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A Health Care System that Buckled but Held: NJ 2020, the Year of COVID-19

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The pandemic altered how we do everything from celebrate holidays to vote for president, and highlighted strengths — and weaknesses — in our health care system

This story was written and produced by NJ Spotlight. It is being republished under a special NJ News Commons content-sharing agreement related to COVID-19 coverage. To read more, visit njspotlight.com.

Full story link – HERE.

By Lilo H. Stainton

Like something from science fiction, 2020 was upended by a minute, spike-crowned virus that spread aggressively among people, caused unprecedented disease and death, and altered the way we do everything from celebrate holidays to vote for president.

The novel coronavirus put immense stress on all our public structures, but the impact was particularly profound for health care systems nationwide and in New Jersey, which was among the first states to diagnose cases of COVID-19 — the disease caused by the virus — and which remains among those hardest-hit by the pandemic.

Since March 4, when New Jersey announced the first confirmed case of the disease, more than 467,600 state residents have been diagnosed, including nearly 18,800 who have died as a result. Overall, almost 46,500 people have been hospitalized for COVID-19, which takes an outsize toll on Black and brown communities, and many struggled for months to fully recover.

By the time the coronavirus emerged here, Gov. Phil Murphy had formed a task force that had been meeting for weeks under the leadership of state health commissioner Judy Persichilli, dubbed by Murphy “the woman who needs no introduction” in what would eventually become  daily media briefings. Murphy signed an executive order formally declaring a public health emergency on March 9 and ten days later began what would be a near-total shutdown of the state’s businesses, schools and civic spaces. Only services deemed essential were permitted to remain open, under new restrictions. That executive order has been extended every month since.

Why race and racism mattered

The impact of the coronavirus on communities of color was evident by early April, as soon as state officials began sharing demographic details of cases, but how this was connected to social determinants of health became more apparent over time. Studies have shown that decades of racist public policy and economic trends had put Black and brown families, here and across the country, at greater risk for infection, hospitalization and death than their white counterparts. These groups are more likely to live in crowded, multigenerational households that allow for easy spread of the virus; in communities that lack options for health and wellness, and experience underlying conditions like asthma and diabetes at higher rates.

Studies have also shown that Black and brown individuals make up an outsize share of those in frontline jobs, putting them at greater risk working as food servers, home care aides or public transit officials, jobs that can’t be done from the safety of home. Overall, four in 10 frontline workers are people of color and 57% of bus drivers are Black, according to the nonprofit Center for Economic and Policy Research.

In addition, these individuals are less likely to have easy access to COVID-19 testing and care if they are sick, and may not be prioritized for new, more effective treatments with the same frequency as white patients. These factors combine to leave Black and Hispanic residents significantly more likely to contract COVID-19 than white New Jerseyans, at least three times more likely to be hospitalized, and twice as likely to die as a result, according to state data.

“No one is surprised by this. And if they are, they haven’t been paying attention,” Dr. Denise Rodgers, a vice chancellor at Rutgers Biomedical and Health Sciences program and professor of family medicine and community health at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, said in April. “The reality is, COVID-19 could just become another in a very long list of diseases for which there are substantial disparities in outcome by race and ethnicity.”

While public life had slowed to a crawl in March, the pace quickened for many health care and hospital workers. Despite a slow start to testing for the disease in New Jersey as nationwide, diagnoses were ticking up quickly and COVID-19 hospitalizations of very sick patients growing exponentially; clinicians said they had never seen people arrive with such little oxygen in their blood, a sign of severely impaired lung function.

By April, Persichilli and her team were worried that hospitals would run out of space for all the extremely sick COVID-19 patients. Plans were launched to stand up at least three field medical stations, using a common wartime technique to back up a strained civilian system. Other former hospitals were repurposed to provide additional beds, if needed.

Facing unthinkable decisions

With COVID-19 hospitalizations spiraling upward, concerns had begun to emerge about the supply of critical resources, especially masks, gowns, gloves and other personal protective equipment, or PPE, a term Americans would come to know well. Nurses at some New Jersey hospitals and nursing homes were ringing alarm bells, afraid their facility would soon run out of these inexpensive but critical elements, much of which was made or sourced in China, which was also devastated by earlier bouts of the coronavirus.

Persichilli, a nurse who previously ran a large, multi-state hospital system, expressed shock that this was happening in a nation of such bounty. The Department of Health worked with the State Police to find, order and stockpile additional resources; a joint effort with the New Jersey Hospital Association, which represents the state’s 71 acute care sites and other health care facilities, now allows the state to track the use and distribution statewide.

