Grid Magazine March 2021 [#142]

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The secret lives of city beavers

Nicetown residents smell injustice in the air

Landscaper brings out the best in tiny spaces

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p. 16

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MARCH 2021 / ISSUE 142 / GRIDPHILLY.COM

T O W A R D A S U S TA I N A B L E P H I L A D E L P H I A

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Kristi Habedanck Philadelphia, PA TELL US ABOUT YOURSELF Hi my name is Kristi Habedanck and I am the founder-maker of m. et al, a jewelry business that utilizes cuttlebone casting methods. After graduating from UC Berkeley with a BA in Economics, I swapped numbers for artwork, completing two semesters at California College of Arts and an array of classes at the Main Line Art Center.

WHAT ARE YOU CURRENTLY WORKING ON? I’m always inspired by different forms of beauty and craft, and I get the most joy from the originality of hand-crafted jewelry. The interesting thing about this cuttlebone casting method is that it makes every single piece original. Each cuttlebone is destroyed once the hot silver is poured over. This means all of her rings are entirely unique, much like a person’s fingerprints, and fit everyone differently.

WHAT ARE YOUR GOALS? It’s fair to say I am an old-school seller and have completely avoided social media and online sales—I don’t even have a website yet! However, I do realize that developing a social media presence is the next step for my business and I am definitely willing to jump on the bandwagon if it means I can make beautiful jewelry for some new customers! At NextFab I mostly use the torch because I work with metal and I don’t have access to these tools anywhere else. I can design and finish in the comfort of my own home, but I really could not do what I do without NextFab. With a jewelry studio, a woodshop, a photo lab, and so much more, I am always telling people that NextFab is the best-kept secret in town!

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EDI TO R ’S NOTES

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alex mulcahy

No Comment

publisher Alex Mulcahy managing editor Alexandra W. Jones associate editor & distribution Timothy Mulcahy tim@gridphilly.com copy editor David Jack Daniels art director Michael Wohlberg writers Bernard Brown Amanda Clark Gabrielle Houck Alexandra W. Jones Randy LoBasso Brion Shreffler Lois Volta photographers Drew Dennis Milton Lindsay illustrators Sean Rynkewicz Lois Volta published by Red Flag Media 1032 Arch Street, 3rd Floor Philadelphia, PA 19107 215.625.9850 G R I D P H I L LY. C O M

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ments on the majority of its online articles. They will continue to provide a public forum for sports stories, so feel free to share your opinion on the departure of Carson Wentz, but you can’t comment on the news.

Some Inquirer posters bemoaned the decision as censorship: an attempt to silence opinions other than those held by the newspaper.

The newspaper explained their decision: “Commenting on Inquirer.com was long ago hijacked by a small group of trolls who traffic in racism, misogyny and homophobia.”

In days of yore, readers could only voice their opinions by mailing a letter; only those that editors deemed worthy would be published. This effectively locked out racist ramblings and unfounded conspiracy theories from any association with the news.

Not so online.

The comments section on a media website bypasses the traditional gatekeeping that a publication adheres to. Perhaps because it has been serving Philadelphia for 191 years, The Inquirer felt a greater sense of responsibility to its constituents.

Silicon Valley, on the other hand, dodges responsibility that a local publication takes on. They prefer to think of themselves in the same light that former Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy did. In 1997, Kennedy described the internet as “vast democratic forums,” akin to a public square or town hall meeting.

Though they are being moderated somewhat, social media sites allow posts about anything and everything. As we have seen, truth and accuracy cannot possibly be vetted for each post. It does not matter if a post has an audience of three or three million.It is all content, supplied by the largest staff of unpaid freelance writers and photographers in the history of mankind.

The economic implications of this for the print publishing industry are profound. Media companies, ourselves included, employ editors, who then assign stories to staff

writers and work in conjunction with photo editors and photographers. The editorial process also involves fact-checkers and copy editors, and once the words and images are approved, the pages need to be designed.

It’s expensive to create content when you follow these rules. Social media has no such costs, and as a result, there is a staggering amount of content. This in turn creates an enormous audience, which tech companies—after spying on their users’ every move—sell to advertisers at a fraction of the cost that traditional media does. This is why local news departments have been eviscerated or have vanished completely around the country.

Sacha Baron Cohen, the absurdist comedian best known for his Borat character, spoke about the power that social media wields, and how grossly that power is misused, in a 2019 speech at the Anti-Defamation League Never Is Now Summit on Anti-Semitism and Hate: “This is about giving people, including some of the most reprehensible people on earth, the biggest platform in history to reach a third of the planet. Freedom of speech is not freedom of reach. Sadly, there will always be racists, misogynists, antisemites and child abusers.

But I think we could all agree that we should not be giving bigots and pedophiles a free platform to amplify their views and target their victims.”

Publishing is a responsibility, and when you provide a platform for amplified speech, you are a publisher. It is time to regulate companies trying to shield themselves from it by invoking the First Amendment, all the while enriching themselves and laying waste to our democracy.

ALEX MULCAHY Editor-in-Chief alex@gridphilly.com COV E R P HOTO G RAP H BY D RE W DENNI S

I L LU S T R AT E D P O R T R A I T BY J A M E S B O Y L E

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n february 1, The Philadelphia Inquirer put a stop to reader com-

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by

lois volta

DEAR LOIS,

How does the Capitol riot reflect how people live at home?

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hen we live in a world where we feel we can do whatever we want, whenever we want, we succumb to a spiritual plague. It erodes the fabric of cooperation and equality, as well as the symbiosis that allows for us to have safe, healthy living environments. When we look at those trying to dismantle our democracy, we can see ‘doing whatever, whenever’ as a symptom of a bigger problem that is chipping away at the health of our government.

I want to acknowledge the role of the custodial staff, in particular the people of color, at the U.S. Capitol, who cleaned the mess and damage left by a right-wing white supremacist mob on January 6. There were feces, blood and broken glass that had to be wiped and swept. I doubt the mob ever thought twice about who would clean up after them. They apparently believed that the message they were trying to convey was more important than treating other humans with dignity.

I value the importance of the home, and the Capitol Building is the symbolic home of our democracy. My mission is to promote equality and personal responsibility in the domestic sphere, but I can’t help but apply that lens to the enormous problems facing our country.

Because these problems are reflected in our homes as well.

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There is a plague that is attacking the heart of the American people. People believe that they can do and say whatever they want without consequence. The spirit of hatred, and this perceived invincibility, stems from the fear of engaging with and exploring the depths of love. It’s the egocentric, rugged individualist attitude that stinks up the house— the same spirit we saw in those who tried, unsuccessfully, to take down our democracy.

It’s as if individualism has stripped us from all sense of community and consideration for our fellow citizens.

Other people are impacted by your attitude and behavior; you cannot do or say whatever you want without consequence.

It’s all too familiar within the home to hear someone say, “I’m not good at cleaning,” or “I would be wasting my time because you can do this so much better than I can” or simply “I’m too tired.”

These everyday phrases shirk personal responsibility, in the form of misogynist microaggressions against the people with whom we share our lives. If you make the mess, you should clean it up.

If we take a real look at how deep the issues are in our homes and our country, we may finally be able to identify and reverse patriarchal attitudes and strategic incompetence that has unjustly and unfairly subjugated women, people of color and other marginalized groups.

After the fear of being humbled is overcome by every person in the home, the truth of equality can be realized, economic and healthcare divides can be remedied, and the narrative governing these things can be reversed.

We can take an inspired look when contemplating the idea of a fresh start for our government with the renewal that comes

P O R T R A I T BY J A M E S B O Y L E

TH E VO LTA WAY

IL LUSTRATIO N BY LO I S VOLTA

Keep it Local Shop the Co-op

People believe that they can do and say whatever they want without consequence.” with spring cleaning. However, like any true and lasting change, we have to combat the status quo with a good look at the dirt that is overlooked in our personal lives, and in our own hearts. It can be overwhelming.

