Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
The views and opinions expressed in the following programmer those
of the speaker and don't necessarily represent those of the station.
It's staff management or ownership.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Good morning, you'll find out with Pete and the Poelic Gold.
I'm Peter Leonard and I'm the poet Gold, and we're
on the air with people from Vassar College. We have
two faculty members and two students and we're going to
have introduced them later right after we go right to
the public goal for weekly poem prayer incantation. Gold, please
let it roll.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
Thank you so much, Peter, I'm going to read a
poem call When the walls come down. When the walls
come down, new beginnings form. Does particles rise into the
atmosphere like stardust moving through the cosmos, searching for a
place to rebuild or build a new life, new energies.
We are the remains of these supernova's casualties, explosions of
(00:51):
weight no longer to be withstood. Stars. We are stars
made of the same thread fusions hydrogen converted in helium,
helium subsumed into carbon, nitrogen and oxygen, iron and sulfur.
The makeup of our skins houses no walls. When the
walls come down, fear is smashed, courage is born, Ideas
are spawned. Human hands connect and create bridges for all
(01:15):
to cross the toll. Already paid in toil, the journey
long would seemingly no reward. When the walls come down,
we build communities.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
And we build poems, and a communities start with poems. Yeah,
and let me just our vast students who are with us,
and thank you very much for being with us. I
know it's a busy time at the end of the semester,
and we have Koe Kaplan and Taylor Frasier, both juniors,
and we're going to get to them. And the faculty
members are Katie Height and Kim Kerschelin, and all of
(01:50):
them were involved in the same course called the Politically
Economy of Poughkeepsie, which is a surprising title for a
VASA course. But Katie, can you give us a sense
of how that cause came about?
Speaker 4 (02:07):
Sure? Well, thanks for having us on. It's the first
time for Tim and me teaching together. We've known each
other a long time, We've been at vas for a
long time, and we've been talking about trying to do
something together. Tim's economist and urban studies person, and I'm
polysci and I teach on social movements and on coming
(02:30):
to terms with violent political past. And I'm a city
resident and homeowner here in the city of Poughkeepsie, and
I feel pretty passionate about things here. So I talked
Tim into doing this class with me, and Tim, you
want to talk a little bit about overview.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Yeah, yeah, thanks for having us. I'll be interested. Thanks,
and thanks for your beautiful poem. And I'll be interested later. Pete,
when you declare that this is a surprising title for
a Vassor course, I'm not surprised to hear you say that,
but i'd be interested to hear what's behind that. So
(03:12):
Katie and I have talked about doing this on and off,
and I was I'll admit I was a little reluctant
to do it. I've had the experience. I teach urban
studies and taught about Poughkeepsie to some degree in my courses,
and we have a very very clear sense. You know,
we talk about the Vassar bubble. Yeah, Vassar is you know,
it's in the town of Poughkeepsie, not too far from
(03:34):
the city of Poughkeepsie. But we can feel in sense
that you know, there's just the relationship between Vassar and
the city of Poughkeepsie is distant, walled, Yeah, distant, and
I'm curious. We were We felt like it would be
it's an important opportunity for us, like, let's put our
(03:55):
heads together and think about a way of encouraging, facilit
illitating our students having a sort of more robust engagement
with Poughkeepsie. And I used that phrase robust. I remember
as we designed the syllabus, we wanted to do this
with some humility. We weren't gonna educate them about what
Poughkeepsie's really not like because it's presumptuous, because I don't know.
(04:17):
We are aware, and we have learned really deeply over
the course of the semester how many magnificent layers there
are to the city of Poughkeepsie. And I have to
admit I was a little bit reluctant to do it
because I felt, you know, who are we to do this?
And I thought, well, it's better that we do our
best than not do it at all. We had one
hundred students wanted to take the course, which indicated there
(04:41):
was real interests, and we ended up with thirty three students,
which has been great. It's a little big, but and
we started out the course of a few classes a
sort of crash course on when I think of asurban
political economy. The history of Poughkeepsie, as you and many
of your listeners know, is is it's got a lot
(05:01):
in common with the recent history of many cities in
the in the Northeast and in the Midwest, experiences of
the industrialization, uh, suburban sprawl, history of segregation, really important
influence of Federal highway money in dividing the city and
(05:22):
reinforcing divisions. So we've sort of talked about that history,
the federal uh uh, the f h A and uh.
And then we have had a really magnificent collection of
visitors from the city of Poughkeepsie, and so Kate and
I thought, you know, what better way to have our
(05:46):
students learned about Poughkeepsie than to have them learn from
people who have been living and working and struggling in
Poughkeepsie to make Poughkeepsie a better place. And I will
also add I felt like it was really this was
sort of a vague idea, but boy, it's it's really
been so robustly true. I don't usually use the word
(06:07):
robust that are in conversation that you know, we're kicking
around this elite institution, and there are all kinds of
wonderful things going on at Vaser. It's not all about arrogance,
but there is a sort of where'd you got to
graduate school? Where'd you get your PhD? We got a
really really deep education from people who have done really good, important,
(06:27):
brilliant creative work without sort of traditional academic credentials, and
it felt like that wasn't important.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
So we're talking about the war right right. What I
noticed is that I was going to ask you, was
this basically a lecture based course, because but you've invited
you made that clear, you've invited other people who've actually
had lived experiences and they bring coming into Vassar. But
what methodology have you put in place where your students
(06:56):
go outside of vasser and have that type of life
lived experience for themselves. In relationship to Poughkeepsie.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
We should let the students talk to this because they're
the ones who've been been very involved in this. Beyond
we we also formally took a group of students down
to for the Many to the offices of for the
Many to talk to us about all the work they're
doing locally and politically and how they started as former
visors students. So but yeah, we've been out and about.
(07:26):
We were lucky because the Office of Comedian Engaged Learning,
where Pete was once the director, really gave us the
funding to compensate all of our guest experts. So we
had twenty, which was quite a number. And they gave
of themselves and and we were honored to have them
(07:49):
and to respect their their presence and and and then yeah,
we went out and explored.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Will you talk about your explaining exploration? Maybe you could
say what drew you to the course? And this is
parenthetical but sort of just local gossip. I mean, getting
one hundred students interested in the political economy of Poughkeepsie.
