Black Maternal Health Awareness Week

hospital that almost cost her her life. And why was that? It was because Serena, who very much knew her body and knew that something was wrong as she was in the birthing problem, says, asked the doctors and the nurses present to give her the care and medicine that she needed because she suffers from a condition where she has a series of blood clots which are can be life threatening, and she was ignored and it took multiple ass to get her the care that she needed. Thank god, obviously

she did. But too many, too many Black women who don't have the wealth, don't have the fame, are ignored and because of that, they die. Three hundred black babies die every year in the wealthiest country, one of supposedly the wealthiest countries in the industrialized world. How is that? How is that not a national alarm that is set off to talk about this very preventable pandemic that is

experienced in the black community. And so today I'm really excited to have a conversation on both ends, both a woman who is creating a birthing center in eastern Massachusetts that is dedicated to the health and well being of black and brown women, and moving outside of upstetrics and back into the tradition of midwiffery and dulas. We love

to believe nowadays that that is considered alternative medicine. Meanwhile, you'll hear in the interview that I have with Nishira that, oh, well, that is how my mother was born, my aunts, my uncle's all at the hands of my great grandmother in Jamaica. And many of us have that story right with our family,

with our grandmothers and our great grandmothers. And yet by virtue of capitalism and white supremacy and the pharmaceutical industry and all of these things, we've allowed them to move us away from what was, as Nashira will say, a very safe and sacred practice. And so what does it mean then to find a way to return to what

we know is time and test it right. Later then I will have a conversation with doctor Mkiba McCreary, who is the new president of a fund that was put together by black executives in Massachusetts to lead on issues such as black maternity health and to look at the capital that they have built in their own careers and come together as a collective to take on issues and

areas that white fillianthropy has failed right or neglected to address. So, folks, I hope that you enjoy these two in depth interviews on this feel good Friday after a long and arduous week, I wanted to end with some hopefulness, some realness right in terms of what black women and women of color face in this country who are on a birthing journey and what they are up against, but also what is being done right solution oriented in thinking about here's the problem,

but here are people that are working to alleviate that issue. So I hope that you enjoy the upcoming interviews. Drop me a note and the comment section and let me know how this landed for you. If you are a person that has their own birthing story, have you shared it right? Was it something that you felt like you could share that there was safe space to do so? Please do share with us in the comments section. Folks.

I'm very excited to welcome to wok a F for the very first time, Nashira Barrell, who is a director

of Boston's Neighborhood Birth Center. And you know, I think that during Black Women's Maternity Week, right, it's always an opportunity to one, I think, talk about the healing side and the transition that black women and women of color have made from your traditional birthing inside hospitals and what have you, but also to talk about the fact that black women still die right in giving birth more so

than any other any other demographic. It doesn't matter that you know, the United States is quote unquote one of the wealthiest nations, that this is still a major issue. And I remember, right as I'm certain you did, listening to Serena Williams's story a couple of years ago. This amazing world renowned athlete, wealthiest woman, all of these things, and she's in pain during labor and being ignored tell having being told that what she's feeling, she doesn't know

what she needs. It's normal. And I think to myself, my God, if she hadn't been Serena Williams, she would have ended up as a statistic. Can you talk to us about why we still need to have these conversations and then the work that you do to make birthing safe and not only safe but like the miracle, and then the enjoyment and the connection and the alignment that it should really be m Thanks Daniel, thanks so much for having me. Yeah, not only safe but sacred is

is our goal? Right, And one of the guiding questions for us here at Neighborhood Birth Center is like, what's possible for us collectively, not just like the family, the community, but but the big we, all of us, our planet when we get birthright, when we really invest in UM, in all systems, in particular in the healthcare and maternal

healthcare system UM and get birthright. And I'm one to say I think that we can correct for public health outcomes, the economy and climate change, So I just like I want to start there. I think we want to work

birth to be safe and sacred. Um. Yeah, and thanks for you know, I mean, I think that the the there's this tension, right that we want to both like um, explicitly name the way that the the crisis of maternal health in this country is not working well for anyone and is in bar is down the worst on black birthing folks and black women in particular, and that has, you know, so much to do with the healthcare system and the ways that you know, healthcare system is rooted

