 Welcome to this episode of Fort Worth Forward. We're here at the Market at Ridgely and we've got a great panel together today to talk to you and tell you about what's happening here in Fort Worth. We've got Amanda Ware, who is the owner of the Market at Ridgely. Erica Ramos and Katrina Johnson with Steer Fort Worth and Reggie Robinson with Funky Town Food Project. Let's get this started. Hey everyone, I am thrilled to be here at the Market at Ridgely with Amanda Ware, the owner, Amanda, welcome. Thank you. Thanks for having us here today. This is a crazy amazing place. Oh, well thank you. And my ADD loves coming in here because there's so many things, so many vendors. It's true. Tell everybody what this is and how you got this idea to bring this together. Absolutely. So the Market at Ridgely is a cooperative retail space. We have approximately 70 different local vendors inside the store and they can rent spaces ranging from a couple of shelves to large, almost boutique size spaces. So give us some ideas of some of the things that are here. We really have a mixture of everything. I tried to make it a one stop shop when I was selecting vendors. So we have women's clothing, men's clothing, children's, plants. We even have grab and go foods. And really a mixture of just everything you could possibly want in one space. It's true. My wife loves shopping here. My credit card reflects it and it's wonderful. And lots of friends I know that are vendors here. Where, tell people the physical location where you are. Located at 3400 Bernie Anderson Avenue. We're right outside of Ridgely Country Club and it's hard to miss this because we have a giant dolly mural on the outside of the building. That's right, that's right. How do you select the vendors when you're looking at who should be a part of the mix in here? What do you do? Sure. Well, I'm really fortunate that we have a pretty long wait list right now. Which is great. So I can be a little picky. I really try to keep a good mix. So I look at what we have and then the size of space that's available at the moment. And then go through my list and see who matches the best. The best. Was there some thought process put into where you were located and why you want to be located here? Well, I have lived in Ridgely Hills for, well, the whole time we've been in Fort Worth, 13 years now. And great district three neighborhood. I love, I love. And really had this building has set vacant for a while. And I had watched it kind of all through the pandemic in 2020 and it was empty and about the right size for the vision I had in my head. And I honestly didn't even look at any other spaces. I knew I wanted it right here. And I wanted it close to home and I knew that this area would support it. And it seems to be it's, when I come here it's full of people. We've done a lot of talking with small businesses and really focusing, I've got to focus on small businesses because I believe that we've put a lot of time and attention in attracting bigger businesses to come into Fort Worth and the jobs. But we have a lot of homegrown businesses that we've got to put that support into as well. So talk a little about your, maybe the challenges you had getting this place open and what that looked like as a small business owner. Absolutely. Well, the background is, I actually have owned a women's boutique for the last six years called Calton Couture. Okay. And we really. I see your boots. They're beautiful. Yeah, thank you. We really wanted a brick and mortar. However, it is almost cost prohibitive to do. To open your own standalone store, the overhead is just very, very high. During 2020, we had to pivot a lot, like a lot of businesses did. And just as the merchandise we were selling and what people were wanting and also supply chain issues was a huge challenge. And a lot of the vendors in here had made their livelihoods doing large shows in markets. Which we didn't exist during 2020. Which were completely shut down. And they were sitting on tens of thousands of dollars in inventory, if not more. And so this offered them the ability to have a place to go and sell their merchandise. But it was a challenge. Like I said, I think our biggest challenge was the supply chain issues after we were open. Right, right, right. Trying to sustain the merchandise level. Okay. Well, it's full in here now. And I see it's great. One of the questions I had, what do you see as sort of the future of the market, of what's happening here? Well, so not too long after this location opened, I actually opened a second location in the north side of the city in Roanoke. Okay. It's called the market at Roanoke. Okay. And- I see a theme there. Yes, there is a theme. And so moving forward, I don't know if there's gonna be more. I would love for there to be more. I think that this is probably the future of retail is having these cooperative spaces. And so many people have little side hustles and they do this as kind of a supplement to their income. And so this affords them that opportunity. Many of my friends that are here, this is their side hustle. Yeah, for sure. They've got day jobs, but this is maybe their creative outlet. Exactly. Yeah, do you find that? Exactly, yes, 100%. We actually have a space of the store dedicated to, I call it our artisans collection. Okay. And it's to handmade goods. And so that's where you get, where you capture those business owners. Well, thanks for letting us host today's talk. Absolutely. I've got some great guests coming up after you. It'll be awesome to talk to them here. How can people find you? Like website and social media. We do have a website where themarketartoriginally.com. Okay. You can also find us on social media, Instagram and Facebook at themarketartoriginally. Great, well thanks for what you're doing. Thanks for putting together what I would say collaborative for small business owners to be able to do what they do. And thanks for being a small business owner and really putting a new spin on the fabric here of Fort Worth. I really appreciate what you're doing. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for coming. Thanks for being here today. Thank you. And now I'm here with Erica Ramos and Katrina Johnson with Steer Fort Worth. Welcome guys. Thanks for having us. How are you? Good, how are you? I'm good, I'm good. I'm very proud of all the work that y'all are doing and I've got obviously a special place in my heart for Steer Fort Worth. Having served in capacities, their executive committee and now seeing it continue to thrive under y'all's leadership. You're president now, right? Yes, that's correct. And you're president-elect. Yep, all right, we'll be starting next year. Yeah, so for our viewers that don't know about Steer Fort Worth, what is it? What was the purpose? Senator Wyatt, what does it do? Yeah, so Steer Fort Worth is a nonpartisan, non-profit organization that seeks to grow our emerging leaders and get them civically engaged in Fort Worth. We actually started back in 2011 under Mayor Price as a result of low voter turnout in that demographic. I think there's like four or five percent of voters 20 to 40 voted in that election. Yes, and so Steer Fort Worth was created and in 2016 we officially became our own non-profit and have continued the work since then by hosting a variety of programming that gets people interacting with the city on different levels. We have events like our policy and pints where we touch on different issues and have someone come and speak to us in a more casual and laid-back environment. We have recently hosted our Civic Summit that I know you were in attendance at where we talked about a wide variety of topics, had panels and panelists that covered great feedback on all of that and shared with our members ways they could get engaged. We also host Generation Next with the mayor as a way of connecting our membership base to the mayor and giving them some of that one-on-one time that they so desperately want. And we also have our elected officials reception where we invite elected officials across Tarrant County to come into a room, engage with our membership and have our membership engage with them. In addition to that, we host volunteer events throughout the year and we also have a really incredible key holders program that I'm immensely proud of. That's great. Well, let's talk about that key holders program. I know you've talked about policy and pine and some of the other things that you do to get people engaged, even voter sign up, et cetera, just having your voice heard. What's the idea behind the key holders program, which is sort of a subset of Steer of Fort Worth? Yeah, so our key holders program, I like this. And you're leading it this year, right? Well, no, I was. You led it before. The last two years I was in charge of key holders and then I, President-elect, had to give that up and give it to some new people. There you go. They're really great co-chairs. Basically, I say it's like a fast-track civic engagement program. For me, when I was truly just, I was at a point in my career where I just wanted to get involved and I didn't know how to do it. And when I looked on social media and organizations, Steer of Fort Worth is the one that was literally doing stuff all the time. Some other organizations go inactive or don't do anything. And so that's where I started going to an event and then I joined key holders. And so it's one event every single month and every month we put people, our young professionals, in front of the people who make those decisions. And they get an opportunity to truly just ask questions. There are times like, I never would have gone to City Hall. Like we have our leadership session where we have our elected officials sitting in front of them. And I honestly didn't know where City Hall was. I wouldn't have known who the elected officials were unless it wasn't for key holders. So we have our first session, which is over history and we've done a kind of cool thing. Judge McGowan does this history walking tour. Quentin McGowan's great, great friend of mine, yes. And then Mitch Whitten Visit Fort Worth has been kind enough to talk to us about what's going on now, what's coming to the future of Fort Worth. So it's a good past and present. And then we have our business leaders sit in front. So we've done small businesses. We've done, you know, with the chamber, having all of them speak. So every year is a little bit different. So we don't have the same people speaking every single year. So it truly is like you get your own experience which you go through the program. We have a session over volunteerism, how to get engaged within the city, one over the arts. Because I think that so many of us are interested in what's going on in the arts, but we don't necessarily know how to necessarily plug in to the scene here. And it's pretty extensive once you start looking into it. And then what, I'm missing one of them. Talk about the government panel. Yeah, government, business, history. Oh, education. Education, yes. That's the one, and so the education one. And so we've had from the superintendent, teachers, the director of innovation, a wide range of top people speaking on education. And the best part is being able to sit and be in that room and be able to put faces and names together and you can leave and know who they are and then get an opportunity to go talk to them one-on-one and get your questions answered if they weren't answered during the session. Yeah, well, I've had the privilege of sitting on that government panel for the last couple of years. And it's interesting because you have a wide range of, and I don't think