That refers back to goals opening poem that had to
(08:20):
do with saw. I mean, the faculty members are both
fastest Staws for a long time, and that might have
been part of the drawer as well as Poughkeepsie. But
that's just speculation. Give us as why each of you
took the course.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
Yeah, so I'm Taylor and I'm a junior here at Vassar.
And the reason that I was inspired to take this
course is because at Vassar, my work steady job is
actually working in Poughkeepsie High School as a student mentor
and like a college tutor. For these students, I help
them go through the common at process and the financial
aid process, and we do a lot of community building.
(09:00):
And so through my experiences with those students, I feel
I feel very connected to the city of Pickkeepsie. And
I also have kind of had opportunities where I have
seen how community members perceive the vaster bubble. I remember
my freshman year, one of my students at Pikeepsy High
School mentioned just offhandedly, well, you know, you have actual
(09:23):
walls around your school, which I had never even considered,
you know, because they are relatively small cobblestone walls, but
they are walls nonetheless. And then there's these huge gates,
and a lot of our buildings face inward as opposed
to outward. And that very obviously is this architectural story
that I think is reaffirmed by the way that a
(09:43):
lot of students on campus lack, you know, connection with
the community. They don't go outside the wall.
Speaker 6 (09:55):
I am Chloe. So I was one of those students
I think that was sort of in the Vassar bubble.
I didn't have a car, so I didn't really have
I didn't it wasn't easy for me to get outside campus.
We have the bus stop, but I personally at the time,
I didn't have a lot of you know, expertise with
(10:15):
public transport. I grew up in a very small, lake
suburban town, so I thought that for some reason that
was inaccessible to me. And I had recently got involved
in more local activism in my own town and learned
a lot about the structural issues there, and knowing that
there was this sort of existing restrictive relationship, this wall
(10:36):
between Vassar and Poughkeepsie, I was sort of ashamed that
I had let myself become a part of that, and
I was eager to sort of get out. And I
knew that my town had a story that I wasn't
aware of, and that likely that was the same for Poughkeepsie.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
So and where's your town?
Speaker 6 (10:52):
Oh, I grew up in Connecticut.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
Okay, if you're just tuning in, you're listening to finding
Out with Pete and the poet Gold and I'm the
poet gold and we're here today with Katie Heid and
Tim Kershler Kershlin. I got it right, Tim, Tim Kershlin
also VASA professors teaching a course on political economy of
Poughkeepsie and joined by two students, Chloe Kaplan and Taylor Frazier.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
And you know, Tim asked the question why I thought
it was a surprising title to a course, and then
he went right ahead and answered, well for you. And
you know, VASA has a thousand wonderful things going on,
and you think that's a good thing, But do all
the good things happening on at VASA are also impediments
(11:40):
to the students getting out and discovering what's great about Poughkeepsie.
And you know, my sense is both. You know, the
students in the class deserve a lot of credit for
showing the interests then showing the moxy in terms of
getting out there. The one of the things I like.
(12:02):
You know, you had lots of people come in, and
I love the fact that they got paid to come
in because, you know, because it's a pain to go
to Vassa. If you're if you're if you're working anyway,
give me a sense of who you you might have
as students who you might remember what uh what community
(12:26):
members struck you as particularly good.
Speaker 6 (12:31):
So we had a civil rights attorney, Jen Brown visit
our class and her presentation she gave us on this
sort of systemic history of Poughkeepsie about housing and the
impact of racial laws. But found was extremely, extremely fascinating
and really sort of showed for me why Poughkeepsie looks
(12:54):
like the way it does now, a horribly tragic history.
But I also thought that, you know, in our class,
we'd been talking sort of on the broader federal structures
like the Federal Housing Administration and things like that, but
what struck me with her is they're sort of big,
broad policies, but you can see she brought up the
maps and the physical data about how this had local
(13:18):
impact and that it can still be felt now. I
also think she was extremely striking because she was still,
despite knowing all these big sort of systemic issues and failures,
she was still very active. She's a civil rights attorney,
she's still very willing and passionate about doing something about it.
Speaker 5 (13:35):
So Yeah, some of our very early presenters were Deron
Wilson and Barrington Atkins, and they came and they spoke
about the situation with the twenty six Oakley Shelter, which
is a proposed homeless shelter on Oakley Street, very close
to two elementary schools in a park, and we had
gotten the opportunity to watch the county legislature meeting where
(13:59):
they ended up voteving on that, so we kind of
came in with a pretty good understanding of how opposed
the city was to that, and so listening to them
talk about it and give us updates months later where
things were and how they were still actively fighting, what
struck me the most was despite feeling not particularly confident
(14:20):
in their ability to stop the homeless shelter from being
placed on Oakley Street, both were still fighting with the
same level of like passion and commitment that they had
months before. On the meeting that we saw, and you know,
I asked them if they were going to be doing
a lawsuit and if they thought that would be an
effective avenue to prevent the shelter from being placed there,
(14:44):
and the consensus was, we're not sure if it will work,
but that's not the point. The point is we need
to fight. We need to make sure our voices are
heard and the Act of doing this lawsuit is strong
and that is powerful, and that was reiterated by Jordan
Shanella from Hudson River Housing when she came and spoke
with us, and you know Mayor Flowers, who is spoke
(15:06):
at the redlining panel a couple of weeks ago on
the situation of Okay, I think everybody that's fighting and
Pickkeepsie just has an un ending level of strength, which
I think was really empowering to.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
See my resiliency for the fight and going into Oakley,
which brings to my question, Uh, Tim and Katie in
your course, was there any was there?
Speaker 5 (15:28):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yes, I.