Though we may all feel hope, we can also get mired down in the sticky details.

When we get stuck, we can attach ourselves to something bigger to pull us out of indifference. Stand in solidarity with those who rose to the occasion when they cleaned up after the mess left by the insurrectionists. Let yourself absorb and confront the reality that they are people worthy of honor every single day.

Participate by taking the time to hit your own reset button and by recognizing the value of what your helping hands have to offer those who are right in front of you. It is a lot of work to clean up your own messes.

Collectively we can set our goals high, to make our democracy one where a plurality of cultures are heard, represented and celebrated. And the best place to start is with ourselves. This includes understanding our own privilege, acknowledging problems with the status quo and deciding to change. Within the home, this might be deconstructing gender norms, adjusting spending habits and connecting to the broader community.

The way that we clean up our home and our country is one and the same: With a hopeful heart, using our helpful hands to create the change that we want to see.

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lois volta is a home consultant, musician and founder of Volta Naturals. loisvolta.com.

Send questions to thevoltaway@gmail.com.

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bike talk

The Squeaky Wheel Why do loud objectors have so much power over whether bike by randy lobasso lanes are installed?

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ver the last few years, the two-way protected bike lane on 11th Street has provided a safer route for thousands of people who commute and run errands in South Philadelphia every day. It’s become such an important route for cyclists, in fact, the city now plows the lane when it snows.

But it nearly didn’t happen.

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In the summer of 2019 I reported on an out-of-control community meeting held to promote discussion of the lane between Bainbridge and Wharton streets.

While reconstructing the street, the city had removed about 17 parking spaces, and outrage over this prompted many in attendance to curse, scream and issue threats.

Although those who opposed the new

streetscape were outnumbered by those who supported it, the people against the infrastructure for bicyclists were louder.

After the meeting, a few parking spots were restored, but today the bike lane is still there—and it’s basically a non-issue.

It’s become part of the landscape, and people have learned to live with it. The problem wasn’t so much with the change but with the anticipation of change.

Whether it’s a bike lane, a trail, a building or a stop sign, there is always going to be at least a small contingent of people opposed for any number of reasons, a big one being the status quo is familiar and comfortable.

With the planning process as it currently exists, a small portion of the public not only gets a say in how the project works but also in some cases, whether it exists at all.

Community meetings too often become a vehicle for whataboutism and distrust of the government.

And this isn’t just a Philadelphia problem. The destruction of fully planned and funded initiatives happens everywhere. But the city government of Washington, D.C., found one way to stop this. They made it the law that streets designated for bike lanes have to install bike lanes. The public, then, provides comments on implementation.

“If a road segment undergoing construction has been pre-identified as a candidate for a protected bike lane, bus-only lane or private-vehicle-free corridor, then it must be rebuilt with that new feature,” explained journalist Josh Kramer of the law in Bloomberg’s CityLab. “By mandating protected bicycle infrastructure whenever roadwork is undertaken, much of the usual political and community resistance to bike lanes can be eliminated, speeding the spread of safer streetscapes, block by block, across the city.”

This new law, said Kramer, has led to community meetings in which attendees decide not whether a bike lane or crosswalk will go in, but how it will go in. Such a change keeps the civic theatrics at bay and allows the community to work together to come up with a plan that serves everyone.

Like Philly, D.C. has struggled to meet its Vision Zero goals and saw an uptick in traffic deaths in 2020 over 2019 (from 27 in 2019 to 36 in 2020). Philadelphia, on the other hand, saw 153 traffic deaths in 2020—a 70 IL LUSTRATIO N BY S EAN RY NKEWI CZ

percent increase over 2019, and deadly hitand-runs more than doubled. Our current laws would not allow a D.C.-like policy to exist, though we’re actually really close to it.

In 2012 Philadelphia City Council signed its Complete Streets plan into law. The plan laid out then-modern street engineering processes and detailed what types of safe infrastructure can and should be used on city streets—from the colonial-era streets in Old City and Society Hill to the ill-thoughtout urban highways in North and Northeast Philadelphia.

Today, that guide is still used when planning for upcoming safety and Complete Streets projects, as well as securing federal funds for safer streets.

The problem? When City Council signed the guide into law, they did so with veto power over any project that comes from it. Their want or need to scrap projects often comes from the political theater of open civic meetings or someone politically-connected asking a

councilmember for a veto, independently.

This use of councilmanic prerogative to adhere to constituents’ wishes is, in part, an overcorrection from a bygone era in which cities attempted to compete with suburbs by using federal block grants to replace entire city neighborhoods with urban highways for white suburbanites.

Our current system gives extended clout to wealthier neighborhoods, and specifically the constituents in those neighborhoods who have the time to attend evening meetings. And it does this in the name of democracy.

In Philadelphia and elsewhere, litigating every neighborhood project and allowing for vetoes of basic engineering projects, can be detrimental to the communities these projects are supposed to serve.

“The most resourced neighborhoods are typically the most successful in lobbying against projects,” Los Angeles Councilmember Nithya Raman wrote on Twitter, of this same process in her city, but of

housing. “This further perpetuates inequality in a city where new housing construction is vastly uneven, and rarely in job- and resource-rich neighborhoods.”

Los Angeles, Philadelphia and Chicago infamously have the harshest rules for installing infrastructure and housing, allowing for councilmanic prerogative on virtually any project.

No one wants to see the sort of urban renewal projects and processes of the 1960s and ’70s that devastated neighborhoods and communities’ relationships with their government. But a system that prioritizes the feelings of the few over the safety of the many isn’t equitable or sustainable.

As cities like Washington, D.C., address the importance of peoples’ lives, as opposed to their feelings, Philadelphia needs to begin thinking about how and why councilmembers are given veto power over projects that have been planned and funded with input from the public. And with traffic deaths skyrocketing, the time to figure this out is now.

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M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HILLY.COM 7

urban naturalist

Seeing the Light Nature-loving Philadelphians reflect on the by bernard brown impacts of the pandemic

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ven in the before-times, I was always looking for an excuse to get outside.

My bike commute from Walnut Hill to Washington Square was often the most satisfying part of my day. I slipped out at lunch to birdwatch in Independence National Historical Park. And the weekends found me herping, or doing my best to find snakes, salamanders and turtles around the city.

A normal spring would have me swearing at all the people who thoughtlessly expected me to show up to birthday parties, brunches and cookouts, when clearly we all 8 GR ID P H I L LY.CO M M A RC H 20 21

should be hiking in the woods!

Last March, though, all social engagements were cancelled and “outside” was one of the few places we were allowed to be.

My family certainly had our favorite go-to spaces like Houston Meadow or the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge, but we made a point of exploring new green spaces around the city as well. For example, we tried out Fairmount Park West, where it turns out there are a lot of trails.

We were not alone in getting outside.

When the lockdown started, Lauren Umlauf of East Passyunk started taking her three children to the Navy Yard.

“We were going to this one patch of trees and climbing the trees every day. It was great to see how fulfilling it was, when all we were around was trees,” she says. As the lockdown and social distancing became routine, Umlauf and her family added more parks to the itinerary.

Debra Lytle and her husband found themselves trying to work full-time from home with their toddler, Teddy, in a Point Breeze rowhouse. Whoever was on childcare duty usually headed outside in the morning, often to FDR Park, the John Heinz Refuge or the Grays Ferry Crescent Trail Park.

“We would not have normally been going hiking on a Tuesday morning, but that’s our thing now,” says Lytle.

All of these extra outdoor excursions added up. Throughout the state, state parks saw around 7.4 million more visitors between March and September than the year before. Similarly, Philadelphia Parks & P HOTO G RAP HY BY M ILTO N LI NDSAY

From left: Debra Lytle and her toddler, Teddy, enjoy FDR Park on a snowy day.

Another parkgoer tows his daughter on a sled.