in inequity and white supremacy culture and racism, and also the intersection of all the other systems, right, so the ways that it is inherently kind of like unhealthy to be black and female in this country, and that that bears on our reproductive systems and ways that result in

bad outcomes. And but I want to go back to one thing you said though at the beginning, which is like kind of the traditional I think you said about the traditional ways of birthing, and I actually just call us into like what is traditional traditional birthing particular Black traditions is midwifery and humber right, right, And so in some ways, as somebody who identify as a black woman, I've given birth at home twice with midwives, and I

hear all the time, oh, you have the most you know, alternative, the most non traditional birth, and you know, like, actually, let's pause there and think about what is maybe the

most traditional way to give birth. And so, in a lot of ways, what we're doing to bring community based Midwiffree back into our neighborhood and into our community is a reclaiming of Midwiffree and a remembering of what it is that our ancestors knew so well before Midwiffree became racially redlined and the growth of obstetrics and that became you know, dominated by white supremacy culture and white men and big institutions and payers like, we have known how

to how to catch babies and how to birth babies forever,

and so I think just kind of them. A big part of our work is around that narrative shift and that remembering, because as we work to open the first birth center here in Boston, and to do so, you know, led by black folks and in a in a in a black neighborhood in Boston, we want to make sure that you know, in part of what we're doing is like bringing folks along to say this is not white women's stuff, and we're trying to you know, do an autom hospital birth and a crunchy birth center like this

is you know, this belongs to all of our ancestors, and so that remembering is an important piece of our work, is to reframe. You know. I love that you call it a remembering because as you're as you were speaking, I was reminded of the fact that my great grandmother, my family is from Jamaica, my great grandmother birth all of my aunts and uncles and my mother. Um uh. And what I learned as I as I got, as I was older and you know, able to ask a

lot more questions, was she was the midwife for her town. Yes, and knew how to turn babies, um and you know, an aid women who were in need, and that that

was just a part of life. And I think that, you know, as I was listening to you, that a part, you know, not one, not a small part, but one of the major parts of white supremacy is a detaching from your story and a detaching from your lineage in a way that juxtaposes it against whiteness and Eurocentric values and anything that is that falls outside of that framework. Then somehow is less then, so we move from this space as you're as you're saying from you know what, Oh,

it's so alternative. No, the actual Actually, to your point, the alternative was obstetrics. The alternative was hospitals. The alternative was presenting a capitalist industry around something that should be sacred. That's right, that's right. How do you go about your work in trying to reattach our original narrative? How do you bring this story of our ancestry and our history two people who have been robbed of it? Thank you

for that question. It is central to our work. We're working to open a birth center, and I often say that as much as we are working on a business plan and a nonprofit structure and real estate acquisition, the third leg of our school is narrative and community engagement

and really community organizing around this. And I think one of the things that has been really key for us is a commitment to intergenerational healing, right that like, because so it's the remembering, as you said, like we like I said a thing and then you're like, oh, yeah, my grandmother in Jamaica, Right, So there's that, and it happens like that, and we're just like, you know, everybody great grandmother was born at home, and everyone's like, oh, yeah,

you're right. But then the other thing is like, I have friends who are you know, my age, who have come to me interested in out of hospital birth. We have no birth centers in eastern Massachusetts, so they're often asked for asking about home birth, and um, I'll talk to him about home birth and they say, you know, Nash, I'm down. It's just that she's not she's scared, she's

not going to support me, she's you know. And so I think that the conversations that need to happen where the grandmother is done childbearing but is the matriarch of the family and has experienced her own trauma and lost right that the data that you started the conversation with

like that is that's not our people. So when we talk about the health outcomes, we can't do it in a way that's detached from saying everybody knows somebody who has had, you know, a bad outcome, which is how we talk about in public health, right, and so an infant who has you know, diet, been born prematurely, or you know, or or any other outcome an emergency C section, you know, some blood loss like something that so that