Speaker 5 (15:32):
Know, I know.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I felt so comfortable with them, like you know, it's
sitting over a dinner table or something. But but talking
about twenty six Oakley Street and the the challenges and
the struggles and balancing the unhoused and uh and and
you know mental behavior, do you see some type of
inn the economic impact that it's having on local businesses,
(15:54):
particularly on main Street. Do you have a thought about
that on and how it can be approached to be
resolved so that compassionately the on how situation is dealt with,
but also the people who invest in the vibrancy and
the economic stability of the city itself and the local
(16:16):
business owners.
Speaker 4 (16:17):
Yeah, thanks for asking that, and I'm glad that Taylor
brought up Barrington and Deran. They were purposely our first
visitors because we really wanted to get at the politics
of the city versus the county and what it means
when you have a city that's politically Democrat majority, and
(16:37):
right now the entire city council and the mayor are Democrats,
largely black and Latino, a struggling city economically, a lot
of racial disparity in a county that is comparatively affluent,
that is Republican dominated by its legislature, and that controls
a lot of the fiscal responsibility that has had a
(17:01):
horrendous history with the city of Poughkeepsie, where the City
of Poughkeepsie literally gets treated like a dumping ground for
the county legislatures. So we started very purposefully with the case,
and it's something that many of us in the City
of Poughkeepsie have been involved in speaking up at the
(17:21):
legislature for the past two years on the Oakleigh Homeless Shelter.
It's been a united voice in the city of Poughkeepsie,
whether it's the mayor and the city council people, whether
it's local business people on main Street, community members of
all kinds, you know, and I think many of us
feel that, Yes, of course, Poughkeepsie is an incredibly caring
(17:44):
place that you know, wants people who are unhoused, who
are struggling with mental health issues and with drug adult conditions,
are taken care of, are treated well, are given opportunities.
There's no question that we have a very caring city.
It is a question of how it's you know that
(18:05):
many of the people who are on Main Street are
not from Poughkeepsie. They are attracted into Poughkeepsie for the
city being the county hub for all social services and
you know, comparatively better access to a drug a drug chain.
Unfortunately that is prevalent as well in Poughkeepsie, and that
(18:29):
there's a way in which the county has just created
part of this vicious circle. And community members and all
kinds of different experts have spoken to alternatives, including scatter
site housing for those who are unhoused, including you know,
renovating Hillcrest in the town of Poughkeepsie, where prior to
(18:51):
the pandemic. Hudson River Housing ran that emergency housing shelter.
So there have been many different proposals on the table,
and became quite apparent that the county legislature was going
with this and the ultimately because there was money there
for them from the State of New York. I mean,
it's it's unconscionable what's happened, you know, to put an
(19:15):
emergency helmelett shelter in the poorest ward of a city
that's already struggling. Uh. You know, is is not good
for it not just the residents of Poughkeepsie, but for
those themselves that are are struggling. So so you know,
of course it's not an e resolve, uh, and it's
(19:37):
not unique to Poughkeepsie, but we deal with a particular
political dynamic that's really detrimental to resolving to being supportive.
We don't have, you know, all of the social service
supports we need, and unfortunately, I've watched our mayor feel
like she has no choice but to call the police
(19:58):
out onto Main Street and and that's that's a painful
decision she's made. And I've seen it on my drive
from where I live down at one end of Main
Street up to up to Vassar.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
And this question was built out of I reached out
to someone who I know does a lot of great work, uh,
through PK Forward and Sabrina Yes, and and uh and
I just said, you know, I know you do this
type of work. Is there something I could?
Speaker 4 (20:25):
Yeah? No, And I really I'm so glad you brought
Suprena Kenny up because she's just been amazing and she
and Joe and and yeah, no, we need we need
to continue the fight. I mean, as Taylor said, she
was at a recent event that the local n W A,
p A CP and and the Prolific Circle organized recently,
(20:47):
and and Mayor Flowers told us, it's coming back that
we thought that it had made some progress Oakley in
terms of a negotiation a compromise with the current county
execs to Serno. And now it's not at all clear
and we'll probably be back out there fighting.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
I know, and in all fairness, I know that that
Cuserno has kind of executive sort of stepped into this
the Oakley situation. It was already happening prior to her
administration system. Now she's here and has to deal with
this as well. Once Again, if you're just tuning in,
you're listening to finding out with Pete and the poet Gold.
Peter and I'm the poet Gold. We're here having a
(21:25):
wonderful conversation with the two Vaster professors Katie Hede and
Tim Kershlin, professor's teaching a course on a political economy
of Poughkeepsie, as well as two students, Chloe Kaplan and
Taylor Frasier.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yeah, I wanted to ask you a question about the
economy part. In other words, you study economics formally, but
you have a very wide perspective on it from where
I can gather and maybe you could talk about how, uh,
you know, Poughkeepsie is both very specific and Poughkeepsie is
also in general a generic is like other cities. If
(22:03):
you could expand in that, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
Well, I appreciate the question. You know, there are a
few things I've been thinking as we've talked, and they're
related here. I mean one of the things I do
as an economist, I mean I think of myself as
a multidisciplinary economist. I think we can't understand issues of
who's rich and who's poor, and who has access to
healthcare and who doesn't the sort of what we think
(22:26):
of as sort of the main economic indicators of inequality
without understanding that we have to go outside and we
have to look at where is the bridge built, where's
the arterial built? How are those decisions made local political decisions,
decisions about who gets access to capital or political and
you know, the long history of redlining and racial exclusion
(22:49):
from housing markets explains the racial well, I mean, over
a century and more and five hundred years of racists
economics and politics and violence can help us to understand
what we see as as now economic inequality. So and
that's of course part that's an important part of the
(23:09):
story of Poughkeepsie. Who had access to capital? Who has
access to school funds?
Speaker 5 (23:15):
Uh uh?