people understand it until you get in that room. How many, what the county's in charge of and what, you know, who else did you have in there? You had some, you had the DA's and what they're in charge of, what the city government. Tax Assessor. Tax Assessor was part of this. The Water District. And we also just try and make sure we have our events at different locations around the city. So not only are we trying to get you engaged with what's the topic, but also take you to different parts of the city so you can see what Fort Worth is. Because we really kind of get pigeonholed like where we live. It's very easy, especially when you live in the urban core of Fort Worth just to stay with your people, like your area. No, and I love that too because I think you've got to get out and see the other parts of the city and understand, again, we all operate within our homework and maybe where we go at game theory and et cetera to hang out with friends. But if you don't see the other parts of the city, you don't understand. And that's, you know, from my job, what I love is that I get to listen to my colleagues and hear about their problems and their parts of the city. And I obviously represent district three. You're sitting in district three right now. And I love it, but I understand that we're a big city and we've got big city challenges across the board. You talked a little bit about some of the things that you're doing. How can people partner with Steer Fort Worth and be a part of it? Yeah, so I like to tell people there are probably two big ways to partner with Steer Fort Worth. The first and probably one of the easiest is supporting the organization financially. For us, as Katrina mentioned, it's so important that we host events across the city. And part of doing that has meant our membership base has grown. So we really strive to keep our programming affordable and accessible to any young professionals. So if anyone wants to become a sponsor, whether that's sponsoring the organization or sponsoring a specific event, they can do that. And we have some great sponsors that have helped us along the way this year. The second is partnering with us on an event. Oftentimes, you know, we come across nonprofits like Junior Achievement or Southside Community Garden who are working on some really impressive causes and need an outlet or way to help communicate the work that they're doing. So they'll come to us. We work with them to host an event, create a conversation around that cause so that our members can learn, but also engage after the conversation's over. That's great. And I think it's worth pointing out, this is a non-pay. I mean, y'all are president or whatever. Yeah. You have your own business, right? Yes. You wanna talk about that for a second? Yeah, so I am the owner of Game Theory Restaurant and Bar over on South Main and the near Southside based in District 9 and... It's a totally volunteer position and you work for Junior. Yeah, I work for Junior Achievement. It's been around about 100 years and our goal is to get kids workforce ready. Some of them are not prepared from that leap from senior year to actually workforce. And so Junior Achievement does it free for educators. We also are a nonprofit so we do get donations for us to continue to do that. But yeah, none of us get paid to do any of it. And when you look at all the things that we do, we were talking to somebody last night and they're like, wait, none of, there's not a paid person? There's some that's overseen. No, there's just 17 of us that have decided that this is our passion and we wanna give back to the city, the city that we truly love and we want people to come here and enjoy and if they're here to stay here and be involved here. Right, right. It's pretty incredible to work with other emerging leaders that are on the board or even are serving in our committees and see that everyone's doing it simply for the passion that they have for the city, which is an incredible momentum and energy just to be around. And I think speaks volumes when you attend our events as well. Well, and that's an idea I wanna, a lot of what you're doing is awareness, right? Just having, getting people aware of what's happening in the city, that their voice needs to be heard and that could just be simply by voting or it could be by volunteering, getting involved and getting organizations. How have, does the group, how do y'all take it, awareness into action? What is that sort of bridge? Yeah, that's a really great question. And if I had a silver bullet, man, I think I'd be in business, right? But for Sierra Fort Worth, what we've seen that works is having that full cycle of discussing, learning, engaging and repeating that cycle again. So what we aim to do with each of our events is create a space where people can come and learn about a topic. A recent, you know, one that we have coming up here is on September 8th, our membership asked a lot of questions about downtown Fort Worth, what can we do to, you know, drive some change there. So as a board, we reached out to downtown Fort Worth, Inc. And we now have an event, September 8th at 5.30, if you wanna attend, where downtown Fort Worth, Fort Worth, Inc. is actually going to share their 10-year strategic plan for downtown and explain what a strategic plan is, share that with our members, give our members space to give input into that strategic plan. And then at the end, we'll also share ways that our members can engage on their implementation committees to help put that strategic plan into action. That is probably one specific example, but I think speaks volumes of how you create that loop for people. So that they don't feel like I'm just hearing what I should do, but you're giving me a very clear call to action and how to follow through on the changes I wanna see. So we do