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Today's interview is being facilitated for the Durham Oral Histories Project. On behalf of Durham County Government, the narrator for this discussion is Mr. Abner Mason and I, JT Tabron, am going to serve as the interviewer. This interview is being conducted at the Durham County Admin 1 building on July 29th, 2022. Mr. Mason, thank you for joining us.

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Thank you for having me. Very nice to meet you. So, you've lived around the world, you've fought for causes, you've started world-class businesses, you've advised US presidents, and are part of a truly cultured family. I know some of you are your relatives, but since this is our first time meeting, how would you describe yourself?

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Good question. I describe myself as someone who is eager to try to make a difference. I don't like the idea that we live in a world and in a country and even in a state where it's just it's not working well for everyone. And I think that those of us who have an opportunity and an ability to make positive change and to create positive change, we ought to do it.

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It's not enough to watch problems and talk about problems. I think you really got to step in, lean in, and actually, you know, make a difference. And so, I think I'm a lean-in kind of guy who wants to make a difference. There you go.

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Excellent, excellent. Now, you were born in Durham and bred here, spent a lot of your formative years here, is that correct? That is correct. In fact, I'm dating myself, but I was born at Duke Hospital when it was called Duke Hospital.

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They've changed the name from, you know, Duke Medical Center, you know, Duke Health, but when it was just one hospital, they hadn't built Duke North or anything like that. That's when I was born there. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha, perfect. Now, when you were growing up, what was Durham like to you and what kind of spirit would you say the city had?

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Another really good question. You know, I think from my perspective, it was a city where there were significant expectations about what you could be and what you could do. It was definitely, I was brought up in a family, my parents didn't go to college, but they made a point of making

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sure that I had exposure to people who had broader experiences than they did, and I'm talking about exposure to people in Durham who were doing big things and who had had done significant things in their lives, and so I really admire my parents because they, I don't know if they thought about it or if it's

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just the way they operated, they wanted to make sure that we had exposure to things that were bigger than what the experiences they had had, and in a sense even bigger than Durham. You know, they wanted to make sure that we knew

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that there was the world, that Durham was great, but we shouldn't think that Durham was all there was, and they made a point of, certainly for me, introducing me to people and putting me in the presence of people who had a sort of broader experience, and the combination of being in Durham where there

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was, as I said, this sense of you ought to do something with your life, you ought to make something of yourself, combined with being around people who had made something of themselves, who had done things. For me, Durham growing up was a,

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it was a really good place to grow up, and a good way to grow up, and I think I adopted values that still serve me today, and so I'm really glad I grew up in Durham, because I have a lot of friends who grew up in other places, and when they talk about how they grew up, and what they

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experienced, and the kind of expectations that were put on them, I'm glad I grew up in Durham, and that it was higher expectations, that there was no sense of, you know, you can't go far, you can't do much, it was just the opposite.

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You can do a lot, and you can go very far, but you got to work, and you got to, you know, be disciplined, so it was a good place to grow up. Sure, sure, sure, sure, and I'm sure that sort of they were able to share some of those lessons as a function of the neighborhood that you grew up in, and so what I'd like to ask you now is, if you could, first of all, tell me what part of Durham, the neighborhood that you grew up was in, and what do you remember about it? So I grew up in an area called, part of Durham called Braggtown, and this is really funny when I share this with people as I've grown up, that when I grew up, my parents, as I said, neither of them went to college. My father worked for Duke Power Company, which is the power company that serves the Durham area.

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He was a meter reader, so he would go house to house and read meters, and he had a second job at Duke Hospital to make extra money, so we were not rich by far from it, but I didn't know that. We never missed a meal. We always, you know, had everything we wanted, and here's the interesting thing. In Braggtown, where I grew up, because my father had been born in that community and grew up there, and he was part of a big family, and that extended family, a lot of those folks lived in Braggtown, and I had an uncle who was an entrepreneur who owned a store, a little store in Braggtown, but it was a central part of the community.

