At Our Best: 2005 to 2023

Transcript

Jon Ray

A neighborhood is residence and a community where everyone feels a part. I mean, community is something that I think is missing in today’s America.

If there is an opportunity for pathway back to community, I think that what’s going to give people hope.

Right now, I think people are thinking that you can’t do anything. We have a lot of apathy because people feel helpless.

In my neighborhood, where I grew up, well you really couldn’t do anything and not be seen.

My dad, he ran a Mission. It was important for him to run a Mission in the area they lived in. So we really lived my entire life in the center of Fort Wayne, in the McCulloch and Hugh Street area.

Love the community, lots of neighbors and friends and family. And I look at it now, it’s kind of ghost town, a little disappointing.

---

Jon Ray

I was the CEO for a total of twelve wonderful years.

The Urban League is an advocate…for the people that are really without advocacy. The Urban League CEO needs to be in a position where they can speak to the things that are germane to the black community.

---

Aisha Arrington

My name is Aisha Arrington, and I’m the President and CEO of the Fort Wayne Urban League.

In our position, we have to do so many things: raising money, grant writing, building relationships in the community.

Vernon Jordan, of course, has history in here in Fort Wayne because, of that assassination attempt.

Before Vernon Jordan, all of us had the title of Executive Director, and he advocated for that title to be changed.

And he felt that it was really important that Urban League leaders have the title of President and CEO. Which gives us power then to interact with other Presidents and CEOs in the community.

---

Judy Lindsey

I have retired from the Fort Wayne Urban League, which is currently located at 2135 South Hanna Street, in the Hanna/Creighton area.

---

Jon Ray

I can’t say that the Urban Leagues around the country are built like ours was in terms of having uh services within the building. At the time we probably had (if not the best) one of the best Urban League facilities in the country.

---

Aisha Arrington

We have about 92 affiliates across the country, so there’s pride in that.

It was a campus initiative to make sure that we had services uh tucked right in the 46803 ZIP code, right here on the southeast side. The Urban League proudly sits in the middle of the Allen County Public Library and Brightpoint.

---

Joy Witherspoon

Hello, my name is Joy Witherspoon, the Pontiac Branch Manager for the Allen County Public Library. And we’re located at 2215 South Hanna Street.

---

Susan Archer

Hello, my name is Susan Archer. I am the secretary at Brightpoint Headstart. W e’re located at 2107 South Hanna St. On the Hanna/Creighton campus.

---

John Rogers

I’ve been a member of the Fort Wayne Urban League board off and on since the year 2000.

I divide the building up into three sections. There’s that main two-story entrance, and then the north wing is where the Urban League offices are. And then the south wing was more laboratories, classrooms where kids could come in after school. They had a large meeting room in there that the community still does use. And they’ve got a kitchen. Then the downstairs area was a rental area, which eventually became Health Visions.

---

Etse Mulugeta

Now we have building, we have more responsibilities, you know we know have the keys, when something breaks we don’t call other person we have to call the person that fix it. I mean, it’s different when you own like on your house, you know.

---

Jon Ray

Este was part of the initial staff that came in; Carol Cartwright was another person. And I surely brought on JJ Foster to really head up my youth area. Paula McGee came very shortly after that to head up our housing department.

---

Paula McGee

My name is Paula McGee. I am from Fort Wayne. Family of Henria and Dewitt McGee, family of 9.

Including myself, there has been at least 3 of us that have been associated with the Fort Wayne Urban League.

My oldest sister, she was 13 years older than me. Her and her husband, they were active with tutoring and the youth program over at the Urban League, and that’s when it was over on Pontiac.

I was hired in 2009. I think I was hired under the economic development.

Then we had the housing department: foreclosure prevention: rental assistance. Those were the two things that (I think) we really tried to focus on.

I worked with Denise Porter. She was able to research and locate additional funds to be able to work with our community.

