Dear Beautiful Black leaders,
Whew!
It's been a minute.
A storm came and we showed our love for one another, our resourcefulness, and our resilience.
Although the impacts of Winter Storm Uri are still difficult for many in the Black community already disproportionately affected by the pandemic, we want to stop for a moment to reflect and express how appreciative we are for this incredible community of Black leaders.
The Black Leaders Collective was formed as a response to the global social uprising and call for social justice towards the beginning of a global pandemic.
And now we have made it through a literal storm by coming together as a unified collective to address the immediate needs of the most vulnerable in our community.
Winter Storm Uri revealed what we already knew – the pandemic has made life even more difficult for Black people.
But you stepped up as leaders. And we stood right next to you so that as things got rocky... very rocky at times...yet we continue to prove that we are family and that we love Black people.
We took the month of March to breathe, reflect and handle the influx of needs created by the storm. Our next general body meeting is Wed. April 14 at 5 p.m. CT. We will give an update on the activities of BLC and our collaborators. Also, our next training session, featuring Dr. Stephanie Hawley, will be April 23-24 Register today.
We wanted to take a moment to highlight the collective work done during Winter Storm Uri.
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Disaster Relief Efforts
We want to thank the entire Collective, including local leaders, organizations and elected officials such as the DAWA Fund, The Austin Area Urban League, 10,000 Fearless First Responders, Survive2Thrive Foundation, Huston-Tillotson University, Austin Justice Coalition, Six Square, Commissioner Jeff Travillion, Mayor Pro Tem Natasha Harper-Madison, Councilmember Rudy Metayer, Trustee Tiffanie Harrison and Mayor Larry Wallace Jr. for your continuous efforts to help house and feed our BIPOC community members. With your help, we were able to serve more than 18,000 community members in need of disaster relief. We appreciate you and your ongoing service to our community! There’s still more work that needs to be done and with your support, we can continue to serve and uplift those around us!
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A very special thank you goes out to Pamela Benson Owens, Tyra Clark and Eric Byrd.
Pam led the disaster relief fundraising charge! We are grateful for her magical works, which included securing a generous grant from the Moody Foundation for six BLC collaborator organizations. Congratulations to the Austin Area Urban League, 10K Fearless First Responders, Six Square, Survive2Thrive, DAWA, Austin Justice Coalition and thank you for your hard work and dedication.
Eric and Tyra were the people behind the scenes and onsite helping to coordinate, organize and problem solve so that we can quickly and successfully launch our disaster response initiatives, Feeding the Village and Serving the Village. They spent late nights and long days helping us to deliver food, water, meals, and resources to our community. Thank you!
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Feeding the Village – BLC partnered with local Black-owned restaurants - the Gossip Shack, Rolling Rooster, The Avenue, Tater-Que, Anything’s Baked Potato, Emoji’s Grilled Cheese and the Cooks Nook to provide hot meals to families immediately after the storm. Thank you to each business for partnering with us!
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Serving the Village – We served more than 18,000 households by providing resources such as hot meals, water, groceries, toiletries, baby necessities, and cleaning supplies. BLC set up sites at Sims Elementary and Millenium Youth Entertainment Center for more than a week and did a pop-up drive at Sims Elementary on Sat. March 6th to continue relief efforts due to the ripple effect of the storm. Special thanks to the American Red Cross for their support, volunteers, and technical assistance with these efforts.
As part of Serving the Village, we collected data from 2,043 households! BLC volunteer and PhD candidate, Ricardo Lowe, took our data and provided this breakdown:
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The average family size of households served was approximately 4.48 per household.
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More than 9,000 total people were served (including household members).
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77.3 percent of all respondents reported that they lost power during the winter storm.
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84.4 percent of all respondents reported that they lost water during the storm.
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Nearly 70 percent of respondents came from the following zip codes: 78721, 78723, 78724, 78702, 78741 and 78753.
**Race/Ethnicity data was only collected for the March 6th, Feeding the Village event.
244 total respondents/households reported analyzable data which totaled about 1,128 people on March 6th.
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52 percent identified as Black.
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This makes for a total of 127 Black households.
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The average household size for Black families helped is 3.92.
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Approximately 498 Black people were accommodated (including household members).
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75.5 percent of Black respondents reported that they lost power.
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87.4 percent of Black respondents reported that they lost water.
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As of March 6th, 18.9 percent of Black respondents reported that they were still without water.
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As of March 6th, 25.3 percent of Black respondents reported that they would need home repairs.
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45 percent of all respondents identified as Hispanic/Latino (race not specified).
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This makes for a total of 110 Hispanic/Latino households.
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Average household size for Black families helped is 5.45.
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Approximately 600 Hispanics were accommodated (including household members).
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69.1 percent of Black respondents reported that they lost power.
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80.9 percent of Black respondents reported that they lost water.
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As of March 6th, 21.8 percent of Black respondents reported that they were still without water.
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As of March 6th, 17.3 percent of Black respondents reported that they would need home repairs.
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The remaining 2.8 percent of respondents identified as white, Asian or mixed.
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This makes for a total of 7 households.
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Average household size is 4.28.
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Approximately 30 people were accommodated (including household members).
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71.4 percent of respondents reported that they lost power.
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85.7 percent of respondents reported that they lost water.
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As of March 6th, 14.3 percent of respondents reported that they were still without water.
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As of March 6th, 16.7 percent of respondents reported that they would need home repairs.
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