The Power Coalition: How Integrated Voter Engagement is Empowering Citizens in Louisiana
Session Type(s): Panel
Starts: Thursday, Aug. 2 10:00 AM (Eastern)
Ends: Thursday, Aug. 2 11:15 AM (Eastern)
The Power Coalition for Equity and Justice has built an Integrated Voter Engagement (IVE) model to support community-driven activism and grassroots leadership development that empowers citizens to address classism, racism, and other marginalization in their own lives and communities instead of having their voices ignored in the traditional, top-down structures of power. Join us for a discussion on how to bridge and connect community organizing and advocacy that is people centered. We’ll also discuss how we have mobilized infrequent voters of color to chose elected leaders that understand their issues.
Moderator
Panelists
Norris Henderson
Norris Henderson believes that “those who are closest to the problem are closest to the solution.” A former Soros Justice Fellow, he has had tremendous success in his work impacting public policy and discourse about police accountability, public defense for poor and working-class people, and reforming the notorious Orleans Parish Prison (OPP). As someone who was wrongfully incarcerated for 27 years, Norris has firsthand experiences of the racism and brutality of the criminal justice system. He uses these experiences to address the needs of communities of color across Louisiana and beyond. Since his release in 2003, Norris has applied his 27 years of self-taught legal expertise and community organizing skills to a number of leadership positions, including Co-Director of Safe Streets/Strong Communities and Community Outreach Coordinator of the Louisiana Justice Coalition. Norris serves on a number of organizations’ Board of Directors including Family & Friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children, and acts as Board President of the Louisiana Center for Children’s Rights.
Other sessions: From Chains to Change: Race and the Right to Vote in the Nation's Incarceration Capital, Empowering Communities to End Mass Incarceration
Andrenecia Morris
Andreanecia M. Morris serves as the Executive Director for HousingNOLA, is a 10-year public private partnership working to solve New Orleans’ affordable housing crisis. The 10-year Strategy and Implementation Plan, released in 2015, indicates the need for 33,600 additional housing opportunities by 2025.
Morris has spent her career working to create affordable housing in Metro New Orleans. Post Katrina, she has either directly implemented or advocated for programs that created 500 first time homebuyers, disbursed $104.5 million soft second subsidy for Metro New Orleans and provided supportive services for approximately 5,000 households—homeowners who were struggling to rebuild and renters who required wrap around services. Morris was lead organizer for the Greater New Orleans Housing Alliance (GNOHA) when it started in 2007 as a loose coalition of non-profits and community development corporations and, since its incorporation in 2012, Morris has served as GNOHA’s Chair. She also is vice-chair of the Housing Authority of New Orleans, co-chair for the Louisiana Housing Trust Fund Initiative and is a board member of the Friends of Lafitte Greenway and the Mid-City Neighborhood Organization.
In 2016, BIZ New Orleans Magazine named Morris one of the Top 10 Influencers in Real Estate and in 2017 Morris was selected to participate in an international workshop on forced eviction and urban displacement in South Africa. The Baton Rouge Chapter of The Links, Incorporated also named Morris a National Trend Louisiana Role Model in December 2017. Gambit Weekly named Morris New Orleanian of the Year for leading HousingNOLA’s efforts to change housing policy in 2017.
Other sessions: Housing Touches Everything Progressives Care About. So Why Aren’t We Talking About It?