---

Denise Porter

The issues were always inclusion. How you got included and what was happening would change over the years. The Urban League, one of the reasons I ended up being there was the recession from 2008 to 2009 hit hard in this community.

People were losing their homes during that time. And Indiana had just opened up the hardest-hit fund, which was allowing rental assistance and mortgage assistance.

---

Paula McGee

I guess it was just booming. It was just an overflow of what we can do to help. People don’t seem to know that it’s there that the Urban League is capable.

---

Jon Ray

We started out with this program Bridges to a Better Community after suffering through a year of 40+ murders, and we wanted to do something about it from a community policing standpoint, in a way that allows for civility. Putting into writing, the feelings of the entire community.

The Urban Youth Empowerment program is a program that was built around helping young people have an avenue of seeing their future.

We had this big event at Turner Chapel every year. We recognize kids from every school system who had an A or B level.

The Build program came about for what we had done for the non-union program, that really got people qualified for going into the process of getting into a specific field of the skill trades. And then we combined that with some of things with the union said they wanted.

I brought Leroy and Mr. Patterson from the McMillen Center.

---

Leroy Jackson

The Build program started in the winter of 2014.

We were having problems getting people in because we would have them do applications, they wouldn’t bring all their paperwork in, they would leave stuff out.

---

---

Jon Ray

I was the Urban League President and CEO until 2017.

I think you never accomplish everything that’s possible, and so I can’t say that when I left the Urban League I thought I’d done everything that I could. I think that I laid a pathway.

---

John Rogers

Probably from sometime in the 2000s, I served as a board member, was off for a while, came back as board member at Jonathan Ray’s urging.

I think we suffered, probably kind of like, um, a recession of our own, things kind of went down, business, if you can call it business slowed down. We lost some programs. We lost a chief executive or two, I think. And then finally, we hired Aisha, who had great not-for-profit experience, has great leadership skills.

---

Aisha Arrington

My first day was July 5, 2022.

My first initiative with joining the Fort Wayne Urban League was really to just give the organization some stability. When you’ve got transition and leadership for several years, sometimes there’s a lot of little things that you’ve got to tie up so that you can move forward.

For 2023, we had several signature programs. Our Senior Techie program gives a free Amazon tablet to a senior; they go through six weeks of training so that they gain the skills of developing an email, using apps. What we learned in our Senior Techie program is that we have a lot of seniors that were raising grandchildren that were in the school system. And now, a lot of things are dependent upon having an email as a means to communication.

We then in the spring offered our block club, beatification projects. We gave $1,000 each to eight southeast side blocks where they can beautify their block however they wanted. That was a really fun project because really it was just about sending the message that you can really proud of your home and your neighborhood no matter where you live. It also helped us meet our neighbors face to face.

It encouraged neighbors to talk to one another, because they had to figure out how they were gonna use that thousand dollars. And in that process, we learned that sometimes you could be living right next to someone and you don’t know their name, you don’t know their work schedule, or what they’re doing.

A strong neighborhood is where people feel safe, where there is open communication, and people know who to go to or where to go to when they have questions about how to make things better. Or how they can work together to make things better.

Black history is so very important and that is why I made it an initiative for the Fort Wayne Urban League to join the no-banned book movement. A lot of those books on that list are black authors, black characters, black themes. And we cannot erase history, and so it was really important to me that we took a stand for that.

During our Banned Book campaign, we raised a little over $5,000, but we also were able to pass out 537 banned books to community members. I Know Why the Cage Bird by Dr. Maya Angelo that was a banned book. The Bluest Eye by Tony Morrison.

We had Ruby Bridges day here November 14.

To live in a country where we’re banning a Ruby Bridges book does not feel good; it’s not the right way to go.

And that’s part of the advocacy of an Urban League, is to bring attention to some of these issues, but also take a stand for what’s just and what’s right.

The Fort Wayne Urban League received some CDBG funds from the City of Fort Wayne so that we could offer one-on-one tutoring to kids, two hours per week.

