GET TO KNOW ACTIVIST, COMMUNITY LEADER, AND NMBLC BOARD PRESIDENT- AMY WHITFIELD

A one-on-one with New Mexico Black Leadership Council’s Board President and agent of change Amy Whitfield!

For NMBLC Board President Amy Whitfield, a heart for social justice just comes naturally.

What initially drew Amy’s attention to the Black Leadership Council goes back to the day that she first witnessed Roots Summer Leadership Academy. “I got really excited… I kept saying, whatever I can do, I want to be a part of it.” A passion for change and community outreach goes back to Amy’s childhood in South Dakota where she grew up watching her parents be the change in their own community. Since coming to New Mexico from Portland, Maine in 2004, she has continued to carry her family’s legacy of community dedication.

Check out our interview below!

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One-on-One with Leader and Activist Amy Whitfield

Note: Answers have been edited and condensed for length and clarity.

Megan Bott: So how did you get to be involved with the New Mexico Black Leadership Council?

Amy Whitfield: I got an invitation to the Roots Summer Leadership Program. And, you know, I was sitting there, and I was watching it. I was just amazed at how extensive it was, and how it really gave our young people a chance to learn and grow, you know, with their own culture in mind. I love how the parents were being brought into that process. So I think I forced my way in because I was watching all of that happen. [Cathryn McGill] was standing there and I kept saying, you know, I want to help, whatever I can do, I want to be a part of it. She said, you know, it’s larger, it’s all these different spokes and I got really excited about that. So she let me join the board and I’m really excited to be a part of it!

MB: Outside of being on our board, what else do you do?

AW: I recently took the position of the Executive Director for the Office of African American Affairs, and I’m very, very excited about being able to work in the community to drive forward how we improve the lives of African Americans, from a political standpoint, how to invest in our communities, and build empowerment and capacity in our communities. 

“It’s hard to say here’s when I got involved [in the community], and here’s why I got involved. It’s just always been my life.”

– Amy Whitfield, NMBLC Board President

MB: So, aside from being Black, what set you in the direction of wanting to get involved in and contribute to improving our community?

AW: Aside from being black, yeah, that’s a great way to say that. I think social justice was a thing in my house. It was what we do. So my parents believed that in everything you do you make space for the person who is less privileged than you and so I recently have been hearing everyone say the quote, I believe it’s a Shirley Chisholm quote, “if they don’t give you space at the table, bring your own chair.” That was how my parents lived their life, making space for other people, not bringing the chair. I don’t know, it’s hard to say here’s when I got involved, and here’s why I got involved. It’s just always been my life. I remember going to cheerleading camp and wondering why there weren’t any people with disabilities there and talking to my high school coach about how we could create [space] where people in wheelchairs could get involved. I remember having conversations in church. It wasn’t something you had to come to, it was just like a part of the Whitfield family thing that we do.

MB: Is there anyone in particular who is in the social justice field that you can say sort of guided you?

AW: I would say my dad, you know, again, it was the way of living. When you grew up in small towns in the Midwest…there’s not usually a lot of race conversations. When I went to college, I had this very feminist mindset. I took a course on the sociology of gender. I got introduced to all of these, like feminist women of color and Alice Walker. It was 20 years ago, I believe it was an article or maybe a short story on what it is to be a woman. So really thinking about feminists from a Black perspective changed the way that I think about it. Prior to that, I was like, Oh, I can deal with race over here with my friends who talk about race. I can deal with feminism over here with my friends who talk about gender. Her theory of womanism just really kind of opened up the door for me to be like I don’t live race sometimes and gender sometimes. Later on, I learned about Kimberly Crenshaw and intersectionality. I was kind of like, this is what Alice Walker was saying. Patricia Hill-Collins is someone that I really love to read as well. So I think all of those people have been really significant in my own understanding of social justice.

“We use the words community engagement when really we’re talking about ‘I had a town hall meeting’ or ‘I had a meeting for people to show up and for me to tell them what we’re doing’. That’s not community engagement.”

AW: I think one of the things that has really moved me forward in social justice work is the Tamarack Institute. I think we talk about community outreach as if it’s this natural thing, right? Like you just go walk the streets and you talk to the community, but historically, that’s been very damaging to communities in that it gives people in power the feeling, a sense, that they’ve done their job of talking with communities, but they haven’t actually. So, I’ve really been moved by the Tamarack Institute’s continuum of community engagement. There are times when you’re with a community, that you’re just informing the community, and you don’t get to pretend that that’s engagement, you don’t get to pretend that that’s empowering, you don’t get to pretend that that is real community-based organizing. That continuum goes all the way up to empower. That is when we’re really doing community work. That has been very, very important to me over the last maybe 10 years, but extremely important to me in the last two years that I’ve been in state government. Far too often in state government, we use the word[s] community engagement when really we’re talking about ‘I had a town hall meeting’ or ‘I had a meeting for people to show up and for me to tell them what we’re doing’. That’s not community engagement. So I’m really into their stuff right now.

