The New York City area is full of people making a difference in their neighborhoods. WNYC's Community Partnerships Desk is highlighting some of them. We're calling them community champions. You know, the volunteer, the senior center. The nonprofit founder helping young moms or the grandmother who rallies the block for spring cleanups. Today we meet Reverend Robert Ennis Jackson. He co-founded Brooklyn Rescue Mission. The group helps folks in Bed Stuy facing unemployment and food insecurity.
Do you have a story about a community champion? If so, we want to hear from you. Tell us about them and how they're making a difference in your community at yourvoiceatwnyc.org. and we may feature their story in an upcoming segment on WNYC.
Reverend Robert Ennis Jackson:
It's fantastic to see people come from maybe desperation to thank you, and I'm happy I got food for a week. I come from a background of having a mother and father who were very community-oriented. My father was a barber, and he loved being able to educate and teach while he cut hair. My mother was a minister and also a hairdresser, and watching them serve community and also watching them help people became part of what I do.
The win is you learn to have compassion. You learn to be able to understand people's culture. Even though I'm an African American, we have everybody, like a lot of food programs around the city, not just us, line up. There are Chinese folks, there are Latino folks, there's Ukrainian, there's Russian, there's Caribbean, there's everybody that's fighting food insecurity. You learn how to say "good morning" in Chinese, learn how to say "good morning" in Spanish. You learn what the cultural norms are so that people feel comfortable with you and you feel comfortable with them.
I have a saying, P O W E R. It's power, and power means personal opportunity with equal responsibility. The world would be a better place if people worked on their personal opportunities with equal responsibility. The equal responsibility part is the will to make it, succeed, and give back.