L. Pleasure Williams steps into large sneakers as the brand new president of the NAACP New York State Convention. As she carries the legacy of the late Dr. Hazel Dukes, Williams enters the management function dedicated to fostering intergenerational connections with the nation’s oldest and largest civil rights group.
On the time of Dr. Dukes’ loss of life in March at age 92, Williams was already main the Brooklyn NAACP and dealing intently alongside her. With twenty years of expertise as a political strategist and civic chief working inside the group, Williams brings a youthful vitality to NAACP New York that she’s keen to hold ahead.
“My plans are till 2031. However I’ve a lot of plans,” Williams tells BLACK ENTERPRISE. “I’ve been a part of the NAACP since 2004 or 2005. I got here to the affiliation already baked as an grownup. And I began by serving to to reorganize the Brooklyn department of the NAACP, which is below the New York State Convention, and dealing with my mentor there [Dukes], serving to to reorganize that department, after which would later turn out to be the president of that department and served for a few decade, for 10, 11 years, and served till March of this 12 months, once I turned president of the state convention.”
Now main all 54 NAACP branches in New York State, whereas nonetheless main the Brooklyn chapter, Williams carries a heavy workload. But, together with her capability to bridge gaps, drive change, and assist marginalized communities, particularly at a time when even celebrating their historical past is below federal assault, she acknowledges the very important function she performs in guiding a company central to the struggle for civil rights.
“One of many issues that I take nice pleasure in on and being president of Brooklyn was constructing an intergenerational department,” Williams shares.
It’s this intergenerational method, Williams says, that’s key to the work the NAACP is understood to do.
Forward of the shut of this 12 months’s Harlem Week celebrations, Williams highlighted the significance of occasions like these.
“I feel celebrations like this are necessary. Like, if we’ve got a neighborhood dialog, it’s necessary. And even on this context the place a lot of our historical past is being attacked, it’s being stripped away, it’s necessary that we’ve got markers, that we’ve got areas to coach, inform, and construct the pleasure of our historical past, of our heroes, of our advocates, of our story actually right here on this nation,” she says. “And issues like Harlem Week are markers for us to have the ability to do this, automobiles for us to have the ability to have a good time, to recollect, and to coach future generations.”
This 12 months’s Harlem Week celebrations additionally honored the a hundredth anniversary of the Harlem Renaissance, a pivotal second in African American historical past in the course of the Twenties and Thirties when writers, musicians, artists, and students got here collectively to have a good time Black id, problem racial stereotypes, and take pleasure of their tradition.
Williams hopes the commemoration conjures up at present’s Black creatives to search out unity and neighborhood in their very own inventive expressions.
“Properly, how becoming,” she says. “As a result of we’re at a interval in our collective historical past the place we’ve got a chance, not simply trying on the challenges that we’re dealing with, however trying on the alternative that we’ve got to create and have a good time these markers, these monuments, these people, and people areas of telling our collective historical past.”
Williams continues, “We’ve got a chance the place not solely all of those anniversaries developing, not solely the challenges of the federal aggression, however we’ve got a chance to create cultural markers much like the Harlem Renaissance that will likely be celebrated 100 years from now. And so I consider these individuals, these artists, these researchers, these educators, some who native born from New York, from Harlem, and a few who migrated in the course of the nice migration from the Midwest, from the South and located neighborhood in an area and located it to be necessary to not solely construct a life, construct wealth, but additionally guarantee that they had been making a mark when it comes to their religious and cultural heritage.”
As a part of this 12 months’s Harlem Week, the one hundred and tenth Road subway station on the MTA’s 2 and three strains was renamed one hundred and tenth Road Malcolm X Plaza, honoring the long-lasting civil rights chief. Williams hopes it serves as “a doorway to larger training and a deeper understanding of what people have contributed, not simply to a neighborhood, however to our nation.”
Now in her new function as president of the NAACP NY State Convention, Williams deeply acknowledges the duty of carrying Dukes’ legacy, honoring her a long time of dedication to the NAACP. Dukes served as nationwide president from 1990 to 1992 and led the New York State Convention from 1977 till she died this 12 months at age 92. Their bond, constructed on mentorship and hard love, ready Williams to step into her function as the following state convention president.
Though Williams has solely been within the full-time volunteer function for 5 months, she leads with pleasure and pleasure, embracing the chance to assist drive pivotal change, simply as her mentor, Dukes, as soon as did.
“It’s so rewarding to have the ability to make investments all of my time into the upliftment and the way forward for Black individuals,” she says. “And understanding that you just had been mentored and guided by somebody who additionally beloved Black individuals.”
Relating to how New Yorkers throughout the state can interact in the neighborhood work led by Williams and different NAACP members, she emphasizes the significance of proudly owning your energy and never handing it over to those that don’t have your finest pursuits at coronary heart.
“I definitely at all times invite anyone in New York to affix us and be a part of our work on our web site, NYSNAACP.org,” she says.
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