Speaker 1 (23:17):
And that's as as as we've both said a general story,
it's a story of Elizabeth, New Jersey and Newark, New
Jersey and Cleveland. But on the other hand, and I
have to say, this is the thing that has been
really striking to me. And I think at the beginning
of the course I might have said these words, but
I'm going to echo something that that that are two
magnificent students have commented on and that is you know,
(23:38):
it's a global economy, and you know there's been the
industrialization across the country and IBM left, and you know,
how do how a town with high rates of poverty
and low uh you know, average incomes? What do we
do as an economist? I think we need to think
regionally and think uh nationally, and think globally. But what
(24:00):
I've been really deeply struck by is how powerful the
efforts of local activists have been to really make Poughkeepsie
a better place to hold legislators to account. But they're
also just one after the other coming in and as
Taylor pointed out, pushing and pushing and pushing, and they
get knocked back and they keep pushing, but they're really
(24:23):
making an enormous difference. And another thing that has been
gratifying for me to watch. I mean you asked earlier
it was this electure course. It's so not a lecture course.
I mean we I think Katie and I probably talked
more than most people in the classroom. But as I said,
we entered this with humility. We were learning, and we
(24:44):
were sitting back and learning because there are we knew
that people were coming in who knew things that we
didn't know. But also I would say the questions. I mean,
we had a magnificent conversation yesterday in class about empathy
and solidarity. I got to say, when I was taking
econometrics in graduate school, I didn't think i'd presiding. It
was magnificent and moving and a thing that our students
(25:06):
have said, and I have had this experience too, so
they've learned about Poughkeepsie. You know, I think that that
most of the students who wanted to take our course
came with an interest, with a sense that you know,
they ought to know more, so they brought But I
think it's very easy to say, well, Poughkeepsie is a
poor city, or Poughkeepsie's nice, but it's not that much
to do whatever the sort of simple, single single story is.
(25:31):
And you know, it is a remarkable city with a
remarkable history, and it's got its particular architecture and the
story of the Arterial. And you know, a couple of
our students have written to us, and you know, our
the stereotype is that all the Vaster kids are rich kids.
It's expensive to go to Vassar, but one of the
(25:52):
advantages of teaching at rich schools. We actually have pretty
generous financial aid. And many of our students have said
to us, I grew up in a place. I go
into Poughkeepsie and it reminds me of where I lived
in the Bronx, reminds me of where I lived in Shanghai.
Speaker 4 (26:06):
And so.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
What I was going to say is I feel like
our students. We've asked our students, we gave them, asked
them to write a short essay. I could talk about
the ungradedness of our essays, which is part of our
pedagogical approach, but that they we said, so what do
you tell us something about how you understand Poughkeepsie differently,
or how you understand your hometown or your community or
your neighborhood differently. And many of them said, there's so
(26:34):
much more going on. Poughkeepsie is a much richer place
than I gave it credit for. And they were gratified
by that. But they also said, now I see why
when I crossed that boulevard in my hometown, there's a
difference there, and I just sort of thought that's happened naturally,
but it didn't. It was policies, and it was so
(26:54):
they say, they tell us, they're seeing the world differently.
The end of class, we have many seniors and one
of one of our classmates commented, said, you know why
I go back to Oregon, I'm going to think about
where I'm living and working differently.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
So in Katie's point, they say, yes, she just mentioned casually. Yes,
Poughkeepsie is a carrying place, and that's you know, goes
with what you're saying. You have your political structure, but
you also have a very high number of charismatic, talented
people who auditioned it out and Poughkeepsie and you know,
(27:29):
like when I from New York, I said that a
cute little town because of stuff, and basically my life
has my job was to basically know something about Poughkeepsie.
And what I'm struck by still is how much stuff
I don't know. You know, it's in a gold and
Golds had a similar experience. How you moved here?
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Yeah, well, you know it was it was a couple
of things that that kept me here. And one of
our guests that actually we have coming on, Frank Plea
his mural. You know I always said this art on
the wall then it says it speaks to the community
there was a Japanese restaurant. Not every place has a
Japanese restaurant. You can find Chinese, you can find pizza,
(28:10):
you don't find Japanese. So that spoke also to me
about the city. And then I grew up in Washington Heights,
so I was smacked by the George Washington Bridge off
the Hudson River, and so the bridge was there. My
brother was right, come to Poughkeepsie, You'll like it, You'll
love it. So it had all the right I was
a little skeptical, but it had all the right elements
for me really to to be here. But I'm curious.
(28:31):
I must speak to the students for a minute. Chloe
and Taylor very quickly. We have about two minutes left.
What do you do with the information or your discovery
in this journey from this course? I mean, what do
you do? What can else can you say? I want
to offer to Poughkeepsie or an idea that you can
put out there, so I know.
Speaker 6 (28:52):
Going forward, you know, I have one more year left,
and I really do plan to get much more involved
in the community, you know, working at a lot organization
or something like that. But I also think more broadly
that I think what this course has really taught me
is that any place I drive through or any place
I go to, I'm going to see it differently, that
there's a story there, there's a reason certain places look
(29:15):
a certain way, why certain people live there, and just
be more cognizant, but also the fact that every place
has a richness, even if it's not by certain sort
of traditional standards or what have you.
Speaker 5 (29:27):
Yeah, I actually opted to get an internship in Poughkeepsy
this summer, and so I'll be in the city of Peckepsy.
And when I made that decision, I did so in
part because of this class and because I wanted to
be around for the important conversations that are happening in
the community. I want to be able to go to
the city council meetings and the county legislator meetings and
(29:48):
speak just like so many of our our class guest
speakers have, because I think, you know, they have given
me the strength and they've they've they've kind of showed
the way that this is important and you can do this.
And so I think, yeah, acknowledging that we all have
a voice and we just need to choose to use it.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
I have a feeling I may look up after you
graduate and you wind up back in the community. Definitely.
How are we doing on time?
Speaker 2 (30:13):
We're out of town, but we learned today. Kipsie's a
place it inspires and.
Speaker 4 (30:19):
Well.
Speaker 3 (30:19):
Thank you to our listeners for listening to finding out
with Pete in the Poet Code, Kate, Tim, Chloe and Taylor,
thank you so much for being with us and come
back and visit us sometime. Okay, And to our listeners,
once again, you hear the show and you want to
hear it again, please visit our podcast and just you know,
check us out on iHeart
The views and opinions expressed in the following programmer those
of the speaker and don't necessarily represent those of the station.
It's staff management or ownership.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Good morning, you'll find out with Pete and the Poelic Gold.
