FAM Houston 2021 Year in Review

Working for justice by building empowered community among refugees, immigrants, and local Houstonians through practices of hospitality, mutuality,

2021 Year in Review

storytelling, and inclusivity.

CONTENTS

02 Greetings 03 Our Mission 04 Our Programs 06 Pamoja 10 Shamba Ya Amani 14 Our Team 16 Our Supporters

Throughout 2021, we stood shoulder to shoulder with one another, and our determination to thrive intensified.

You can still hear our cheer, our cry of “Umoja Ni Nguvu” across the greater Houston area—in Alief, Fondren, Gulfton, Katy, Memorial, Missouri City, Near Northside, Sharpstown, the Heights, and Westbury—as we claim that we are stronger together.

17 Financials 18 Year at a Glance 19 Exciting News for 2022

PHOTO CREDITS: Julia Jordan, Kelsey Johnson, Francine Murhebwa, Willy Mutunda, Jennifer Scogin, and Hannah Terry

Friends, I hope the spirit of determination is kindled in you as you witness how lives are being touched and changed through FAM Houston.

REV. HANNAH TERRY FOUNDING EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Memorial Drive UMC sent Youth Work Camp volunteers in summer 2021 to support the work of Shamba Ya Amani.

They constructed benches for the gathering circle and 30 raised beds.

Our Mission

FAM Houston works for justice by building empowered community among refugees, immigrants, and local Houstonians through these practices: Hospitality

Mutuality

Storytelling

Inclusivity

the unconditional sharing of one’s self and unconditional welcome of others

commitment to creating and maintaining relationships that go both ways

acknowledging and embracing our similarities while recognizing and celebrating differences that show how we’re woven together

celebrating differences and helping someone understand they are needed and invited to join you on their own terms

Our Programs Congregational Partners

Epworth League

Providing pathways for faith communities to discern vision of ministry with their neighbors and strategically engage in local relational ministry with the community.

A city-wide ministry for 18–35-year-olds that provides community, fosters discipleship, and equips leaders to love their neighbors and serve God and the Church.

Pamoja ("Together" in Swahili)

Shamba Ya Amani (“Farm of Peace” in Swahili)

Pairing local Houstonians as companions with newcomers— particularly refugee women and children. The program helps identify and address gaps and opportunities to help each participant and their family become successful and fully integrated in their community.

A community farm in West Houston working for justice by feeding the WEG community, both body and soul. Shamba Ya Amani is a collaboration born out of relationship with land owner, Alief ISD and land manager, International Management District, located at 8401 Dairy View Lane, Houston TX 77072.

Storytelling

Women’s Empowerment Group (WEG)

Creative workshops and community events for all ages that invite neighbors into the practice of personal and communal storytelling.

A group for refugee women to find mutual community with American women, build their support network and knowledge of resources, and grow in confidence as they build their lives in Houston. WEG’s collaborative initiatives include adult ESL resources, emergency assistance, and the Youth Empowerment Group.

FEATURED STORY

Pamoja Photos on next page

Top: Francine Murhebwa, Pamoja Program Director, laughs with Rev. Ginny Griggs, Associate Pastor at Memorial Drive UMC, where the program is being piloted.

Bottom: The community gathers around the table for the first Pamoja Friendsgiving at Shamba Ya Amani.

Empowered community goes the distance As our newest program, Pamoja’s purpose is to connect refugee and immigrant families to Houstonian families to learn from each other and create mutual aid groups.

Pamoja complements the work of resettlement agencies and Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative by providing a model for how to not only welcome newcomers and educate Houstonians but discover long-term solutions where individuals, families, and communities are empowered.

Companions are asked to walk alongside another person through life’s ups and downs, form an ongoing relationship, and help connect their partner to resources.

Pamoja extends missional, life-giving opportunities to congregations and faith communities helping them rediscover their contextual call.