so the trauma is very real. And so I think in our work to bring people along, and I you know, I don't always like try to try to correct everyone when they say it's alternative, but they're like, oh, that's really alternative. Yeah, So let's talk about one how it got that way. Ye talk about the history of how midwood Free got so white. It wasn't right, and it was it was legislated that way, it was made that

way through policy. And too, let's have an intergenerational conversation because again, the childbearing age folks might be like knocking at our door when the birth center opens next year, but it's their mother and their grandmother and the other elders in their lives or their do you know their peers who have had bad outcomes or known somebody who has who says I don't know, right, And so I think it's like, um, part of our work is not just about the people who will you know, be o

our clients at the birth center who will give birth there, but it's our whole community has to heal. We are carrying the trauma of generations of bad outcomes and so having a space to talk about that, and like I did when we were doing some early kind of needs assessment around the birth center. We did some key informant interviews and stakeholder circles, and I remember asking these questions about people's birth story and this several I mean, they

were very emotionally charged. And somebody who said, you know, my kid is seventeen years old, and nobody has ever asked me about my birth experience. She said, this is the first place where I am because you get home and you have a healthy baby, and all the focuses at least you know, like that's like the bars, like you survived right, the lower right, and that's why you

can't You don't get to complain about anything. And whether you had you know, a hard time the postpartum period or any or lactation breastfeeding was hard, but she said she wept. She said, to gosh, nobody's ever asked me about that. And so we're holding and then asked we talked about it? She said, oh, I can remember not feeling listened too. I can remember telling them I head pain. I can remember asking if it was normal to be

bleeding night. This I can remember, right, And so I think that part of it is, I think the remembering of that but in a container that is held. You know, we are not trying to like take anybody out by having them relive their trauma, but to tend to those wounds because they're with us, and they can be the thing where that auntie who has a seventy year old now is going to say to the they're nibbling their you know, whoever's pregnant in their life. Oh, I don't

know about that midwifferything. Because so if we can like bring them into a loving container to kind of heal from the stuff that we hold collectively and the stuff that we've taken from media, all the stuff we've downloaded. I mean, have you ever seen a rom com with an orgasmic birth or a home birth? No, we see all these like harrowing, you know, screaming images. And so I think we've got collectively, like a lot of healing

and reconciling to do. And I think that that happens through you know, kitchen table conversations and story story circles and when we can gather safely again. We cannot wait to do some open mic nights and just invite people to heal kind of collectively through storytelling. You know, part of this too outside of and not as if we can actually move outside of the white supremacis lens. But part of this too is the fact that birthing people

keep their cold, their trauma to themselves. I have so many friends who have given birth, probably in the last five years, and their stories vary, but not in their degree of trauma. Right so, and and they have expressed to me as a as a person who does not have children, because they feel like they can share and not be judged and and and not feel like a failure,

feel like their bodies didn't do something right. I had a friend who was um struggling with breastfeeding and of course, uh, you know is feeling like my body is letting me down, you know type of thing, and again feeling that you can confide in me because I'm not going to then offer my you know, like a whole weighted opinion. I'm just there, like you said, as a container to to

hold to hold her feelings. And so how do you speak to that about breaking down this kind of the silence, the silence on part of the struggle, right that everyone doesn't get the lush, glowing, growing hair and fingernails. That people lose their hair and you know, and and have terrible acne and are in excruciating pain, and it isn't this glorious thing. So that does that mean that they are less, you know, less then for that? Or should

they be made to feel alone? So how do you how do you go about, you know, in the creation of this of this sacred space, breaking down that silence and that j and that judgment. Yeah, well, one, I thank you for being that friend. We all need to have that friend that we can go to. And I think I want to add another place where the silence

comes into, which is around loss. There's a cultural thing where we don't tell anyone we're pregnant until we pass the first trimester because because if we're more likely to lose the pregnancy in the first trimester, and then it's as if it didn't happen. I'm like, oh no, I'm telling you the minute I find out, so that if I have a loss, you can hold that with me. That is Yeah, it's not a deeply rooted practice of like silencing our trauma and our loss. Right then it's

