Conversations With The Citizen

Through her work, Tytannie Harris, clinical therapist and the owner of TMH Behavioral Services, P.C., noticed that many black men were lacking an opportunity to address their emotional needs in a safe space. Because this can have a negative effect on their mental health Harris created the Mancave event series which is specifically for black men and give them the chance to come together and talk about their issues and needs.

Cradles to Crayons, a national nonprofit organization with an office in Chicago, created their Earth Day Clothing Drive which will take place on April 27. The clothing drive will not only support their own mission, but will also help to keep textiles out of our landfills.

For years, Tracy Allen, founder and chief executive officer of Freedom Naturally Beautiful Cosmetics, struggled with her sensitive skin and was unable to find a makeup line that didn't cause breakouts and inflammation on her face.

Preparing for college is a difficult task for both parents and students. Tom Lewis, chief executive officer and founder of the Oink Group, said he knew from the young age of 13 that he wanted to be an entrepreneur and focus on helping parents prepare themselves to send their children to college.

A local nonprofit arts enrichment organization, Praize Productions, Inc., is currently preparing for their 8th annual theatrical performance. This years program, Smells Like Freedom, will take viewers on a spiritual journey to both explore and refine their definition of freedom through dance, music, visual arts, and spoken word.

Kim and Time Lewis are high school sweethearts, parents and co-founders of CurlMix, a clean beauty brand for curly hair. The pair recently had an opportunity to pitch CurlMix to a panel of big-name investors on the mid-season premiere of ABC's Shark Tank.

Chicago native Michelamonè Henderson is an author, a life coach, a motivational speaker, and the founder and chief executive officer of The Core Woman Academy. Most recently, she released a book titled Rejection Saved My Life which is a self-help memoir that tells the story of her struggles with rejection and self-reflection and provides readers with 15 transformational keys on how to use rejection as FUEL.

I would begin with public schools. We have to have great public schools in all of our communities and where we are now is that you can pretty much tell the success and performance levels of a school by the zip code that it’s in just as you can predict life expectancies on the basis of zip codes.

Immediately we have to make sure that we have a healing process where we bring people to City Hall to say that City Hall is open to the people of Chicago, we have to make sure that we bring people back to government. We want to send a strong message that this administration, the Ford administration, is going to be powered by people.

After hearing concerns from community members, the Chicago City Council recently voted in favor of creating a Public Mental Health Clinic Service Expansion Task Force to explore how the city might be able to improve it’s mental health services.