From Sunflowers to Squash: One Detroit Farmer’s Push for Food Sovereignty
Fennigan’s Farms combines agriculture and design to create a space for both fresh food and meaningful community connections.
This story is the first in “The Healing Soil: Detroit’s Urban Farms,” a three-part series being co-published with Outlier Media and Planet Detroit, and is supported by the Michigan Health Endowment Fund.
Driving down Monterey Street on Detroit’s westside, there are more abandoned and vacant houses than occupied ones. Sidewalks are overgrown with grass, and stretches of land as long as football fields separate the homes that remain.
About midway down the block, between Wildemere and Lawton streets, is Fennigan’s Farms. You can’t miss it from the tall towers of bright yellow sunflowers waving in the wind. As you walk up, there’s a table with tomatoes and a sign that reads “Free Produce.”
Amanda Brezzell is the co-founder and creative director at Fennigan’s Farms. Brezzell said the farm and design firm’s mission is to be a resource to the community, helping Detroiters achieve food sovereignty by providing fresh, accessible food, some at no cost.
According to a report sponsored by the Michigan Association of United Ways, about 69 percent of Detroit households surveyed find it difficult to afford the basic cost of living, including food. This is compounded by the fact that 39,000 Detroit households spend more than half of their income on housing alone, and that many find other necessities, such as utilities, auto insurance and child care, unaffordable.
“I just know what kind of help that would be for me, if somebody was giving me some of my groceries for free before I even had to get to the grocery store,” Brezzell said. “Even if it’s just a pint of tomatoes, that would have cost you way more. That’s three more dollars in your pocket or five more dollars in your pocket, or shoot, eight more dollars in your pocket.”
Brezzell said they believe urban farming is important for their neighbors’ health and well-being, and hopes Fennigan’s Farms becomes a community hub to accomplish just that.
A community-first approach
At its core, Fennigan’s Farms is an “agricultural design” studio. The team develops pop-up farmers markets, garden beds and community gardens to increase green spaces around Detroit. Fennigan’s also grows flowers to sell at local events.
The design work and floral sales are how Brezzell can offer free produce, which they say is important to giving their community locally sourced food options, eliminating barriers to access.
“Being aware of community needs is paramount to what we do,” Brezzell said. “We wanted to break down that immediate barrier to accessing food. I can’t drive you to the store, but if you’re walking past, I can give you something. … Food was never meant to be a commodity.”
The U.S. Department of Agriculture considers an urban area a food desert if its poverty rate is at least 20% and if one-third of residents live more than one mile from a major supermarket or grocery store. By that definition, about 10% of Detroit is considered a food desert.
But the key consideration is access to fresh and healthy food, which remains a problem in the city, especially for Black residents, Brezzell and Bauer said. A poor diet and an inadequate nutrient intake can lead to several health problems, such as obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
“It’s about our food system taking advantage of certain communities,” said Kate Bauer, an associate professor of nutritional sciences at the University of Michigan. “This is not about a lack of education. Urban farming allows local people — individuals — to take back that ability to control their health, their bodies and what goes on in their neighborhoods.”
Fennigan’s Farms aims to be more than a local grocery store. Brezzell wants it to become a community hub, a place for residents to gather, share knowledge and engage in discussions about sustainable practices.
When planning crops, Brezzell said it’s important to consider the needs of the community and consult them about what they want to eat.
“Sometimes people are like, ‘Wow, you grow a lot of tomatoes,’ or, ‘You’ve got a lot of herbs,’ or whatever. Yes, because people in the neighborhood want tomatoes. They want potatoes, they want squash, corn, beans, et cetera. So we’re making sure to grow those things and not have to throw them away because people aren’t eating them.”
Creating a food-sovereign Detroit
Between 2017 and 2022, the city lost 10 full-line grocery stores, leaving 64, at that time. The addition of Black-owned stores like the Detroit People’s Food Co-op, Neighborhood Grocery and Linwood Fresh Market has helped to address the issue, but considering some suburbs like Livonia have more major grocery stores than residents say they need, Detroit still has progress to make.
“Looking at particularly African American or Black communities, I think it’s incredibly important (to) think about the overlapping and interfacing systems of injustice and structural racism that are impacting these communities,” said James Buszkiewicz, a research investigator at University of Michigan who has studied social determinants of health. “It trickles all the way down to this kind of (food access) … and access to opportunities that can impact food access.”
Urban farming offers a community-based solution to this problem, but Black urban farmers often encounter financial barriers to acquiring land or accessing water to grow food. Brezzell said they had to spend between $5,000 and $10,000 to get water for the farm.
“Food was never meant to be a commodity.”
Amanda Brezzell, co-founder of Fennigan’s Farms
The City of Detroit has initiatives to increase access through land-based projects like urban farming, but Brezzell said the support is still inadequate. They want policies that make sustainable farming simpler at the city, state and federal levels.
“It’s an economic opportunity,” Brezzell said. “It’s not just that I can’t buy the land. It’s not just the water. It’s about the fact that I need access to continue to do the things that I want to do for my community. But if it’s been commodified and turned into an economic opportunity that I’m not allowed to benefit from, then that’s just another form of displacement, right?”
An appreciation for locally grown produce
Recent research shows that living near community-based agriculture initiatives can have a positive impact on a person’s health.
Bauer’s research for the project Feeding MI Families shows that lower-income families have limited food options. Urban farming increases those options, cultivates a deeper connection to local food sources, promotes healthier eating habits and invokes a greater appreciation for local agriculture.
“Our health is really due thanks to farmers and all the people in the food system who can get healthy food to us,” Bauer said. “That’s why (there’s) all the efforts to get farms in schools and child care centers, to get kids exposed to fresh flavors. There’s a strong belief that knowing where your food comes from and knowing the process of growing the food … is going to shift your mindset to be more appreciative and open and thoughtful about the way you eat.”
Brezzell said the joy they experience cultivating land with their family and the conversations Brezzell gets to have with their neighbors gets them out of bed every day.
They hope the farm remains a resource for Detroiters, as a community hub for emergencies, a place to find fresh produce or just somewhere for residents to get together and talk about growing.
“I’m not sitting here thinking like, ‘We’re feeding people,’ or ‘I’m keeping people alive.’ I’m coming from the space of, you come by, you see free produce, and it sparks something in you,” Brezzell said of their mission.
“The community doesn’t need your … pity. Nobody needs your help from that mindset. People need access to resources so they can best take care of themselves with full autonomy. So offer your support.”
This article first appeared on Outlier Media and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.
Healing Soil: Detroit Urban Farms is produced by Outlier Media in partnership with Planet Detroit, with support from the Michigan Health Endowment Fund.
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