totally normal. I've had a couple of miscarriages. We don't talk about it. I might talk about all the time because it's part of saying like, you know, this whole idea that we wait to tell is it? Just like I wanted to bring that in as another way that we kind of like silence it a abortion, Like God, we don't want to talk about that, right, We've had a couple of those two like, we just don't talk

about that. And so I think that um to the to the how we break that I think is is is the vulnerability you know is and doing so um, you know, in small experiments with people, I think it's one thing to like, you know, be out on Instagram talking about it. And blessed are those who are like kind of telling the deal story out there, um and also just experimenting because the minute we say it to somebody else, they're like, oh, I had a miscarriage too, Oh I had you know, a hard time breasting too.

And so I think that, um, it is a cold clatural thing, the silence thing and the kind of perfectionism around it and the shaming that we do, you know, in the community of people who birth to others about you know, did you have a c section, like there is no right or wrong way to birth a baby, and reproductive justice is choosing when and if and where

and how you to if you do. And so I think, um, I would just say, it's kind of like experimenting with you know, small tribes of folks that we feel like we can get get real and get raw with, and then having you know, the small is all right, and then letting those those little cultural patterns between you and two friends reverberate out. And I think the other thing and one of the things that I think about a lot.

I was just saying this to a local artist who I'm hoping to work with on like a series of like you know, I'll call them greeting cards because I cannot stand going to the pharmacy to buy a card for a baby shower, but they are because I don't like those cards either. But there's certainly no cards for loss. There's certainly no cards. Yeah, you know, if you're an abortion, whether it was one you chose or one you had to have, what, there's certain there's no cards for you know,

like the realness all of the pregnant. Yeah, Like like when you go into labor, may you feel you know the power and so I just like I I have a dream of, like, you know, creating a line of cards like that because I love that. We also have to do culturally is like be saying to you, like, you know, you got this right and we got you

and I think that you know all of that. In some ways the silence is replicated by by the greeting card aisle because the things that we're supposed to applaud you for and cheers it's boy, are there and the other things are not there. So even if you wanted to send a card when somebody had a loss a

culturally they're not even out there. No, And I think that that's so right, and I you know, again it is really around the silence around it all that then produces the shame which has us, you know, passing on generations of trauma as opposed to being able to be in a place you know, we we you know, in our lexicon now we say normalize this and normalize that, But I don't actually think that we put the activity behind the normalize that we are saying, right, because part

of normalization means continued discussion. It isn't just something that is one and done and you know, to your point about folks on social media, I will say, you know, celebrity is can be a great thing and a bad thing. Chrissy Teagan who you know, wife of John Legend, you know, supermodel, chef,

all of those things. She had announced her third pregnancy, you know every you know, it was covered in like People magazine and then traumatically, uh loses the baby and instead and then you had then and she was very public and as a remain public about that loss and mourning that loss and having a funeral for that baby, and like having you know, her kids understanding the in the spiritual tradition that she was raised in, you know,

what it means to honor the dead. And you know, there were people who came out because people love to hate, and they came out They're just like, why can't you just mourn in private? Like why is she looking for attention? And you know, and so I want to ask you, like, do you feel by virtue of like doing an open mic or doing these things that people are gonna be like this is supposed to be private and why why does everything have to be public? Like what is your

pushback to that? I'm like, y'all have to come because I think that the right right, right, right, you know. But but I think that it will be more impactful and healing. It'll be impactful and healing to more people than it will to those one or two who are who you know, have not yet seen how their liberation is bound to the storytelling and the liberation of that

person who's speaking. Right, Maybe you've never been pregnant, don't intend to be, never had a loss, never, But if you can't kind of see your humanity reflected in that person, then you know, um, love and light. But like, what we're trying to do is really for for the collective, and so I think that, um, I really haven't thought

about my pushback to those particular nisayers. I mean, I think that we we get a lot of I get a lot of pushback already right in the communities of color that are like, well, you know, is it safe and you know, what about when something goes wrong and what and so we we have so much work to do that I think I'm excited to take I'll call it take the risk of doing that storytelling and that open mic to bring to bring you know, ninety son of people along, even if a few people say, you

know that that shouldn't happen because this is at the end of the day, and yelle, this is about our our our bound liberation and and like generations ahead and so UM, you know, I just know that like at the root of this, I'm trying to get free. I'm trying to get my people free. And UM, I guess if people you know feel like that should happen in in uh in quiet, they're not trying to get free yet and they're not ready and that's okay, But we're not, you know, free in a way that is absolutely okay.

