Shalem Healing, a nonprofit health clinic that provides services to the underinsured, is setting an example of how to treat COVID-19 patients in Milwaukee. Dr. Robert Fox, Shalem Healing’s owner, treats patients with nutritional counseling and natural remedies before resorting to medicine. Using the latest research on the disease, he has been prescribing patients supplements and antivirals that strengthen the body to fight against the disease.
Taking Action on Climate Change, Economic Equity
Wisconsin’s state government has taken sweeping action against COVID-19, enacting emergency orders and investing lots of money to stop the virus. Climate activists have been demanding this kind of governmental action for years. “Climate change is an equal if not greater threat than this pandemic, but this pandemic is now feeling real and scary to people,” says Janet Meissner Pritchard, an environmental policy lawyer and a board member of Citizen Action of Wisconsin. Activists like Meissner Pritchard and Ted Kraig are Milwaukee residents who have invested years of their lives working on the climate issue. More than ever, they feel it is important to continue that work during these challenging times.
County Supervisor Supreme Moore Omokunde is Optimistic on Milwaukee
Supervisor Supreme Moore Omokunde outside of the Milwaukee Public Library.
When we talk about local heroes, Supervisor Supreme Moore Omokunde comes to the forefront of many people’s minds here in Milwaukee. A member of the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors representing District 10, Moore Omokunde has been a figure to look up to for years. In an interview, he talks about his experiences that eventually led him to run for office and what he believes an elected official is meant to do. He has an optimistic outlook for a better Milwaukee but explains that people must organize and know their neighbor in order to make their voices heard.
How did your background lead you to where you are today?
“I grew up in Midtown on the 1200 block of 25th street,” in the district his mother, Rep. Gwen Moore, once represented in the state assembly. His father, Rev. Dr. Tolokun Omokunde, was a Presbyterian minister who gave Supervisor Moore Omokunde a strong sense of self identity and an understanding of his African heritage. Moore Omokunde was heavily influenced by his parents, both of whom were very involved in community organizing.
As an adult, he began working with organizations that service youth in the city, providing them with more opportunities—nonprofits like True Skool, the Boys and Girls Club and Public Allies. That work stretched into other avenues of community organizing, such as helping the Sherman Park Community Association to establish local block clubs which gave people a way to voice their concerns.
What motivated you to run for office rather than staying in the nonprofit sector?
Moore Omokunde is passionate about his work he did with local organizations, but now as an elected official, he is able to represent his constituents and work to change policies based on their needs, or as he says, “be in the room where it happens.”
Since being in office in 2015, he has reallocated money to create safe zones in neighborhoods which helps prevents violence. Moore Omokunde worked with neighborhood groups, for example, to transform Tiefenthaler Park to an active community meeting space, preventing crime from occurring. Last year, he also helped kick off the Milwaukee City-County Joint Taskforce on Climate and Economic Equity, which aims to have net zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, while also minimizing the racial and economic divide.
What is the best way for everyday people to get involved and have their voices heard?
“It’s important to ask yourself, how well do you know your neighbor?” That’s the first step, explains Moore Omokunde. Community organizing is as simple as getting to know the people close to you, whether that’s your local block club, residence council, neighborhood association, etc. “At that level, connect with other people who have similar desires as yourself,” then as an organized body, make your concerns known to your local representative. “I think it’s really important to let people know that their elected officials work for them and give people the kind of representation that redirects the power back to themselves,” he says.
More than ever, our local communities need to continue to organize and stay connected. Supreme Moore Omokunde is running for reelection unopposed to represent District 10 on the Milwaukee County Board of Supervisors. Thanks to everyone that went out to vote on April 7th in the midst of these challenging times.
Learn more on the Milwaukee County Board website. Read this article on the Shepherd Express, part of the column “Hero of the Week.”
Milwaukee Residents Forced to Choose Between Their Safety and the Right to Vote
Voters line up outside of Riverside High School on Milwaukee’s East Side to exercise their democratic rights in the midst of public safety concerns. Although Governor Evers issued an executive order on Monday, April 6th to delay the acceptance date of absentee ballots, the Wisconsin Supreme Court blocked the order that same day. The decision resulted in crowded voting lines wrapped around city blocks. Milwaukee residents were forced to choose between their safety and using their rights as citizens to cast their ballot.
How are Healthcare Workers Responding to COVID-19?
Healthcare workers assess incoming patients at Columbia St. Mary's on North Ave.
Everyone is scrambling in this time of crisis, but healthcare workers are the people on the front lines being pushed to the edge. As confirmed coronavirus cases increase in Wisconsin and around the country, hospitals and testing facilities are being overwhelmed and the systems in place are cracking under the pressure.
“It’s becoming clearer that we don’t have the infrastructure to handle what’s coming,” says Jaime Lucas, the Executive Director of the Wisconsin Federation of Nurses and Health Professionals (WFNHP), a statewide union. Unions like WFNHP and healthcare workers around the country are demanding safer working conditions and more support, but so far, their employers have offered little help.
The biggest problem in hospitals and laboratories at the moment is that there are not enough staff members to handle the influx of patients and testing needs. But this issue can’t be blamed solely on the evolving crisis. Ascension, a healthcare company owning a multitude of hospitals in Wisconsin, made large cuts to their staff in hospitals like Ascension St. Francis as recently as six months ago.
“There wasn’t enough staff before this pandemic. Now you’re in this crisis mode,” says Connie Smith, an OR Tech and president of the WFNHP Service and Tech Chapter in the hospital. She explained the layoffs were mostly clerical workers, which forced the nurses to pick up those extra tasks. “Those cuts are playing havoc right now” because the nurses are being distracted from their patients and having to train new people, making it impossible to keep up with the swiftly rising demand for care.
Without Protection
Overworked and under supported, many nurses are being asked to treat COVID-19 patients without proper protection. A nurse at Froedtert Hospital who requested to stay anonymous said on Thursday, “they are not providing us with N95 masks, only paper masks telling us that we are following CDC guidelines.” However, the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) states on their website, “Use of N95 or higher-level respirators are recommended for HCP (healthcare personnel) who have been medically cleared, trained, and fit-tested.”
Emergency Dept. entrance at Columbia St. Mary's on North Ave.