FAM is piloting the program with Memorial Drive United Methodist Church by training church members to serve as companions to FAM’s community members who are refugees from Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, and Tanzania.

Companions are asked to walk alongside another person through life’s ups and downs, form an ongoing relationship, and help connect their partner to resources.

Additional cohorts will be anchored with FAM’s current congregational partners, as well as new faith community and community organization partnerships.

Any of us in a new place, with a new language to learn, understands ‘I need a friend. I need someone who will walk with me, listen to me, and be compassionate.’

— FRANCINE MURHEBWA PAMOJA PROGRAM DIRECTOR

SCAN QR CODE WITH YOUR PHONE CAMERA TO READ THE ARTICLE www.houstonchronicle.com/lifestyle/houston-belief/article/In-newprogram-church-volunteers-refugees-walk-16702066.php

FEATURED STORY

Shamba Ya Amani Photos on next page

Top: Beekeepers in training inspect the top bar hives.

Bottom: One of our first harvests of the year unearthed an abundance of tomatoes, peppers, and radishes.

Tending the earth, healing the soul Now entering its second year, Shamba Ya Amani (Farm of Peace) continues to work for justice by feeding our community, both body and soul.

Through the initiative of the Women’s Empowerment Group, this community farm is located in Alief (west Houston) on acreage owned by Alief ISD and overseen by the International Management District.

With plots for growing produce, herbs, and flowers, Shamba Ya Amani serves over 25 refugee women and their families.

It is run by women making collective decisions about what to grow, when to plant, and how to harvest and distribute the crops. The women receive ongoing technical guidance and assistance, as well as supplies from FAM Houston in collaboration with other highly-respected grassroots organizations, including Urban Harvest, Plant It Forward Farms, and Finca Tres Robles.

Shamba Ya Amani aims to address the immediate and systemic injustices of food insecurity and its impact on health by giving women a place to grow their own food to supplement their families’ diets and incomes. In addition to providing a source of tangible sustenance, the farm acts as a deeper healing space by reconnecting the women, through the food they grow, back to their homelands.

And Shamba connects them to one other and new friends, further rooting them in this city where they have been resettled.

We feed the body by growing fruits and vegetables and raising bees.

We feed the soul by building this farm together, forming a connection to each other and to the earth we are tending.

FROM SHAMBA YA AMANI MISSION STATEMENT

I hope that everybody will get to have the same kind of joy and love for this kind of work that I do.

It would just make me so happy if everybody saw it as something as precious and special the way I see it.

Even though we are at the beginning, I can see a bigger picture of how the farm is going to change our lives and other people’s lives.

—VESTINE MUKARUSINE SHAMBA YA AMANI LEADERSHIP TEAM

The hardest spiritual work in the world is to love the neighbor as the self— to encounter another human being not as someone you can use, change, fix, help, save, enroll, convince or control, but simply as someone who can spring you from the prison of yourself, if you will allow it.”

BARBARA BROWN TAYLOR Bestselling Author

Lighting candles at a gathering of the Epworth League.

Our Supporters

Partners, donors, and sponsoring organizations Congregational Partners Westbury United Methodist Church St. Mark’s United Methodist Church St. Paul’s United Methodist Church Chapelwood United Methodist Church Memorial Drive United Methodist Church

Individual Donors 103 people made donations in 2021 (58 one-time and 45 recurring gifts)

People Engaged in FAM Initiatives

Accessible raised beds installed at the farm in 2021 enable women with injuries or disabilities to garden with more ease.