But PPE was only part of the problem. Another concern soon emerged about a potential shortage of ventilators, the mechanical breathing machines that were a primary treatment for many COVID-19 patients early on. Hospital officials were apprehensive and the state empaneled an expert task force to draw up a triage plan to help health care providers decide how to prioritize ventilator use, if a shortage became real. That never happened, officials insist, and the recommended treatment has since shifted to favor other practices over ventilators.

“When the resource is scarce, the goal is to save the most lives with the resources available,” Dr. Hannah Lipman, a gerontologist and director of the Center for Bioethics at Hackensack University Medical Center, part of Hackensack Meridian Health, told NJ Spotlight News at the time. “When resources aren’t scarce, those two goals are not in tension.”

It soon became clear that equipment wasn’t the only issue. As the virus spread, health care workers became sick or exposed, requiring them to quarantine for two weeks before they could return to work, if they were healthy by then. This problem compounded, prompting an ever-growing shortage of workers — particularly nursing staff and respiratory therapists. Efforts to call in retired nurses or trained volunteers provided some extra hands, but eventually New Jersey officials called in nurses from other states and arranged with clinical personnel from the U.S. military to help care for patients in the short term. (Staffing shortages continue to be a concern, as hospitalizations are again increasing, but with the pandemic affecting almost all states, reinforcements are now hard to find.)

Hospitalizations peaked in New Jersey on April 14, when more than 8,000 COVID-19 patients were in acute care facilities, nearly a quarter requiring intensive care. (Predictive modeling suggests the current wave will peak sometime in January, with fewer hospitalizations than in the spring.) As the impact of the statewide shutdown — coupled with constant reminders from health officials to keep distance, wash one’s hands and wear a mask, something that had been a point of debate early on — began to take effect, the impact on hospitals began to decline. In the end, the field hospitals and auxiliary sites, with space for nearly 1,000 people altogether, would treat just over 500 patients before closing in May.

Warming weather and declining virus counts brought some relief, and by mid-May the Murphy administration took steps toward reopening the state’s economy and public spaces. At the same time, public health leaders and the families of nursing home residents were raising the alarm about conditions at the state’s 650-plus long-term care facilities. In New Jersey and nationwide, these sites — with frail elderly and medically fragile individuals in close quarters — were an easy target for the virus. Nearly 7,500 residents and staff at these facilities have died of COVID-19, or 40% of the state’s total fatalities.

Institutions rally, flaws exposed

While hospitals in New Jersey were largely celebrated for the extreme measures they took to protect and save lives — working together to share PPE, ventilators and treatment tips, despite long-standing regional competition — nursing homes have generally faced criticism for their response to the pandemic. Some long-term care facilities, including at least one of the three state-run veterans homes, reportedly failed to implement universal mask use or properly separate sick residents from those who were well, exacerbating the spread of COVID-19. Others suffered serious shortages of PPE and staff, resulting in sub-par care, with residents not receiving meals or medication on time and lying in dirty diapers for hours on end. Communication with family members also ground to a halt at some facilities, leaving loved ones — who were unable to visit in person — at a loss for information.

By May, the situation had reached such a critical point that the Murphy administration hired experts from Manatt Health, who spent nearly a month compiling a detailed report on New Jersey’s nursing homes, with short- and long-term recommendations to improve the response. The report, which cost $500,000, identified a host of long-standing problems at these facilities, including inadequate funding, lack of staff and problems with infection control. Manatt’s recommendations prompted legislative hearings and multiple bills, many of which Murphy has signed, and the governor has pledged to spend at least $10 million in federal funds to better these facilities.

As spring turned to summer, the daily case count kept declining and the impact on health care facilities ebbed, leading Murphy to take steps to reverse the statewide shut-down. Reopening continued during the summer months and state officials encouraged local school leaders to take steps so that children could safely return to classrooms in the fall. But the progress was tempered by new outbreaks — initially linked to a few high-profile private parties — and then growing viral spread in the community. Murphy instituted new limits on gatherings in mid-November and eventually begged people to limit private gatherings indoors and rethink plans for the approaching holidays.

“As the governor has stated, this will not be a normal Thanksgiving. With the alarming surge in our cases, we all need to be vigilant and take all of the public health precautions that helped us to limit the spread of the virus last spring,” Persichilli said at that time. “Our lives — and the lives of our loved ones — depend on it.”