I'm Peter Leonard and I'm the poet Gold, and we're
on the air with people from Vassar College. We have
two faculty members and two students and we're going to
have introduced them later right after we go right to
the public goal for weekly poem prayer incantation. Gold, please
let it roll.
Speaker 3 (00:29):
Thank you so much, Peter, I'm going to read a
poem call When the walls come down. When the walls
come down, new beginnings form. Does particles rise into the
atmosphere like stardust moving through the cosmos, searching for a
place to rebuild or build a new life, new energies.
We are the remains of these supernova's casualties, explosions of
(00:51):
weight no longer to be withstood. Stars. We are stars
made of the same thread fusions hydrogen converted in helium,
helium subsumed into carbon, nitrogen and oxygen, iron and sulfur.
The makeup of our skins houses no walls. When the
walls come down, fear is smashed, courage is born, Ideas
are spawned. Human hands connect and create bridges for all
(01:15):
to cross the toll. Already paid in toil, the journey
long would seemingly no reward. When the walls come down,
we build communities.
Speaker 2 (01:25):
And we build poems, and a communities start with poems. Yeah,
and let me just our vast students who are with us,
and thank you very much for being with us. I
know it's a busy time at the end of the semester,
and we have Koe Kaplan and Taylor Frasier, both juniors,
and we're going to get to them. And the faculty
members are Katie Height and Kim Kerschelin, and all of
(01:50):
them were involved in the same course called the Politically
Economy of Poughkeepsie, which is a surprising title for a
VASA course. But Katie, can you give us a sense
of how that cause came about?
Speaker 4 (02:07):
Sure? Well, thanks for having us on. It's the first
time for Tim and me teaching together. We've known each
other a long time, We've been at vas for a
long time, and we've been talking about trying to do
something together. Tim's economist and urban studies person, and I'm
polysci and I teach on social movements and on coming
(02:30):
to terms with violent political past. And I'm a city
resident and homeowner here in the city of Poughkeepsie, and
I feel pretty passionate about things here. So I talked
Tim into doing this class with me, and Tim, you
want to talk a little bit about overview.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
Yeah, yeah, thanks for having us. I'll be interested. Thanks,
and thanks for your beautiful poem. And I'll be interested later. Pete,
when you declare that this is a surprising title for
a Vassor course, I'm not surprised to hear you say that,
but i'd be interested to hear what's behind that. So
(03:12):
Katie and I have talked about doing this on and off,
and I was I'll admit I was a little reluctant
to do it. I've had the experience. I teach urban
studies and taught about Poughkeepsie to some degree in my courses,
and we have a very very clear sense. You know,
we talk about the Vassar bubble. Yeah, Vassar is you know,
it's in the town of Poughkeepsie, not too far from
(03:34):
the city of Poughkeepsie. But we can feel in sense
that you know, there's just the relationship between Vassar and
the city of Poughkeepsie is distant, walled, Yeah, distant, and
I'm curious. We were We felt like it would be
it's an important opportunity for us, like, let's put our
(03:55):
heads together and think about a way of encouraging, facilit
illitating our students having a sort of more robust engagement
with Poughkeepsie. And I used that phrase robust. I remember
as we designed the syllabus, we wanted to do this
with some humility. We weren't gonna educate them about what
Poughkeepsie's really not like because it's presumptuous, because I don't know.
(04:17):
We are aware, and we have learned really deeply over
the course of the semester how many magnificent layers there
are to the city of Poughkeepsie. And I have to
admit I was a little bit reluctant to do it
because I felt, you know, who are we to do this?
And I thought, well, it's better that we do our
best than not do it at all. We had one
hundred students wanted to take the course, which indicated there
(04:41):
was real interests, and we ended up with thirty three students,
which has been great. It's a little big, but and
we started out the course of a few classes a
sort of crash course on when I think of asurban
political economy. The history of Poughkeepsie, as you and many
of your listeners know, is is it's got a lot
(05:01):
in common with the recent history of many cities in
the in the Northeast and in the Midwest, experiences of
the industrialization, uh, suburban sprawl, history of segregation, really important
influence of Federal highway money in dividing the city and
(05:22):
reinforcing divisions. So we've sort of talked about that history,
the federal uh uh, the f h A and uh.
And then we have had a really magnificent collection of
visitors from the city of Poughkeepsie, and so Kate and
I thought, you know, what better way to have our
(05:46):
students learned about Poughkeepsie than to have them learn from
people who have been living and working and struggling in
Poughkeepsie to make Poughkeepsie a better place. And I will
also add I felt like it was really this was
sort of a vague idea, but boy, it's it's really
been so robustly true. I don't usually use the word
(06:07):
robust that are in conversation that you know, we're kicking
around this elite institution, and there are all kinds of
wonderful things going on at Vaser. It's not all about arrogance,
but there is a sort of where'd you got to
graduate school? Where'd you get your PhD? We got a
really really deep education from people who have done really good, important,
(06:27):
brilliant creative work without sort of traditional academic credentials, and
it felt like that wasn't important.
Speaker 3 (06:35):
So we're talking about the war right right. What I
noticed is that I was going to ask you, was
this basically a lecture based course, because but you've invited
you made that clear, you've invited other people who've actually
had lived experiences and they bring coming into Vassar. But
what methodology have you put in place where your students
(06:56):
go outside of vasser and have that type of life
lived experience for themselves. In relationship to Poughkeepsie.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
We should let the students talk to this because they're
the ones who've been been very involved in this. Beyond
we we also formally took a group of students down
to for the Many to the offices of for the
Many to talk to us about all the work they're
doing locally and politically and how they started as former
visors students. So but yeah, we've been out and about.
(07:26):
We were lucky because the Office of Comedian Engaged Learning,
where Pete was once the director, really gave us the
funding to compensate all of our guest experts. So we
had twenty, which was quite a number. And they gave
of themselves and and we were honored to have them
(07:49):
and to respect their their presence and and and then yeah,
we went out and explored.