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I mean, this little store, it was my Uncle Taylor, and we call it Taylor's Store. It probably has a real name, but we always call it Taylor's Store. It became a kind of focal point of the community, and I had lots of relatives who lived around Durham, aunts and uncles and cousins, and so, I don't want this to sound wrong, come off the wrong way, but I grew up, we were by any measure poor, but I felt like I was part of, you know, a semi-royal family. We were a major family in the Braggtown area.

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Everyone knew who I was. They knew my parents. They knew my uncle. They knew my Aunt Valley, who lived there, my Aunt Salad.

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I mean, we had, it was a rich experience for me as a kid, because I felt supported and connected, and it was also a place where you couldn't do anything wrong and get away with it, because everyone knew who I was, so it was a really rich experience without money. It's very fascinating that, you know, my parents and the community was able to create that kind of experience with no money. Yeah. No money to speak of, so it was great.

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Yeah, yeah, it's fascinating. I've spoken with my parents about stories and how they had a similar circumstance in that they would by no means be classified as rich, but they had no idea that they were quote-unquote poor. We didn't know. I didn't, if you had said I was poor, I'd have been like, what are you talking about?

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I got everything you could possibly want here. So yeah, it's an important lesson, you know, as we think about how we want to shape the future, that, you know, I'm not saying money isn't important. It is. We need resources, but it's not the only important thing.

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Right, and it just speaks to this idea of value. Exactly, values. I'm very much with you. So you've spoken a little bit about your father, and you can roll him into this question.

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Could you talk a little bit more about your family, your extended family, how your interactions with them shaped you and helped you grow, and just things that you remember about them? Yeah, sure. So I'll share it through a couple of stories. So I don't remember all the details of this, but it's still definitely a memory that's imprinted on my mind, one of the memories.

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In Durham, at that time, we were not getting a lot of support and resources from the city of Durham. It was a predominantly black community, and we just weren't getting a lot of resources. And I don't remember the details, but there was something about trying to get a bus route that would better service the Bragtown. And I remember my parents being involved in a community organization.

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I can't remember what it was called, but the thing that impressed me was that my parents weren't like bystanders. They were leaders. My mother and my father, they really wanted to be involved in this and took a leadership role. And it wasn't easy, but ultimately we got the bus route.

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So in my mind, I don't have all the facts. It was so long ago, but what impressed me and I remembered is that you can make a difference. If people decide they deserve better, they can organize and make a difference. So that's one story.

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And then the other is, there was actually a church that we went to in Bragtown called Lakeview Baptist Church. And my father, I should tell this because again, it's an interesting story of developing. I'm not sure how they decided they wanted to organize the church, but they decided to organize the church. And they didn't have a church place, and so we were having church in the school next door, Lakeview Elementary School, where I ended up going to school.

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So a lot of us would go to church on Sunday there, but also go to school there. They allowed us to have church in the auditorium. And then my father, and I'm not giving him all the credit for this, a lot of other men and women in our community really came together and built Lakeview Church next door. And I remember seeing them build it from nothing, no resources.

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Everybody basically was poor, low-income, but they worked, interestingly. Every person I remember growing up worked. They didn't make a lot of money, but they worked. And so they pooled their resources, and they built this church.

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And I remember my sister Sheila and I used to play in the playground, it's a funny story, while mostly men were building the church just next to the school. And one day something happened, and I got hurt, and I remember all the men coming over, and I still have a scar from that, but I was fine. But what impressed me about that story, if you think about what happened, that they wanted to do something. It was all African-American men and women, as opposed to just talking about it.

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They said, we can do something, we can do something, we can build something. And they started having church in the school, and then they organized themselves. They counted, as my mother would say, they counted their pennies and gathered their pennies, but ultimately they built a beautiful church, which is still there now. So again, that was another one of those experiences that, as you think back on it, you're like, these are people who did things, you know.

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And so I grew up with that kind of perspective. And then the last one I'll share is, because my mom and dad both were involved in this, the Civil Rights Movement was really in swing, and African-Americans were demanding to be treated fairly, and Durham was one of those cities where that wasn't really happening. And so folks got together and wanted to organize themselves, and so they created a group called the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People. And it was a fascinating group because it was led by a lot of ministers, and they would have meetings, I can't, couldn't have been every Sunday, but maybe it was either every Sunday or once a month, I can't remember, and they would rotate at different churches because the ministers would host it, and they were getting the African-American community in Durham organized.

