]
For half of that time, the man, Marc Peeples, 32, was the subject of dozens of calls to the police — the allegations growing more serious with each call — by three women who lived on a street facing the park. They were white.
Mr. Peeples said he returned to the neighborhood where he grew up to create a garden that could help feed residents, chip away at food deserts and teach children about urban horticulture — a personal redemptive mission after three years in prison on drug charges.
What happened next was something else: gardening while black, as his lawyer described it, another example of white people calling the police on a black person for everyday activities.
You must be logged in to post a comment.