Organizers Behind Kelley Sq. Protest Accepted $50K in Grant Money from Worcester
Wednesday, July 01, 2015
Black Lives Matter Protesters Block Cars in Kelley Square in January
Following the announcement by the state that the DPH was to benefit from these funds, the City determined what organizations in Worcester the money would be allocated towards.
Mosaic Cultural Complex of 41 Piedmont Street (a building owned by the City of Worcester and assessed at more than $350,000) was one of 12 organizations that were allocated funds from the city.
Since the announcement of these grants, Mosaic Cultural Complex, the organization behind January's Black Lives Matter protests in Kelley Square, has received more than $52,000 in funding from the City of Worcester through the DPH as part of of the Prevention and Wellness Fund. Most recently, on June 29, the City wrote a check for $17,500 to the organization.
According to the City of Worcester, "The check referenced is a payment of state funds for services rendered under the Prevention and Wellness Trust Fund."
GoLocalWorcester inquired as to what services were rendered by Mosaic that accounted for $52,000. "Mosaic Cultural Complex, as one of the 11 partners in this state grant, participates in the hypertension intervention by providing chronic disease self-management program classes, as well as self-monitoring blood pressure education through referrals from clinical partners," City Communications Specialist John Hill told GoLocalWorcester.
However, there is no specific mention of these services on the Mosaic Cultural Complex website.
(Another unrelated $8,000 was distributed to the organization through the City Manager’s office in November 2013 - bringing the total payment to over $60,000 - although the payment was unrelated to the DPH grants. At the time the November check was cut, the Secretary of State had apparently already dissolved Mosaic Cultural Complex.)
In a statement released in response to an inquiry from GoLocalWorcester, Hill writes, "The Prevention and Wellness Trust Fund is a grant program of the Massachusetts Department of Public Health awarded to nine communities across the state. The grant looks to reduce health care costs in three preventable health conditions; uncontrolled hypertension, pediatric asthma, and senior falls. Through evidence based community-clinical linkages the grant programs seek to serve the community’s most vulnerable populations. The city sees this partnership as a unique approach to continuing our mission to make Worcester the healthiest city in New England by 2020."
When the recipients were announced in January 2014, City Councilor Sarai Rivera said, “"This unique opportunity is an innovative approach to help thousands of Worcester residents access a more culturally competent approach to health and wellness. Promoting wellness and preventing disease are the pillars of good public health."
“This is a significant opportunity for the City of Worcester," added Mayor Joseph Petty. "This partnership did an extraordinary job representing the needs of this community. In addition, WDPH played a key role in bringing the different organizations to the table, and in ensuring that the proposal that was ultimately submitted would meet the needs of the communities we serve."
Who is This Group? What Do They Do?
Through her own admission, Mosaic is a business owned by Co-Founder and President Brenda Jenkins. Jenkins is also the Community Relations Director of YMCA of Central Massachusetts.
According to their website, Mosaic Cultural Complex is a “grassroots organization whose mission is to provide the highest level of services, to improve the quality of life for vulnerable populations through holistic services based on Christian principles, with a focus on men of color.”
However, the website doesn’t say much else beyond advocating for the Barbershop Health Network (BHN). Apparently this organization was created by Mosaic and founded by Barbershop owners. BHN educates men of color about screening and early detection of preventable diseases, including prostate cancer, diabetes, and hypertension. BHN also “Refer men to quality, local health primary care physicians and Access to affordable quality produce to men.”
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As a condition of receiving the grant from the city, each organization must focus on achieving “specified health and cost saving benchmarks on at least two of the four health issues prioritized by the Trust”: hypertension, smoking, falls prevention among older adults and pediatric asthma."
In May, Mosaic and BHN joined AdMeTech Foundation, a nonprofit based in Boston that runs “programs in research, education and awareness in order to advance early detection and treatment” of prostate cancer, for a symposium on prostate cancer hosted by the YMCA of Central Massachusetts, where Jenkins works.
Aside from this event, there isn’t much more information available as far as an active public health role Mosaic plays within the city and there is no contact information available on the Mosaic website.
So how do they fall under the umbrella and gain funding through the city’s Department of Public Health? How are they fighting chronic illness and reducing healthcare costs?
According to the website Coming Home Worcester, which identifies itself as a “resources for the reentry population of Greater Worcester,” Mosaic Cultural Complex is provides the following services:
“On a weekly basis… provide a system of case management, support and healing. These Peace /circles show participants how to: Reframe and rewrite their life stories; Reframe their past; Break the shackles of shame; Release the pain; Stop the slow acid drip of regret; Move from grief to gain; Practice acceptance; /Cultivate gratitude; Break the habit of blame /find Inner Peace and create a satisfying future. Serves all Men of Color whom have experienced trauma. Men are identified through the Peace Circles as being a victim of or perpetrator of violence. The Trauma Circle utilizes the Peace Circle process combined with clinical expertise to address Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.”
Mosaic’s own website has no schedule of meetings for these Circles, or any strategy on how they go about organizing them.
Mosaic and the Henry Lee Willis Center
The Henry Lee Willis Center served as the fiscal agent (they were responsible for the money) for the grant and was responsible for assisting Mosaic in their Efforts to Outcomes (ETO) implementation.
In January 2013, the Henry Lee Willis Center in Worcester was shut down following an audit by the state that found that the social service center had charged more than $143,000 to the state in questionable expenses.
According to the state’s report, “We found that costs were not sufficiently controlled and Center management did not effectively respond to financial losses it incurred during fiscal year 2004 through fiscal year 2012. As a result of these losses, the Center was in poor financial condition and was operating with accumulated deficits from current operations that at one point approached almost $1 million.”
The Willis Center was audited from July 2010 to February 2013.
Mosaic and the Kelley Square Protest
In recent months, Mosaic Cultural Complex has come under scrutiny from the City, the Worcester Police Department, and a local blog, for facilitating and planning the Black Lives Matter protest in Kelley Square.
The protest led to four participants (Robert Blackwell Gibbs, Sonya Conner, Julius Jones and Kevin Ksen) being charged with being a disorderly person and for disturbing the peace.
Augustus’ statement read:
On January 19th, a group of protestors purposely blocked traffic in Kelley Square for more than four minutes. Shortly thereafter, I and members of the Worcester Police Department leadership spoke to members of the group and offered a compromise: If they would commit to refraining from blocking public streets in future protests, I would ask the Worcester Police Department not to seek charges against anyone involved. That offer – which still stands – has been declined.
The residents of Worcester have the right to traverse public streets unimpeded. The city has the responsibility to protect the right to protest, but that right must be carefully balanced against our duty to maintain public safety. As chief conservator of the peace in the city of Worcester, my job is to balance those competing interests. The city can not and will not allow unauthorized blocking of public ways, no matter the reason.
GoLocalWorcester has submitted a request for all files and documentation relating to the grants received by Mosaic from the city. According to the City of Worcester, that information will be provided within a few weeks. Stay with GoLocalWorcester for more information as it becomes available.
(Editor's note: The original text of this story has been changed. Initially, the story had the City of Worcester had no specifics as to the services rendered by Mosaic Cultural Complex. GoLocalWorcester was given specifics by the City, but added that Mosaic's website had no mention of these services being offered.)
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