Join High Ground News on Feb. 28 at Clayborn Temple for “Economic Justice in the City,” a conversation with five Memphis business leaders on the strength of entrepreneurship as a strategy to grow the middle class and what barriers remain in the effort to spread Memphis’ wealth.
Join High Ground News on Feb. 28 at Clayborn Temple for “Economic Justice in the City,” a conversation with five Memphis business leaders on the strength of entrepreneurship as a strategy to grow the middle class and what barriers remain in the effort to spread Memphis’ wealth.
"Economic Diversity in the City", presented in partnership with EPIcenter Memphis, is from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. and is free and open to the public,
but please RSVP to reserve your spot.
The event features a panel conversation with:
Darrell Cobbins, president and CEO of Universal Commercial
Cynthia Daniels, chief event strategist at Cynthia Daniels & Co.
Elizabeth Lemmonds, director of talent programs at EPIcenter Memphis
Montgomery Martin, founder and CEO of Montgomery Martin Contractors
Joann Massey, director of the City of Memphis office of business diversity and compliance
The discussion is moderated by award-winning journalist Wendi C. Thomas. She is the editor of MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, a yearlong online reporting project focused on economic justice.
African American-owned businesses earn less than one percent of all revenue flowing through Memphis.
That’s according to the U.S. Census Bureau’s most recent findings released in December 2015. Of all the revenue flowing through Memphis in 2012, black-owned firms only garnered 0.83 percent of those receipts. Women-owned firms earned 2.73 percent.
In the year after that data was released, the city of Memphis launched new programs, initiated stricter diversity participation benchmarks and brought broader partnerships between the public and private spheres.
But are those efforts going far enough? High Ground News, with partner EPIcenter Memphis, takes a look at “Economic Justice in the City,” the fifth in a series of entrepreneurship-focused speaker events.
Clayborn Temple, 294 Hernando Street, was a civic and community anchor during the Civil Rights Movement and is the site for this local conversation. Refreshments will be provided.
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