Intvw w/ Bethany Little for Tillie Deitz Article
Over the years, I have used my journalism as an excuse to meet interesting people I want to talk to. My story about Tillie Deitz gave me the chance to interview Bethany Little who I have long admired from afar. Bethany is founder of WIN Recovery (which stands for Women in Need), a reentry program for women that deals with issues of drug addiction.
I was on a panel, called “Visions of Justice,” with Bethany hosted by Illinois Humanities on Zoom in the middle of the COVID lockdown, but wanted to speak more with her. A woman who often speaks about her own struggle to overcome addiction, she knows the issue better than almost anyone in Champaign-Urbana.
In establishing her own SAFE House, Bethany linked up with Susan Burton, who is nationally known for her story of redemption. Becoming Ms. Burton, a book about Susan Burton’s cycling in and out of the criminal punishment system, and her road to recovery, is a must read.
WIN operates two homes in Champaign-Urbana serving around 30 people a year, and recently opened a reentry home in Berwyn, Chicago.
Bethany Little is a person to watch, a woman on the move!
In Other News…
You may have heard about activists mobilizing to “Stop Cop City,” a growing movement trying to halt a massive police militarization training ground being constructed outside of Atlanta.
On Wednesday, one of the activists, Manuel Teran, known as Tortuguita, was killed by police. You can read a recent article in Truthout about his killing and the protest movement.
#StopCopCity represents a unique alignment of environmental rights and Defund the Police movements, as 100 acres of the Weelaunee Forest is being cleared to make way for the new cop city. I first heard about the campaign from an anarchist friend who told me about tree sitters, calling themselves “forest defenders,” that were holding off construction of the site.