The CDC website also posted an update saying, “Based on local and regional situational analysis of PPE (personal protective equipment) supplies, facemasks are an acceptable alternative when the supply chain of respirators cannot meet the demand,” but the CDC makes it clear, that “healthcare facilities are responsible for protecting their HCP from exposure to pathogens, including by providing appropriate PPE.” The guidelines are changing, but only because there are not enough supplies, putting our health care workers at greater risk of disease.
The healthcare facilities in Wisconsin and around the country do not have the systems in place to protect their staff and have not taken the necessary precautions to prepare. This has become obvious when nurses at Ascension St. Francis Hospital are told to reuse N95 masks, according to Smith. Yet, standard practice is to replace these masks after exposure to a pathogen like COVID-19.
Nurses and techs charge that the poor planning also shows when hospital management departments take weeks to respond to crisis preparation plans. The WFNHP has a union chapter at Wisconsin Diagnostic Laboratories (WDL), a lab owned by Froedtert that analyzes blood, urine and other samples for patients. Charles de la Pena, the president of that chapter, requested a meeting with the management of WDL on March 6 to discuss a COVID-19 protection plan for their lab techs, before any cases occurred in Milwaukee. The management of the lab took two weeks to respond to the request. “WDL management worked on contingency planning to keep the lab staffed and open, but less about PPE and protocols for containment,” says Lucas.
Vital Role
These workers play a vital role during this time of crisis and if their basic health and safety needs are not being met, then we will not have a workforce to take care of the growing number of patients. The WFNHP sent out a proposed list of immediate solutions to Wisconsin health care employers that included instituting a policy of paid leave forgiveness and providing child care solutions. The WFNHP commented that Ascension and Advocate Aurora have been communicative but have taken no action yet.
Workers such as the nurse at Froedtert Hospital are treating extremely sick COVID-19 patients with only paper masks, then having to return home to their children, worrying about putting their families at risk. “I’m in tears thinking about all this. I feel like I can’t even be around my kids,” said the nurse. Nurses like this are scrambling for childcare options while working extremely long work weeks.
Additionally, sources at WFNHP say that many of their members are required to use their limited paid leave to stay home, even if they were exposed to a COVID-19 patient. This forces them to make the decision between risking the spread of infection by returning to work or exhausting their paid leave and potentially losing their jobs.
The WFNHP have published their list of immediate solutions that will help ease the burden on people on the front lines. The employers need to properly train their workers on how to handle COVID-19 situations and provide clear communications on their proposed crisis plans, which has yet to happen.
Wisconsin Diagnostic Laboratories and Froedtert Hospital were asked to comment but have not responded.
An Ascension Wisconsin Spokesperson sent the following comment:
Ascension Wisconsin has a number of protocols and policies in place to protect our associates, one of which is following CDC guidelines regarding personal protective equipment (PPE). The CDC has recently updated the PPE used for COVID-19, and Ascension is adhering strictly to those guidelines. Ascension Wisconsin is taking proactive steps with our distributor and suppliers to ensure access to supplies. We are arranging expedited shipments directly from manufacturers, assessing alternative products and taking advantage of our abilities as a national system to make intra-hospital inventory transfers when appropriate. We have also implemented conservation measures, in anticipation of further supply chain disruption over the coming months due to COVID-19.
Additionally, we are postponing surgeries, procedures and tests that are deemed non-urgent to ensure the availability of resources to meet emergent health needs during this pandemic.
We continually review staffing models, while respecting our collective bargaining agreements, to ensure efficiency of our resources, while providing the highest quality and most compassionate care. Out of respect for the privacy of our associates, we do not comment on personnel matters.
Read this article on the Shepherd Express.
Walnut Way, Antonio Butts Rebuild a Neglected Neighborhood
“In order for the City of Milwaukee to be a place where there’s true economic diversity among all people, the isolation and exclusion [of minorities] has to continue to be addressed,” says Antonio Butts, executive director of Walnut Way. The nonprofit organization, based in Lindsay Heights, is dedicated to supporting the neighborhood’s residents through community engagement, environmental stewardship and economic development. Butts holds a strong belief that the strengthening of a neighborhood happens by harboring the skills of its residents and building from within. As he explains, the funding and support need to come from people who are part of the community, not from external sources.
Walnut Way was founded 20 years ago, when a group of neighbors came together to talk about the lack of camaraderie in the Lindsay Heights neighborhood compared to the time when they were children. These residents grew up in the 1940s and 1950s, when the area was still known as Bronzeville, a thriving African American neighborhood fueled by a wealth of industrial jobs and ambitious migrants from the South.
But Bronzeville and its booming businesses got torn apart in the late ’50s and early ’60s, when the City of Milwaukee decided to build the I-94 and I-43 freeways right through the middle of the neighborhood; the communities have not been the same since. Businesses and residents were displaced and consequently divided and neglected. That small group of Lindsay Heights neighbors remembered the strong sense of community from their childhood and began gathering groups of residents, reclaiming vacant lots and taking on initiatives.
‘Neighborhoods Need Businesses, Organizations and Institutions’
Motivated to make a difference in the neighborhood he has called home his whole life, Butts became Walnut Way’s executive director three years ago. His professional experience involves both social work in the nonprofit sector and work with social enterprises that use for-profit models; he was specifically drawn to Walnut Way because of the unique opportunity it presented to blend the two.
A program called the “Community Wealth-Building Campaign” is a perfect example. Walnut Way has built relationships with the residents of Lindsay Heights and taken note of all their skills and interests. That information is then used to group people together in an effort to start interest groups and evoke business ideas. “In order to turn neighborhoods around and create real opportunities for residents to have social and economic mobility, neighborhoods need businesses, organizations and institutions,” says Butts. The community gatherings have already brought ideas for new business ventures which Walnut Way will help bring to life. As part of the program, Walnut Way will offer funding, administrative and structural support to these groups.
The success in this organization comes from building spaces of trust as well as seeing the potential in each of the residents. The destruction of the neighborhood in the early ’60s and “lack of investment in areas predominantly populated by African Americans, left [the residents] without an economic base to be able to move forward,” says Butts. Walnut Way has been breaking down those barriers and helping individuals succeed by building trust for 20 years. When individuals are confident in their potential, a neighborhood can start to be rebuilt.