Vaccines here at last

The controversial presidential election — unprecedented itself, with voting in New Jersey mostly by mail — served as a diversion of sorts from the battle against the virus. And by Thanksgiving, the promise of a vaccine offered hope to many here and beyond, despite widespread distrust for the process under which vaccines had been developed and were being approved. By mid-December, federal officials had approved for emergency use two highly effective vaccines from the drugmakers Pfizer and Moderna. Vaccinations for health care workers at risk for infection began on Dec. 15, at University Hospital in Newark; immunizations at nursing homes started this week with 103-year-old Mildred Clements at Roosevelt Care Center in Old Bridge.

According to the state vaccination plan, the priority, or 1a group, includes health care workers at risk for infection and residents and staff at long-term care centers — although Persichilli conceded on Monday there was some confusion over who was covered in this category. As of Monday, more than 46,000 individuals had been vaccinated in the state.

The state Department of Health is now working to delineate who will be part of 1b, the next group to have access to vaccinations, which could begin in the weeks to come. These vaccines will be administered at community clinics, county health departments, drugstores and six state-run “mega sites” which Murphy has said will be set up in the weeks and months to come, based on vaccine availability, logistics and demand.

The governor closed his briefing on Monday this week with another warning to avoid large gatherings on New Year’s Eve, imploring people to celebrate responsibly and get tested if concerned.

“We have a lot to look forward to in the new year, but it must start with our staying focused on the practices that have gotten us through most of 2020: social distancing, wearing our face masks, washing our hands with soap and water, using common sense — meaning if you’ve been exposed, take yourself off the field. If you don’t feel well, take yourself off the field,” Murphy said. “But make no mistake, better days are ahead. Let’s make sure that we make it to those days together.”

 

Header:  Photo by Maria Oswalt on Unsplash

Jersey City Native Launches WatchThatNegro.com

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As a social media tool, Facebook has become the perfect site for sharing funny cat memes, photos of last night’s dinner, and the images from the family reunion. Try using it to spark a political dialogue, however, and you’re likely to end up in Facebook jail. For the uninitiated, “Facebook jail” happens when a person repeatedly posts content that violates the site’s standards. On its surface it sounds like a good practice, but talk to nonwhite users of the site who have tried to discuss race issues on Facebook, and you’ll find many have been “Zucked” for posting what the site calls “hate speech.”

Meanwhile, the Facebook page for “Kenosha Guard” was allowed to stay active, despite encouraging “armed citizens to protect our lives and property.” The page remained active even after Facebook received complaints from the public, due to the implied threat of gun violence.

The apparent double standard can be emotionally exhausting for people of color and other groups who feel the social media landscape too often mirrors the worst of what already exists offline. While organizations like Color of Change seek to reform platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, others hope to create new online spaces that can succeed where the industry leaders have failed.

Enter Jersey City native Quinn Williamson and WatchThatNegro.com. Williamson, who is nonbinary and uses the “they/them” pronouns, created the site in 2016 so that “uncomfortable” speech could exist without censorship.

“I have a friend who is an influencer who had a post Instagram around that time. The post wasn’t harmful, but it may have been uncomfortable for some white people. And I though, just because you are uncomfortable with a post doesn’t mean it should be taken down, especially on these public platforms,” Williamson recounted. “So, that made me think we need a space for us, by us where you can say exactly what you want freely and unapologetically, so long as you aren’t encouraging violence.”

They say the site’s origin also coincided with the rise of Blue Lives Matter, a phrase meant to pushback against the Black Lives Matter movement.

“At the time, a lot of people were posting on different social media platforms, in very short form, explaining their grievances around social and racial injustices,” Williamson said. “And I shout it would be great if we had one singular platform where people could really thoroughly explain their opinions that might be seen as soundbites on Twitter or Instagram.”

The site also includes posts from LGBTQ+ writers who address social justice from their unique perspective.

Williamson was a college sophomore at Howard University at the time doing a double major in political science and philosophy. Life and school being what they are, WatchThatNegro.com eventually took a backseat to classes and homework. The site came off of hiatus this year following Williamson’s 2019 graduation from HU and return to Jersey City.

Williamson admits the site will likely be “uncomfortable” and unsettling, even among people who may see themselves as allies.

