REP for MN

✨Registration for REP’s 2026 Community Training Info Sessions is now open!

This training was first envisioned in 2020 during the Twin Cities uprising following the murder of George Floyd. What began as a practice for preparing community members to respond through REP’s community hotline has grown into a space for building the skills, relationships, and collective capacity needed to turn toward one another in moments of crisis, conflict, and uncertainty.

This October 15-18th, REP is hosting our annual community training. This year we will gather for a 3-day immersive training in Annandale, MN to practice de-escalation, community safety, mental health crisis response, and deeper ways of showing up for our neighbors.

Attending an info session is required to receive a training application. Join us to learn more about the training, meet the organizers, and ask any questions before applying.

Visit linktr.ee/REPMN to register for an info session and learn more at repformn.org

With Care, 💜

“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.” — Audre Lorde

The words of Lorde make clear what is at stake for ourselves, our communities, and our world if we don’t center collective healing. This wisdom will guide our conversations in our upcoming healing justice studio, Story of Me, Story of We, Story of Us. Join us on July 22nd, 5-7 at the Lucy Parsons Center to look at the interconnected relationship between self and collective-care, and their role in our movements for liberation.

WHEN: July 22nd at 5-7 PM
WHERE: Lucy Parsons Center (4100 S 28th Ave Minneapolis, MN 55406)
REGISTRATION REQUIRED: Please register at bit.ly/REP_Story – link in bio!

Our next Café Hours will be Friday, July 17th at 3-6 PM at the REP offices out of New City Center (3104 16th Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55407) 🪻🍵☕️✨☀️

*We will be skipping our session in the first week of July (7/3) due to the holiday weekend.

Ever had questions about pods? Safety alternatives? How to handle conflict with a loved one or neighbor? Even if you just need someone in the community to connect with over shared values. Drop in to hang out and chat with REP folks at Café Hours!

No registration required.

What can you expect at Café Hours? 2-3 members of REP will welcome you into our cozy office space, invite you to a warm beverage and ask you what brought you to Café Hours. You are welcome to come with something specific in mind, like a big question or project proposal, or just with an open mind and heart!

We aren’t experts, therapists or miraculous problem fixers. We won’t have the answers to everything. We are, however, dedicated community members with time to listen and talk through your questions!

💻🌿🌅 Join us online for a summer of abolitionist co-learning!

Care as Infrastructure is the second session in our digital summer series, an interactive space dedicated to exploring abolitionist pasts, presents and futures. Care as Infrastructure will look at what it takes to build alternative systems based in care and dignity. Connect with us and together, we will consider what else is possible beyond punishment, isolation and violence.

DATE & TIME: Thursday, July 16th 2026 at 5-6:30 PM CST
LOCATION: Online. Register for the Zoom link!
REGISTRATION REQUIRED: Register at bit.ly/REP_Care, linked in our bio!

⭐️This space is for you if you are...
• curious about movements that rally behind the term abolition
• interested in abolition but unsure what that means in practice.
• motivated to build new systems of care and dignity
• willing to be in the mess of experimentation and new possibilities

“No one can stop us from imagining another kind of future, one that departs from the terrible cataclysm of violent conflict, of hateful divisions, poverty and suffering. Let us begin with the worlds we would like to inhabit, the long lives we will share and the many futures in our hands” —Susan Griffin

We hope to see you there!! ✨🌻😎

We have a bunch of amazing offerings this July – connect with us!

🌷💻💚ONLINE STUDIO – Care as Infrastructure 💚💻🌷

Join us online for a summer of co-learning & co-creation! Care as Infrastructure is the second session in our digital summer series, an interactive space that explores the aspects of abolitionist work that have to do with creating alternative systems based in care and dignity. We will look at real-world examples of ‘infrastructures of care’ and consider what else is possible beyond punishment, isolation and violence.

DATE & TIME: Thursday, July 16th 2026 at 5-6:30 PM CST
LOCATION: Online. Register for the Zoom link.
REGISTRATION REQUIRED: Register at bit.ly/REP_Care, linked in our bio!

This space is for you if you are...
• curious about movements that rally behind the term abolition
• interested in abolition but unsure what that means in practice.
• motivated to build new systems of care and dignity
• willing to be in the mess of experimentation and new possibilities

💜🍵⭐️CAFÉ HOURS⭐🍵💜
Our next Café Hours will be Friday, July 17th at 3-6 PM at the REP offices out of New City Center (3104 16th Ave S, Minneapolis, MN 55407).
*We will be skipping our session in the first week of July (7/3) due to the holiday weekend.

Ever had questions about pods? Safety alternatives? How to handle conflict with a loved one or neighbor? Even if you just need someone in the community to connect with over shared values. Drop in to hang out and chat with REP folks at Café Hours! No registration required.