To support the health of the community during the COVID-19 outbreak, Walnut Way is temporarily postponing events at the Walnut Way Center and the Men's Wellness Group at The Innovations and Wellness Commons until further notice.
Learn more at walnutway.org. Read this article on the Shepherd Express, part of the column “Hero of the Week.”
Breaking Down the Barriers with a New Kind of Market - Circulate MKE seeks to change Milwaukee’s economy
In Milwaukee, most people stay in the areas of town where they are comfortable—with the people that match their economic status and skin color. That’s been the norm in this city, but Shalina S. Ali and Fidel Verdin are working hard to change that culture.
In 2015, these two community organizers started Circulate MKE, a creative entrepreneur market that connects small vendors from different corners of the city to shoppers. Circulate MKE has always been more than the standard pop-up market because Ali and Verdin have made a point to host their events in vacant spaces located in various communities, whether they be black, brown, white or anything else. In doing so, their market brings new business to those spaces and to the surrounding neighborhood.
Their intention from the beginning has been to create connections among different groups of people and to support small vendors with the business tools they need. In the minds of Ali and Verdin, segregation stems from economics, so that’s where they decided to focus their energy. If they could influence people to spend their money locally and in neighborhoods that need a stronger economy, then maybe we could take a step in the right direction of fixing the city’s segregation problem.
How it All Started
Long before 2015, Ali and Verdin were fighting for equal opportunities in the city. As two people of color, they see Milwaukee in a different light than most affluent white residents who live in majority-white areas such as Downtown or the East Side. They grew up in neighborhoods with fewer resources and vital institutions such as banks and supermarkets. This has been a systemic, national problem for decades, based largely in the history of redlining, which often led to minority communities being denied access to services.
Many of Milwaukee’s residents live with the effects of our country’s institutional racism and consequently have to travel farther to access a bank, healthcare office or supermarket. Not only do they have to travel downtown for the necessities, but most theaters, restaurants and other entertainment are in more affluent parts of the city. Residents from lower-income neighborhoods have to spend their money in other areas of the city, but residents from neighborhoods with plenty of resources don’t ever have a reason to travel to poor black neighborhoods. As Verdin sees it, “[The city] only became racially segregated because of money.”
Ali and Verdin saw economics divide people their whole lives, so they began thinking of ways economics could bring people together. The idea for Circulate MKE first came to fruition because Ali would purchase all her jewelry, lotions and other material goods from makers she knew from her communities. Friends would constantly ask her where her earrings and other products came from, and she would introduce them to her vendors. She soon realized there was an opportunity to connect people on a larger scale that would allow her to help both the vendors and the buyers.
The moment she ran the idea past Verdin, he was committed. The two began brainstorming on how to get people to spend their money on local vendors in a way that distributes wealth equally throughout the city. They wanted both dollars and ideas to circulate. “It’s about shared resources and being able to work together as entrepreneurs and startups, or just craft people,” says Verdin. Most importantly, the markets had to be nondiscriminatory and accessible to everyone, so from the beginning, they did not charge the vendors or shoppers to participate.
Location Matters
It was important for the market to represent and include all the communities in Milwaukee as well as to create economic growth for everyone. Verdin and Ali decided the only way to accomplish that was by moving the location around the city. They would approach owners of buildings that weren’t being used and ask them to use their space for the maker’s market. They have been able to bring new business to unused spaces around the city while creating relationships with building owners.
Every new location created more awareness for Circulate MKE while also bringing in new vendors and customers. The regular bi-monthly market took place for about three years, but people began to create their own versions of the market, developing a culture for pop-up craft markets in Milwaukee. Circulate MKE now operates only about five of their own markets every year because they are focusing on developing the skills of the business owners, allowing them to go in the direction they please. The diverse events have stimulated new economic activity in often-forgotten parts of the city and gave people a reason to cross the invisible lines that Milwaukee seems to have.
An Equal Economy, a Change in Culture
The markets have started to break down barriers. Verdin and Ali know that white people often avoid inner-city neighborhoods because they don’t feel safe, but Circulate MKE has been showing people that those fears and prejudices are only in our heads. “We’re building relationships, we’re busting myths about stereotypes of people, and we’re showing how a community can collectively come in and add love and life,” says Verdin.
Thanks to these markets, Milwaukee residents of all races have been moving throughout the city because they now have a relationship with a vendor or a customer. Previously, as the two activists explain, people would travel to the underserved parts of the city to spend their money as a political statement. Places like the Sherman Phoenix (a collective of food and shops), for instance, tends to draw white customers to the Sherman Park neighborhood. But Ali says that having it in one location is not enough. “That’s where the laziness of our city comes in. We can celebrate this and not get comfortable believing that the work is done.”
Places like the Sherman Phoenix are the result of a lot of hard work put in by community organizers like Ali and Verdin and are a step in the right direction. However, the city cannot take this as a sign that the problem is solved. There is still a lot of work to do. Ali and Verdin are dedicated to changing the culture of the city by getting people to cross those lines in an organic way—simply to buy something from their local vendor. By changing the culture and how we see each other as human beings, we can move closer to becoming a united city.
Learn more at circulatemke.com.
Read this article on the Shepherd Express.
Community Organizing Through Food
David Boucher and Stephanie Shipley are celebrating 14 years of connecting people through food with Amaranth Bakery and Café. The pair always shared a love for community organizing and knew that food has a way of bringing cultures together. In 2000, they bought the rundown building at 3329 W. Lisbon Ave. with the intention of building a public meeting space in a neighborhood that needed more access to public places.
The bakery was founded on an idea that change can happen in a community if people are given a space that allows them to feel comfortable and interact with one another. From the beginning, the café was meant to help ideas grow. That’s why the seating area consists mostly of large tables which organically allow people to start conversations. Movements and local initiatives happen through relationship building, explains Boucher, and “none of this happens without trust.”
As their budding business developed, so did their food and Shipley’s knowledge of baking. “I feel like this place created me as the baker, as the food person,” she says, as someone who never had experience in baking previous to the café. She was first inspired by the large red plant she saw being grown by her neighboring Hmong gardeners. “The amaranth plants that grew in the community gardens were strong, anchored and unwilted,” says Boucher. Shipley’s research of the plant led her to discover the many cultures that have a history of cultivating it. That helped her realize the importance food and crops hold in different ethnicities and religions.