Tell folks, UM how if they want to support the development of UM your the birthing center, they want to get involved, they want more information. Please tell the woke Apple audience how they can participate and learn more. Yes, thank you. So UM we are online at um Neighborhood birth Center dot org. We're also on social media at Neighborhood Birth Center. And we are at a point right

now where we are in a capital campaign. We're raising three million dollars to open the city's first birth center and as I said, the only one in eastern Massachusetts. And on some days it feels like a huge raise right every because every ten dollar donation makes me still feel like, oh my gosh, people are really supporting this

and really it's our community that's building it. And then the flip side, Danielle, if I could just call in kind of like philanthropy and and the racialization of the distribution of wealth in this country and stolen wealth, is like, why am I having house parties to raise three million dollars to open of our centers that's actually going to save lives and save money. So there's a way that like also the three million that we're trying to raise

through house parties as a rounding error. So I do this like, you know, a little bit of a feeling between like incredibly profound gratitude that our community is stepping in UM to open this first center in the absence of systems UM that really should be funding UM and supporting the the the financing and the opening of a

key part of our healthcare infrastructure UM. But but so, yeah, it's a call to like, you know, so, but but you know what, in the absence of anybody ever doing it, community is here and we're opening as first first center, and so we welcome you know, donations and support and every dollar at this point because we've we've raised our operating funds for the year. Every dollar at this point goes to the purchase and renovation of our space and

we hope to open in twenty twenty three. Well, I hope to have you back to discuss the excitement around the opening. UM folks, if you are looking to contribute, please do so, UM, because we need we need more, we need we need more UM involvement and more community, more community care and healing this year. Can yeah please? Yeah? Yeah. I just want to say because you were saying we need more and I was like, yeah, we need more

birth centers and what we know. The other part of my work is like codirect birth Center Equity, which is a national strategy to redirect full spectrum capital to birth centers led by people of color. Most birth centers are for profits that are started by midwives using their personal savings and lines of credit, and it means that most midwives of color and communities of color are left without

birth centers. And so we have a cohort of thirty birth centers that we support through technical assistance and grants and funds, and so there, you know, I would just say, also find a birth center in your community and go to birth Center Equity dot org because we're out here and we're all everyone has a business plan, a legal structure, you know, a building in space, in mind, and it's all about just moving capital that this country absolutely has too and we need to redirect that to birth centers

a hundred. Thank you so much for making the time to join WOKEAF. Appreciate you, appreciate you. Thanks so much, Danielle Folks. I am very excited to be welcoming to

woke F daily for the first time. Doctor mckeba McCreary, who serves as president of the New Commonwealth Racial Equity and Social Justice Fund and NCF, is a coalition founded of black and brown executives from Massachusetts leading corporations united to support black and brown communities amid COVID in the wake of George Floyd and just roughly a whole lot of things that we need economic support and power around.

Doctor McCreary, talk to us about why this fund, why this came about in I believe it is twenty twenty one, and you know you've already raised an extraordinary amount thirty million towards or maybe it's more than that at this point. But what I have is thirty million towards your one hundred million dollar goals. So talk to us about the

why behind this. Sure, thank you first of all for having me, and also I know you hosted Nashira are Real earlier and she's an incredible partner for NCF, particularly in this partnership with mass General Brigham and our focus on maternal health equity, especially for black women. And here we are. We were founded about two years ago, and I have to say that I wasn't a part of the initial beginning of the organization, but I am really

really thrilled to have joined. And I remember the moment it was announced, and I remember being really proud that nineteen colleagues across the city really put themselves their own positionality in a slightly precarious place because they stepped in front of their corporations and said, we're going to leave this, and you're going to support it financially, but we're going