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And this group, I can't, you can do the research on them because I think it's worth doing, and it's worth knowing about that group and what they did. But for me, seeing people organize again and say, you know, we deserve better, and we're gonna fight for what we deserve, and that group produced results, and it produced leaders. People learned how to understand policy, and to understand how to advocate for changes in policy, to advocate for changes in laws, they learned how to, and I saw some of this. I was too young to really do it, but I was a bit precocious, and so I was really an observer, and I saw leaders, you know, how they operated, how they got people who might have been afraid to stand up, or might have been afraid to say something, how they organized them and created support around people to do things.

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So that group, the Durham Community and Affairs of Black People, was another one of those examples that really stuck with me. So even now, you know, I remember it, and I'm like, wow, that was really cool. So those are, and it was my parents, though, who were not, as I said, you know, educated in a college way. They weren't, you know, leaders in the community, but they were like, you are going to this.

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I don't know, because I wanted to stay at home and watch TV on Sunday, and they were like, no, no, no, you are going, and as I think back, I wonder, what would they think, because I'm a kid, what could I be, what possibly, you know, were they thinking a kid could get from those meetings, but now I understand they were smarter than me. And the roots and the legacy of that organization, because it still exists today. I didn't even know that. It still exists today.

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They still work, they still advocate, and so that's cool to have sort of a connection story to bridge that past to this present, so thank you for that. Now, you light up when you talk about Durham and your parents, and what I'd like to ask you now is, what is one of your just favorite memories about Durham being a child, not necessarily related to anything in particular, but just sort of a fond memory of an experience that you have that was uniquely Durham? That's a good question. The first thing that comes to mind is, for a long time, pools were segregated, and there was a public pool, I can't remember the name of it, but we used to call it Duke Pool, I'm not sure why, because it wasn't Duke's campus or anything, but it was a public pool, and it was segregated for a long time.

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African-Americans couldn't go there and swim, and I remember eventually, through advocacy and agitation and demanding that things change, they integrated pools, and the fond memory is going to swim, you know, a picnic and going to swim at that pool. My family will know, it's the pool that's over near where Skip lives, I can't remember the name of it now, but that, Duke Park, I think is the name of it, but my father would take us, and it was just wonderful. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, so you've touched on a lot of value that was generated as a result of your upbringing and just being sort of in space where you are.

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Growing up in Durham, what do you feel is something that you had as a child that young people today don't have? I think definitely the, that deep family support and community support. I had it, you know, times ten, right, and so, but I think now most kids just don't have that. We live in a different kind of society, it's much more fractured, people move away quickly.

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One thing about Bragtown, and my experience in Durham was very much tied to Bragtown, is that a whole lot of people didn't move away, you know, they stayed there, and they had deep roots there, and so like my father, you know, I was born there, my father was

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born there, so deep, deep roots, and a lot of his brothers and sisters lived walking distance from us, and so that creates a kind of security and certainty that I think helps you develop as a person. You don't develop with fears and wondering what's going to happen to you if you make a mistake.

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It's nice knowing you have that kind of support, and I don't think a lot of kids have that today. The other thing, so that's one, and then the other one I think that is really important, and this is more generally about Durham, and as I've, you know, gone to school in Massachusetts, and I live in California now, and I talk

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to a lot of people, particularly for African Americans, when I talk about my experience growing up in Durham, there were, there was example after example after example after example of sort of what I call black excellence.

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African Americans who had either, whether it was, you know, the university, we had an HBCU, historically black, you know, college, NCCU here, and I had family members who went there, but we knew about it, right, so we knew that this was in our community, and that there were professors and PhDs and people who had really educated themselves and become experts in their discipline, so we had that. We had, you know, church leaders, and I went to a church called Union Baptist Church, which is still here, and the minister there was a guy named Grady Davis, who was incredible, and he had, you know, had a PhD, and for me as a kid, you

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know, I didn't even know what a PhD was for a long time, but when I found out, and that he had left North Carolina, he had been born here and gone to BU to get a PhD, and it's kind of interesting that that idea that you, it's a big world, and the world is bigger than Durham, and part of the way you create excellence is that you

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explore the rest of the world, and some of those folks came back, and he was one of them, and so he had a profound effect on me. I think at the time, I didn't, I didn't, didn't realize it, but it was really important in my thinking. We had one of the largest black businesses in the, in the country here, the North Carolina Mutual.