So, she intentionally built the menu to be inclusive and healthy. Even though Shipley is vegetarian, she makes a point to add meat into their hearty vegetable-filled soups because meat is so valued in the culture of the neighborhood. By simply adding meat to her soups, she gets more people to try something they wouldn’t normally eat.
Their menu has adapted over the years because of the people from various cultures that they’ve invited into their café. Boucher and Shipley have made a point to hire people wanting to learn the trade who bring their own perspectives on food. By being willing to take extra time to teach those with less experience, the couple, in return, learns from their workforce. They also support neighborhood businesses and budding entrepreneurs who help develop new products that the couple otherwise wouldn’t have thought of. The support they’ve offered has not only created an open safe space in the café, it’s also built up the surrounding neighborhood. Boucher and Shipley view the world in very different ways, but their goal has always been the same: Empower the people in the neighborhood so they can improve their community as well as their own well-being.
Learn more at facebook.com/amaranthbakerycafe. Read this article on the Shepherd Express, part of the column “Hero of the Week.”
Nic Mink’s Sitka Salmon Shares Is Changing How We Consume Seafood
“Seafood is a system that has really lost the trust of the American consumer,” says Nicolaas Mink, founder of the seafood company Sitka Salmon Shares that delivers Alaskan seafood to the doorstep of its Midwestern customers.
Mink is from Wisconsin, and while living in Madison for college, he started learning about our broken food system and how industrialized food processing cares more about quantity over quality. But it wasn’t until he moved to Sitka, Ala., for a summer, that he saw firsthand how the commercial fishing industry was crushing small-scale fishermen. Motivated to change the story, he created a community-supported fishery program. Like CSA programs that support local farms, Mink’s “CSF” program supports small Alaskan fishermen by bypassing the supermarkets and bringing high-quality, sustainably caught fish directly to Midwest consumers. Thus, Sitka Salmon Shares was born.
When we buy seafood from a grocery store, about 75% of it is farm-raised and 25% is wild-caught. Some people assume that farm-raised seafood is better than wild-caught because it doesn’t target wild fish stocks, but most farms feed their fish with smaller wild-caught fish, also depleting ocean ecosystems. The vast majority of wild-caught fish in the United States comes from Alaska, which also exports seafood all over the world.
The industrial fishing industry has a history of causing destruction to bodies of water. Like Alaska, the Great Lakes used to have a massive fishing industry in the late-19th and early-20th century with Jones Island being one of the major ports in the region. But pollution, overfishing and an invasive species called the lamprey led to the steep decline of the Great Lakes fisheries and moved most commercial fishing in the U.S. to Alaska. Unfortunately, many of those destructive practices are still used in Alaska, which is what Mink is trying change.
Large-scale commercial fishermen often use hazardous fishing methods which involve massive boats dragging miles-long nets behind them. These nets pull anything and everything out of the water, destroying coral reefs and whole ecosystems. In contrast, Sitka Salmon works with small-scale fishermen who mostly use a hook and line to catch their fish. They keep at least eight out of 10 fish they catch, compared to the large boats that throw away about 50% of their catch because they only get paid for the species they’re actually targeting.
To combat this destructive system, Sitka Salmon has created a model where the consumer’s dollar goes directly to these small fisheries. They no longer have to compete with large fisheries because of this direct income. The small fisherman can now focus on safeguarding fish ecosystems and delivering high-quality product.
Hopeful for the future, Mink has seen growth in the number of small, environmentally conscious fishing businesses that are disrupting the commercial fishing market. “Slowly but surely, the big system is being challenged by a bunch of small guys who are trying to do things correctly,” he says. Mink’s journey into the seafood industry started with his desire to create change, and his ambitions only grow with the support of everyday consumers who join his cause.
Learn more at sitkasalmonshares.com. Read this article on the Shepherd Express, part of the column “Hero of the Week.”
Inspiring the Community Through Harmony
Members of the LGBTQ community have fought for decades for equal rights, and amidst that movement, LGBTQ choral groups developed to support the cause. Six years ago, the Milwaukee gay men’s chorus, Our Voice Milwaukee, has joined that movement to bring positive voices and support to the local community.
The Gay Rights Movement started to gain traction in the 1980s because the LGBTQ community was in crisis. People were dying from AIDS while the public turned a blind eye. People were working to make the LGBTQ culture more widely accepted, and part of that effort was the beginning of the LGBTQ choral movement. The San Francisco Gay Men’s Chorus was started in 1978 and is widely recognized for starting the choral movement that brought hope and a public awareness to a group of people who were struggling. It only took a few years before LGBTQ choral groups were popping up around the world; today, Milwaukee carries on that flame.
The LGBTQ choral movement was started in the midst of death and loss, as a way to bring public awareness to the AIDS epidemic, to support those mourning their loved ones. “People’s worlds were falling apart, and it was a way to get out there and say, ‘listen, we’re not just a disease,’” says John Walch, who recently served as president of Our Voice Milwaukee for two years. That message of awareness is still important, but as Walch explains, the choral movement has developed into a celebration of identity and the freedom that LGBTQ people have to express themselves. “We’re proud of who we are, we’re representing who we are, and this is how we do it—through song.”
The official mission statement of Our Voice Milwaukee is “offering harmony in music to help inspire harmony in community.” They are boldly and openly themselves, showing their audiences that it’s okay to be open about your identity. The members of the men’s chorus see it as vital to have a strong public presence, especially in a society where being gay has only recently become widely accepted. More so, the chorus is making a point of creating an environment where their members and audiences can feel safe and meet new people. Walch explains that energy and confidence radiate from participants during their concerts because of the harmonies they create. He has loved singing since he was a child and “it’s the feelings that, for so many years, I didn’t feel like I could express. I can be on stage and express my feelings. It’s who I am. It’s a powerful feeling.” The choral group exists so that others can experience that same feeling.