Speaker 2 (08:00):
Will you talk about your explaining exploration? Maybe you could
say what drew you to the course? And this is
parenthetical but sort of just local gossip. I mean, getting
one hundred students interested in the political economy of Poughkeepsie.
That refers back to goals opening poem that had to
(08:20):
do with saw. I mean, the faculty members are both
fastest Staws for a long time, and that might have
been part of the drawer as well as Poughkeepsie. But
that's just speculation. Give us as why each of you
took the course.
Speaker 5 (08:38):
Yeah, so I'm Taylor and I'm a junior here at Vassar.
And the reason that I was inspired to take this
course is because at Vassar, my work steady job is
actually working in Poughkeepsie High School as a student mentor
and like a college tutor. For these students, I help
them go through the common at process and the financial
aid process, and we do a lot of community building.
(09:00):
And so through my experiences with those students, I feel
I feel very connected to the city of Pickkeepsie. And
I also have kind of had opportunities where I have
seen how community members perceive the vaster bubble. I remember
my freshman year, one of my students at Pikeepsy High
School mentioned just offhandedly, well, you know, you have actual
(09:23):
walls around your school, which I had never even considered,
you know, because they are relatively small cobblestone walls, but
they are walls nonetheless. And then there's these huge gates,
and a lot of our buildings face inward as opposed
to outward. And that very obviously is this architectural story
that I think is reaffirmed by the way that a
(09:43):
lot of students on campus lack, you know, connection with
the community. They don't go outside the wall.
Speaker 6 (09:55):
I am Chloe. So I was one of those students
I think that was sort of in the Vassar bubble.
I didn't have a car, so I didn't really have
I didn't it wasn't easy for me to get outside campus.
We have the bus stop, but I personally at the time,
I didn't have a lot of you know, expertise with
(10:15):
public transport. I grew up in a very small, lake
suburban town, so I thought that for some reason that
was inaccessible to me. And I had recently got involved
in more local activism in my own town and learned
a lot about the structural issues there, and knowing that
there was this sort of existing restrictive relationship, this wall
(10:36):
between Vassar and Poughkeepsie, I was sort of ashamed that
I had let myself become a part of that, and
I was eager to sort of get out. And I
knew that my town had a story that I wasn't
aware of, and that likely that was the same for Poughkeepsie.
Speaker 3 (10:50):
So and where's your town?
Speaker 6 (10:52):
Oh, I grew up in Connecticut.
Speaker 3 (10:54):
Okay, if you're just tuning in, you're listening to finding
Out with Pete and the poet Gold and I'm the
poet gold and we're here today with Katie Heid and
Tim Kershler Kershlin. I got it right, Tim, Tim Kershlin
also VASA professors teaching a course on political economy of
Poughkeepsie and joined by two students, Chloe Kaplan and Taylor Frazier.
Speaker 2 (11:17):
And you know, Tim asked the question why I thought
it was a surprising title to a course, and then
he went right ahead and answered, well for you. And
you know, VASA has a thousand wonderful things going on,
and you think that's a good thing, But do all
the good things happening on at VASA are also impediments
(11:40):
to the students getting out and discovering what's great about Poughkeepsie.
And you know, my sense is both. You know, the
students in the class deserve a lot of credit for
showing the interests then showing the moxy in terms of
getting out there. The one of the things I like.
(12:02):
You know, you had lots of people come in, and
I love the fact that they got paid to come
in because, you know, because it's a pain to go
to Vassa. If you're if you're if you're working anyway,
give me a sense of who you you might have
as students who you might remember what uh what community
(12:26):
members struck you as particularly good.
Speaker 6 (12:31):
So we had a civil rights attorney, Jen Brown visit
our class and her presentation she gave us on this
sort of systemic history of Poughkeepsie about housing and the
impact of racial laws. But found was extremely, extremely fascinating
and really sort of showed for me why Poughkeepsie looks
(12:54):
like the way it does now, a horribly tragic history.
But I also thought that, you know, in our class,
we'd been talking sort of on the broader federal structures
like the Federal Housing Administration and things like that, but
what struck me with her is they're sort of big,
broad policies, but you can see she brought up the
maps and the physical data about how this had local
(13:18):
impact and that it can still be felt now. I
also think she was extremely striking because she was still,
despite knowing all these big sort of systemic issues and failures,
she was still very active. She's a civil rights attorney,
she's still very willing and passionate about doing something about it.
Speaker 5 (13:35):
So Yeah, some of our very early presenters were Deron
Wilson and Barrington Atkins, and they came and they spoke
about the situation with the twenty six Oakley Shelter, which
is a proposed homeless shelter on Oakley Street, very close
to two elementary schools in a park, and we had
gotten the opportunity to watch the county legislature meeting where
(13:59):
they ended up voteving on that, so we kind of
came in with a pretty good understanding of how opposed
the city was to that, and so listening to them
talk about it and give us updates months later where
things were and how they were still actively fighting, what
struck me the most was despite feeling not particularly confident
(14:20):
in their ability to stop the homeless shelter from being
placed on Oakley Street, both were still fighting with the
same level of like passion and commitment that they had
months before. On the meeting that we saw, and you know,
I asked them if they were going to be doing
a lawsuit and if they thought that would be an
effective avenue to prevent the shelter from being placed there,
(14:44):
and the consensus was, we're not sure if it will work,
but that's not the point. The point is we need
to fight. We need to make sure our voices are
heard and the Act of doing this lawsuit is strong
and that is powerful, and that was reiterated by Jordan
Shanella from Hudson River Housing when she came and spoke
with us, and you know Mayor Flowers, who is spoke
(15:06):
at the redlining panel a couple of weeks ago on
the situation of Okay, I think everybody that's fighting and
Pickkeepsie just has an un ending level of strength, which
I think was really empowering to.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
See my resiliency for the fight and going into Oakley,
which brings to my question, Uh, Tim and Katie in
your course, was there any was there?
Speaker 5 (15:28):
Oh?
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Yes, I.
Speaker 5 (15:32):
Know, I know.
