Interview of Savannah Thomas
Savannah Thomas: 00:26 Savanna Thomas. S-A-V-A-N-N-A-H T-H-O-M-A-S
Interviewer: 00:32 Alright. And then you can use this map, can you reference where do you live or where do you work?
Savannah Thomas: 00:49 I think around here. 12th and Vincent.
Interviewer: 01:03 Yeah, Golden Valley?
Savannah Thomas: 01:03 Yeah.
Interviewer: 01:04 All right, so thinking back to that area today, what changes have you seen? Positive and negative in that area?
Savannah Thomas: 01:12 So I lived on 12th and Vincent. There’s a park–Folwell, I believe?
Interviewer: 01:18 Yeah
Savannah Thomas: 01:20 Folwell Park like two blocks away from it, and there was always a summer program, We Care Performing Arts, with Ms. Loraine Smaller and every kid in the neighborhood attended it every summer for years, and I don’t believe they do it anymore. So that was a big change because it really brought our neighborhood together; our block. Everyone came to the little last performance. All our neighbors in the surrounding areas.
Savannah Thomas: 01:54 I seen a lot of African Americans moving out because they couldn’t afford the housing in the area anymore. So, a lot of them moved out. A lot of them.
Interviewer: 02:06 Okay. All right, I won’t ask you that because you kind of answered it. So let me just shorten this up. So, the examples that I said like housing, transportation, employment, the war on drugs, even–How do those policies affect you or the community?
Savannah Thomas: 02:31 Well transportation, I mean, it didn’t really affect me as much. I was always just in my own little world, kind of. I went to school farther–I didn’t go to school in the north. So, I was never really in North Minneapolis or never impacted by anything like that. Like I said, I always stayed in my area. I never really went that far off anywhere…North Minneapolis. I don’t know much about it.
Interviewer: 03:05 Have any family?
Savannah Thomas: 03:07 Same goes with them. Me and my brothers, we all went to so it was always farther off, and they were always into sports. It never really affected them, and my dad works at the Minneapolis Urban League. So, we just come home and… It didn’t really affect us like that. Our neighbors either. My best friend is Martin’s daughter, so, she’d probably say the same thing. It didn’t really affect us like that.
Interviewer: 03:46 Okay so, in the community, as of now, do you have any concerns about anything else going on?
Savannah Thomas: 03:59 So, I remember hearing about the historical designation. I don’t know if that’s passed or not? Do you know? That was kind of a big issue I was hearing about. They tried to up the prices of the houses all around there. So–wait can you repeat the question one more time too?
Interviewer: 04:27 Do you have any concerns about the community?
Savannah Thomas: 04:30 I’d say, probably, that’s the biggest one because that’s just like I said: More people of color are moving out because of the increase of housing in the area and-
Interviewer: 04:52 What gives you hope for the future in this community?
Savannah Thomas: 04:54 Wait, what did you say?
Interviewer: 04:54 What gives you hope for the future in this community?
Savannah Thomas: 05:01 For my neighbors, in general, we’re all pretty–we get together a lot. They think of better ways…things to do. They have little meetings. They go to the ARC meetings. And they just find things they can do. We talk a lot. It’s like this little group chat thingy. I think just our neighborhood is all worth the same thing, or most of them. So that’s cool.
Interviewer: 05:38 All right. Do you have any last words about what you want to say about Minneapolis as whole, even, or?
Savannah Thomas: 05:49 I love Minneapolis. I love my neighborhood. I think the get-togetherness is great and how everyone finds different ways to improve it as much as they can. I think that’s cool.
Interviewer: 06:01 All right. That’s all we have for you today. Thank you for coming we enjoyed your time.
Savannah Thomas: 06:08 Welcome. Thank you.