The chorus has performed all around the city for the last six years, including concerts for PrideFest, Bucks’ Pride and Brewers’ Pride. They have also raised money for causes such as the Gay-Straight Alliance at Watertown High School and the It Gets Better Tour, a project dedicated to suicide prevention in the LGBTQ community. Their next performance will be singing the national anthem at Pride Night for the Milwaukee Admirals on Wednesday, Feb. 5. Our Voice Milwaukee proudly sings for inclusion and acceptance of all cultures. They continue the tradition of LGBTQ choruses around the country who stand as symbols of hope for the community.
Learn more at ourvoicemke.org. Read this article on the Shepherd Express, part of the column “Hero of the Week.”
Helping 53206 Through Gardening: Andre Lee Ellis Grows the Community Through Gardening
“We need to take our hands off the trigger and put them in the soil, because if your hands are in the soil, you can’t have them on the trigger of a gun,” says Andre Lee Ellis. With a background in theater, Ellis never expected to be in the business of gardening, but a series of events led him to start the organization called We Got This. The program provides support and guidance for African American boys through gardening. Since its inception in 2011, We Got This has grown tremendously because of community support and has changed the lives of many young men.
Ellis and his wife moved to Ninth and Ring streets in 2011. Within their first week at their new home, they heard six gunshots outside their front door. His wife ran from the kitchen to find a young man lying dead in the street. There was a lot of bad activity on that street corner, Ellis explains, but on that same corner was a small plot of land with raised beds. One day, he asked a young girl playing in the street what the raised beds were. She responded with an attitude and said, “It’s supposed to be a garden, but don’t nobody grow nothing.” Ellis thought that should be changed.
With the idea stirring in his head, he was approached one day by a worried mother from the neighborhood. Her 11-year-old son had committed an offense and was being held at the police station. Ellis went with her to the station to convince the officers not to arrest the boy because the boy was participating in a program with Ellis that coming Saturday. He made it up on the spot, and when the officers asked the name of the program, Ellis said the same thing he kept repeating to the worried mother: “We got this.”
That Saturday, the boy showed up to the small plot of land across from Ellis’ house at 8 a.m. sharp. With the promise of $20, the boy worked with Ellis to start the garden. The next Saturday, the boy came back with five friends, promising them $20 each. Unprepared, Ellis told the boys that he didn’t have the money. Instead, he told them to raise their fists in the air and pose for a picture. He posted that picture to his network on Facebook asking five other black men to come to the garden and support the boys. By noon, seven men showed up. Each week, more boys would come to the garden, and with them came more people from around the city willing to fund their efforts.
The program has empowered young boys to make an honest income and provide for themselves. With close to 90% of them not knowing their father, Ellis and other men in the community are showing up to be that father figure and offer guidance that they haven’t had before. That mentorship is helping the boys find new confidence and imagining new possibilities for their futures.
These efforts are taking place in the heart of the 53206 zip code. Ellis recalls the negative articles that cite facts about incarceration, claiming that the area is one of the worst places to raise a black child. But he lives there, he explains, and he sees the good that’s happening every day. What those articles are missing are the people who live in those communities who support their neighbors and build up their youth. Those facts completely gloss over the capabilities these young boys have and the possibility for change in this city.
Just like any other person in this country, these young men have the potential to grow up and become loving fathers, caring neighbors or anyone else they can dream of. It’s time we start paying attention to the neighborhood’s potential, not its statistics.
Learn more at wegotthismke.com.
Read the article in the Shepherd Express, part of the regular column “Hero of the Week.”
Joann Henriques’ Beacon of Hope to Single Mothers
At 20 years old, Joann L. Henriques’ life was just starting. On the verge of moving to New York for school, she got pregnant, and the father chose to leave her to raise the baby alone. Unprepared and terrified, she began calling organizations for assistance.
“I remember swallowing my pride and asking for diapers,” she says. When she met with people working at the larger nonprofits in the city, she recalls their insensitivity, making her feel like just another number on a long list. She never wanted to feel that way again and wanted to prevent other single mothers from going through that same experience.
Since she was a teenager, Henriques dreamt of a career in helping women, and after living through the hardships of being a single mother, that dream only grew stronger. She lost motivation in her 20s, but in her early 30s, she was finally back on her feet. One day while listening to a sermon in her church about finding one’s purpose, she decided it was time to pursue the dream she had put on hold.
“‘All This Started With a Dream’”
She didn’t waste time trying to figure out logistics or funding; instead, she went straight to the source to provide single mothers with what they need most: diapers. So, Henriques began walking the streets handing out free diapers, and before long, she was being called “the diaper lady.” When word got out, members of her church began bringing her diapers to distribute, and women in need began contacting her for help. “All this started with a dream,” says Henriques.
She soon realized that these women needed more than diapers; they needed resources and someone who would show them compassion. She thought back to her horrible experiences at large nonprofits and knew she could do better. So in 2005, Henriques rented a small office space with her own money, and JLH Women’s Mentoring Services was born. Fourteen years later, Henriques is still in that space handing out diapers, connecting women to services in the city and crying with them when all they need is someone to listen.
Determined to act and follow her dream, Henriques never felt the need to become a certified counselor, because to her, it didn’t matter: She knew that she could positively impact women’s lives simply by dedicating her time and energy. While working a full-time job, Henriques has showed up at her office space every Friday and Saturday for 14 years, helping more than 3,000 women so far.
Humble and soft-spoken, Henriques puts her heart into her work. When she is with her clients, she is gracious, but when they need her to stand up for them, she is relentless. She has done everything from confronting pimps, to leading prayer sessions in brothels, to fighting for restraining orders in court. She is a beacon of hope for struggling mothers and will stop at nothing to support them.
“I always tell people that babies are not going to stop coming, and girls are not going to stop finding love, so keep the diapers coming.”
JLH Women’s Mentoring Services is located at 3846 W. Wisconsin Ave., Suite 109. For more information, call 414-934-0216, send an e-mail to jlhmentoring@live.com or visit rehobothnewlife.com/jlh-womens-mentoring-services.
Read the article in the Shepherd Express.
Shawna Whitehead Works for Workplace Diversity
Shawna Whitehead has always been an entrepreneur, motivated to make her own path. With a bodacious and outgoing personality, she has a way with people and has dedicated her time to improving the lives of others. In the past, she ran a daycare center, beauty salon, nail salon and recruitment center, but it wasn’t until two years ago that she founded the company that brought all of her passions together. That company is called Destined to Succeed. Her newest business trains people in cultural diversity and job preparation to help them adapt to the workforce. More than that, Whitehead structures the programs to help people find what they are “destined” to do.
