by Sarah Thomack
St. Joseph Post
You may have seen some orange yard signs popping up around St. Joseph.
The signs say “Hate Has No Home Here.”
An event with a similar name, "Hate Has No Home in St. Joe," is taking place this weekend.
St. Joseph YWCA CEO Tammy Killin says shortly after the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis, she contacted MidCity Excellence Community Learning Center CEO Kimberly Warren.
“I called her and said, ‘What do we do? How do we support the Black community? How do we stand up for minorities? How do we really address this issue and not just make it a checklist… but what do we really do? How do we make solutions?”
Warren, along with Rachel Kretzer, who leads the YWCA's social justice program, began planning the Hate Has No Home in St. Joe event. Warren says she’s been hosting a weekly Facebook Live show called, Solutions Summit and this event is a sort of next step.
“This is to gain momentum and act as a springboard. It’s not a one-hit wonder rally and everybody goes back to their own corners. Hopefully people will be saying, I want to volunteer at your agency or I like that, I’m going to support and sponsor this anti-racism initiative,” Warren says. “I think this is an opportunity to challenge people and say, would you courageously come out, listen and learn. Let’s sing some songs together, have speakers from different perspectives talk about discrimination and racism and what they think will work.”
The event’s keynote address will be from Janet “Candy” Embray, President of American Family Insurance Commercial Farm Ranch.
"So it's a rally, a community forum and a Solutions Summit all built up into one," Warren says. "We don't have all the answers, I just think our community is looking for answers though and our young people are looking for hope, so I think we can make them a part of what this is supposed to look like. Otherwise we can sit (at) our desk and just develop programs all day, but we're going to be stronger when we diversify how we put together our programs and the ideas that we get."
The event takes place from 5 to 7 p.m. on Sunday at Civic Center Park behind City Hall in St. Joseph. For more information, click here.