An open letter on the site titled “Dear cisgender idealism,” by Afro’Man Blac notes, “To be transgender is to acknowledge the manipulation of gender through patriarchy and to resist it through existence. Trans threatens your identity and failing systems; you all fear it and all that defies your androcentric gender complex. Hence transphobia.”

Elsewhere, the site’s editors suggest their Top 10 List of literary works by black writers that should be, in their opinion, mandatory reading for high school students, a list that is sure to invite much debate. (The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison is there, but not Alice Walker’s The Color Purple? Zadie Smith’s White Teeth makes the cut, but not Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates? Lols, guys.)

But that’s point, said Williamson, who is now a first year grad student at Tufts University, though studying remotely in JC due to the pandemic. The point is to provoke.

Speaking of provoking, there is the site’s rather jarring name, Watch that Negro. Over the summer Roger Stone, an advisor to Donald Trump, got in trouble for allegedly referring to black radio host Morris O’Kelly as a “Negro” on-air. So, is “Negro” the new n-word?

“When I decided this was going to be the name I was fully aware that it was going to be off-putting to a lot of people — a lot of black people — because we don’t use that term anymore,” Williamson acknowledged. “But I think this is just another case of reclaiming a word that we didn’t initially call ourselves, taking the power from the word, which I think is necessary.”

The site’s title, though, has its roots in an unreleased song lyric that is very much in synch with its stated purpose. The lyric refers to a black man moving on a dance floor — freely, un-self-consciously, without fear of intervention from anyone.

Protest in front of Greenville Precinct

Editorial: It’s Time for Community Policing

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Shortly after Mayor Fulop’s election in 2013, he asked me to join the city’s Public Safety Advisory Board. It was a newly formed body in keeping with candidate Fulop’s stated goal of being more inclusive and transparent. The board, which would meet once a month, had no specific mandate or charter, but I figured why not. Maybe with my background as an assistant district attorney and criminal defense lawyer, I could make an impact.

One of my fellow board members was the late Bill Braker, an ex-cop, ex-freeholder, ex-con and, at that time, the president of the Jersey City NAACP. Bill came off as gruff and not a little intimidating. At one of the meetings, one of us (I can’t remember whether it was Bill or I) suggested that Jersey City implement community policing.  All of a sudden Bill became quite passionate. “You’ve got to get your people out on the street interacting with the community,” he told director James Shea. I chimed in in agreement.  Mr. Shea listened to us politely.

As an assistant district attorney, I’d witnessed New York City’s first foray into community policing in the late 1980s and become a believer.  It made perfect sense to me that the only way cops could gain trust and prevent and solve crime was to return to walking the beat, a practice that most U.S. police departments relied on for a good part of the twentieth century.

A few days after our meeting I went so far as to email Director Shea a New York Times article about the success of community policing in Camden, New Jersey. (Camden has not coincidentally been touted a lot lately for its success rebuilding its police department, lowering crime, and working with the community.)

I don’t know if Mr. Shea ever read it.

I couldn’t help but think of Bill as I walked up Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive this past Sunday afternoon gathering quotes for my colleague Alexandra Antonucci’s article on  defunding the police.  A twenty-something man who would only identify himself as “Slack” was blunt.

“They don’t do s— … all they doing is destructing our community and f—–g with us. They don’t protect, they don’t do none of that.”

Would he call the police for help? I asked. “We call each other … I can’t stand the mother f—–s.  It’s gotten worse.”

Then there was the voluble sixty-something John Hines.

“If you look at it right now, you have police on every corner in this town, but most of us are afraid of them. Some of these cops be on the same corner for months and months, but nobody even know their name. There’s no community involvement. Back in the sixties or fifties, everybody knew the community cop that walked the beat. When I came up there was the … PAL [Police Athletic League]. There is no longer that. It all starts with the [kids]. It all starts with educating the mindset of a different generation.”

A young woman named Alex Fahmy complained that the police “are not really doing their job” and “take very long to come to a crime scene.”

When asked whether the police are responsive to the community, she said “not at all.”

So here we are. It’s six years after Bill Braker and I broached the subject of community policing with the city’s public safety director, and people of color in Jersey City appear to have little trust in — or respect for — its police force. I don’t think Bill or I were ever under the illusion that our suggestions carried enough weight to change policy but I can’t help but wonder if things might have turned out differently had Jersey City embraced community policing back then.