Women’s Empowerment Group Women members and families: 239 Volunteers and speakers: 68 ESL students and teachers: 20 Youth Empowerment Group students: 39 Youth Empowerment Group volunteers: 12 Shamba Ya Amani Leaders: 10 Participants: 35 Supporters: 78 Epworth League Participants: 38 Supporters: 13 St. Mark’s UMC Church-School Partnership Volunteers: 15 Students: 300 Storytelling Leaders: 6 Participants: 239 Pamoja Participants: 55

Sponsoring Organizations/Donors A 2nd Cup Alief Community Garden Alief Independent School District Alliance for Multicultural Community Services Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc Baker Creek Heirloom Seed Company Bee2Bee BeeWeaver Baxter Trust Bee Mindful Honey Farms, LLC Benevity Community Impact Fund Bishop Scott Jones and Mary Lou Reece The Caring Forever Foundation Chevron Matching Employee Fund Dominican Sisters of Houston Ecclesia Houston Eclectic Masala Edible Houston ExxonMobil Foundation Frederick Lazare Finca Tres Robles Farm First United Methodist Church Houston Gather Houston Hays County Beekeepers Association HOPE Clinic Houston Botanic Garden Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative Houston Independent School District Ibraim Nascimento Interfaith Ministries of Greater Houston

International Management District JAGS Graphic Design & Printing KJ Designs Moody Permanent Foundation Nature’s Way Nellie Keyes Park Community Garden Plant It Forward Farms Pure Growth Project Restorative Justice Alliance Seed Savers Exchange Sixty Consulting LLC SMC Landscaping Services Southern Methodist University Strike LLC Survival Movements Texas Beekeepers Association Texas Honey Bee Education Association Texas Methodist Foundation Volunteer Houston Willett Family Fund Yang Family Fund

Financials

Income

Other Income 3% Congregational Partners 22%

$400,000

Grants 36%

$300,000

Companies 1%

Fundraising 38%

$200,000

$100,000

$0

Expenses

2018

2019

2020

Income = $396,126 Expenses = $320,002 A combination of your donations and outside grants have enabled our projects and community impact to truly flourish. We finished 2021 with a surplus of $76,124, which will provide robust resources for our programs’ growth in 2022.

Asante sana! Thank you very much.

Administration 12%

Fundraising 4%

2021

2021

Epworth League 3%

Women's Empowerment Group 58%

Shamba Ya Amani 20%

Congregational Partnerships 3%

2021

Year at a Glance

FEBRUARY The Women’s Empowerment Group secured over $70,000 for Pandemic and Winter Storm Relief thanks to Houston Immigration Legal Services Collaborative and Texas Methodist Foundation.

MARCH FAM hired its first full-time employee, and Shamba Ya Amani began its first spring planting.

MAY In partnership with Bee Mindful, FAM launched its beekeeping program that specializes in top bar hives originating from Africa.

SEPTEMBER FAM collaborated with Houston Botanic Garden to create job opportunities and skill advancement for members of the Congolese refugee community.

OCTOBER Through partnership with Memorial Drive United Methodist Church, FAM launched training with the first cohort of its newest program “Pamoja” — pairing local Houstonians with newcomers to Young artists took part in a mural project to paint the tool shed at Shamba Ya Amani.

Designed by Ibraim Do Nascimento Santos, the mural was inspired by African textiles.

accompany one another.

Pamoja Friendsgiving potluck at Shamba Ya Amani

Exciting News for 2022 Build new partnerships

Expand Pamoja

Grow and share

Building connections with Houston Botanic Garden, A 2nd Cup, Alief community groups, and the Albert Schweitzer Fellowship Houston Galveston to share ideas and resources, furthering FAM’s impact by leveraging the power of collaboration with organizations with similar missions and goals.

Engaging additional congregations to connect with refugee and immigrant families and continuing the work of developing and deepening relationships between refugee families and their companions.

Expanding Shamba Ya Amani plots and crops to include cassava to sell to African markets and neighbors while interculturally networking Houstonians across Alief and the greater metropolitan area.

THANK YOU FOR HELPING US THRIVE IN 2021

Umoja ni nguvu We are stronger together!

5200 Willowbend Blvd Houston, TX 77096 www.famhoustontx.org Insta, FB, Twitter: @famhoustontx Women’s Empowerment Group leadership responded to community needs during winter storm Uri.