We would not normally have been going hiking on a Tuesday morning, but that’s our thing now.”

— debra lytle , Point Breeze resident Recreation estimated a 50% jump in visitors to city parks in 2020.

In April Wissahickon Valley Park saw a surge in visitors that looked more like the typical summer peak. Parking lots filled up, and the Friends of the Wissahickon actually asked people to stay away.

As routine travel like work commutes and vacations dwindled, nature lovers shifted their activities closer to home. I found myself slipping out of the house with my binoculars and heading to Malcolm X Park, four blocks from my house, whenever I needed a break. Though the park is thoroughly landscaped and busy with human

activity, I’ve managed to spot at least 40 species of birds there.

Jason Weckstein, ornithologist at the Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University, informs me that I have been “patch birding,” visiting a single place repeatedly and getting to know its birds particularly well. “For some people a patch might be their yard, for some people it might be a particular park,” Weckstein explains.

Weckstein’s patch is Shortridge Memorial Park in Wynnewood, a small strip of green along Indian Creek. Along with impressive species like golden eagles soaring overhead, Weckstein has found a

community of local birders. “A girl who lives near the park has a sign on her house about what birds she’s seen,” Weckstein says. “It became a way to meet neighbors.”

Patch birding has become a worldwide trend. Record numbers of birders have been downloading the eBird app, a citizen science platform for documenting birding observations; at the same time, observation totals have fallen in vacation hotspots like Hawai’i.

Birders aren’t the only nature lovers who have shifted closer to home.

Lori Hayes, director of urban forestry for Parks & Recreation, hasn’t been to her Center City office since March 2020 and has had to quarantine at home three times since then. With more time at her home in Germantown, she started cultivating plants there. “I harvested carrots for Thanksgiving and I have rediscovered house plants. It’s in my heart to grow things,” Hayes says.

As much as nature has been a refuge during the pandemic, social distancing has made it less enjoyable for many of us who miss the communal side of the outdoors.

“My passion for wildlife is 50% how awesome the flora and fauna is and 50% telling other people how awesome the flora or fauna is,” says wildlife biologist Jakub Zegar.

“Finding a salamander is like unlocking an entire new universe for people, and I haven’t been able to do that.”

With thousands of Americans still dying every day from COVID-19, the pandemic is far from over. But as vaccination efforts ramp up, it is becoming easier to imagine what we’ll do once it’s all over. And it’s hard to contemplate losing our time spent outdoors.

“I do think some serious life shifts have happened,” Umlauf says, “ … I realize I don’t want our family to go back to that pace of life. We think a lot about saving to buy land outside of the city and splitting our time a bit that way.”

Lytle agrees.

“I hope we don’t have to go back to the way it was before,” says Lytle. “I hope that work-life moving forward includes more flexibility, so I might be able to take my son to a park on a Tuesday morning and still keep my job.”

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water

Our Hidden Friends Photography project shines a light on how city beavers work and play

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f course the toothy mascot on Chris Muller’s bright orange cap is a beaver.

“Oregon State,” he explains.

I should have known. We are meeting up on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive at the Fairmount Dam, where we could talk while admiring the view—not of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Fairmount Water Works or Boathouse Row—but of the beaver lodge on Silt Island.

Muller is the human behind Beavers Matter, a website and social media project that educates Philadelphians about the large aquatic rodents that share our city.

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“Mama Beaver,” the beaver who serves as the face of the photo project, crossed paths with Muller as he was running at the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge in 2018.

Muller didn’t immediately know what he was looking at.

“I barely got a picture with my cell phone,” he recalls.

Mama Beaver crossed the path the next morning, and this time Muller was ready with his camera. “That’s really what kicked the whole thing off: the surprise encounter and then the predictability of this. That I could go back to the same place at the same time and learn something new every time.”

by

bernard brown

Like many Philadelphians, Muller didn’t realize that our waterways are home to a lot of beavers. The large rodents—around 50 pounds and 3 feet long—do a good job of staying out of our way. They mostly stick to the water, usually only climbing out to feed and gather building material early in the morning or at night.

Nonetheless, it is easy to spot their work.

You can see the stumps they leave behind at the refuge where Muller and Mama Beaver first met, as well as along most of Philly’s rivers and creeks. On the iNaturalist app you can see photos from the Navy Yard up the Delaware to Pennypack Creek,

P HOTO G RAP HY BY AN D COURTESY O F CHRISTO P HE R MULLER

Chris Muller beside a beaver-chewed tree.

Muller has been spotting and photographing beavers—including those pictured here—in ponds, creeks and rivers around the city since 2018.

as well as along Cobbs Creek, Tacony Creek and the Schuylkill River.

Beavers have returned to claim waterways that were theirs before Philadelphia was Philadelphia. Trapping to feed the trade in beaver pelts between the Lenape and the Dutch in the 1600s extirpated beavers by the time William Penn established his colony. The demand for their soft, warm furs wiped out most of the beavers in eastern North America by the end of the 19th century. Their populations only began to recover in the mid-20th century as game agencies, including the Pennsylvania Game Commission, released beavers trapped out West. From there, beavers spread across the state, becoming common in Philadelphia

only in the last 15 years.

Muller spent a year and a half photographing beavers and learning about them before he launched his website.

“I realized that there was a lot of content on the internet that was geared for the ‘beaver believers,’ and there was a bunch of content of cutesy photos and such,” Muller says. “But there wasn’t a lot in terms of photography in the wild showing the breadth of what they can do, especially in an urban setting.”

Today BeaversMatter.org shows beavers

at work and play, irrepressibly adorable but all-wild. Along with Mama Beaver’s family, Muller has photographed beavers throughout Philadelphia, its suburbs and in the New Jersey Pine Barrens.

Of course beavers are cute, but Muller has also made a point of showing beavers in all their engineering prowess, toppling trees and building dams.

The creatures also have wide-ranging influence.

By damming streams, beavers create ponds that eventually fill in with sediment and become wetlands, which act as water filters in river systems. Over time trees take over the wetlands, and the cycle begins again. The result is a dynamic landscape with a variety of habitats. “They create ecosystems that benefit plants and animal life,” Muller says.

“They improve water quality and they return habitats to a more natural state.”

This past summer a major storm flooded out the beavers on Silt Island, just above the Fairmount Dam. With the river raging and their lodge u n d e r w at e r, t h e beavers took refuge amid the neoclassical marble architecture of the Fairmount Water Works. A Twitterstorm followed the rainstorm, with concerned observers assuming the beavers had been swept downstream from somewhere outside the city, somewhere less urban and more wild.

“I had to create a Twitter account just to respond, saying ‘No, no. If you see the beavers there, leave them alone. They live there,’ ” Muller says.

And indeed as the flooding subsided, the beavers got back to work in the river.

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From left: NAGP member Nikki Bagby and NAGP Director Lynn Robinson stand outside of the Midvale Bus Facility, where SEPTA’s natural gas plant will operate.

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SOMETHING IN THE AIR Nicetown neighbors monitor air quality in anticipation of the pollution SEPTA’s natural gas plant will bring story by bernard brown

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n november 2019 the City of Philadelphia approved SEPTA’s request to operate a natural gas–burning power plant in the Nicetown neighborhood of North Philadelphia.

This approval marked a defeat for the neighbors opposing the plant, who are now preparing for the next phase in the struggle: taking oversight of the new plant’s emissions into their own hands. In doing so they are joining the growing ranks of Philadelphians monitoring their own air quality and revealing the invisible injustice of pollution.

According to Nikki Bagby, a member of Neighbors Against the Gas Plants (NAGP), the plant will join a long list of pollution sources plaguing Nicetown and surrounding neighborhoods, including SEPTA’s nearby Midvale Bus Depot, as well as the thousands of cars and trucks spewing exhaust on the Roosevelt Expressway and other arterial roads running through the neighborhood.

