Resources:
Sarah Rigg's Feature Article: Ypsi’s Family Empowerment Program marks 15 years of supporting public housing residents
Transcription:
Lee Van Roth: You're listening to 89.1 WEMU. I'm Lee Van Roth, and this is On the Ground Ypsi. For the past 15 years, the Family Empowerment Program housed at Eastern Michigan University has been working within local public housing communities to connect residents with essential resources to substantially improve the educational, health, and economic outcomes for over 900 individuals currently living in Ypsi's Housing Commission communities. With me today is Lamar Thomas, FEP's resident service coordinator, to discuss how this program is impacting our community and his personal connection to this brand of social work. Lamar, thank you so much for being here today!
Lamar Thomas: Thank you for having me!
Lee Van Roth: So, Lamar, how did you first connect with and begin working with the Family Empowerment Program? What drew you to this mission?
Lamar Thomas: Well, I grew up in this community, and I just always wanted to give back and try to help uplift the community. I started with the Family Empowerment Program through the social work program from Eastern. I was a 350 student, and it was like a pre-intern. I really wasn't an intern, but I had to go out in the field and do placement for a couple hours. So, after I finished my 350 class, I ended up coming back as an intern. So, I did both of my internships with the Family Empowerment Program with Mark Hammond.
Lee Van Roth: And you spoke with Sarah Rigg about this period during your childhood with your brother how these instances during your childhood kind of impacted the way that you saw the community and wanted to give back to the community in this way. How did these experiences really translate into you wanting to be in social work?
Lamar Thomas: Well, as a kid, I had my own problems growing up with the neighborhood. It's kind of like an impoverished neighborhood. And I just remember, like, for instance, I was real hungry. My mom was struggling to make ends meet for always feeding us. And sometimes, I went to school just to be able to eat. And now that I'm in the community working with the little kids, I do tutoring programs and all different type of activities for the kids. And the one thing that I noticed is that the kids were hungry when they get out of school. So, that's the first thing that I wanted to do for as far as the kids is try to create some type of safe place to where they're learning after school, I'm helping them with their homework. But also, before we got started with their homework, I wanted to make sure that they were fed. And the majority of the kids came out to eat because I don't know what their circumstances was like at home. For me, I know that me and my brother had to fend for ourselves when my mom was at work. We couldn't open the door for nobody. We were a little too young to let anybody in or be at home by ourselves. But I know me and brother had to cook for ourselves. And it would be little things like hot dogs and pork and beans and stuff like that. But it was a lot of times where we went, maybe, weeks, where we've barely eaten.
Lee Van Roth: You mentioned working with young people in the area, not just with food security and ensuring folks are well fed, also working on the educational piece, helping with homework and things like that. Can you talk a little bit more about the kinds of programs that you have either worked on, spearheaded, whatever the case is, as far as getting these young people these essential meals?
Lamar Thomas: Well, for me, my biggest win was when I started off at a Sauk Trail property. I now work at Hamilton, which is the biggest one. But while I was at Sauk Trail, I partnered up with LaRonica. She's the head of Food Gatherers. And me and LaRonica sat down and talked, and I told her about the food disparities on Ypsi's south side. And we came together, and we created a program to where the kids could eat hot meals when they got out of school in the summertime. And it would be maybe like one hot meal or two hot meals out of the week and then the rest was like little sandwiches, cold meals. But what I did was at Sauk Trail, I had kids coming to the building to get tutored. So at first, I started off with like five kids. So, when I started getting the meals, I had five meals coming. But as the kids were seeing that I was feeding them, they were spreading the word like, "You can get help with your homework, and you can come eat with Mr. Thomas!" So, the next thing I know, I got like 20 kids. So, I used the kids to go back into the community to find other kids that was in the apartment complexes and to bring them to me. So, I can do the numbers on how many kids were hungry and needed food. So, I think, in the end, I ended up with like 30 kids that was coming on a regular to get tutored and to get fed. So, what I did was I had LaRonica bring me 30 meals for the kids at Sauk and 30 other meals for Hamilton Crossing. So, what I did was I started loading up my pickup truck with the other 30 meals, and I went to the Hamilton Crossing community, and I start reaching out to the kids, asking them who was hungry. And the kids start coming to my truck just getting the meals from the truck. So, once I got transferred to Hamilton Crossing, it was a bigger community, more kids. So, my coworker Sergio, he start working in my place down at Sauk Trail. So we had the 30 meals coming to the kids. Now I'm at Hamilton. Now, my numbers boosted up to like 50 kids. So, I told LaRonica, I need 50 meals. I need 30 at Sauk, I need 100 at Hamilton because the 50 kids I had coming, I gave them 50 the meals, and I took the other 50 up to our other community, which is up at Parkridge.
Lee Van Roth: Oh wow!
Lamar Thomas: So, once I got done with the 50 at Parkridge, I only really needed like 30. So, what I did was I took the other 20 down to our complex on Grove, which is a smaller community. So, I got rid of the 20 there. So, that was my way of at least making sure the kids had food during the summertime when there was no more school because, like me, I went to school sometimes just to eat. But since Trump's been in office, a lot of money's been cut, and these programs are no longer available.
Lee Van Roth: This is WEMU's On The Ground Ypsi. I'm Lee Van Roth, talking with Lamar Thomas. Despite these struggles, we've seen a lot of growth come out of this program. What are, from your perspective, some of those factors that have kind of driven the amount of growth that you've seen during your time working with them?
Lamar Thomas: Well, first of all, I have to thank Decky Alexander and Mark Hammond. They are two down-to-earth, beautiful people. Mark Hammond, I mean, he's the best boss, best person, that you could ever meet! This guy, he taught me how to see the good in everybody. And sometimes, I had a problem with just helping people that were trying to manipulate the system. And Mark let me know that regardless on what they're trying to do, you just do your job. The first thing is having two great people that really care about people, as far as Decky and Mark, that makes my job more easier because they give me all the support and the help that we need. And Mark, he's a grant writer, so he reaches out to different type of organizations and connects us with the organizations to be able to bring food to the community, food pantries. Him and Decky give us everything we need, all the tools we need, to get out there in the community to do what we need to do. And then, they also give us the free range to create programs or to connect with other people to bring them to our organization.
Lee Van Roth: And finally, when you think about Ypsi's community today and looking back on your own history within the community into today, why is a program like FEP and the resources that it provides so essential to all the folks living here?
Lamar Thomas: Well, I wish we had this program when I was a kid, because it's like having a counselor. It's like having a father or a big brother in the community that...like for the kids, I take care of everybody: the seniors, the kids, women with children, single fathers. Everybody comes to me. My job is to uplift people. So, that's the reason why I took this job, because it's so much mental illness in our community. It's hard to talk about mental illness with the people because nobody wants to be seen as crazy.
Lee Van Roth: Sure.
Lamar Thomas: But it's like everybody looked to me like I'm a manager or somebody big in power, because I always try to uplift them. You know, I've been through a lot. I've shot five times, and I had to learn how to walk all over again, live all over again. But my communication with God is so strong that I give out all that I have to these people to uplift him. And then, I get on my knees at night and in the morning and pray. And God replenishes me with the strength that I need to help these people.
Lee Van Roth: Lamar, thank you so much for joining me here today and for sharing this perspective! I know I'm definitely excited to see how things grow, evolve and change over the next several years.
Lamar Thomas: Well, thank you for having me!
Lee Van Roth: For more information on today's topic and links to the full article, visit our website at WEMU.org. On The Ground Ypsi is brought to you in partnership with Concentrate Media. I'm Lee Van Roth, and this is your community NPR station, 89.1 WEMU, Ypsilanti.
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