that. And then we also, you know, when voting season comes around, we do a huge push to make sure our members are registered, voting and are aware of all the things that are on your ballot beyond, you know, the individuals on the ballot, but propositions, bonds. And that's a big, you know, a big push for us as well. That's great. Trina, I wanna add, what is one thing maybe walked away that you didn't necessarily know before, maybe not some 10, but just something you've walked away out of this experience already, because you're gonna assume the role as president, that maybe is gonna form your, how Steer for Earth moves forward. You know, since I've been involved, the greatest part about Steer for Earth is seeing how, where people start and then how they end up, as they've gone through the organization, as they meet people, as we engage with each other and as we promote and hype each other up and get them to where we wanna go. And I think that the most important thing that I've kind of learned, especially that'll take me into my presidency is to listen and to learn where does our organization want to be and where do the members wanna be? Where does our board want us to be? Because honestly, I may be the face of who the organization is at that moment in time, but the organization's not gonna exist without our 200 members and our board of 17. It's really taking the input of everybody and then learning what they want and how they wanna go about it and then tailoring that and channeling that so that we can get to where we would like to go. That's great. Where can people find you? Yes, so you can find us at our website, Steerfortworth.org and that's Steerfw.org or you can catch us on social media. We are super active across Instagram and Facebook and are always posting updates on our events. But I highly encourage sending people to our website. It's how you can become a member. There's even a nifty Google calendar you can add to your phone so that you can easily see what's coming up next. So it's a great way to stay connected with us. That's awesome. Well, thanks for being here today. Thanks for continuing to do what you can to educate people here in Fort Worth really about everything that's going on. I mean, we have so much going on. I've often said we have to communicate better with our citizens and that's across the board and also engaging the 20 to 40 somethings, the ones that are going to be most affected about decisions we're making today, not only them, but their children. And so thank y'all for what you're doing. Really appreciate y'all. Yeah, thanks for having us. Yeah, of course. Yeah, thank you. And now I'm here with Reggie Robinson who is executive director of the Funky Town Food Project. Welcome, Reggie. Hey, thanks. I'm so excited to be here. I'm happy to have you here. I think you're doing some great work. Tell our folks, our viewers, what Funky Town Food Project does. Yeah, yeah, great question. So I think we started off with a really strong belief system. One, we believe in the power of food to sort of connect communities, to connect people to the land and then people to each other because food sustains us all, right? Like I can't live without eating. And then two, we believe in sort of like the empowerment of people to have agency and choice around the foods that they eat and the food systems that they're a part of. And so we prepare our future leaders to tackle food insecurity in their own neighborhoods. Okay, okay. Where is it located? Yeah, we're physically out in Crowley, just like just off the Chisholm Trail. So there's this like sense of being like in town, but then just far enough a way to feel country and farm and all that, yeah. Do you take kids that are, you know, I hear this all the time if you're kind of inner city of sorts that you don't really see this. You don't see how food is produced, how it really works. All you know is that it shows up on the shelf at the grocery store, right? But I think you take kids out there, right? And kind of show them the process and they grow it. Yeah, yeah. This summer we had an opportunity to bring some interns in and they did everything. They tilled the land, planted, cultivated, harvested. We composted, we solarized some of the property and then we took that produce to farmers market so that they can learn sort of the sales sides of things, the entrepreneurial roles inside of food. And you know, I had one girl that talked about like, I just picked a squash. That was crazy. And like letting them see and experience where it comes from. And I'll hear this sometimes too because I'm doing work with a food bank, et cetera, where they've never seen a squash. They don't even know what it is or how to use it or how to cook it. Do you get some of that experience with the kids too? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Every Friday, so as a chef, like every Friday I take pride in the fact that I can pull food off of the land and then we all work together to prepare it. And then I'm gonna give you food to take home to continue to like teaching people, again, around food and about food and giving them a chance to taste stuff they've never tasted and experiences that are actually nutritionally dense for them. That's interesting. You talked a little bit about some of the thought process. How did this idea come about? I mean, what was the thought process of like, why do we need to do this in the city? Yeah, our project, the Funky Town Food Project is sort of predicated off of the Boston Food Project that they've started like 30 years ago and they've just taken inner city youth and exposed them to farming in a way that has like, is radically transforming lives. Not just from a learning standpoint or an economic standpoint, but then also from a community standpoint, right? Like people are pulling together