What can you expect at Café Hours? 2-3 members of REP will welcome you into our cozy office space, invite you to a warm beverage and ask you what brought you to Café Hours. You are welcome to come with something specific in mind, like a big question or project proposal, or just with an open mind and heart!

We aren’t experts, therapists or miraculous problem fixers. We won’t have the answers to everything. We are, however, dedicated community members with time to listen and talk through your questions!

[continued in comments]

💖☀️🌿 Join us for our upcoming healing justice studio, Story of Me, Story of We, Story of Us on July 22nd PM at 5-7 PM at the Lucy Parsons Center! Register at bit.ly/REP_Story, link in bio!

“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”

The words of Audre Lorde make clear what is at stake for ourselves, our communities, and our world if we don’t center collective healing. This upcoming studio will look at the interconnected relationship between self and collective-care, and their role in our movements for liberation.

This studio has three parts: Story of Me, Story of We, and Story of Us.
🌷 Story of Me – Uplifting the stories of who we are and how we got here.
🪴Story of We – Grounding ourselves in the value of collective healing
🪻Story of Us – Practicing joyful resistance through dance and music

This studio is on July 22nd at 5-7 PM at the Lucy Parsons Center (4100 S 28th Ave Minneapolis, MN 55406)

Please register at bit.ly/REP_Story (link in bio) for more information! You don’t want to miss this!!!

Join us for a summer of co-learning and co-creation! ☀️🌷We are kicking it off with our June digital studio session, What is Abolition?

What is Abolition? is an interactive political education space that looks at the foundations of abolitionist thought and practice. What is Abolition? will look at the past, present and future of the abolitionist movement with a focus on how this work has not only about the destruction of oppressive systems like prisons, but also about the co-creation of new liberatory possibilities.

DATE & TIME: Tuesday, June 30th 2026 at 5-6:30 PM CST
LOCATION: Online, register for the Zoom link.
REGISTRATION REQUIRED: Register at bit.ly/REP_Abolition101, linked in our bio!

This space is for you if you are...
• curious about movements that rally behind the term “abolition”
• if you are newer to movement spaces and want to strengthen your political education, and/or
• if you are interested in abolition but unsure what that means in practice.

“Abolition is not absence, it is presence. What the world will become already exists in fragments and pieces, experiments and possibilities. So those who feel in their gut deep anxiety that abolition means knock it all down, scorch the earth and start something new, let that go. Abolition is building the future from the present, in all of the ways we can.” - Ruth Wilson Gilmore 💜🌻✨

🔮”Without new visions, we don’t know what to build, only what to knock down. We not only end up confused, rudderless, and cynical, but we forget that making a revolution is not a series of clever maneuvers and tactics, but a process that can and must transform us.”
—Robin D. G. Kelly

🪻A quote that inspired our upcoming studio, IMAGINING BEYOND! Join us on SATURDAY, JUNE 27 at 11-1:30 PM to further explore themes of imagination and its role in creating abolitionist horizons.

🌿 This studio will be in-person hosted in Seward, South Minneapolis. Register for this experience at bit.ly/REP_ImaginingBeyond (linked in our bio!) for more details!

💜 Through prompt, somatic practice, and readings on Radical Black Imagination, IMAGINING BEYOND will invite you to tend to the gift of yOur imagination. IMAGINING BEYOND will be an interactive experience that will include simple, feel good movement and guided breathwork as well as meditation.

Meet the trainer for IMAGINING BEYOND, our upcoming studio on June 27th, 11-1:30 at the Ivy Building!

Demetrius McClendon (also known as ImagineJoy) was born and raised in the south side of Chicago. They have traveled nationally and internationally as a professional dancer, teacher, and choreographer sharing their passion for the arts. As a community organizer that believes wholeheARTedly in the power of loving action, political education, and spiritual practice, they co-create with others experiences that heal and empower the Black community as well as QBIPOC communities. ImagineJoy is a certified wellness and somatic practitioner with over a decade of experience leading movement as well as social justice spaces. Thanks to the Lorde, they understand radical self-care as “political warfare” which they view as one of many tools that enables our ability and capacity to provide community care.

Join ImagineJoy on SATURDAY, JUNE 27 at 11-1:30 PM for our upcoming studio, IMAGINING BEYOND. This studio will be in-person hosted in Seward, South Minneapolis. Register for this experience at bit.ly/REP_ImaginingBeyond (linked in our bio!) for more details!

The heartwork of q***r liberation and abolition is driven by our collective imagination. When we practice engaging our imagination, we ultimately are developing a necessary revolutionary skill. Through prompt, somatic practice, and readings on Radical Black Imagination, IMAGINING BEYOND will invite you to tend to the gift of yOur imagination. IMAGINING BEYOND will be an interactive experience that will include simple, feel good movement and guided breathwork as well as meditation.