A 2019 Department of Public Health report ranked Nicetown-Tioga 45th out of 46 Philadelphia neighborhoods in overall health outcomes. The prevalence of health conditions exacerbated by air pollution, such as asthma and cardiovascular illnesses, are all higher than city averages.

With the gas plant now constructed and approved to operate, NAGP is planning to measure the air quality impact of the plant, starting by documenting the already-high levels of neighborhood air pollution.

“The idea is that we can show that this area we live in is bombarded by all these different pollutants,” says Thakiyah Ahmad-Yankowy, a member of NAGP who lives in Germantown, just across Fernhill Park from the site of the gas plant. “You would think that living next to an expressway and a bus depot you wouldn’t need to do that.”

According to Lynn Robinson, the director P HOTO GRA P H Y BY DR EW D E N N I S

of NAGP, the group plans to use stationary air quality monitors on neighbors’ houses as well as mobile monitors. NAGP members express frustration that they have to take on monitoring and mitigation themselves. “It’s something that’s taking up our time and energy and resources, and we shouldn’t have to do this,” says Robinson.

The Department of Public Health’s Air Management Services (AMS) operates 11 air quality monitoring stations as part of an EPA network. AMS also recently ran a pilot study called the Air Quality Survey, with 50 monitoring sites, from 2016 to 2018. “It’s a big project to make sure that each community breathes the cleanest air, and, if not, we go to the policymakers and say we need to do something,” says AMS Director Dr. Kassahun Sellassie. For example, if a station detected high levels of emissions from diesel engines, AMS could recommend that SEPTA run electric buses on routes through that neighborhood.

However, NAGP’s Robinson noted several reasons the city’s air management team is not meeting her group’s demands, including that AMS has not yet published the results from the pilot; the 50 sites are concentrated in Center City; and the sampling equipment, which rotates among the sites at two-week intervals, does not yield the continuous monitoring NAGP is looking for.

Off-the-shelf air quality monitoring technology is helping to fill in the local gaps. For example, PurpleAir brand monitors measure particulate matter and feed the information to a publicly viewable online map.

Christina Rosan has a PurpleAir monitor on the porch of her West Philly house and would like to see more of them monitoring local air quality, particularly in the neighborhoods around Temple University, where she works as an associate professor of geography and urban studies. Along with graduate student Naida Elena Montes and Russell Zerbo, advocate with the Clean Air Council, Rosan has been reaching out to North Philly residents to document community challenges.

“We’ve been meeting every Friday with the RCOs [registered community organizations] to talk about the collective challenges they’re having. Focusing on disinvestment, gentrification and environmental challenges,” Rosan says.

Although large polluters like power plants and chemical facilities grab headlines, they have permits allowing them to pollute, Zerbo says. Pollution measured by neighbors doesn’t lead to enforcement by regulators as long as the pollution stays within the permitted levels. However, neighbors can get authorities to crack down on smaller sources that can still be significant on a local scale.

The idea is that we can show that this area we live in is bombarded by all these different pollutants.”

— t hakiyah ahmad-yankowy, NAGP member

M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HILLY.COM 13

For example, gentrification, a leading concern for those living around Temple’s campus, is driving an increase of rowhouse demolitions, which often kick up clouds of dust.

“Any particulate in the air will get into your respiratory system and cause irritation, asthma and other health issues,” says Zerbo. “When you think of what that dust actually is, it gets infinitely more frightening. We’re talking about lead, asbestos and other substances.”

From top: Robinson holds a PurpleAir brand air monitor, which measures the amount of particulate matter in the air; an NAGP sign protesting the SEPTA plant hangs on a fence outside the Midvale Bus Facility

14 GRID P H IL LY.CO M M A RC H 2021

And unlike most air pollution, construction dust is easy to spot with the naked eye.

“I looked down and saw this red dust on the inside of the window sill. Then I started looking around the bedroom and saw more,” says Jacqueline Wiggins. A rowhouse demolition in November around the corner from her North Philly house had kicked up a cloud of dust that settled over her block. Wiggins immediately contacted the AMS as well as a long list of city councilmembers and other city officials. Although the demolition was already completed, she wanted to do her part to improve accountability for construction violations. “The hope is that you get into the next pile of complaints,” she says. “People in this town are not respected.”

“I have a resident-based perspective,” says Montes, who lives just south of Temple University Hospital. She pointed out that many of the pollution sources in the neighborhood, such as automotive shops, employ her neighbors, complicating an enforcement strategy. “It’s a very … weird position to be in. As a resident I don’t want to live in these conditions. But it is also their livelihood.”

Montes, who studies geography and urban studies, is eager to get a monitor on her house to at least make the pollution problem visible. She is not alone in seeking to bring air pollution to light across the city as part of an environmental justice strategy.

Craig Johnson, of the design firm Interpret Green, has worked with schools in West and North Philadelphia to set up air quality monitoring stations as part of a project called Sensing Climate Change. Along with weather monitoring equipment that can provide information on the local impacts of climate change, the stations can show what’s actually in the air the students breathe.

“Our Sensing Climate Change project has received enthusiastic support from the School District of Philadelphia’s GreenFutures Office and their [School] Greenscapes initiatives,” says Johnson, adding he is looking for additional schools as well as religious congregations that would be interested in hosting stations.

Most air pollution is invisible, but several advocates pointed to its very real impact on the lives of people of color. According to the Department of Public Health’s 2017 Community Health Assessment, “Non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic children have rates of hospitalization for asthma 5 to 7 times that of non-Hispanic white children.”

As Ahmad-Yankowy, whose youngest child has asthma, says, “We realize there is great racial injustice that we live with every day.”

“Environmental racism is a lot harder for people to catch a recording of,” Ahmad-Yankowy continues. “But people have to know it exists.”

M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HI LLY.COM 1 5

PETAL TO THE METAL

Costa Rica native turned West Philly resident digs into sustainable landscaping story by gabrielle houck

L

una lemus-bromley doesn’t mind getting a little dirt under her fingernails. In fact, that’s what Lemus-Bromley loves so much about gardening. She appreciates that while the end result is beautiful, the road to getting there can be tough.

That’s why she named her gardening business Petal and Blade—to signify the time and effort it takes to produce a lush space.

“Gardening is sometimes idealized,” Lemus-Bromley says. “People think you get to work with flowers and it must be so lovely, and it is so lovely, but it’s also a lot of hard 16 GR ID P H IL LY.CO M M A RC H 20 21

work. You get the flowers because you put in the work.”

The West Philly resident started Petal and Blade in 2019 and has since been transforming green spaces for residential and commercial clients in Philly and the surrounding suburbs.

Being born and raised in Costa Rica, one of the most biodiverse countries in the world, it’s no surprise that Lemus-Bromley developed a love of greenery and gardening. She says she first got her feet wet with vegetable gardening and remembers planting bulbs before she was barely big enough to hold a shovel.

“We lived in the mountains and we had so many gardens and fruit trees around us, I remember just being fascinated by the blossoms and watching everything transform,” she says.

When she was 10 years old, Lemus-Bromley moved from Costa Rica to Delaware County after her parents divorced and her mom, a Philadelphia-area native, decided she wanted to be closer to her family. In her new hometown, she honed in on her other passion—dance. Lemus-Bromley was 3 years old when she attended her first dance class.

Ultimately, she went on to earn a bachelor P HOTO G RAP HY BY M ILTO N LI NDSAY

Luna LemusBromley is a one-woman landscaping business. She strives to work with organic plants and materials on all projects.

of fine arts in dance from the University of Michigan (alongside a bachelor’s in international studies) in 2017.

But after college, she realized she needed “a break from school stuff.” So, when a friend presented her the opportunity for some professional gardening jobs in Hawai’i, she jumped at the chance.

“Hawai’i was the start of my professional gardening. It was just wonderful there. Things just grow so easily and they grow so huge. I mean, there were just tons of lavish fruit and vegetable gardens,” Lemus-Bromley says.