The idea to train people in cultural diversity came from Shawna’s personal experience in 2015. When she applied for a human resources job at Northwestern Mutual, Whitehead understood her audience and specifically dressed the part. “My hair was professional, I had my French manicure, short lashes; I had my gold teeth, but I had my suit on,” she explains. The image she put on for the hiring manager was far from how she usually chose to express herself, but she knew she had to appeal to a corporate team. Even with her efforts, her recruiter told her that she likely wouldn’t make it to the second interview because “you have gold teeth. You do not look like our demographic.” Whitehead felt belittled by the situation and chose to pour her frustrations into helping others navigate diversity challenges in the workplace.
After starting Destined to Succeed, she hasn’t looked back. In addition to cultural diversity workshops that teach people how to communicate with others from different backgrounds, she offers certifications for corporate etiquette and customer service. The company also assists people in getting their GED, aids in job placement and hosts mock job interviews. As if that wasn’t enough, Whitehead instituted her Pipeline Program, which helps those coming out of prison to re-enter society and find work.
The Pipeline Program gives previously incarcerated men and women a chance in the job market, especially when there are few resources available for them when they leave prison. Whitehead was tired of seeing these people in her community struggle, so she began enrolling them in a two-week job preparation program. She contacts local employers that are looking for new hires and are willing to hire these potential employees the moment the program is finished.
Whitehead is not only changing the lives of the participants in the program but is encouraging workplaces to hire previously incarcerated people. She is fighting the stigma associated with incarceration by showing companies that these are hardworking people and they just want to get their lives back on track.
These programs barely scratch the surface of what Whitehead has done to effect change in the city. Her other two business ventures called Second Chance Transportation and her Christian talk show “Walking in Your Destiny” contribute to the work she is doing to give the underrepresented an advantage. And she’s not stopping there.
Read the article in the Shepherd Express.
James Arms on a Mission to Improve Milwaukee
To make an impact on our communities, the first step we must take is to show up for the causes we care about, but James Arms took his passion for helping others a step further: He structured his business to work with companies whose missions involve improving Milwaukee.
Arms is an entrepreneur who has worked from the ground up to grow a successful graphic design and video business. Having lived in Milwaukee his whole life, Arms has been frustrated with the issues Milwaukee carries like inequality and segregation. So, his solution was to use the skills he learned to offer promotional materials to organizations that need assistance with outreach.
Arms grew up in central Milwaukee on 28th Street and began his career on the press floor at Quad Graphics. In those early years, he remembers traveling home from his factory job and being laughed at because of his dirty clothes. One day, Arms walked past a neighbor sitting on his porch who told him to ignore the insults and continue to work hard. The man said his hard work will be worth it. Arms remembered those words and held onto them when he needed encouragement.
Keeping that work ethic front and center, Arms eventually worked his way up through the company, taking every opportunity he could to learn extra skills and ask questions. In 2005, he left Quad Graphics to start his own business with the help of Debbie Lassiter, co-founder of the Convergence Resource Center (CRC). The nonprofit is focused on helping women in human trafficking find resources and now works nationally to help the cause. But at the time, the organization was new and in need of funding. Lassiter and Arms connected and built an image for the organization that showcased their dedication to the victims of human trafficking.
Arms was inspired by Lassiter’s vigor for her work and made it a goal to put that same energy into showcasing the CRC. In that process, he created his first logo, along with other promotional materials like brochures, print materials and videos. Everything he was creating was aimed at finding donors that would help the CRC with the funding it needed.
Early on, Arms learned the importance of connecting with his clients and understanding the problems they are working to solve. “You kind of just connect with the pain that they feel for what’s going on in the city,” he says. That connection is what gives his promotional products a strong message, helping nonprofits attract supporters.
Arms’ company, JL Promotions, continues to grow, and before accepting any new work, he asks himself, “Is this going to help somebody?” Since 2005, he has aided countless nonprofits by building an image for them that demonstrates the work they are doing for the city.
You can learn more about JL Promotions by visiting jlpromotionsonline.com.
Read the article in the Shepherd Express.
Dan Newberry, a Veteran Reaching Out to Other Veterans
At the young age of 19, Dan Newberry enlisted in the U.S. Army. By the time he turned 28, he served two tours in Iraq and was awarded a Purple Heart, but in 2012, he was medically discharged. For nine years, Newberry lived in a world of structure and discipline. Everything he needed was provided for him, from the clothes he wore every day to the doctor who checked his health. But when he was suddenly let go, Newberry had to learn how to do everything for himself and had little resources to help him with the transition.
“When I got out, I had a really hard time, primarily because I didn’t know how to integrate myself back into the community,” he says. More than fulfilling daily needs, the former soldier was struggling to make sense of the traumatic events he experienced in the army and unknowingly dealing with PTSD.
No matter how hard he tried, Newberry couldn’t find a way to fit in. Potential employers were telling him he wasn’t worth their time and people he opened up to about his past didn’t know how to respond. When he would talk about losing a close friend in an explosion, people would respond with a story about their grandfather passing. He felt overwhelmingly lonely and didn’t want to ask for help because he saw it as a sign of weakness. Struggling with depression and unemployment, Newberry attempted suicide in 2015. “I decided I needed a way out.”
After being at the lowest place in his life, Newberry started looking for things that made him feel better about himself, and what he found was physical fitness. A regular workout routine reminded him of the military and the bond he and his fellow servicemen would share every morning. He began going to the gym again but felt that the sense of community was missing.
So, in 2017, Newberry began teaching a free fitness class for veterans that focused on comradery and acceptance. He wanted to create a safe space for people dealing with trauma to have a conversation. He personally understood that traumatic experiences are “wounds that don’t really heal” and sought to bring people with those struggles together. “I don’t want people to feel like I did. I wish that, when I got out of the military, there would have been something like that for me.”
