Capstone: Amy Alexis Gonzalez

The People’s Mansion, Volume 3

The People's Mansion is a fictional zine and community publication that reports on community news, services, and initiatives in the Strawberry Mansion neighborhood in Philadelphia. Historically, underground and local forms of information sharing have been essential to community preservation and activism. If we keep our neighborhoods informed and prepared, we create strong mutual aid networks.  

By providing essential services, we are preserving our communities in real time. The best way to preserve a community in the long term is to preserve the ability of its existing population to thrive in place. Strawberry Mansion, like many neighborhoods all over the country, has inequitable access to fresh produce. By addressing food insecurity, the stories, people, and culture that make up Strawberry Mansion can grow. 

Volume 3 of The People’s Mansion reports on the mobile food access program mysteriously spotted around town. It provides free food, meals, and hosts community cookouts. The programming supports several types of events, but its main ones include a mobile farmers market, which makes three stops a week at locations determined where food access is the scarcest. 

The truck hosts community cookouts, where local restaurants are welcome to donate food in exchange for word-of-mouth advertisement, circling back to the local economy. These cookouts can be opportunities for activism, education, and community building.