Greensboro HIVE

by Sue Edelberg | Go Triad

To strengthen relationships and community power in Greensboro, a new community space called The HIVE opened on Grove Street in the Glenwood neighborhood this past fall.

The not-for-profit center was created as a space where communities in and around Greensboro could come together to build strong relationships, share resources and participate in events that help educate and unite communities.

A group of community organizers persevered for more than a year to bring this idea of the HIVE to life. Since the HIVE first opened, they’ve held events such as grant-writing workshops, support groups, film screenings, youth poetry nights, and discussion forums.

The Vision

The birth of the HIVE began in fall 2006, when the now defunct music venue The Flying Anvil offered to the Greensboro community a small space rent free that they could mold.

Excited by the news, an all-ages racially diverse group of about 50 people, many of them artists and activists, came together to brainstorm ideas and eventually agreed that the space would have no rules and would be shaped over time by the people who would use it.

Though the Flying Anvil shut down not long after, a light bulb had already gone off in the minds of a highly-motivated group of community organizers. By October 2007, seven of those organizers found a location to execute their vision, a brick business strip on Grove Street in the Glenwood Neighborhood. They named the space the HIVE, which stands for the principles that the HIVE is built on: History, Information, Vision, Exchange. Jonathan Henderson, a HIVE organizer, likes to use the phrase “a world in which many worlds fit” to describe their vision for the space.

“[The organizers] came together because we felt it would be useful to have a space where communities can come together and organize and interface with each other and learn from each others’ work,” Henderson said.

The HIVE consists of one main room open to the community, while the remainder of the space is occupied by offices and workspaces rented by organizations and businesses.

In the main room, members of the community can use computers or browse the HIVE’s library, consisting of primarily donated fiction books as well as nonfiction, poetry, history books and even zines. There are also couches for lounging and a stage at the back of the room, where musical and dance performances have taken place. The room can also be used by the community for public or private events. The organizers’ hope is that through these events and the community’s participation, the public will mold the HIVE into what they would like it to be.

“We’re open to listening and incorporating individuals’ ideas about what the space is about and how it’s used. It’s different than a library or church or even a school in that these are all institutionally related,” said Susan Burkholder, HIVE organizer and Glenwood resident. “The HIVE is different because it’s the people’s place. It has the flexibility for the community to make it their own.”

The HIVE is part of what Burkholder describes as a positive shift toward change in the Glenwood neighborhood. A sculpture and community garden, a coffee shop, and an artisans craft store were added to Grove Street over this past year.

“In the Grove Street area there is this shift happening and we’re a part of this shift, but we’re not driving that shift,” Burkholder said. “We’ve stepped into the current and are helping it along.”

Ricky Bratz sees the HIVE as one of the answers to organizing locally and building strong communities.

“I think the HIVE comes at a time when downtown Greensboro is getting revitalized and a lot of people are getting displaced,” said HIVE organizer Ricky Bratz. “… What we need to do in the face of big battles like this is to organize locally… We’re providing a place for people to come together.”

Partners of the HIVE

Opening the doors to the HIVE in October was the first step in making their vision of a diverse, yet unifying, community space come true.

In order to keep the space running, The HIVE rents out offices to grassroots organizations as well as independent businesses (see sidebar for a complete list) including a massage therapist and holistic health counselor.

Not only do the groups represent diversity coming together under one roof, but the work these groups and individuals carry out helps to encourage democracy, relationship building, individual and community empowerment, and further outreach to foster participation in the community.

“The people in the offices are actively out there organizing communities,” Bratz said. “There’s that connection they make that brings people in. They play a key role in how the HIVE is used and what people come through.”

Miriam Biber, a holistic health counselor who shares an office at the HIVE with massage therapist Kammaleathahh Livingstone , sees her work as “strengthening activist and progressive communities.”

The HIVE has allowed for both Livingstone and Biber to work in a setting with like-minded individuals and groups from different backgrounds. It also allows them to reach a diverse clientele.

For the community, by the community

Events are an important aspect of the HIVE in that it keeps the community in charge of what events are held in the space. Anyone is able to submit an event to the organizing committee to take place there as long as it falls in line with the HIVE’s mission.

Past events cover the gamut of live music, art classes, poetry for kids, forums, community workshops and film screenings, including “Bastards of the Party,” a documentary about gang violence, which was a standing room only event. Similarly successful was the two-night series on Palestinian Culture and Nonviolence Resistance presented by the Greensboro-Palestinian Solidarity Network in February.

The event included dancing, food and film screenings.

“The goal was to educate the public about Palestinian culture, the effects of the Israeli occupation on the Palestinian people, and the joint Israeli/Palestinian nonviolent resistance that has a long and rich history, but is often ignored in this country,” said David Reed, one of the organizers of the event. “We wanted it to be educational and build solidarity, which I think it did. We hope that these events sparked interest in the community about the Israeli occupation and that these will translate into more events.”

Change in the community

As a resident of Glenwood for the past 15 years, Brenda Torres has watched her neighborhood decline when many of the properties turned into rental homes. It had gotten to the point where she was afraid to walk her dog even during the day. Now, with positive things like the HIVE in the neighborhood, there is communication among residents and Torres feels more comfortable leaving her house.

“People want to regroup the community which was lost for the longest time,” said Torres, 41, who also volunteers at the HIVE. “It’s moving along which is great. African Americans, Hispanics, you name it, they all live [in Glenwood]. It’s cool to have these people come in, trying to get more involved, fixing things and helping out.”

Although the HIVE has only been open for five months, small differences have already been made in the lives of people who have attended events at the HIVE.

“So far we have had so many people come through and so many events, and I think that speaks to the need in the community,” Bratz said.

The organizations and businesses housed in the HIVE are seeing the effects as well.

“Collaboration is happening,” Livingstone said. “And there’s lots of potential for it to keep on happening, which is necessary to strengthen our communities in Greensboro. And I think there’s lots of great potential for the older generations and the younger generations to merge and collaborate more at the HIVE. I’ve already seen it happen a lot.”

Contact Sue Edelberg at suethatswho@gmail.com.