The class, called 22 Fitness, is hosted at FUEL Fitness in Oak Creek every Sunday at 11 a.m. Newberry structures the class so that people of any fitness level can participate. During the class, he will often share one of his difficult experiences, opening the floor for anyone that wants to talk.
Since losing his way after being in the military, Newberry is now driven to help veterans find the recourses they need to acclimate back into society. The last few years taught him that he can’t always solve problems on his own. In his words, “the most courageous thing someone can do is reach out for help, and the most selfless thing someone can do is listen.”
Learn more at 22fitnesscommunity.com.
Read the article on the Shepherd Express.
Healthy Food for Everyone - The Victory Garden Initiative
Many of us take for granted what we have available to us when choosing the food we eat. We often try to make healthy choices at the grocery store, telling ourselves to buy more produce and less packaged foods. But what if those fresh vegetables aren’t available? For many people in Milwaukee, grocery stores are hard to come by.
The 2015-2016 Milwaukee Community Health Assessment shows people in lower income neighborhoods are nine times more likely to have less access to healthy food choices than those in higher socioeconomic areas. The report defines a “food desert” as a “neighborhood where a high proportion of residents have low access (more than one mile in an urban setting) to a supermarket or large grocery store.” Food deserts are very prevalent in our city. Access is even harder when residents have to rely on public transportation. Their options are corner stores with rotting produce (if there is any produce at all) or a long bus trip to a higher income neighborhood with more grocery stores.
Montana Morris, the community programs manager and event coordinator at the Victory Garden Initiative (VGI), sees the answers to these problems in urban farming and food education. For 10 years, the organization has been providing healthy food access to the community through events like their Garden BLITZ, their pay-what-you-can farm stand every Tuesday and their upcoming fifth annual Farmraiser harvest festival on Saturday, Sept. 28, from 4-7:30 p.m.
The organization started the Farmraiser to advocate the basic human right for everyone to grow their own food. Since their first year, VGI installed raised beds in yards around the city through their Garden BLITZ event, an annual 15-day event with 300 volunteers installing 500 raised beds.
VGI has become deeply rooted in the Harambe neighborhood. On any given day, you may walk into the garden space hidden between bungalow houses to find local kids doing summersaults amongst the crops. It feels like a refuge away from the busy city. Growing our own food is “helping us personally get in touch with the changes of nature, learning how to work with nature and getting something rewarding out of it,” says Morris.
Morris regularly works with kids that have never seen food pulled from the ground. Not knowing what a carrot was, one youth told Morris it looks like a Cheeto. Such a profound moment allowed Morris to realize how disconnected people are from their food and how easy it is to overlook what is available to us. “I realized that education was the most important part [of the solution],” she says. Through education on healthy food, VGI puts power in the hands of the people to become self-reliant food sources.
Learn more at victorygardeninitiative.org.
Read the article on the Shepherd Express.
Jared Bell’s City Champs Brings Martial Arts to Kids with Less Opportunities
While training at a local boxing gym in Milwaukee in 2017, Jared Bell watched as a boy from Puerto Rico trained alongside him. The boy came from a difficult family situation but found boxing as an outlet. Bell witnessed that the physical exercise and discipline of the sport changed the boy into a strong young man full of passion and certainty. It was then that Bell realized the influence boxing and other martial arts could have on young lives.
Bell was inspired by this young man and wanted to help other youth lacking opportunities in Milwaukee. So, that year he started the foundation called City Champs, a nonprofit that provides scholarships to youth, allowing them to train at local martial arts gyms. “We want to come up with the simplest solution to solving a large societal challenge,” says Bell. His idea was not to create a brand-new gym, but instead to utilize the many gyms and seasoned trainers we already have in Milwaukee. Bell looked at studies showing that martial arts and boxing are successful means to help troubled kids. He wanted to use local resources to provide access to youth who otherwise wouldn’t be able to afford gym membership.
Martial arts and boxing teach discipline and respect. In the ring, opponents bow to one another or shake hands before beginning a match. Trainers stress that fighting is only used in competition or for self-defense. Initiating violence is unacceptable, and most trainers of the sports will not let their students practice if they break those rules. When youth come to train in the gyms, they are not learning to fight, but are learning control, focus and confidence.
City Champs started by partnering with the Sixteenth Street Clinic to offer an eight-week program where kids can try different martial arts disciplines at participating community centers. The goal of the program is to help kids build self-assurance and provide different training options that best fit each student. The participants who graduate from the program are eligible to apply for a one-year gym scholarship, which gives them a free gym membership, including access to the equipment.
In the last two years, City Champs has given away five scholarships with the help of generous sponsors. Bell has seen this intensive year of training and mentorship change the lives of the participants. Kids who were aggressive in schools, he explains, turn into hard-working students who have the confidence to achieve their goals.
Bell and the other dedicated people who have worked to build City Champs have no intention of slowing down. City Champs will soon have a course that Milwaukee Public Schools students can take at Bradley Tech High School. They are keeping busy writing curricula and developing new programs that will strengthen the self-esteem of our city’s youth, working to build up the future members of our community. “I want to leave something greater behind,” says Bell. “I think everybody wants to belong to something bigger than themselves.”
Learn more at citychamps.org.
Read the article on the Shepherd Express.
Monica Lopez Helping Parents of Special Needs Children
Born and raised in Guadalajara, Mexico, Monica Lopez never planned to leave her home, but when her first child was born, her and her husband’s lives drastically changed. Her son, Francisco Javier Jr., was born in May 1982 with cerebral palsy and at the time, Lopez could not find any services in Mexico for people with special needs. Like many immigrants, Lopez and her husband decided to move to America in search of a better life for their child. So in 1987, while pregnant with their second child, Lopez and her family boarded a plane in Mexico and landed in Milwaukee.
Her son was not diagnosed with cerebral palsy until she found a doctor in the U.S., but even in this country, there were not many services available for those with special needs in the 1980s. At the time, Lopez didn’t realize that she would eventually be a leader in the community, helping to develop a better array of resources for families.
Lopez explains the move to America being one of the hardest things she’s ever done. She had to leave the rest of her family behind and start a new life in a place where she didn’t know the language, culture or school systems. It was extremely difficult for her to find the necessary resources for her son, but with the help of a family friend, she was eventually connected with the right doctors and therapists. Those initial years in America were often isolating because she spent much of her time at home with her kids while her husband worked long hours.