She spent about a year there, and in that time she developed a newfound appreciation for the state and its people, working alongside locals and native Hawai’ians. She says that it was interesting to see the Aloha State through the eyes of a worker and not a vacationer.

It was also in Hawai’i where she learned to work more organically. Being eco-friendly was ingrained in her from a young age, but seeing how locals gardened on the island made “everything click” for her, she says.

“The culture over there was more about doing what you can with what you have, and that aligned with me,” she says. “I loved learning from the locals in that way, where it was just having to make use of what was around.”

While she doesn’t yet have a greenhouse in which to grow all of her plants from

seeds like she did in Hawai’i, she says it’s her dream to someday have one. Until then, Lemus-Bromley does everything within her means to reuse and recycle, and the plants she purchases from growers are organic and don’t contain toxins or pesticides.

When Lemus-Bromley came back to the Philadelphia area in 2018, she moved in with her longtime friend Abigail Meloy. At this point, Meloy recalls seeing Lemus-Bromley put in the time to hone her gardening skills.

“She took various public transportations in order to get to Glenside to go to her job at a gardening shop. I just watched her put all of this effort into better understanding her craft,” Meloy says.

Even though she has a strong love for gardening, Lemus-Bromley says she never imagined starting her own business because the prospect of it intimidated her.

“I’m definitely not a business person, but I talked to a lot of contacts and friends who knew people that have their own businesses, I just kept asking people how they do it, took their advice and then just did it myself,” Lemus-Bromley says.

And when she says she did it herself, she’s not kidding. Lemus-Bromley is currently a one-woman show and has been running Petal and Blade solo for the past two years.

“It’s funny because sometimes clients

You get the flowers because you put in the work.”

— Luna Lemus-Bromley, Petal and Blade owner

aren’t sure if I can do it on my own, and I understand. But it’s fun because they’re usually surprised and pleased after the work is completed,” Lemus-Bromley says.

She does have goals to expand, but for now she loves the independence of working solo and being able to take the lead on the planning and design process of her clients’ gardens.

Meloy, on the other hand, wasn’t surprised to see her friend start this business venture and has loved watching Lemus-Bromley grow every step of the way.

“Her dedication and her vision have always been really strong. Luna has always been enterprising, so it’s been really thrilling to see how her business has grown, and because plants have always been an interest for her. So it’s nice to see it all shaping up,” Meloy says.

Although it’s a lot of work running a business, Lemus-Bromley embraces the heavy workload.

“I love it. I love being exhausted after a day of work. It feels refreshing, physically, as well as mentally because designing and planning all of the gardens is stimulating and it keeps me engaged,” Lemus-Bromley says.

Since she splits her time between the city and the suburbs, Lemus-Bromley acknowledges that her days working in the city are different compared to when she’s working in the suburbs. But Philadelphia has a good amount of green space, she says, and that’s why she loves unlocking the unrealized beauty of spaces for her city clients.

“Some people have small backyards, and it’s nice to see how much potential different spaces really can have,” she says. “You just have to be a little more creative about how you arrange everything and fit it in, but that can be really fun.”

The result can sometimes get people to reconnect with their natural spaces. Lemus-Bromley helps her clients view their front yard as more than just a lawn, and she teaches them how to embrace their green space even if it sprouts weeds.

“Sometimes people pay more attention or notice their own spaces differently when I can tell them what’s growing and what blooms are going to happen at what time,” Lemus-Bromley says. “I think they start connecting with that space as a changing organism, and they also start to realize it’s something that can bring you joy.”

M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HI LLY.COM 17

Kianu Walker, of Vannah Banana, eyes his Cookies N Cream ice cream.

18 GRID P H IL LY.CO M M A RC H 20 21

P HOTO G RAP HY BY M ILTO N LI NDSAY

t h e vegan i s s u e

VEGAN DREAMIN’ A look behind Philly’s first Black-owned, vegan ice cream business and the family values that shape it story by alexandra w. jones — photography by drew dennis

T

he winter slump had set in for ice cream sales in late January, and Kianu Walker, the force behind Vannah Banana, was dreaming of the summer—picturing himself not on a beach, as many people do, but instead in an ice cream truck.

After starting the city’s first Blackowned, vegan ice cream business in 2020, Walker found himself hustling between tasks day in and day out: Whipping up batches. Managing supplies. Taking orders.

Delivering his product to restaurants. All while promoting the brand on social media and in the local news.

“I didn’t even have time to think in the

summer,” he remembers. “It was just: make ice cream, deliver, go and repeat.”

While he started the business with a few small-batch ice cream makers in his home, in late June he moved to working out of Vegan Commissary in South Philly.

He’s been based there ever since. The space has allowed him to increase the amount of ice cream he makes. He estimates he’s sold around 1,000 units of ice cream during his first year.

This coming summer, in addition to bringing a few new flavors and frozen treats into the mix, he hopes to buy a cart or a food truck so he can push sales further.

With this in mind, the North Philly

native set up a GoFundMe this winter asking the community to invest.

“I was able to do all of this with a strong work ethic, a good product, a few hundred dollars and a dream,” he wrote in the fundraiser bio. “If given the opportunity to access more funds/capital, I believe I can take my ideas much farther.”

He set a goal of $25,000, of which he’d raised $1,100 by late February. Depending on how much capital he’s able to raise, he’ll decide whether to start looking for a cart or a truck.

“Whichever one ends up coming my way,” he says, as Vannah Banana’s lone full-time employee, “I think I’m gonna be there 24/7.”

M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HI LLY.COM 1 9

t h e vegan i s s u e

W

a l k e r sta rt e d u p h i s business during the first few months of the pandemic. The then 25-year-old holed up in his house, laying the groundwork for Vannah’s signature coconut-based ice cream recipe one batch at a time.

“This pandemic has helped me a lot,” he told Grid in late June, four months into his journey. “It’s given me a lot of time to focus on personal development and making things I haven’t had time for. I’ve just been doing what I can do rather than focus on things that I can’t do.”

At the time, he was coming off tour as a rapper. Walker liked poetry and music as a kid, the latter of which he dropped out of high school to pursue. Eventually this led him to joining the Harrisburg-based electrofunk band Exmag as their lead vocalist for four years, from 2016 to 2020.

“We traveled around performing in major cities and small towns,” he says. “It was an incredibly pleasant experience in which I also got to try really cool plant-based food

20 GR ID P H I L LY.CO M M A RC H 2021

all over the country, which gave me a palate for vegan food and vegan desserts.” He also credits his time on tour with giving him both the personal confidence and culinary experience to pursue his ice cream business.

“Being on the road, sometimes I didn’t want to eat out. I would cook a lot,” he says. “I just ended up experimenting with vegan food.”

He’s developed nine flavors, including Cookies N Cream, Salted Caramel and Green Tea Matcha, that he hopes will “show people that they don’t need to have ice cream made from dairy for it to taste delicious and creamy and sweet.”

Sarah Scandone, of the South Philly plant-based café and juice bar Nourish, says another flavor, Rose Gold, sealed the deal for her and her team.

“Once we sampled the product, we all fell in love with the Rose Gold flavor—it was such a unique approach to ice cream and really set his line apart from all the others,” Scandone says. He puts edible flakes of gold in the ice cream. She noted that her café doesn’t sell soy-based products, so the coconut base was a plus, alongside Walker’s “dedicated and driven” character.

“We were so excited to be able to support him,” she says.

I think plant-based eating is one way you can help take care of your future self and influence the people around you to eat healthier.”

— k ianu walker, Vannah Banana founder

B

y the time he brought Vannah Named after his sister Savannah, he says the big idea behind Vannah Banana is to Banana to fruition, Walker had been thinking about starting a vecreate a family legacy. gan ice cream company for “roughly “I’m very family-oriented,” Walker says, four or five years,” since he became explaining that family values have shaped his business—from its name to the motia vegan.