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It was, it was a tall building, like there was a building that let, that was, and I don't remember talking a lot about it, but it certainly impressed me that if you come, if you grow up in a place where there is, there are all these examples of sort of black excellence, you, it imprints on you this

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idea that you want to be, you want to do some good stuff, that you can achieve good things, and that being, and what's more important, your race has no connection really to what you can achieve, that you can do big things, and I think a lot of people generally, and I know I'm talking, you know, sort of, your question wasn't

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about African-Americans, but part of the answer is, I think that, that certainly for me as an African-American, and I talked to other African-Americans, they didn't see that, they didn't grow up around that, and so that expectation, that idea that people are doing amazing things, and you ought to be one of them,

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they didn't have that, and so I think that idea of just lots of examples, and I could go on and on with examples, but that had a, had a more profound impact on me than I thought. Now that I'm older, I see it, but yeah, at the time I didn't, but it did.

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Yeah, yeah, so this, this next question, one could probably infer an answer from what it is that you just shared, but since I've got you, I should just ask. So, you live in California now. Los Angeles, yes. Los Angeles.

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So, I don't know how often you get back to Durham, but sort of the question is, what are your thoughts on how Durham has changed, from what you've seen, from all these rich stories that you're sharing, to what it is you may see and experience now when you do come back? Wow, yeah, it's kind of a, a question, my answer is, is sort of, on the one hand, really optimistic and hopeful, but on the other hand, really kind of concerning. So, when I come back now, I see a Durham where there is enormous investment, that is, the development is everywhere, communities that used to have, you know, housing prices that, you know, were, were, you know, very low. Now, they're, the housing prices have gone through the roof, there's competition, people are realizing that this is a great place to live, you know, the combination of weather and education and, and, and the other investment that's going on, I think Durham is just on a, on an absolute roll.

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I look at downtown Durham and I'm like, oh my god, it's, it's, Durham is a foodie city now. It competes with any city in America in terms of being a foodie city and, and people really, you know, sort of valuing food and being willing to pay top dollar for it. So, lots of restaurants are opening, I see, you know, condo towers rising and so it's, it's, it's just this incredible tale of growth and investment and, and that's kind of wonderful, right? But then, I think, you know, the concerning part is, I think a lot of

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people in Durham, and it's not just black people, a lot of low-income people aren't, aren't sort of, we haven't found a way to, to bring them along on that ride of economic growth and prosperity and so it's certainly true for a lot of African-American people, but I don't want to, I know it's not just African-Americans,

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there are a lot of low-income people in Durham who are kind of looking at what's happening and, and it's almost like Durham is, is, is leaving them behind, even though they're a part of Durham. So, I don't have an answer.

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I live in Los Angeles, so I'm not judging. I'm just saying, well, you asked me what I see and that's what I see. Yeah, yeah. So, for this next section, I'd like to talk to you a little bit about the events and the people who have continued to shape you.

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In the first portion of our discussion, you talked a lot about, sort of, the community itself and your parents, so now I'd like to kind of expound upon that a little bit more. Who would you say has been your greatest coach in life and what fundamental lessons, or lesson, there's, there's one that really stands out, did they, were they able to convey to you? Really good question, and I think it's, it's the minister at my church I would put in that category. I'm not particularly, I'm not like a religious, you know, person.

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I'm not a minister or anything, but I actually thought I was going to be when I was growing up, and so again, my parents, we went to Union Baptist Church and the minister there was a guy named Grady Davis, and he was just a fascinating guy who had been in the civil rights movement. He had, as I said, gone to Boston University and got a PhD. He was dean of the, this, the theology school at Shaw University. He was really well known in the community, but he took a particular interest in helping me.