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I felt so comfortable with them, like you know, it's
sitting over a dinner table or something. But but talking
about twenty six Oakley Street and the the challenges and
the struggles and balancing the unhoused and uh and and
you know mental behavior, do you see some type of
inn the economic impact that it's having on local businesses,
(15:54):
particularly on main Street. Do you have a thought about
that on and how it can be approached to be
resolved so that compassionately the on how situation is dealt with,
but also the people who invest in the vibrancy and
the economic stability of the city itself and the local
(16:16):
business owners.
Speaker 4 (16:17):
Yeah, thanks for asking that, and I'm glad that Taylor
brought up Barrington and Deran. They were purposely our first
visitors because we really wanted to get at the politics
of the city versus the county and what it means
when you have a city that's politically Democrat majority, and
(16:37):
right now the entire city council and the mayor are Democrats,
largely black and Latino, a struggling city economically, a lot
of racial disparity in a county that is comparatively affluent,
that is Republican dominated by its legislature, and that controls
a lot of the fiscal responsibility that has had a
(17:01):
horrendous history with the city of Poughkeepsie, where the City
of Poughkeepsie literally gets treated like a dumping ground for
the county legislatures. So we started very purposefully with the case,
and it's something that many of us in the City
of Poughkeepsie have been involved in speaking up at the
(17:21):
legislature for the past two years on the Oakleigh Homeless Shelter.
It's been a united voice in the city of Poughkeepsie,
whether it's the mayor and the city council people, whether
it's local business people on main Street, community members of
all kinds, you know, and I think many of us
feel that, Yes, of course, Poughkeepsie is an incredibly caring
(17:44):
place that you know, wants people who are unhoused, who
are struggling with mental health issues and with drug adult conditions,
are taken care of, are treated well, are given opportunities.
There's no question that we have a very caring city.
It is a question of how it's you know that
(18:05):
many of the people who are on Main Street are
not from Poughkeepsie. They are attracted into Poughkeepsie for the
city being the county hub for all social services and
you know, comparatively better access to a drug a drug chain.
Unfortunately that is prevalent as well in Poughkeepsie, and that
(18:29):
there's a way in which the county has just created
part of this vicious circle. And community members and all
kinds of different experts have spoken to alternatives, including scatter
site housing for those who are unhoused, including you know,
renovating Hillcrest in the town of Poughkeepsie, where prior to
(18:51):
the pandemic. Hudson River Housing ran that emergency housing shelter.
So there have been many different proposals on the table,
and became quite apparent that the county legislature was going
with this and the ultimately because there was money there
for them from the State of New York. I mean,
it's it's unconscionable what's happened, you know, to put an
(19:15):
emergency helmelett shelter in the poorest ward of a city
that's already struggling. Uh. You know, is is not good
for it not just the residents of Poughkeepsie, but for
those themselves that are are struggling. So so you know,
of course it's not an e resolve, uh, and it's
(19:37):
not unique to Poughkeepsie, but we deal with a particular
political dynamic that's really detrimental to resolving to being supportive.
We don't have, you know, all of the social service
supports we need, and unfortunately, I've watched our mayor feel
like she has no choice but to call the police
(19:58):
out onto Main Street and and that's that's a painful
decision she's made. And I've seen it on my drive
from where I live down at one end of Main
Street up to up to Vassar.
Speaker 3 (20:12):
And this question was built out of I reached out
to someone who I know does a lot of great work, uh,
through PK Forward and Sabrina Yes, and and uh and
I just said, you know, I know you do this
type of work. Is there something I could?
Speaker 4 (20:25):
Yeah? No, And I really I'm so glad you brought
Suprena Kenny up because she's just been amazing and she
and Joe and and yeah, no, we need we need
to continue the fight. I mean, as Taylor said, she
was at a recent event that the local n W A,
p A CP and and the Prolific Circle organized recently,
(20:47):
and and Mayor Flowers told us, it's coming back that
we thought that it had made some progress Oakley in
terms of a negotiation a compromise with the current county
execs to Serno. And now it's not at all clear
and we'll probably be back out there fighting.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
I know, and in all fairness, I know that that
Cuserno has kind of executive sort of stepped into this
the Oakley situation. It was already happening prior to her
administration system. Now she's here and has to deal with
this as well. Once Again, if you're just tuning in,
you're listening to finding out with Pete and the poet Gold.
Peter and I'm the poet Gold. We're here having a
(21:25):
wonderful conversation with the two Vaster professors Katie Hede and
Tim Kershlin, professor's teaching a course on a political economy
of Poughkeepsie, as well as two students, Chloe Kaplan and
Taylor Frasier.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yeah, I wanted to ask you a question about the
economy part. In other words, you study economics formally, but
you have a very wide perspective on it from where
I can gather and maybe you could talk about how, uh,
you know, Poughkeepsie is both very specific and Poughkeepsie is
also in general a generic is like other cities. If
(22:03):
you could expand in that, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
Well, I appreciate the question. You know, there are a
few things I've been thinking as we've talked, and they're
related here. I mean one of the things I do
as an economist, I mean I think of myself as
a multidisciplinary economist. I think we can't understand issues of
who's rich and who's poor, and who has access to
healthcare and who doesn't the sort of what we think
(22:26):
of as sort of the main economic indicators of inequality
without understanding that we have to go outside and we
have to look at where is the bridge built, where's
the arterial built? How are those decisions made local political decisions,
decisions about who gets access to capital or political and
you know, the long history of redlining and racial exclusion
(22:49):
from housing markets explains the racial well, I mean, over
a century and more and five hundred years of racists
economics and politics and violence can help us to understand
what we see as as now economic inequality. So and
that's of course part that's an important part of the
(23:09):
story of Poughkeepsie. Who had access to capital? Who has
access to school funds?
Speaker 5 (23:15):
Uh uh?