He says he started eating a plant-based vation behind it. “Most of the things I do diet in pursuit of good health after seeing are for my family, or in the grand scheme family members fall ill due to conditions of things, something that will bring more like high blood pressure. resources [and] opportunities to my family.”

“Things that I think could have been cur(He has another sister named Nevada able or preventable by eating healthier,” he and says he is currently kicking around says. “I just decided to take that journey and ideas for businesses that use her name, too.) start learning how to eat healthier. I want to “I want to represent them and inspire be able to move around when I’m older and and motivate them and be able to pass think clearly and do the small things like something down to the people in my famiwalk to the store, petting my dog, making my ly who come after me,” he says. “You know, own tea in the morning.” create some form of gen“I think plant-based eaterational wealth.” ing is one way you can help Walker’s family supGRAB-ANDtake care of your future ports him right back.

GO SPOTS When he started the busiself and influence all the Find Vannah Banana ness, Savannah’s boypeople around you to eat ice cream at the healthier,” he continues. friend Zhair Nixon, who following locations runs Thee Blvck Sheep, Tattooed Mom a graphic and clothing 530 South Street design firm, created his Nourish 943 S. 9th Street logo. His “wifey,” TiffaVegan Commissary ny Teich, who works as 1429 Wolf Street a professional photograDreams Ice Cream pher and owns Blue Hon33 E. Glenside Avenue, ey Studios, shot his ice Glenside Queen and Rook Café cream and promotional 607 S. 2nd Street​ photos.

His father, George, owns the catering company Kole Mari, that features vegan baked goods which Walker uses for ice cream sandwiches. His father and mother also ran a cleaning business that Walker worked for while growing up.

Although Walker wasn’t particularly fond of the job, according to his father, it ingrained “a certain hustle in him.”

“I wanted to try and instill in him that you don’t get something from nothing,” says George.

Walker credits his father’s example with wanting to be an entrepreneur himself.

“He taught me I could work for myself and pay myself when I need to and make my own hours and things of that nature,” he says. “I don’t have to work for some company. I can create something.”

He also looks up to his mother, Donna Lee Etnoyer. “She’s an extremely hard

worker and she also helped my father create that business in the first place,” says Walker.

His father says creating a close-knit family was always a goal.

“I tried to drill into him to always look out for his sisters,” George says. “We’ve got a dysfunctional family, just like everybody else, but I wanted him and his sisters to be close.”

Before he started the cleaning business two decades ago, George worked in restaurants for nearly 30 years—including an eight-year stint as a waiter at Tattooed Mom, where Walker currently sells his ice cream. He also used to cook for caterers and restaurants.

He fell into catering, starting up Kole Mari about a year ago when cleaning clients fell off due to COVID-19.

“I started cooking for one of the places where I had a cleaning contract—there was a bunch of nurses there—and I cooked a meal for them, and they wanted me to cook all the time,” George explains.

The idea for Kole Mari’s vegan baking line was spontaneous. George was doing a cleaning job on South Street when he dropped into Nourish, where his son’s products are now sold. He ended up asking Scandone if she’d sell some of his vegan desserts, “which I hadn’t made yet,” he says. The collaboration with Walker took off from there.

When baking his vegan line, he says he tries “to make things that don’t taste vegan” by avoiding flavors you wouldn’t find in non-vegan baked goods. “‘I’m not a vegan, but I eat everything,” George says.

Walker says he’s been grateful for his family’s support in his venture.

“I love them so much and I want them to succeed and I know they want me to succeed,” Walker says. ”So that’s what I’m striving to do.”

He’s eager to continue his entrepreneurial journey this ice cream season.

“The biggest thing I’ve learned this past year is it’s not easy at all to create something and keep it going,” Walker says. “But you can definitely make things happen. You can bring your ideas to reality. Focus your energy into something with a positive mindset and then try your best to connect with everybody and create an experience for people to enjoy.”

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t h e vegan i s s u e

GHOST KITCHEN Built around a love of horror films, new Center City takeout restaurant offers vegan Italian food story by brion shreffler

W

hether due to seasonal shutdowns or permanent closures, the city has no shortage of depressingly dim restaurants and bars lately. So it was refreshing to see a welcoming splash of color on the door of one such establishment.

While the Valanni Social Club, at 1229 Spruce Street, has been in stasis for months due to COVID-19 restrictions, a small poster could be seen on its glass front door since the first week of December featuring the Creature from the Black Lagoon holding a meatball sub. It announces a new takeout business running out of Valanni: Monster Vegan.

Owned and operated by husband-andwife team Ron Tadeo and Lauren Margaretta, the takeout-only business offering third-party delivery draws heavily upon Tadeo’s experience cooking Italian comfort food. The pair struck a deal with George Anni, the owner of Valanni, who also owns the building, to obtain the work space—and if Monster Vegan’s takeout sales continue to be robust, he’ll be a financial backer for an eventual expansion into a bar/restaurant in the existing space.

It didn’t hurt that Margaretta had served as the general manager at Valanni several years ago and that the couple previously established a proven business model while 22 GRID P H IL LY.CO M M A RC H 2021

generating sales out of a commissary kitchen in Brewerytown almost solely through their Instagram account, @monsterveganphilly. Margaretta’s twin sister, Jenny, worked in property management for George Anni and other clients; she oversaw special events for Valanni until they closed. She helped pitch the deal to Anni and is also a co-owner of Monster Vegan.

As for many people in the pandemic economy, this was a plan hatched out of necessity. COVID-19 left Tadeo, a chef by trade, furloughed from a job at a dining hall at the University of Pennsylvania, where he had instituted a vegan dinner program in 2020. Margaretta, who left the restaurant industry after most recently serving as gen-

eral manager at Tio Flores, saw a slowdown early in the pandemic at her job managing Airbnb rentals for Bespoke Stay.

Tadeo and Margaretta became vegans in 2012. Tadeo cites his experience at Penn as being critical to his development as a vegan chef.

“Being at Penn, it gave me full range to get whatever products I wanted and play around with them,” he says. He spent much of his spare time in the last year cooking vegan food at home. “It got the ball rolling, and here we are with Monster Vegan,” he says.

But why Monster Vegan?

That goes back to why they’re together.

Margaretta, who ran ’70s and ’80s punk rock and metal nights featuring horror P HOTO G RAP HY BY M ILTO N LI NDSAY

From left: Co-owner Ron Tadeo; one of Monster Vegan’s “chicken” sandwiches.

The challenging part is almost in a sense, ‘Can I fool you?’”

— r on tade o, Monster Vegan co-owner movies at a New York club with Jenny in the early aughts, says she noticed Tadeo’s online dating profile because she saw he liked horror movies.

“What’s your favorite horror movie?” she asked.

He said, “They Live,” a 1988 classic about a drifter who discovers a pair of sunglasses that allow him to see that the rich and powerful are aliens concealing their true appearances to manipulate the general public.

It’s one of Margaretta’s favorite films as well. They met for a drink, and the rest is history.

For the restaurant, Tadeo explains, “It kind of ties into everything.”

“The love of horror films. Our sense of humor,” he says. “It’s almost like we don’t want to play it safe with our theme. We’re confident in the food that we put out, so let’s have a little fun with it.”

But settling on the monster theme, Margaretta also saw a deeper meaning related to the pair’s love of animals, which led to them becoming vegan. “I kind of look at animal rights the way I look at those monsters—they’re shunned and misunderstood, though they’re sensitive beings,” she says.

The monster theme gave them a lot of room to play with marketing.

“We decided we have nothing to lose,”

Margaretta says of their social media approach. “Let’s use monster hands and play a funny metal song in the background and be goofy as hell on Instagram and tag everyone and see if it catches on.”

The restaurant also blends their ideal comfort foods—cutlet sandwiches, meatball parmesan and pasta—with the ’80s horror they grew up with.

“It really comes back to being nostalgic,” Tadeo says.