One popular solution being bandied about is “de-escalation” training.  To that end, the mayor has proposed spending $1,000,000 on Seal Team Six-inspired “Tomahawk Strategic Solutions.” Given that Tomahawk’s “team” has all the ethnic diversity of a dinner party hosted by David Duke, it’s not surprising that local activists are pushing back and demanding a seat at the table.

There’s no doubt that de-escalation training is needed. Just last month, police descended on Bostwick Avenue in response to a fistfight (which had largely ended by the time they arrived) and ended up engaged in a full-blown brawl with local residents, several of whom ended up arrested and injured.  A shining example of de-escalation and community relations it was not.

But even if implemented perfectly, de-escalation training will only go so far.  Sure, it will keep bad situations from getting worse. But why not be more ambitious?  Why not try to prevent bad situations from occurring in the first place? Why not focus on building relationships and gaining the trust and cooperation of people in the neighborhoods you serve?  Why not get out from behind the glass of your patrol car or away from that corner you’re posted to? It seems obvious and eminently doable.

If I as a complete stranger can walk down the street and get people to open up and share their thoughts and concerns, as I did on Sunday, Jersey City police can too.

It’s time for community policing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lewis Spears surrounded by young men of color

Fatherhood and Mentoring Young Men of Color

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Lewis Spears Reflects on His Life and Work

Sometimes it pays to be bookish. Or so it would seem, given the experience of Lewis Spears, founder of Kismet of Kings, an organization dedicated to mentoring young men of color.

That he wasn’t a jock became painfully clear early in life. He remembers standing in the outfield during baseball practice at the Booker T. Houses where he grew up. As he humorously describes it, his friends were catching fly balls “with one hand, while spinning with their eyes closed.”  But not Spears. “I would miss it every time. I sucked so bad at it.”  At the Boys and Girls Club he learned that he “sucked” at basketball too.

But there was a place Spears shined: school. Spears was a born student. He could read a story and recite it back to someone word for word. He memorized poems and plays.  He competed in spelling bees. “I was always the teacher’s pet,” he confessed. He would go on to get a bachelor’s degree in African American studies at Rutgers, a master’s degree in urban education from NJCU and a master’s of education concentrating in school leadership from Harvard.

Talking to Spears, it quickly becomes apparent that he still has the sharp mind that made him a favorite of teachers. He often gives the exact date for the major events in his life; in public appearance he recites long poems to highlight a point he is making. He is half performer, half motivational speaker.

Kismet of Kings was born out of tragedy. The year was 2009. Spears was studying at Rutgers; his beloved cousin, Jalil, would come to visit. In Jersey City, Jalil could come off as “street” but at Rutgers, he was a different person, Spears remembers.

“He was freer, he felt like he could be normal. But then when he went back home to Jersey City, you know, …” his voice trails off.

Spears is clearly protective of Jalil’s memory. “He got involved in activities I didn’t know about.”

On April 25 of that year Jalil was gunned down at the Booker T. houses where Spears had grown up. “Jalil wanted to be a lawyer. It was a dream denied.”

Of course, Spears was already acutely aware of the challenges faced by young men of color growing up in tough neighborhoods. “As you can imagine growing up in Jersey City in the projects, anything that you think of negatively, I probably experienced.  People using drugs and all that good stuff, to abuse and neglect. I remember not having any lights when we move outside of the projects.”

When it rained, their Section 8 apartment on Bostwick Avenue would flood. But Spears had it better than others. “Some of our friends went without food. I don’t ever remember going without food.”

I ask Spears what he attributes his success to. “[T]o being surrounded by a bunch of women … my great grandmother, my grandmother, my mom, her two sisters … I had two female cousins … being informed and just being sensitive and understanding and learning about things that are important to them,” he responds.

Spears’ father lived across the street in the Lafayette projects with his girlfriend and her children. “We would see each other by chance,” Spears said. Spears occasionally ran into him at a small mini-mart between the Booker T. and Lafayette projects. His father might buy him a bag of potato chips.  Then they would go their separate ways.

Spears’ experience wasn’t unique. “Most of the young men I knew, we grew up without dads in our houses.” But even in their absence, fathers played an outsize role in their imaginations.

“I do remember back in the day when someone would say, like, ‘My father, x, y, and z,’ whatever that was. I remember, like, like thinking about that, like, oh, wow, cool, your father. You know what I mean? Like, it’s almost like a shock, like, oh, wow, your father, cool. That’s pretty cool. Like you, you would almost … I don’t know how to describe it. Like you would almost set it apart as somebody who’s special because his dad did x, y, and z, you know what I mean? Most of us had our moms or our cousins or our grandparents, but like when your dad did something, you were very intentional about saying, oh, my dad did this.”