Speaker 1 (23:17):
And that's as as as we've both said a general story,
it's a story of Elizabeth, New Jersey and Newark, New
Jersey and Cleveland. But on the other hand, and I
have to say, this is the thing that has been
really striking to me. And I think at the beginning
of the course I might have said these words, but
I'm going to echo something that that that are two
magnificent students have commented on and that is you know,
(23:38):
it's a global economy, and you know there's been the
industrialization across the country and IBM left, and you know,
how do how a town with high rates of poverty
and low uh you know, average incomes? What do we
do as an economist? I think we need to think
regionally and think uh nationally, and think globally. But what
(24:00):
I've been really deeply struck by is how powerful the
efforts of local activists have been to really make Poughkeepsie
a better place to hold legislators to account. But they're
also just one after the other coming in and as
Taylor pointed out, pushing and pushing and pushing, and they
get knocked back and they keep pushing, but they're really
(24:23):
making an enormous difference. And another thing that has been
gratifying for me to watch. I mean you asked earlier
it was this electure course. It's so not a lecture course.
I mean we I think Katie and I probably talked
more than most people in the classroom. But as I said,
we entered this with humility. We were learning, and we
(24:44):
were sitting back and learning because there are we knew
that people were coming in who knew things that we
didn't know. But also I would say the questions. I mean,
we had a magnificent conversation yesterday in class about empathy
and solidarity. I got to say, when I was taking
econometrics in graduate school, I didn't think i'd presiding. It
was magnificent and moving and a thing that our students
(25:06):
have said, and I have had this experience too, so
they've learned about Poughkeepsie. You know, I think that that
most of the students who wanted to take our course
came with an interest, with a sense that you know,
they ought to know more, so they brought But I
think it's very easy to say, well, Poughkeepsie is a
poor city, or Poughkeepsie's nice, but it's not that much
to do whatever the sort of simple, single single story is.
(25:31):
And you know, it is a remarkable city with a
remarkable history, and it's got its particular architecture and the
story of the Arterial. And you know, a couple of
our students have written to us, and you know, our
the stereotype is that all the Vaster kids are rich kids.
It's expensive to go to Vassar, but one of the
(25:52):
advantages of teaching at rich schools. We actually have pretty
generous financial aid. And many of our students have said
to us, I grew up in a place. I go
into Poughkeepsie and it reminds me of where I lived
in the Bronx, reminds me of where I lived in Shanghai.
Speaker 4 (26:06):
And so.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
What I was going to say is I feel like
our students. We've asked our students, we gave them, asked
them to write a short essay. I could talk about
the ungradedness of our essays, which is part of our
pedagogical approach, but that they we said, so what do
you tell us something about how you understand Poughkeepsie differently,
or how you understand your hometown or your community or
your neighborhood differently. And many of them said, there's so
(26:34):
much more going on. Poughkeepsie is a much richer place
than I gave it credit for. And they were gratified
by that. But they also said, now I see why
when I crossed that boulevard in my hometown, there's a
difference there, and I just sort of thought that's happened naturally,
but it didn't. It was policies, and it was so
(26:54):
they say, they tell us, they're seeing the world differently.
The end of class, we have many seniors and one
of one of our classmates commented, said, you know why
I go back to Oregon, I'm going to think about
where I'm living and working differently.
Speaker 2 (27:08):
So in Katie's point, they say, yes, she just mentioned casually. Yes,
Poughkeepsie is a carrying place, and that's you know, goes
with what you're saying. You have your political structure, but
you also have a very high number of charismatic, talented
people who auditioned it out and Poughkeepsie and you know,
(27:29):
like when I from New York, I said that a
cute little town because of stuff, and basically my life
has my job was to basically know something about Poughkeepsie.
And what I'm struck by still is how much stuff
I don't know. You know, it's in a gold and
Golds had a similar experience. How you moved here?
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Yeah, well, you know it was it was a couple
of things that that kept me here. And one of
our guests that actually we have coming on, Frank Plea
his mural. You know I always said this art on
the wall then it says it speaks to the community
there was a Japanese restaurant. Not every place has a
Japanese restaurant. You can find Chinese, you can find pizza,
(28:10):
you don't find Japanese. So that spoke also to me
about the city. And then I grew up in Washington Heights,
so I was smacked by the George Washington Bridge off
the Hudson River, and so the bridge was there. My
brother was right, come to Poughkeepsie, You'll like it, You'll
love it. So it had all the right I was
a little skeptical, but it had all the right elements
for me really to to be here. But I'm curious.
(28:31):
I must speak to the students for a minute. Chloe
and Taylor very quickly. We have about two minutes left.
What do you do with the information or your discovery
in this journey from this course? I mean, what do
you do? What can else can you say? I want
to offer to Poughkeepsie or an idea that you can
put out there, so I know.
Speaker 6 (28:52):
Going forward, you know, I have one more year left,
and I really do plan to get much more involved
in the community, you know, working at a lot organization
or something like that. But I also think more broadly
that I think what this course has really taught me
is that any place I drive through or any place
I go to, I'm going to see it differently, that
there's a story there, there's a reason certain places look
(29:15):
a certain way, why certain people live there, and just
be more cognizant, but also the fact that every place
has a richness, even if it's not by certain sort
of traditional standards or what have you.
Speaker 5 (29:27):
Yeah, I actually opted to get an internship in Poughkeepsy
this summer, and so I'll be in the city of Peckepsy.
And when I made that decision, I did so in
part because of this class and because I wanted to
be around for the important conversations that are happening in
the community. I want to be able to go to
the city council meetings and the county legislator meetings and
(29:48):
speak just like so many of our our class guest
speakers have, because I think, you know, they have given
me the strength and they've they've they've kind of showed
the way that this is important and you can do this.
And so I think, yeah, acknowledging that we all have
a voice and we just need to choose to use it.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
I have a feeling I may look up after you
graduate and you wind up back in the community. Definitely.
How are we doing on time?
Speaker 2 (30:13):
We're out of town, but we learned today. Kipsie's a
place it inspires and.
Speaker 4 (30:19):
Well.
Speaker 3 (30:19):
Thank you to our listeners for listening to finding out
with Pete in the Poet Code, Kate, Tim, Chloe and Taylor,
thank you so much for being with us and come
back and visit us sometime. Okay, And to our listeners,
once again, you hear the show and you want to
hear it again, please visit our podcast and just you know,
check us out on iHeart
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