to leave this. And so fast forward, we have about a little over three million dollars worth of investments into black and brown leaders across the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and we are about fifty nine strong in terms of those organizations, and we anticipate getting to one hundred millions so that we can push out ten to fifteen percent of our corpus annually, not that three to five percent that typically philanthropy moves out of the door. Why is it important

for this to be led by black executives? You know, oftentimes within the black community, we hear we need to help each other more, we need to be lifting each other up. And you know, personally, as somebody that has been on the ground in activism in movement UM for a majority of my career, I've always seen Black people working in solidarity with each other and with you know,

with other allies and communities. And so what is it about the funding side of this and the coming together on UM on the resources side that is so important? You know, typically you think of philanthropy and you think of protecting wealth UM. You don't think of right like that. That's sort of the structure, that's the way it was, it's been set up, and that's the way that we operate UM. But when I say we, I don't mean collective we people of color because frankly, we have been

redlined out of that that process. We receive. You know, less than ten percent of philanthropic dollars go to our black and brown leaders UM nationally, and it's just as

um Stark in Massachusetts. I can tell you that having spoken to the folks, we've invested in these these leaders for them to know that they have been respected in such a way that these dollars are unrestricted, that they are going to them because we firmly believe that they are closest to the solutions, and therefore they don't need a philanthropic entity a fund to tell them what to

do with these dollars. They need us to get more resources out the door to them so that they can continue to interrupt these cycles of racist policies, practices, programs so important that the founders of NCF came together and the way they did because it was unapologetic. It was saying, look, you know, it hasn't worked so far. Whatever is, whatever we think is supposed to be, you know, effective, it's

not been effective, and we're still suffering. As amplified during the period of time when NCF was launched, you know, you you'd mentioned at the top that black executives put

themselves in a precarious situation. Can you speak you know, with with wanting to be out front um in this space, can you just speak to I guess the balance right, that that black executives that gathered with the intentionality around a redistribution of wealth, the balance that they have to have within their own corporations, but then the internalized responsibility and accountability that they want to have to black and brown communities that they are a part of, right, I mean,

so there's there's not one specific incident that I would point to, but I would say what we all know very very well is that you don't get into the c suite of a corporation of fortune five hundred as a person of color without a lot of blood, sweat, tears and compromise. Um and UM. So these folks, needless to say, have earned. Right, there's their spots um in these companies. And that's sometimes even for the most fear usum individual. You know, there's a lot to lose, right.

They have families there, Um, most of them are our mid mid career. But you know, um have really really fought hard to get where they are. And so to turn around and say you know what, I'm actually I'm actually strong enough and I am secure enough to UM require that this company respects that I absolutely need to be a part of the solution. And our CSR motivation

is not what I'm about. This is about us galvanizing together with our own our own influence also UM and and saying, look, we're gonna we're gonna turn this model on its head. We're gonna we're gonna do it a different way. We're going to do it a way that I guess I really do want to come back to

that word respect. UM is filled with respect for UM, us, for for us, you know, And I think when I when I was speaking UM earlier with Norisha, we're talking about making as it pertains to Black women and maternity and mortality and turning what has become one of the leading ways that black women die right in this wealthy, wealthy nation that we live in. We're talking about what three hundred or so Black babies dying every year in

this industrialized nation. And so why was you know, and I give that those stats to underscore for my listeners the seriousness behind this issue that isn't addressed on a regular basis. That is, you know, by virtue of Serena Williams being very outspoken a couple of years ago about her own birthing experience. Outside of that, if you weren't in this space, in the medical space, in the in the wellness space, you wouldn't really know right about this.

And so why for this group and the partnership that you have was this so important? I think first about my own birthing experience, and Nishia loves to say that everybody has a birthing story. Men have a birthding story, grandmothers have a birthding story. You know. My birthing story is that I never would have entertained a dula or midwife.