Of course, striving for nostalgia comes with a caveat after radically changing one’s diet. Margaretta cites health consciousness as a major factor behind why she and her husband went vegan. Both of their fathers experienced health scares in recent years, and they see similar concerns at play for the high number of older non-vegans patronizing Monster Vegan.

Margaretta recounts one customer who, while raving about the vegan meatball parm, said, “I’m not vegan at all but I know this is cholesterol-free.”

Sara Britt, a corporate officer with PETA and longtime friend who informed Margaretta and Tadeo’s decision to go vegan, is happy to see her impact resonate further.

“I think it’s what any activist is hoping for— that people will hear the information that you share and then, in turn, change their

behavior and share it with others,” she says.

But sharing their zeal for vegan food hangs on Tadeo’s ability to adapt his skills and experience to their current diet.

“The challenging part is almost in a sense, ‘Can I fool you?’ ” Tadeo says, speaking to the intriguing part of the equation for him as a vegan chef.

Whereas before he would reach for butter or stocks enriched from a long simmer with roasted carcasses, he now has to swerve left.

Tadeo’s solution is two-fold. He goes with the better array of plant-based products now available such as Impossible Beef, used in the Kong Burger; Impossible Sausage, the base for the gravy on the Monstrosity cutlet sandwich; Beyond Sausage, for the sweet Italian sausage sandwich; and tofu, marinated in salt and lemon, for the “feta” in the roasted beet salad.

Then there’s doing what he’s always done as a chef.

“It’s going back to the basics and using good, quality ingredients,” he says.

For instance, he adds, “Pure extra virgin olive oil does wonders on pasta. It just brings out all the other ingredients.”

He’s using the surprising creaminess of oat milk to recreate the fatty sauce in a carbonara special he’s working on. To approximate the yolk of a runny egg, he’s applying some alchemy to the umami of tomatoes.

For bacon, he’s crisping tofu infused with smoked paprika.

This is the same approach that has helped him win over friends who pine for the days when Tadeo would handle the definitely not-vegan grub for Eagles tailgates.

“He would smoke and grill incredible stuff for sandwiches,” Frank Anellia, a friend from Northeast Philly says. “Now he’s going strong with vegan takeout where you can’t even tell the difference if it’s meat or vegetables.”

That ability to take a leap comes down to trust with many family and friends.

Frank’s wife, Amy, points to how Tadeo has been cooking for them for years. “I just know that anything Ron cooks, he puts his heart into,” she says.

The heart involved helps take the fright out of Tadeo’s vegan food for anyone.

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t h e vegan i s s u e

VEGANS WELCOME

Plant-based menu items are becoming a staple on more Philly restaurant menus

A

ccording to ashley roberts, eating out as a vegan in Philadelphia is easy. Why? Because so many restaurants offer vegan options.

“I feel like you can go into pretty much any restaurant and they can accommodate you in some way,” says Roberts.

She describes the contrast between Philadelphia restaurants and the venues she frequents when visiting family in places like Upstate New York and Windsor, Vermont.

“I would go to a local restaurant where my sister lives, and the people didn’t even know what being vegan really meant,” she says.

24 GRID P H IL LY.CO M M A RC H 2021

“I feel thankful that I live in a place where it’s very common. Even if it’s not a vegan restaurant, they know what vegan is.”

Restaurants that offer exclusively vegan options are great, but Roberts and others love when “normal” restaurants offer vegan food; it makes it easy to go out with friends and family who follow omnivorous diets.

Though Roberts says not every restaurant in the city will provide the most satisfying options, it’s pretty easy to find ones that do.

Vegan food hasn’t always been this accessible in Philadelphia.

Vegan food blogger Leigh Lemeshuk of Leigh Cooks Plants says that the trend of traditional restaurants offering vegan-friendly menus became popular about three years ago. Now, she says, “Philadelphia has become a vegan mecca.”

“Restaurants feel pressured to provide an option for vegetarians and vegans,” she says. “It’s necessary at this point.”

Though the trend toward offering vegan foods may have become more popular in recent years, Tattooed Mom, a bar and restaurant that doubles as Philadelphia’s unofficial street art museum, has had vegan

P H OTO G R A P H C O U R T E S Y O F M A R T H A

story by amanda clark

From left: A spread of dishes from Martha, many of which are vegan; Jon Medlinsky, coowner of Martha, with several vegan options.

We want to bring the communities together and educate people about why you would want to choose a vegan option.”

— j on medlinsky, Martha co-owner

options since it opened 23 years ago.

Initially, the restaurant offered two or three vegetarian/vegan-friendly options.

But because much of the staff ate vegan, Tattooed Mom’s team started exploring more ways to transform meaty menu options into delicious vegan dishes that they could eat at work.

“It was just stuff that we were messing around with to make the menu interesting and available to us,” says owner Robert Perry. “Then from there someone would ask, ‘What is that? Can I get that too?’ ” About nine years ago, Tattooed Mom committed to including a wide variety of vegan dishes on its menu. Today, over twothirds of the options they offer are vegan-friendly.

While making food more accessible to vegans is important to the Tattooed Mom team, that isn’t their only goal. They hope to expose omnivores to plant-based cuisine by P ORT RA IT BY M ILTO N L INDSAY

making it accessible to everyone.

Through vegan menu options and promotions like Meatless Mondays (which has been suspended during the pandemic), Tattooed Mom creates an opportunity for people to explore, says Perry, “as opposed to a purely vegan restaurant where they might be put off right away.”

Newer restaurants in Philadelphia are equally committed to providing a space for people of all diets to try out plant-based foods, too.

Jon Medlinsky, co-owner of Martha, says, “We want to bring the communities together and educate people about why you would want to choose a vegan option. We’re kind of in that transitional, middle ground for people.”

When Medlinsky and co-owners Cary Borish and Michael Parsell opened Martha just over five years ago, they were inspired by Medlinsky’s longtime friend Kevin Mudrick,

who was a vegan. Mudrick helped to design the restaurant and helped the owners clearly mark vegan dishes, making food more accessible to people of all dietary restrictions.

Martha’s mission isn’t just to make food accessible to vegans but to make healthy food available to the entire local community. And in Medlinsky’s opinion, healthy and plant-based go hand in hand.

“I started working around here and getting to know the neighborhood, and one thing I noticed was that there wasn’t a lot of healthy, fresh food,” says Medlinsky. “We thought it would be a good addition to the neighborhood to offer some vegetables.”

The Martha team makes vegetables delicious using cooking techniques and ingredients that many associate with meat—like smoking and adding hot sauce. “Vegan food isn’t flavorless food,” says Medlinsky, “it just doesn’t have animal parts.”

Medlinsky and others in the restaurant business believe that veganism is “the way of the future”—it’s better for people, animals and the planet.

And great for business.

Triangle Tavern has offered vegan dishes since it opened in 2015, but when chef Mike Schwartz began offering more vegan options and specials, sales jumped “exponentially.”

Schwartz sees the future of food as being connected with the future of veganism.

“Going forward, veganism is going to keep growing. I don’t see this as some kind of trend, I feel like this is a new way of American eating,” he says.

Schwartz thinks diverse and exciting vegan options—rather than plain, boring salads—are crucial to businesses succeeding in the future.

“It’s a win-win for all of us, having these options and having the accessibility,” says Schwartz.

Offering vegan dishes brings more customers to restaurants, and vegans tend to be especially loyal to the establishments they love.

“One of the great things about the vegan community,” says Perry, “is that they’re M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HI LLY.COM 25

t h e vegan i s s u e

From top: Tattooed Mom’s vegan barbeque plate; Ryan Pasquale, director of food at Tattooed Mom poses with two of its vegan plates; Triangle Tavern’s vegan lasagna.

