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Transcript
My name is Shanda Harris. I was born September 14th, 1971, and my relationship to the Hill District is I was born here, and I’ve been raised here my whole entire life. The neighborhood that I grew up in was a nice, friendly neighborhood. It was caring environment as far as other parents and elderly. We had a nice play environment when we were children, we would go out and just create games on our own, you know? So we had a very nice and safe environment growing up in this Hill District area. My family is a well put together family. We go back two generations of being raised to stick together. My mother was a sibling of eight children. My grandmother lived on Whiteside Rd. We weren’t a rich family, but we were comfortable. I would say that we never had to face like being hungry to where we had some friends that they did face those things. Overall, my childhood was pretty good. We were a family that got together whether there was holidays, not holidays, and grandma’s house was the family house. Our parents were young and out on their own. My mom had two kids by the age of 15, so there was no school, you know, for them. Back in those days, my uncles were being drafted to the service, you know? I had one uncle. He was a bank robber. He was in jail the majority time of our life. I had another uncle that went to school, and he’s very successful and is a boss of a bricklaying company. My youngest uncle, he stayed in and out of juvenile prison, you know, so much that it’s hard to even keep him out of prison now, and he’s a very grown adult. And I had another uncle that… He worked the streets. Even though he was doing that, he took care of the community. He took care of children in the community. He helped their parents, you know, clothe them. My uncle Darrell, he was a big influence on that part of my life, of having my nonprofit organization. I’ve been a business owner of all flavors, clothing, and now I’m a business owner of Shared Apparels and Team Grow, which is my nonprofit organization. Getting out here in the community, getting all the kids together, giving away everything that I give away, coat drives, toy drives, book bag drives, you know, thinking about the kids being hungry, kids are hungry. They look just like y’all. They’re well put together, and you’re walking down the street. Nobody can see you’re hungry, and it’s happening every day. And kids are ashamed or either afraid. If I say something to them, I don’t know them, or I may be embarrassed to say I’m hungry. I’m a lady who was born and raised in the Hill District, had her challenges and struggles. I faced the struggle of being a young mother. I was a mother at 16. I faced the struggle of being homeless. I had a couple different experiences that they weren’t horrible, but they were bad, you know, but I still remained to know that I needed an education. Without an education, you can’t make it. Being on welfare at Once Upon a Time you think about “You want more for yourself.” So then you get a job, and you can get off of the welfare…give you subsidized housing, to owning my own home, to owning my own business. I am now a black entrepreneur of two businesses, and I’ve had my struggles and portion through your struggles, and your downs will get you to be a strong black woman. The biggest impact is being able to help the young women like you, ladies. Teaching you guys that you can be all that you can be and never let nobody tell you anything other than that.