‘Village Talks’ speaks truth to power for Middle Georgians 

Community activists L.J. Malone and Tia Lockhart’s new radio show “Village Talks” on Glory 107.9 aims to amplify and unite the voices of Middle Georgia’s marginalized communities.

“Village Talks” will provide a platform to discuss issues that Malone and Lockhart believe don’t receive enough attention through weekly “community and culture conversations.”

“We have to give a voice to people who aren’t being spoken for,” said Malone.

Their effort to give a voice to overlooked communities is one reason Malone and Lockhart say they are excited to broadcast the show on Glory. The station also hosts shows such as “Ask Elaine” with Bibb County politician Elaine Lucas.

Malone hails from a long line of community organizers. His mother, Phillis Malone, runs Habersham Records in West Macon, while his uncle, Alex Habersham, is the publisher of Macon Black Pages.

Malone, who is from Macon, remembers witnessing parts of the city grow and develop, while many of its Black neighborhoods were left behind.

He called this disparity “the elephant in the room” when it comes to discussions about how to foster positive change in Macon.

Certain groups hoard power and information, Malone said, and people in leadership positions often seem unaware of the challenges facing these communities.

“They don’t even know about what we’re dealing with to even come up with solutions for marginalized people,” he said.

What is the village?

“Village Talks” embraces an African and indigenous-centered understanding of the word “village,” according to Lockhart.

A Cleveland, Ohio, native, Lockhart has lived in Macon for nearly a decade and serves as the secretary of the Pleasant Hill Neighborhood Organization. She also worked for Americorps and participated in a fellowship with GRIST magazine, which led her to develop an interest in environmental justice.

“Bringing back the village is, to me, bringing back this concept of the collective where everything isn’t so individualistic,” she said.

Lockhart takes inspiration from the South African philosophy of “Ubuntu,” which means, “I am because we are.”

Western society focuses on the concept of “lack,” in which there aren’t enough resources to go around, Lockhart explained, whereas the collective believes in an abundance which can be shared by everyone.

The pair also touched on the idea of “ancestral obligation,” a term they adopted from local historian Thomas Duval. Duval defined African American ancestral obligation as honoring those who came before and building upon an existing framework.

“We have people who have done a lot of this work before, just in a different form,” Malone said. “It’s up to us to elevate it and take it to new heights.”

Accountability in the village

In their inaugural “Village Talks,” Lockhart and Malone discussed accountability, asked listeners to define the term, consider who acts as enablers standing in the way of accountability and consider the difference between complaining and correcting.

“People in power feel like the people have to serve them rather than serving the people,” Malone said. “Accountability is also giving the power back to the village.”

Malone and Lockhart plan to begin each show with a weekly accountability check and will have a bi-weekly segment, “Mind Your Mental,” which focuses on mental health in underserved communities.

The radio hosts also noted their multi-generational focus, emphasizing youth development and taking pride in one’s own community.

“Sometimes people look at it like it’s an achievement to leave Macon,” Malone said. “Rather than, ‘Hey, I can come back to my city’ or ‘I can do great things here in Macon.’”

In addition to garnering a range of perspectives and guest speakers, Malone said the radio show will be data-driven.

Malone and Lockhart plan to delve into Macon’s long history of redlining — how, in the 1930s following the New Deal, federal housing laws specifically identified and targeted certain areas to keep people living in non-white neighborhoods from qualifying for homeowners insurance or financial assistance like loans and mortgages — and how it and other problems have snowballed in ways that continue to affect communities today.

They pointed to research from the University of Richmond, in deeming Macon as one of the most redlined cities in America. Of Macon’s residential areas, 50% is considered “hazardous” by the government agency Home Owners’ Loan Corporation, which advised lenders to “refuse to make loans in these areas [or] only on a conservative basis” in surveys from 1935-40.

“A lot of people don’t connect the history of redlining, the urban renewal and urban development gentrification to the things that are continuing to happen in marginalized communities,” Lockhart said. “How do we connect those dots so that way we can change policies and the way that people perceive our current conditions?”

From food deserts to housing insecurity, literacy, maternal health, the consideration of school closures and gentrification that is pricing people out of their neighborhoods, Lockhart and Malone are up for discussing any and all issues affecting the “village” that is Macon.

“When they finish listening to our radio show,” Malone said. “We want them to wanna put their boots on to get out here and make a change.”

Listeners can tune into “Village Talks” each Wednesday from 5:30-6:30 p.m. on The Glory 107.9 FM. Call the show’s phone line anytime at 478-250-1444.