26 GR ID P H I L LY.CO M M A RC H 20 21

P O RTRAIT BY M ILTO N L IN DSAY

F O O D P H OTO G R A P H S C O U R T E S Y TAT TO E D M O M A N D M I K E S C H WA R T Z

very loyal and supportive. Especially of small businesses creating vegan, plantbased things. They’re very vocal about sharing things that they enjoy.”

Thirteen-year vegan Lauren Hooks sees the buzz happening every day in the online vegan community. She says vegans get gossipy when it comes to food—if something is good, the entire community hears about it instantly.

This isn’t unique to the Philadelphia area—as throughout the country and around the world vegans have a unique passion for spreading the word about delicious plantbased foods. What is unique about Philadelphia is the quality of its vegan dishes.

“Philadelphians in general will call you out if something doesn’t taste the best,” Hooks says. She compares the food she experiences in this area to other cities she has visited, pointing out that other areas care more about putting a marketing twist on their dishes.

GROW LIKE A BOSS™

“Philly is no-nonsense. Everything has to actually taste good for it to work here,” she says.

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, Philadelphia’s vegans have also been passionate about supporting the restaurants they love to keep them around.

“We don’t want restaurants to stop offering vegan options,” says Roberts. “If people stopped going there, or they’re not supporting that food, these restaurants might Born from working on decide to scale it back a little bit. And that organic farms, our soils would be really terrible.” are earth-friendly to the While customers like Roberts take power core. From starting seeds into their own hands by ordering take-out to container gardening to more frequently, restaurants themselves planting a raised bed, we have also gotten more creative. have the perfect organic Triangle Tavern has used the pandemic as soil for you. This spring, let’s a time to experiment with and explore new GROW LIKE A BOSS together! vegan food options, especially vegan comfort foods. It’s provided an opportunity to offer new specials and menu items that customers are celebrating as their new favorites.

Our products are: Martha’s staff has adapted their dishes to Peat-Free Locally made in Chester County, PA! 100% Organic the habits of patrons. Many of their menu options are crafted for people who will be OrganicMechanicSoil.com eating the food later, after it is delivered to their home. They also offer limited outdoor seating, and have created warm dishes that can be eaten in chilly weather.

OM_ThirdPageAd-Updates.indd 1 2/14/17 Tattooed Mom, which has a similar approach to adapting menu items, has also branched out by offering unique pickup programs.

Once a month, the restaurant offers Crucial Barbecue, a vegetable-based barbecue platter for the whole family. They have also begun selling grab-and-go items at local stores and farmers markets.

Though restaurants have been hit hard by the pandemic, vegan eaters, chefs and restaurant owners have found unique ways to support each other—providing another example of the vegan community working together to make the world a better place.

“I feel like we’re gonna come out of this pandemic even more popular,” says Triangle Tavern’s Schwartz. “So I’m gonna keep pushing vegan food and keep having more exciting options. There’s no stop to it.”

with

Want to support local restaurants with delicious vegan options? Head to tattooedmomphilly.com, marthakensington. com or triangletavernphilly.com to check out their plant-based menu options.

M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HI LLY.COM 27

9:37 AM

GOING ROGIE Queer-owned vegan pierogi business was started by two friends mid-pandemic

A

story by amanda clark

s professionals in the hospitality industry, caring for others is important to longtime friends Stephen Pressman and Heather Gettis. When the pandemic hit and both were laid off from their jobs, restaurant worker Pressman and event manager Gettis found themselves with an abundance of time and a lack of opportunity to do things for others.

Gettis decided to transition to a vegan diet during this time. In the early stages of experimenting with new, plant-based foods, she modified her Polish family’s traditional pierogi recipe and shared the dish with Pressman.

The pierogies were a hit, and friends 28 GRID P H I L LY.CO M M A RC H 20 21

encouraged Gettis to sell them to make money and fulfill her need to care for others.

“I was missing that hospitality factor,” says Gettis. “I wanted to make people happy in a time in which things are uncertain.”

Gettis and Pressman decided to use the skills they had gained in their previous jobs to start their own pierogi business, Rogue Rogies.

At the moment, the business model is entirely based on selling through Instagram.

The menu for the month and pickup dates can be viewed on the handle @roguerogies.

Buyers order via direct message.

Sold frozen in half-dozens, the pierogies are the right size for a family-style side dish.

Customers say they are easy to cook, and the company uses eco-friendly packaging and fresh ingredients.

Some of the herbs and vegetables used are grown in a back-porch garden by Gettis, who also has a background in horticulture. Other ingredients are sourced through grocery boxes from Green Meadow Farm in Gap, Pennsylvania.

The pair is committed to using these fresh ingredients to create recipes that are accessible to individuals of all diets. They don’t use peanuts or soy-based products, they post all other allergens on the Instagram menu and they are currently developing gluten-free dough.

Accessibility is an important part of Rogue Rogie’s business platform. Both owners identify as bisexual. As an out-andproud queer-owned business, Rogue Rogies strives to create a welcoming space for people of all gender and sexual identities.

“I want people to feel safe and comfortable with us. And I want to deter anyone who may not treat us fairly,” says Gettis.

Pressman agrees, adding, “It’s really

P H OTO G R A P H Y C O U R T E S Y O F R O G U E R O G I E S

t h e vegan i s s u e

It is really important to have representation in the food industry. It makes up such a large section of the workforce, but a lot of queer people are relegated to the back.”

— s tephen pre ssman, Rogue Rogies co-owner

From left: The Rogue Rogie pierogimaking process; owners Stephen Pressman and Heather Gettis; Rogue Rogies’cooked pierogies.

important to have that representation in the food industry. It makes up such a large section of the entire workforce, but a lot of queer people are relegated to the back.”

Rogue Rogie’s branding as a queerowned business has also helped to attract customers like Victoria Neifert, who says supporting small, queer-owned businesses is important to her.

“And full disclosure,” Victoria adds, “I’m not even vegan.”

The beauty of Rogue Rogies is that vegans and non-vegans, queer and straight individuals alike are invited to try a delicious plant-based dish. As customer Elaine Panuccio says, “Food does have the tendency to bring people together.”

Selling on Instagram is just the first step for Gettis and Pressman, who have

discussed pop-up and direct-carry options with local stores. They also hope to fulfill other dreams, such as moving to a commercial kitchen, opening their own restaurant and collaborating with other small businesses.

“The goal is just to get them into as many

mouths as possible,” says Pressman. “We want to continue that … hospitality, making something with our hands and seeing the joy it brings people.”

To learn more or order vegan pierogies, direct message @roguerogies on Instagram.

M ARCH 20 21 G R I DP HI LLY.COM 29

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Dr. Sally Willig, Lecturer & Advisor, Master of Environmental Studies

Having a field day This Penn instructor encourages students to get hands-on with the environment Virtual Café Join the MES program director from 12-1 p.m. EST on the first Tuesday of every month for an online chat about your interests and goals.

“Experience is the best teacher,” says Dr. Sally Willig, an advisor and lecturer in Penn’s Master of Environmental Studies (MES) program. “That’s why I like to get students out in the field, where they can put a lot of course content into the context of the natural environment.” Willig teaches courses, such as Wetlands and Regional Field Ecology, that are designed to introduce both new and experienced environmental studies students to the varied ecosystems in Philadelphia and the surrounding regions, from freshwater tidal marshes to salt marshes and pine barrens to coastal plains.

“There’s an element of discovery and surprise because they’re living environments and we never know exactly what we’re going to encounter,” she says.

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This spring, Willig is teaching a course called Ecology, Management, and Advocacy of Urban Forests and combining some of the course features that have worked best for her during the pandemic year: guest speakers from a range of environmental careers, small research projects, and plenty of opportunities for students to get out in the field in Philadelphia and beyond. “The real strength of our program is the students,” she adds.

“I feel really fortunate to be involved with the MES program all these years. It’s been a tremendous privilege.”

To learn more about Willig’s approach to fieldwork and how she and her students adapted to challenges in 2020, visit:

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