“Saving Etting Street,” a documentary film by Dena Fisher & Amy Scott
In this riveting documentary by Dena Fisher and Amy Scott master carpenter Shelley Halstead trains three young Black women in carpentry, electrical work, and plumbing. Together, with cheers from long-time residents, they transform a block of abandoned row houses in Baltimore into a community of Black women first-time homeowners.
There are more than 12,000 vacant homes in Baltimore, the legacy of redlining and disinvestment.
"I saw Etting Street, and I said 'That's gotta be the block.' And I walked around the back and saw a garden. And that is when I was like, 'Somebody cares...' that's when I knew I just needed to fight for the block."
- Shelley Halstead
"I've never been in a position where I've been around a lot of powerful Black women. So, for me, this is a big deal."
— Shandria, participant
Behind The Scenes
The Team
(co-director, producer and sound recordist) is a Baltimore-based independent documentary filmmaker and a senior correspondent and host with Marketplace, the public radio business and economics show. Her 2015 documentary Oyler: One School, One Year, about a Cincinnati school fighting to break the cycle of poverty in its Urban-Appalachian neighborhood, has screened at film festivals internationally and was distributed by American Public Television in 2016. In 2018 she served as an envoy with the American Film Showcase, the film diplomacy program. Amy is the host of the climate solutions podcast How We Survive, named one of the Best Podcasts of 2022 by The Economist and winner of a SABEW “Best in Business” podcast award. Her reporting has earned several national honors, including a 2013 Gracie Award and an Edward R. Murrow Award in 2012. She is a 2001 graduate of the documentary film program at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism.
Amy Scott
(co-director, producer, and director of photography), is a Baltimore-born multimedia artist, licensed clinical social worker, and filmmaker whose work lives at the intersection of art, healing, and social justice. Guided by the belief that care is a revolutionary act, Dena integrates her clinical practice and creative storytelling to illuminate the lives, struggles, and triumphs of those often pushed to the margins—Black women, unhoused families, queer and immigrant communities, people living with mental illness, and returning citizens.
As a visual storyteller, Dena’s lens is both witness and invitation, an instrument for transformation. She has produced documentary and promotional media that elevate community narratives and strengthen organizational impact for institutions such as Morgan State University’s Morgan CARES program, Johns Hopkins University’s Public Health initiatives, and Black queer immigrant organizations. A two-time Addy Award recipient and Saul Zaentz fellow, Dena continues to create work that blurs the boundary between art and social work, turning stories of struggle into blueprints for change.
Dena Fisher
(editor) is a freelance film editor and former Co-Director of the JHU MICA Film Centre and Director of the MFA in Filmmaking at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. He co-produced and was associate editor for Music By Prudence, which won the 2010 Academy Award for Best Documentary Short and aired on HBO. Wright cut Boy Howdy: The Story of CREEM Magazine, which chronicles the messy upheaval of the ’70s just as rock was re-inventing itself and the magazine that went from a Detroit underground paper to national powerhouse. Boy Howdy premiered at SXSW. Wright edited the feature documentary See You Soon Again, about Baltimore-based Holocaust survivor Leo Bretholz and was an Associate Producer on 12 O’Clock Boys. He edited Oyler: One School, One Year, a feature documentary by Marketplace reporter Amy Scott, which profiles a high school located in a traditionally Urban Appalachian neighborhood in Cincinnati, Ohio. Additionally, Wright has produced and directed films on HIV/AIDS, clergy sexual abuse, and a profile of the controversial conservative pundit Ann Coulter.
Patrick Wright
(executive producer) is the Founder and CEO of LWC Studios, an award-winning digital media studio whose original work reaches rising audiences with programming that has a social-justice vein. LWC Studios received a Peabody Award nomination, and won “The Director’s Prize” at Third Coast, also known as “The Oscars of Audio.” As a filmmaker, she has executive produced three short films, August Sun/Sol de Agosto, about how impossible it is to ever really return home, which was nominated for a Student Oscar and Student BAFTA, and was an official selection a dozens of festivals around the globe; The Longest Race, a documentary shot during the Covid pandemic that followed two ultrarunners as they clung on to some semblance of normalcy. Her films have screened at national and international film festivals, including: Palm Springs International ShortFest, European short Film Festival, Oaxaca FilmFest, Los Angeles Comedy Film Festival, Marbella International Film Festival, Madrid International Film Festival, Miami Independent Film Festival, and Firenze Film Festival. Juleyka is currently working on two independent feature documentaries–as co-writer/creator and executive producer–and on an Afro-futurism short, as executive producer. A Fulbright Scholar, she holds a Master’s in Journalism and an MFA in Creative Writing. LinkedIn.
Juleyka Lantigua
(composer) is a multi-instrumentalist and film composer. Williams was raised in Woodbridge, Virginia and grew up surrounded by music. Inspired by a wide range of artists—from Chuck Brown to Elizabeth Cotten—she began developing her innovative fingerstyle acoustic guitar technique while studying music theory and composition at NYU. Williams has released three albums, Unwind (2018), Urban Driftwood (2021), and Acadia (2024) where she introduced unique approaches, such as playing kalimba and guitar simultaneously. She also incorporates instruments like the kora, harp guitar, and banjo. Williams has also scored three documentaries, Dusty and Stones, Finding Our WIld, and Saving Etting Street. Her film scores incorporate a wide variety of musical genres, from jazz to ambient music, and everything in between.
Yasmin Williams
(web designer) is a freelance graphic designer and a recent graduate from Washington, DC. She’s designed for a number of assets, posters, and more in the entertainment world for LWC Studios, Southern Sounds Entertainment, and a number of other indie projects.
Erin Robinson
"It feels good to be home, to come here, and to know that I built this. It's awesome."
— Quanshay, participant