Sneak Peek: Creativity, Culture, and Capital podcast

Sheoyki Jones: So, the number one lesson I learned is: don’t assume that you know what a certain community wants or needs. I’ve seen it even sometimes in Invest Atlanta, sometimes we be like, “We think that they need a grocery store or something on the South Side,” and then they’re like, “No. We actually want a farmer’s market.” That’s the number one thing I push to cities is, “Actually talk to your creative communities, understand what their challenges are and build programming around that,” and then another thing I learned was educating our creative communities. Some of them just don’t know: they don’t know how government entities work. They don’t know where the dollars come from. They don’t even know what like the opportunities may be there, so if you’re thinking about really being equitable with your resources, it’s really just going to meet people where they are. That’s another thing is don’t expect them to come to your big, shiny office or city hall and things like that. Creative communities, they’re big on relationship, so you have to show up where they are and you have to support them, and then also truly support them. And then really try to create intentional opportunities and understand that everybody does not have the same starting point. Especially if you think about equity and inclusion, minorities may not have that same starting point but they have a great idea, so they may not have access to funding to be able to get their projects to a certain point to be able to effectively communicate or show you what it is that they’re trying to do. They may not have like a rich uncle. They may not be able to take out a loan, so just really understanding that everybody does not have the same starting point, and if you think about what equity and inclusion is, it’s how do we get them to the same starting point so that they have the same access to the opportunities as everyone else.