WS Chronicle

Grassroots organizer looks to keep local NAACP relevant

Community activist and grassroots organizer Kellie Easton has put her name in the running to become the next president of the Winston-Salem Chapter of the NAACP. Easton said when she received word that current president Rev. Alvin Carlisle wasn’t running for re-election, she decided to step up and accept the challenge.

“It was always one of my goals but I didn’t think it would happen now, so when I learned Carlisle wasn’t running, then I gave it some thought,” Easton continued. “But I think what really confirmed it for me was reading an article that Melissa Harris-Perry wrote about how to save the NAACP from irrelevance.”

In the opinion piece published in the New York Times, Harris-Perry, a professor at Wake Forest University, discussed several changes that need to happen to ultimately save the organization that was founded in 1909 to advance justice for African Americans. Easton said at a place in time where there is a huge disconnect between young people and the older generation and some of the traditional organizations, with her experience working with up-and-coming grassroots organizers and local organizations like the NAACP and others, she has what it takes to keep the local chapter of the organization relevant for years to come.

“I have a very solid relationship with a lot of the elders in the community, while at the same time I’m very active in the grassroots community and so I think we all want the same things but we just haven’t been able to bridge the gap,” Easton said.

Easton said to stay relevant the organization must be able educate the community and have the ability to apply pressure to the power structure. “I feel like that has a lot to do with the roots of the organization and that’s exactly what I feel is needed now,” she said.

A native of Winston-Salem and graduate of Morgan State University, Easton is most known throughout the community for her work with Action4Equity, a grassroots organization geared toward ensuring equity for every student in the district. She said the fight for students began in 2018 when she started hearing complaints about a mold issue at Ashley Elementary School (Ashley Academy for Cultural & Global Studies) that was causing students and teachers to get sick. “That was just one issue that garnered a lot of community interest and the more I learned about it, the more infuriated I became … I just felt that the community wasn’t being respected in a way that was needed to reflect a true democratic process,” Easton said. That same year Action4Equity joined forces with several other local organizations to file a discrimination complaint with the U.S. Department of Education.

The complaint filed alleges that WS/FCS violated Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that prohibits discrimination based on race, color or national origin. Less than six months later, the Department of Education agreed to look into the claim.

The Winston-Salem NAACP traditionally holds elections for the executive committee in November. Only current members in “good standing” are allowed to vote. When asked what the community and the members of the NAACP can expect from her if she is elected president, Easton said they can expect a leader who will work toward real change.

“They can expect for me to develop a collective,” Easton said. “A collective among shared values and to put pressure on the power structure to create real change for those who are impacted the most.”