Neighborhood watch

• Author: Lorelei Laird
• Pages: 9-10

Opening

Statements

EDITED BY LIANE JACKSON

LIANE.JACKSON@AMERICANBAR.ORG

PHOTO BY KEITH MYERS/THE KANSAS CITY STAR VIA AP

SEPTEMBER 2018 ABA JOURNAL || 9

NEIGHBORHOOD

WATCH

FIRMS PROVIDE PRO BONO ASSISTANCE

TO KANSAS CITY COMMUNITIES

IN 2011, there were fi ve vacant lots at t he cor-

ner of Wabash Avenue and East 29th Street in

Kansas Cit y, Missouri, t hat residents consid-

ered an eyesore. The intersec tion in the city’s

Key Coalition neighborhood had fade d in the

last few decades a s residents with money left.

But thanks to Dre Taylor, a local social entre -

preneur, those lots were transformed into a

thriving urba n farm by 2016.

Taylor built an aquaponics system, where

fi sh and plants support each other, with the

goal to provide food to the neighborhood and

jobs for the boys Taylor mentors through his

nonprofi t, Males to Men.

By summer 2016, a lot of hard work had

made Nile Valley Aquaponics a real ity and

a neighborhood gat hering place. Then Taylor

ran into a major problem: a dispute with

the owner of the land. Negotiations went

poorly, and soon there were locks on the

gates. As a leader of a sma ll nonprofi t,

Taylor couldn’t a ord to fi g ht it in court.

Luckily, he didn’t have to. Through

Legal Aid of Western Mis souri’s Adopt-

a-Neighborhood program, the large law

fi rm Polsinell i agreed to represent Key

Coalition as a kind of genera l counsel to

Dre Taylor created Nile Valley Aquaponics, where fi sh

and plants support each other, with the goal to provide

food to the neighborhood and jobs for the boys he mentors

through his nonprofi t, Males to Men.