I hate hospitals. It was still to this day remember walking in to give birth and cringing at the fact that I knew I had to be there for you know, the remainder of the day, but I didn't know I had another option, another choice. And one of the things I've learned from Nishia, which is so true, is that we entertain the concept that dula's and midwife free are non traditional but right yeah, she says, it's the most tradult way to bring a life into this world. So

the partnership is super important to me. I should say this also became as mgb Entrusted UM New Commonwealth Fund UM. So Mass General Brigham um Entrusted New Commonwealth Fund. With this two point five million dollar investment that we are making taking a position and saying it's not just in the health equity space that we need to move these funds.

We actually need to be educating folks in the policing and criminal justice reform space, folks in the youth development space UM, organizations that are doing work around economic empowerment, you know, housing UM. These are all factors that play into the black maternal experience and the maternal experience period. We need to be talking to men about how to support you know, their partners or or their their daughters UM. And that education is where the Birthing Center is pushing

in with us UM. And so we are thinking about this as a wraparound UM. We're thinking about this as a community based effort. So we really want to work with the folks who are trusted in different communities by those residents, not US, not you know, not some random organization coming in and that might take place in a church, That conversation might take place in a gym, or in a food pantry or a school gymnasium. That's that's what

this partnership is going to look like. We're still designing it, but it's really exciting and I honestly think it's it's a model. What do you think that philanthropy needs to understand about how they can be partners? Right? Because I have, by virtue of the work that I've been in in politics and in policy, have dealt with many different philanthropic organizations,

individual donors, larger foundations and what have you. And you know, most of the folks that are wielding the pen or those that are white, right, and and to your earlier point, UM less than ten percent, and I would probably argue that it's in single digits, you know, like like low, low, low single digits. Uh, the amount of money that is given to UM, to black and brown people, but black

people specifically UM. And what I've heard from you know, from from philanthropy, from philanthropists is UM is that, well, we just don't know where to put our money. We don't know where, you know, where the need is. It

always seems to be some type of excuse. And so what conversation do you think should be had UM with these large, large entities that I'm talking, you know, are holding hundreds of millions of dollars um, but remain gate gatekeepers right in in a in a lot of ways to social ills and issues that they could readily have serious impact act on. I have had this conversation, right, I've been approached by large corporations that are foundations, and they have said, how do you find these people? How

do you find these organizations? We just paid the consulting firm, you know, oodles of money that help us figure out who's out there doing this work. I mean, Danielle, it's about relationships. I mean, it's I mean, I hate to oversimplify it, but I don't have that problem, right, Like you know, the Commonwealth Fund has not had that problem. We the minute that we are talking to somebody who's doing the work. And that's the other thing I would say.

I mean, I have so many conversations. I try really hard to have every conversation and to meet folks that are doing work, not just as potential singular investments, but actually so that I can keep track of who is doing what in what spaces and needs to be doing it together or talking to each other or learning from

one another. And I just think fundamentally, like that's a I'm gonna go out to limitay, that's a black experience, right, Like it's it's about your network that's on around your community, the person you can pick up the phone and call. That's my black experience here is you know, I know if I don't know the answer, I know I have somebody to call who can tell me the answer. And I don't mind asking. Right, That's the other thing I think that there's there's got to be you asked. What

does philanthropy need to do? Differently, I think humility, I think respect back to respect to him, and um, I think being honest about like are you holding onto this forever and ever or did you actually want to put it to work so that our children and our grandchildren

have a better world because you can't, you know. And I think that a part of that when you say you know, the respect piece is also respecting it is it is deeply about respect because for people who haven't dealt in and around philanthropy, there are strengths, lots of strings that are attached to then dictate to those that are on the ground doing the work how the work should be done or how their money should be spent and so how you know that that in and of

itself is paternalistic, right, And as I was saying, you know with Narisia earlier, stems from white supremacy, and so it's so it's like, how you know the conversation with philanthropy isn't also about you know where you got that money that you're spending in the first place, UM, and how it was extracted, but also how you know how you build the trust with the communities that you say