MB: We’re seeing a lot of Black women being put into higher positions, especially with the Biden-Harris administration, and you kind of touched on feminism and to be a womanist and to be Black; seeing this increase, do you think that this is something that’s just happening at the moment because of what we’ve experienced over the summer? Or do you think that this is setting us up for long-term, seeing Black women in these powerful positions?

AW: I’m very, very proud of Kamala Harris, and you know what she means to all of us. But, this isn’t brand new. I think for some reason, we’re starting to say look at all of the Black women in high positions. That’s not, or at least I don’t believe, it is brand new to see Black women in these positions of power, and it’s definitely not brand new to see them doing really, really well, like exceeding our thoughts of what those positions are supposed to do. I don’t even think it’s new to see it in our own communities. I think about Diana Dorn Jones. I think about Jane Powdrell and the people who locally here have been in some very high-level positions and been very successful. I think we’re talking about it now, because they’re rising to a new level, like, nobody’s ever been vice president before. But there have been several people directly beneath the vice president. Of course, it’s going to continue, right, because it has been continuing. I think when I was young, Mae Jamison was the first Black female astronaut. So that is my whole reference. You know, I’m 40 years old. I reference ‘when did I start seeing black female leaders?’ in fourth grade, fifth grade, you know.

MB: Aside from working and making change in the community, what do you do in your free time?

AW: I love to hike. It’s one of the reasons why I have fallen in love with New Mexico because there are so many hiking opportunities in New Mexico, but it’s so close to everything else. It’s like a five-hour drive for me to get to the Utah Red Rocks. I always wanted to be a Black Nerd. I don’t know that I’ve actually gotten there by watching documentaries. But, you know, we’ll see. Maybe somebody will say that’s me. Then I am trying really, really hard to achieve the status of pitmaster. I am a barbecue junkie. I have four different smokers and grills and all of that. You gotta have your Traeger, which is your Pellet Grill. You need four. I know I still need to get a ceramic one. And I also need to get a big huge Weber one, like a Weber circle one. But one day I will be a pitmaster. I’m pretty sure of it. I think that’s going to be my next job. I don’t know how to do it. But I will. I am striving!

“ Very few people will remember my dad but everyone will remember what my dad did, and the impact that he had.”

-Amy Whitfield

MB: Who do you admire most?

AW: My Dad. I don’t know that anybody would ever remember my Dad. He’s very quiet, where my mom is like, everyone’s friend. Very few people will remember my dad but everyone will remember what my dad did, and the impact that he had. I can tell you all the things that he’s done, versus other folks who don’t live with him or didn’t live with him. They’ll say, oh you know, we ended up with a park at that school. And I don’t know why the park and the school were connected to each other. They have no idea. They just appreciate that the park and the school are right next to each other, which is something that my dad did in one of the towns that we grew up in. He highly advocated for the school and the parks to be right next to each other because he really believed that schools needed to be community spaces, just like parks are community spaces. Now when you go to schools of population health and schools of public health and stuff like that, they teach you that what you’re supposed to do is put schools as community spaces, and my dad was doing it like in the ‘80s. It’s fascinating to me to watch because he never [got the glory] not that glory is bad. I just admired [it] once I was older. As a child, I was just irritated like, come on, Dad, let’s do something else. I don’t want to go visit the city councilman. As an adult, I sit back and I’m like, that man played chess with our whole entire town! I think now, they would call him a political strategist but he’s just a pastor. You know, he’s like this is what my church members need so I’m going to do it. I’m going to make it happen. He shifted the community with nobody noticing.

MB: Do you have a personal mantra?

AW: I love having creative and exciting bosses and that has been a blessing in my life that so many of the bosses I’ve had in my life have really pushed me to be better, like, don’t get excited when somebody says good job, be excited to push past what people think is a good job and to do better. I also love that they’ve always given me work that was outside of my scope. I’m telling this story for a reason, I promise. So, the governor just gave me four months ago the opportunity to sit in as the Interim Executive Director at the Office of African American Affairs, never crossed my mind to do it, never was interested in it. It just wasn’t inside my scope. I’m a social worker, I never thought about working over at the Office of African American Affairs. I could have said, that’s not my skill set. That’s not what I want to do, like, I could have said a hundred different things but instead, I said, sure, let’s see what this adventure brings. It has unraveled into this amazing opportunity to do something in my community and to be connected with the staff that’s there that I probably never would have met on my own. It’s not like a mantra that I say but it’s an attitude, maybe, where I’m like, let’s see where this adventure takes me. I don’t say no, because it doesn’t feel right. I say no when it’s unethical and I say no when it crosses my boundaries or I say no when I can’t see value in it. But I don’t say no because I’m scared and I don’t say no because it doesn’t feel like it’s for me or something like that. I just want to see where it takes me.

MB: Is there anything else that you would like to share?

AW: I want to say that being Board President of the Black Leadership Council, I’m so excited about all the places that it can take us. The model for the Black Leadership Council is exciting! It’s exciting hitting these multiple topics and these multiple levels. It’s exciting to see where this organization is going to go. And I’m really happy and proud to be a part of that.