Black Lives Matter.

It’s been roughly four years since we held our last camp for inner-city youth.

When I look through the photographs taken during this camp, I realize more than ever that these are the faces of our future, and these are the voices that I want to hear the loudest.

As I reflect on how the world has changed since then and in the past few weeks, I sit with frustration, embarrassment, and shame. What emerges from these feelings is a deep sense of responsibility for my actions and the actions of our organization as we navigate the future. It has become glaringly apparent that it is not enough for us to be non-racist, but instead, we must commit to practicing active anti-racism every day.

When we started our organization, we began with the ambition of changing the way people live. We wanted to encourage people to think about design, sustainability, and inner-city living but also to positively impact our city. I can tell you today we aren't doing enough. It has been incredibly challenging to push innovation and development in established communities who are not always welcoming to change.

Throughout my 36 years, I've been subjected to racism and told that we should be building "where we came from." I acknowledge today more than ever, the discrimination I've faced pales in comparison to the systemic racism and white supremacy the black and indigenous communities have faced for hundreds of years.

We've been having an ongoing dialogue with our team and reviewing our consumer data. To be transparent, over 95% of our customers are white, and less than 1% are apart of the black community. In viewing this through the lens of racism, this data is staggering. Moving forward, we commit to looking at our organization through this lens every day.

We also realize our goal to embark on sustainable urban development means nothing if we can't find a way to create more accessibility to the living we promote. Our commitment today is to do better and find ways of making inner-city living more accessible to all.

On behalf of RNDSQR, we apologize for not speaking sooner and louder.

Let's get to work.

Alkarim Devani
President, RNDSQR