Particpants And Panelists

Henry Obispo (ReBORN Farms) Henry Obispo headshot

Henry Obispo is a globally recognized leader at the forefront of reimagining food systems, ecological justice, and community-led transformation. As a social entrepreneur, environmentalist, and Eco-Gastronomer born in the Dominican Republic and raised in The Bronx, NY, he bridges ancestral knowledge with regenerative innovation to craft holistic systems rooted in equity, sustainability, and spiritual ecology. His work is a movement—restoring the sacred relationship between people, land and culture. Through ReBORN FARMS, Henry leads a hyper-local revolution in food access and sovereignty. These farms are more than growing spaces—they are ecosystems of healing and resilience. By reconnecting communities to land, food, and cultural identity, they transform urban and rural spaces into thriving, regenerative environments that nurture both people and place.

H. Shellae Versey (Fordham University)

Shellae Versey headshot

H. Shellae Versey, PhD, MPH is an interdisciplinary social scientist who teaches in the Psychology Department at Fordham University. Her research focuses on access to fundamental basic needs – food, housing, and flourishing – for urbanites of every age. She is particularly interested in resistance efforts at the community level to address urban issues. Shellae has written extensively on aging-in-place, participatory geographies, housing and food insecurity, and the psychosocial consequences of gentrification. In another thread of research, Shellae focuses on systemic racism and whiteness, Black women’s experiences of discrimination, and the meaning of Black hair – as a site of intersectional resistance for Black women and girls. Shellae is currently working on several projects related to spatial mapping, embodiment, social memory practices, and measuring the impacts of urban stress, food sovereignty practices, and urban greenery.

Kelly Anderson (Emergent City - Director )

Kelly Anderson is a professor and documentarian. She makes documentaries about the interplay between personal stories and the larger social forces that shape people’s lives but often remain invisible or unexamined. Her work clusters around themes of the city (New York, in particular) and issues of mental health. Her films have been broadcast on POV, America ReFramed and HBO. They have been shown in festivals including the Tribeca Film Festival, Sundance, Slamdance, Rotterdam and the Big Sky Documentary Film Festival. She is currently Professor and Chair of the Department of Film and Media Studies at Hunter College, and faculty in the department’s Integrated Media Arts (IMA) MFA program.

Alexa Calderon (NYU: AgriMap NYC)

Alexa is a Food Studies master’s student and researcher at NYU. In her free time, she grows mushrooms and tries different restaurants around NYC!

Saundrea Coleman (Save Section 9)

Saundrea Coleman, MDiV, is a community activist and organizer. She co-founded 1NYCHA Advocates in 2024 and the Holmes-Isaacs Coalition in 2019, a tenant group opposing RAD-PACT and what she calls the “Preservation Distrust.” She is an advocate for saving and preserving Section 9.

Iyeshima Harris - Ouedraogo (Green Guerillas) Iyeshima Harris headshot

Iyeshima started her journey in the food justice movement over 10 years ago as a Green Guerillas Youth Tiller. A Jamaican native, she struggled with the process of assimilation into a new culture. Through farming she found great comfort in her community. Throughout her involvement in the movement, Harris-Ouedraogo has taught food justice, advocated for universal free school lunch, assisted in the development and sustainment of youth-led organizations, and worked as the Project Director of East New York Farms! She is dedicated to integrating youth empowerment and leadership into adult dominated sectors.

Michael Partis (Red Hook Initiative) Michael Partis headshot

Michael Partis is Executive Director of the Red Hook Initiative: a Brooklyn organization facilitating social change through education, youth development, and local hiring. He was Executive Director of Bronx Cooperative Development Initiative, and co-founded The Bronx Brotherhood Project. He is a professor at Borough of Manhattan Community College and Brooklyn College.

Rob Robinson (Picture the Homeless / Cooper Square Community Land Trust) Rob Robinson headshot

Rob Robinson is a formerly homeless community organizer, activist and an adjunct professor of Urbanism in the Design and Urban Ecology program at Parsons New School University. His work focuses on changing people’s fundamental relationship to land and housing. He works with social movements around the world including the Movement of People Affected by Dams in Brazil (MAB), the Landless Workers Movement in Brazil (MST), Abahlali baseMjondolo in South Africa (the Shackdwellers movement) and the Platform of People Affected by Mortgages in Spain (the PAH). Rob is the USA-Canada Coordinator of International Alliance of Inhabitants, an alliance of 12,000 members worldwide which supports a Zero Evictions Platform.

Ciara Sidell (NYU: ShareShed NYC) Ciara Siddell headshot

Born and raised in Queens, Ciara (known to many as “Farmer C”) is passionate about growing food in educational spaces in NYC. They have farmed at the Queens County Farm Museum, taught with Farm School NYC, facilitated field trips with City Growers on Brooklyn Grange’s rooftop farms, managed Harlem Grown’s network of growing spaces, and currently stewards the Randall’s Island Park Alliance’s Urban Farm — an educational farm, designed completely with teaching and learning in mind. As a co-founding member of Share Shed NYC and the Queens Representative on the NYC FSA Urban County Committee, she's committed to collaboration, equity, and community-building throughout all of her work, on and off the farm. In their spare time, Ciara can be found exploring the city by bike and admiring the green spaces throughout.

Will Thomson (NYU: ShareShed NYC) Will Thompson headshot

Will is a certified arborist and landscape designer. He holds a Master of Landscape Architecture from the Spitzer School of Architecture and an MSc in Environmental Science from the American University of Beirut. His research and work includes advocating for community gardens through the Share Shed NYC project, designing edible green infrastructure, exploring the political ecology of landscapes, and bridging rural and urban landscapes.

Anne-Laure White (NYU: AgriMap NYC) photo of Anne-Laure White and her dog

Anne-Laure is an Associate Research Scholar at NYU’s Department of Nutrition and Food Studies, where she oversees the research and development of the AgriMap NYC project. She holds an MSc in Environmental Archaeology from the University College London. Her work is focused on the relationship between plants and people, drawing on previous experience in climate research, cartography, and farming. Born and raised in Brooklyn, she is passionate about community advocacy and cooperative economics.