The family got used to their new lives in Milwaukee, but in 1992 their fifth child, Ivan, was born with cerebral palsy. It wasn’t until then that Lopez learned English, got a drivers’ license and started getting involved with local organizations. She became a parent mentor with the nonprofit Healthy Transitions, visiting hospitals to talk with parents that had children with special needs. ”Being involved was helping me cope and find balance. I didn’t want to stay in the home all the time,” she says. While Lopez was preparing families for what to expect and where to find assistance, she realized that many of them had that same feeling of isolation that she experienced. The parents felt like they were the only ones going through hardships and didn’t know where to go for help.
So in 1997, Lopez started a support group for families who have children with special needs, showing them that they were not alone. After 10 years, the group became a non-profit called Alianza Latina Aplicando Soluciones (ALAS), specializing in aiding families whose native language is not English. The nonprofit provides trainings for families, hosts youth events and connects people with schools and doctors specific to their needs.“At one time, I was receiving a lot of services for my kids, and now I want to give those things to other families,” says Lopez. Motivated by her love for her children, Lopez has dedicated her life to increase the services available for children with special needs in the Milwaukee area.
Learn more at alianzalatinawi.org.
Read the article on the Shepherd Express.
Rafael Mercado and TEAM HAVOC Leverage the Power of Community
Sitting at a park bench in Clarke Square Park, Rafael Mercado, better known as Pancho, is proud when he talks about the surrounding neighborhood where he grew up. He points to the house across the street with a smile on his face that he can’t seem to hide.
“My brother owns that house there,” he says, then he points at the brick house further down. “There was a lady there named Ms. Robinson. We’d all go there, and she’d hand out candy.” Mercado describes the neighborhood as a lively melting pot where everyone knew each other when he was a boy in the ’70s. Then his expression changes and his cheerfulness fades as he begins to describe what the neighborhood has turned into.
Gang violence, crime, prostitution and illegal drug activity became prevalent. Mercado got swept up in gang life and committed crimes that eventually got him sent to juvenile detention. He was a good kid until he was molested by a priest when he was between the ages of 8 and 12. It wasn’t until he worked with a psychiatrist while in federal prison that he realized how much the experience influenced him to make poor choices later on in life.
“You feel like crap when you commit a crime, and you don’t know why you’re doing it,” he says. “Then you find out you’re a good person.” After making light of his own life, he began considering the many other people that have been through traumatic experiences and pondered ways to help. Once he was released from prison, Mercado returned to his neighborhood to find heroin addiction destroying the lives of relatives and friends. Within a nine-month period, he lost four cousins to the drug. To him, it seemed like no one was talking about the problem, so he took it upon himself to spread awareness and make a change in his community the only way he knew how.
With friends and neighbors, Mercado began passing out pamphlets to educate people about drugs, self-defense and places to go for assistance. He leveraged the power of community by recruiting people he knew who wanted to make a difference in the places they call home. A group of volunteers and he continue to knock on doors and walk up to sex workers, proving to be friendly faces in the neighborhood that will keep coming back.
“You gotta engage the community, get them involved,” explains Mercado. “You just keep coming, then they accept you.” That community service group became TEAM HAVOC, which stands for “Together Everyone Achieves More Helping Another Volunteer or Cause.”
The group meets in Clarke Square Park every Saturday to clean up nearby parks. On Friday and Wednesday nights, the group of volunteers meet from 7-10 p.m. to hand out pamphlets and other safety items like condoms and gun locks. TEAM HAVOC works with existing organizations to raise awareness about the issues mentioned and to show offenders that they will be welcomed back to their neighborhoods. Mercado has learned that the most effective way to stop people from committing crimes and taking drugs is to “let them know that they are part of the community.”
You can learn more about TEAM HAVOC on Facebook.
View the article on the Shepherd Express.
Tony Báez Challenging the Norms in Education
Tony Báez has always seen literature and education as ways to strengthen his activism and political arguments. As a young activist growing up in Puerto Rico, Báez looked up to prominent Latino leaders who fought for issues like Puerto Rican independence and civil rights. “We were reading their books and tearing up the literature of Latin America,” he says. He continued his education as a means to inform others on issues that need to improve, such as human rights and bilingual education. Now in his 70s, Báez is the director of the Milwaukee Board of School Directors, District 6. He continues to challenge the norms of school curriculums and push for teaching practices fair for all students.
In the early 1970s, Báez moved to Milwaukee and got a job at Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS). He helped develop the curriculum for bilingual education, a topic he would focus on for the next 40 years. Before Báez and other leaders of the bilingual movement began changing school curriculums, lessons were taught in English and translated into Spanish with no consideration for culture. Students who were not native English speakers were forced to assimilate, bettering their English but leaving behind their own cultural identity. Those students were not receiving an equal education, Báez explains, because they were forced to take standardized tests and learn standardized lessons that were not adapted to their culture.
With a committee of people adamant about incorporating bilingual education into schools, Báez and the group negotiated with MPS to implement new bilingual practices. The program was one of the first in the country and became a model for other states.
These issues are personal to Báez because he understands the challenges of trying to become part of a new culture. Originally from a poor neighborhood in Puerto Rico, he moved to Chicago in his early 20s. Worried for his safety because of his involvement in protesting the Vietnam War, his parents sent him to America. Almost immediately, he got involved with the Young Lords, a national human rights organization that fought for neighborhood empowerment and the rights of Puerto Ricans and other Latinxs.
For Báez, assimilation was never the answer. His experiences in Puerto Rico and Chicago taught him the importance of building a new cultural identity alongside one’s home language and traditions. He has always stressed that suppressing one’s culture hinders an individual’s potential and hurts a community. The bilingual education movement does more than help individual students, it helps create leaders for the future.
There are still improvements to be made to our education system so segregation does not cripple the opportunities of specific groups of students. And Báez does not plan to slow down his work. “To do the right thing for everybody is going to require that we change how schools function,” he says. “I think that’s what my role on the board is going to be. To keep pushing for that.”
Visit mps.milwaukee.k12.wi.us to learn more about MPS’ Bilingual Resolution.
View the article on the Shepherd Express website, part of my regular Hero of the Week column.