Spears becomes reflective.

“Growing up, [you] feel a certain longing or a certain sense of loss. Dad wasn’t that involved. I felt disposable, unloved and unwanted, like maybe I wasn’t good enough.”

At the age of 24, Spears summoned up the courage to confront his father.  “I decided to go to therapy. I used my therapist like a coach in the boxing ring. I had enough guts to call my dad to try to force some kind of relationship. I said you weren’t really there for me.  He said ‘I was there for you. I bought you Super Nintendo and I took you to get your license when you were 17.’ He focused on two things in my 17 years of living. I’m saying are you serious?”

Spears came to appreciate that his father had tried in his own way.

“Dad never had money. I would call him for the latest sneaker. Dad felt defeated.”

With the help of his therapist, Spears came to understand that his father had had his own “language of love,” which came down to “acts of kindness” like offering to wash Spears’ clothes or sharing recipes. When his father died, they were in a “good space.”

Spears found male guidance elsewhere. “One thing that made me aspire to do more was that I’ve always had mentors, mentors in the church, mentors in the school. They would always tell me, education is the way out.”

Spears’ cousin, Sean, ran a barbershop and supported Spears’ endeavors. One of Spears’ teachers, Don Howard, who later became the principal at Public School 12, would take him to car shows and to his house for dinner. Spears’ friend and mentor Alfonso Williams would “have the conversations. … He knew what we were dealing with, a Christian guy who understood the street.” Kabili Tayari of the NAACP took him on retreats and “exposed us to our greatness.” Spears joined the NAACP Youth Taskforce and attended a New Jersey Black Issues Convention.

After graduating, Spears went to work as a teacher in the Jersey City schools. “I made more than my mom and my dad combined as a teacher” Spears adds, seemingly amazed at his climb out of poverty. But Spears, even with his new relative affluence, was depressed. Ever since Jalil’s death, he’d wanted to do something for the struggling young men he’d grown up with.

At Christmas dinner in 2012, Spears’ friend, Sharmonique Henry (now a board member of Kismet of Kings), challenged him to start the organization dedicated to mentoring young men of color he’d been dreaming about.  For several years,Spears had been running an after-school program for Jerry Walker, a local community organizer, with responsibility for 250 kids — and had formed a sub-group of young men. Spears would invite speakers to talk about fatherlessness. “We would talk about how you navigate the streets when the bully is on one corner and the drug dealer is on another.” They talked about peer pressure and academic excellence.  The group at Team Walker became the seed of Kismet of Kings, which became a 501(c)(3) in 2016.

And what about the name?   “Kismet is a word derives from Egypt, and it means like fate or destiny, fate or destiny Kings. I needed them to know that they could essentially be business owners, that they could be stockbrokers, they could own their own homes … that they are kings … in their space… and that day that they have to take control of their destiny and what they… know to be true for themselves,” he explains.

Spears, father of two young boys, just celebrated ten years of marriage to Dr. Myriam Spears. In January of this year he gave up his job teaching in order to devote himself full time to Kismet of Kings. The organization is supported by a combination of state and local grants and private donations. He works with around 25 young men, meeting them twice a week. The organization has connected with over 500 young men through an annual convention it holds. One of his mentees recently graduated from college and has returned to work with Spears. He hopes to hire more former mentees shortly.

The focus is character and leadership development. “If your dad isn’t involved, it makes it essential to your development. K of K is a brotherhood that pushes the idea of togetherness. It transcends age, sexual preference and intellect. If you are a man, this is what is expected of you.”

Spears describes his work with one young man who was failing trigonometry. “No one said anything, not his teachers or his parents or guidance counselor. I said, yo what’s up with that?  I put a fire under his behind, and he got straight As. I held him accountable. I told him he had to sign up for tutoring. He had to show me receipts for tutoring. That he had to check in with me every week. I needed to talk to his teachers.”

The purpose of Kismet of Kings “is to serve as a life coach and mentor. I invest in young mens’ lives to change their trajectory and destiny. We as a society, sometimes we view black and brown young men as disposable, and because of that many of our young men feel invisible, that they aren’t being seen and that they aren’t heard. If we restore value back into them, if we let them know that they are loved, I think that a lot of the other issues around, violence and school dropouts will be alleviated.”