to grow their own foods and it's changing the landscape out there. And I got with a couple of guys, Court and Kent and they said, hey, we got to do this out here. And I was like. And Kent Bradshaw. Yeah, Kent Bradshaw, Court to Heart. Got with these guys and they said, yo, let's make some magic out here. And I said, I'm all in. Let's get it. That's great. I see your passion and excitement. What's kind of the favorite part that you, when you're with this project? You know, probably this idea that we're not just growing food, but we're growing people. When I get a chance to work with kids, I've been an educator for 15 years. When I get a chance to work with kids, to mentor them, to pour into them, to pun intended, grow them, they end up being the kind of people who we would want to vote for whenever they sit in city councilman positions. Yeah, that's awesome. How do you see the future of this rolling out? I mean, you kind of alluded to growing kids and all that, but what's the future for Funky Town Food Project? You know what I'd love, man? The food insecurity rates here in Tarrant County are abysmal. I mean, it's just... Tell our viewers a little bit about food insecurity. What does that mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's this idea that you don't know where your next meal is coming from. Okay. Because we've heard of food deserts. Sure. And there's food insecurity, et cetera. Food deserts means you don't have a real access to any kind of fresh foods, et cetera, within a certain area. We have lots of food deserts in Fort Worth. Plenty. Food insecurity might mean that they might have access to it that maybe can't afford it, or... That's it, that's it. So let's say, for example, I'm making a minimum wage, but inflation, we've all experienced it, right? So now I have to make the decision between, am I gonna pay rent so we can have a place to stay, or do I go get foods? And then what kind of foods do I get? Do I get the healthy foods? Do I get dollar menu for over here? Yeah, you know? And so this idea of food security is so prevalent here in Tarrant County that the future is that we shut it down, that we produce enough food, that we get enough people thinking about food, that we get a young sort of constituency who has been exposed to an internship before they even go off to college, and they have the necessary skill sets, habits of mind and dispositions to make active change in their own communities. That's wonderful. You brought up too about being a chef. Now you're an educator, but a chef, I wanna give you a little chance to talk about your own sort of entrepreneurial, what you're doing now as a chef, Little Boy Blue. Yeah, so with Little Boy Blue BBQ, man, we serve love and we love serving. It's just sort of a passion project based on our grandfather, little brother and I run it, and we get a chance to do what we love to do, which is to serve food. And then we are grounded in this work that food sustains us all, and so let's make sure that we're adding love to it. Yeah, well I'm honored enough to go to one of your dinners recently, which was wonderful sort of collaboration. Talk about that a little bit. Oh man, so the work that's going on on Magnolia with just the boom of their economics, there's a restaurant there, The Pantry, and they're doing really cool stuff, and they invited me out, they invited Scotty Scott out, who's got the cookbook out, and you gotta get that cookbook, it's crazy. What's it called, I forget. Fix Me a Plate. Fix Me a Plate. I think it's based on some of his grandmother's recipes, right, okay, yeah. Yeah, and so we just got a chance to get in the kitchen, and again, it was this explosion of people who are really good at what they do and then me. And so I was excited to. You're good at what you do too, it was great, it was wonderful. Excited to get to hang out with them and just serve and looking forward to many more collaborations. That's wonderful. Well, where can people find you? Funky Town Food Project and Little Boy Blue Barbecue, you talk about both of those. Yeah, so funkytownfoodproject.org, right? Plenty of information on there, and then there are gonna be those who listen to this and wanna get involved. We've got a donate page, we've got volunteer opportunities, lots and lots of ways to get involved. We're looking for board members. As far as our social media presence, you can find us on Facebook, we're on Instagram as well, under the same funkytownfoodproject. And then with the Little Boy Blue Barbecue, again, Facebook and Instagram, Little Boy Blue, L-I-L, B-O-Y, blue, B-B-Q. And come look us up. We cater, we do private dining, private brunches, all kinds of stuff. Well, Reggie, I appreciate what you're doing and putting a focus on areas that we need to continue to do in Fort Worth. We're a big city, we're a growing city. We've got disparities in lots of different ways. And I appreciate what you're doing to sort of highlight that and make sure that we're addressing it where we can. So thanks for being here. My distinct pleasure. And thank you for the work that you're doing on the council. I love the way that Fort Worth is moving right now. I appreciate it, appreciate it. We're trying. Yes, sir. We got a great city, we gotta keep it that way and keep it moving forward. So I appreciate you saying that. No doubt. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. All right. Thank you. Love it. I hope you've enjoyed this episode of Fort Worth Forward. As Amanda, the owner of the market at Ridgely mentioned, Dolly Parton on the side of her building. You can't miss it. Come check out the market at Ridgely. Check out our other guests, Steer Fort Worth and the Funky Town Food Project. But for now, I'm working nine to five and I gotta go do a business deal with Joe Lean. So we'll see you on the next episode.