I, Dedria HB, need your support
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Dedria Humphries Barker is a candidate for the Lansing City Charter Commission in Lansing, Michigan, the state Capitol. She is the author of the social justice biography, Mother of Orphans: The True and Curious Story of Irish Alice, a Colored Man’s Widow (New York: 2Leaf Press, 2020). She earned Bachelor of Arts, and Master of Arts degrees in English from Wayne State University in Detroit.
Married and the mother of three adult children and grandmother to eight, she hails from the Humphries family of Detroit, and their four-generation legacy of public service and political participation.
She is a member of All Saints Episcopal Church (ASEC), Lansing Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta, The Author's Guild, and AARP, and Eastfield Neighborhood Association.
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Her public service career started when she was a student in high school, continued to her membership in Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. and on to her employment in higher education at Michigan State University and Lansing Community College.
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Qualifications
LEADER
COMMUNICATOR
Columnist, The City Pulse newspaper, Lansing, Michigan
Staff Writer, Lansing State Journal, Lansing, Michigan
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Originator Social Action Committee ZOOM program, COVID-19 Ingham County 911 Virtual Townhall; Member Elections Committee, Founder's Day Chairperson, Lansing Alumnae Chapter, Delta Sigma Theta.
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Senior Warden, Vestry Member, All Saints Episcopal Church, East Lansing, Two term (six years) member of vestry; four years on executive Board, three of those four years as senior warden.
Newcomers Committee chair, All Saints Church/
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President, Capital Area Council of Episcopal Churches.
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Lead Faculty; Faculty Mentoring Coordinator, Lansing Community College, Writing Program.
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Member, Inaugural Lansing Community College Faculty Senate.
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On May 7th, Lansing voters will elect nine (9) persons to the Lansing City Charter Commission. This group will need the leadership skills that I have.
I was a leader at Lansing Community College where I was a professor of writing and English for 18 years, 3 of those years as an adjunct faculty. During this time I held the positions of Lead Faculty, Faculty Mentoring Coordinator, and a member of the first Faculty Senate. I chaired meetings of the writing faculty and shepherded the first Senate resolution to a vote.
I managed my classroom for the benefit of all students' learning. Many of my students are leaders in Lansing.
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I am a servant leader. I was raised in Detroit at St. Cyprian's Episcopal Church and in Lansing continued at All Saints Episcopal Church. I served on the governing board for two terms (six years) and for four of those years was on the executive committee and for three of those years was the senior warden. During this time All Saints was declared itself as a Sanctuary Church. I also was an usher, chair of the Newcomer's Committee, and sang in the choir. I was the president of the Capital Area Council of Episcopal Churches. During this time we built a house with Habitat for Humanity.
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The Lansing City Charter Commission will be creating a new Lansing City Charter. I pledge to use my communication and leadership skills to make the new Charter a well-thought out document, clear and understandable and useable for the people who will govern and live according to it.
I am a writer by trade. My communication career started with Black weekly newspaper, The Michigan Chronicle, in Detroit. I trained for daily newspaper journalism at the Maynard Institute of Journalism Education, University of California, Berkeley campus. I am a former staff writer with two Gannett Co., Inc., daily newspapers, The Commercial-News in Danville, Illinois, and The Lansing State Journal in Lansing, Michigan. I was editor of the College of Human Medicine at Michigan State University, and with Health Central/Blue Cross, Blue Shield of Michigan. I owned and published Take Care MultiCultural Health Care Magazine. As a free-lance writer, my work has appeared in The New York Times, The Detroit News, The Milwaukee Courier, The Miami Times, Redbook and Good Housekeeping magazines, Utne Reader, Salon.com, Literary Mama, among other markets. I have been published by PloughsharesBlog, the Society for the Study of Midwestern Literature and the Ohio and Michigan historical societies, and in the anthologies, The Beiging of America: Personal Narratives of Mixed-Race Americans, and Black Lives Have Always Mattered. I have been a columnist with The City Pulse in Lansing, Michigan, since November 2020.
