My road in life took a while to figure out.
Grew up in the Highland Park neighborhood of Detroit, MI.
As an adult, she continued to live, work, and raise her family in the neighborhood even as it became blighted—buildings sat vacant, trash covered the streets, and crime became an increasing problem.
She worked as a school administrator for 27 years and has owned small businesses within the community since 1998.
In 2007, her 2-year-old son, Jakobi, was killed by a hit-and-run driver.
Inspired to make the neighborhood safe for other children, she bought one of the abandoned buildings for $3,000, transformed it into her ministry, and built a park in honor of her son nearby.
Spent the next decade assembling a team of engineers, futurists, artists, urban farmers, volunteers and donors from around the world to revitalize the neighborhood one lot at a time.
Has received funding from Alex Ebert, lead singer of Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros, and his nonprofit, Big Sun Foundation, and Ellen DeGeneres, enabling her to work on a much larger scale.
The neighborhood is now known as The Avalon Village, a sustainable ecovillage that currently sits on 20 parcels of land with after-school learning, holistic healing centers, greenhouses, and more.
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