that you want to help UM. And I think that that, to me is what's so critical about your fund is that I mean, well, you you tell us how how is this fund for those that are seeking resources different than where where else they could potentially go? Right? And I hope to firmly influence the other places that they could go when they start to understand that there's a lot of knowledge, a lot of talent, a lot of capability in these leaders across at least the Commonalth of Massachusetts,

which is where we're focused. And the way that I've been approaching it, and again I've just started in September, but I know a lot of these organizations from having worked across different fields and you know, there's there's a difference between not holding somebody accountable and this sort of

the strings and the requirements. I mean, we want to be accountable, and CEF wants to be accountable, but also the leaders of these nonprofits want to be accountable to the work that they're doing, not to the funder that is that you know, they jump through these six hoops, then they might be eligible for the next round. And by the way, design something that I'm going to have some influence in telling you what it should look like when I don't even do this work, I'm not even

close to it. I have no idea what it means right to run an after school program or to you know, have a COVID clinic set up on the corner of Blue Hill Ab and Quincy Street, because that's where people walk by every day and they will accept support from a young black doctor whom you know takes the time to stand there and do some education so you know, get out of the way a little bit, but also help not out of the way, like hands off, out of the way, like what what else do you need

from us? And that's one thing that I think is um not necessarily unique, but I'm very proud of is we are building out a capacity to technical assistance and capacity building structure that would allow all of the folks that we've invested in anyone else to come to sessions to learn about fundamental things like how to read a P and L what does lobbying mean? How close can you get to that line? A lot closer than a lot of nonprofits realize. Advocacy is real. It's important. What

you know? You do you need to create another five or one C three or is there a way for you to bring in a fiscal sponsor so that you're not paying that overhead? All of those things all the way up to like what's a collective impact model and how might these five organizations come together? We're not only asking for for what those needs are, you know, how to build a marketing plan, But we're responding right away.

And I can tell you that all of the leaders we're working with are like, wait a minute, are you serious? Like you're you're just going to offer this our workshop. We've even gotten the simple requests of actually, could we just be in a room together for thirty minutes like a zoo in person whom like I don't get to see other black and brown women who are leading organizations because I'm so blinders on, you know, running hard getting this yep done, and I'm really just trying to do

the work yep. So those are the ways that I feel like we will differentiate ourselves. But also, like I said, I want to make sure we're influencing the philanthropic sector as well, so that they start to emulate some of the things that we hope to do that will work. Last question for you, um, doctor McCary, is what what are your hopes for ANDCF and where do you see the fun going? Um? You know, and then in the

next year, and then and the and the years after that. Right, So we're going to take the next two years and we're gonna test in a few different ways. We're going to test a larger grants in fewer geographic areas. We're going to test that still having that five, ten, fifteen thousand dollars opportunity because sometimes that's what's needed right away

without a huge process and a long way. We are going to partner with some other foundations to do um uh sort of an um commitment that's more significant in a place based model approach to see does that move the needle? Because to be honest with you, you know, we need to figure out, like what is the best

use of our energy and our focus. And it's probably not m you know, spread across the entire Commonwealth and you know, five different pillars at four hundred grants a year, right, it's it's it's probably that we need to decide this is where we're going to move the needle, and we're going to get somebody else to be influenced to come in and support moving the needle somewhere else. So is it policy? Is it you know, um? Organizational development? Is

it economic empowerment? Um? These are the things that we're gonna spend some time testing out. We've made a commitment to three million dollars grant making budget for the next two years. We're s team and we're going to keep taking those meetings and keep having those conversations. And for those people who want to find out more information and understand more get connected, please sure share with the folks how they can. Yeah, go right to our website. It's

www dot Newcommonwealth Fund dot org. As soon as you get there, there should be a pop up that allows you to say you want to sign up to be on our newsletter and do that because you will get every piece of information, whether you're a grant seeker, or you're a funder, or you are just really interested in how we're evolving. Doctor McCoury, thank you so much from making the time for wok F and for the work

that you're doing. I'm excited about it. Thank you, and hope that what you're doing in Massachusetts will be a seed for what can be done around the country. Thank you. That is it for me today. Friends, on this Woke a F daily as always, Power to the people and to all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke as fuck.