When we did our research, what we really found is that after-school programming alone is not going to get kids on grade level.

Another initiative, as we really want to get behind supporting the Crown Act locally. We have heard stories and and experiences that some of our African American uh students and workers have felt about just wearing ethnic hair in the workplace or in the school sitting setting. It’s a national problem.

The National Urban League completes a State of Black America’s report every year. And for 2022, the State of Black America’s report stated that African-American people receive 73.9% of what white Americans enjoy.

73.9% doesn’t sound too bad, but when you take 30% away from how much someone earns. Or some 30% away of someone’s home buying power, or 30% away of someone’s education, then you can see how those disparities really start stacking up and it becomes a problem.

That let’s know that there’s still to be done in education, and in employment, and social justice.

For the programs that we had in 2023, 97.2 % were African-American people, more women than men.

For the mission of the Urban League, we are focused um and have been focused on the African-American community but we serve all people. We wanna make sure that all people have access to great education, that their social rights are protected, and that they have the resources necessary to live the American Dream.

At our best, the Fort Wayne Urban League is the hub for all services and activities to support the African-American community and other underserved communities with the best services and programs to help uplift those wanting to do better, wanting to fulfill their hopes and dreams.

And if we do that, and we offer that hope, and we do it through the movement of the Urban League, we are doing our best work for the community.

---

Condra Ridley

The strength of a neighborhood is, it rests in the way the people are able to interact. The Urban League definitely served as a good source of good activity, healthy activity.

---

Denise Porter

Together we are strong and as a community, we can see that strength, because as one generation passes on, there’s another generation to pick up those pieces.

---

Aisha Arrington

Black history is so very important and that is why I made it an initiative for the Fort Wayne Urban League to join the no-banned book movement. A lot of those books on that list are black authors, black characters, black themes. And we cannot erase history, and so it was really important to me that we took a stand for that.

During our Banned Book campaign, we raised a little over $5,000, but we also were able to pass out 537 banned books to community members. I Know Why the Cage Bird by Dr. Maya Angelo that was a banned book. The Bluest Eye by Tony Morrison.

We had Ruby Bridges day here November 14.

To live in a country where we’re banning a Ruby Bridges book does not feel good; it’s not the right way to go.

And that’s part of the advocacy of an Urban League, is to bring attention to some of these issues, but also take a stand for what’s just and what’s right.

The Fort Wayne Urban League received some CDBG funds from the City of Fort Wayne so that we could offer one-on-one tutoring to kids, two hours per week.

When we did our research, what we really found is that after-school programming alone is not going to get kids on grade level.

Another initiative, as we really want to get behind supporting the Crown Act locally. We have heard stories and and experiences that some of our African American uh students and workers have felt about just wearing ethnic hair in the workplace or in the school sitting setting. It’s a national problem.

The National Urban League completes a State of Black America’s report every year. And for 2022, the State of Black America’s report stated that African-American people receive 73.9% of what white Americans enjoy.

73.9% doesn’t sound too bad, but when you take 30% away from how much someone earns. Or some 30% away of someone’s home buying power, or 30% away of someone’s education, then you can see how those disparities really start stacking up and it becomes a problem.

That let’s know that there’s still to be done in education, and in employment, and social justice.

For the programs that we had in 2023, 97.2 % were African-American people, more women than men.

For the mission of the Urban League, we are focused um and have been focused on the African-American community but we serve all people. We wanna make sure that all people have access to great education, that their social rights are protected, and that they have the resources necessary to live the American Dream.

At our best, the Fort Wayne Urban League is the hub for all services and activities to support the African-American community and other underserved communities with the best services and programs to help uplift those wanting to do better, wanting to fulfill their hopes and dreams.

And if we do that, and we offer that hope, and we do it through the movement of the Urban League, we are doing our best work for the community.

Next Stop on the SoundWalk