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He gave me a lot of really good advice, and one, I think the, the key piece of advice that he gave me, and it really came from his life, because he had been born in a, even poorer, I think, than we were, when he would tell his story of, you know, walking to school with no shoes. I had shoes, so, but he had come from a really poor family, and his, the key point he would make is that, you know, where you can go in life has nothing to do with where you start, meaning you aren't constrained by, you know, your, your birth or the situation of your birth or, you know, the, how much money your parents had or even, you know, whether your school was a fabulous school or not. That, that where you can go is almost wholly a result of what you do with, with your life and what you're given. That we're all, we, every one of us has talents, and so it's what we do with it.

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So, as I think about it, he, you know, that lesson stuck with me, you know. Yeah, yeah. Now, we'll say, you know, there are a lot of ways one could be a minister, and based on the work that you do now, you might not be as far away as you, as you think you are in, in some areas, so, so I would say that. Now, you mentioned that your father was an employee, a meter reader for Duke Power.

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Mm-hmm. Now, I have it on good authority that he might have been one of the first, if not the first, African-American meter readers for Duke Power. Wow. And so, it sounds like that might be relatively new news to you.

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Yeah, you're giving me new news. I didn't know that. It's, it's, that's, that's really fantastic to hear and to know. I didn't know.

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Yeah. He started the job before I was born. Oh, okay, see, there you go. Yeah, and interestingly, he had that job his whole life.

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He retired from there, so those times have changed, too, but you have one job your whole life. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, but what it did was, he knew Durham in a way that almost, you know, I think he and maybe a few police officers that knew, because he walked and went to every house, and, and I'll say this because, you know, he can't get in trouble. He's no longer with us, but, you know, one of his roles was to read the meters, and also, when people didn't pay their bills, to turn off their electricity, and so he became, like, an expert at helping people figure out how to keep their electricity on.

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I mean, even as I got older, people would say to me, you know, it was, it was cold, it was winter, and your father figured out a way to help us keep our electricity on. He was supposed to turn it off that, that evening, or that day, and he'd figure out a way to say he couldn't get there because it was a, it was a vicious dog to give them enough time to, I mean, he had all sorts of ways to give people a little bit more time to get, these are low-income people who were struggling to make, make ends meet. They, you know, they might have gotten paid on Friday, but the bill, but the electricity is going to get off on, the power was going to be turned off on Thursday, and, you know, I, he's not here, so he can't get in trouble for it, but he would figure out the most creative ways to, to give people a little bit more time, and, and I think that, that goes to character. So, so yeah, it doesn't surprise me that he brought that kind of, that set of values to his work, and I am surprised to hear that he was the, maybe the first African-American.

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That's really cool. Yeah, and so, so one of the things that I'm, I'm often fascinated about hearing stories from my relatives is not having lived in as overtly racist an era as, as they did, is how they managed to

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persevere and continue, and they would not just kind of recount tales of racism all day, every day, and I imagine something similar, your, your father potentially being in that position, and this being sort of new information for you.

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Right. And I think that speaks a lot to how he chose to go about doing what it is that he did, but in light of everything else that you know about your father, and all these stories that you've recounted, having heard that

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information, and knowing how he comported himself, and continued about his life, and continued to teach you the things that he taught you, and provided support for your family in light of that circumstance, do you have any, any feelings or senses or anything that just sort of, in knowing that now, that's just coming into your

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mind or sort of hitting you? It makes me very proud, and, and also it, it even heightens my, my sort of admiration for, for him and my mom. You didn't ask me, but I have another story to tell quickly, and it's about my father and, and, and my mom. You know, he would, as I said, he, he worked at Duke Power, and now I know another fact about that experience that I didn't know, all day reading, you know, walking house-to-house, reading meters, and then he had a second job at Duke Power.

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The only time that he didn't go to the second job was on Wednesdays. He would not work the second job, and that's because at, at our church at that time, my parents decided to form a youth choir, and this is just fascinating, that he's working two jobs, and she was working at the time, as my mom was working at the time as well, but they decided they wanted to create a youth choir at the church, and you'll love the name, the Ebony Ensemble. Thinking about it now just makes me smile, and so the, the church didn't have a bus or anything, and so my father, on

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Wednesdays, he would get off work, and he would go and collect all of the kids, and literally go house-to-house with, we had an old station wagon, and pick them up, and my mom had, my father had, mom would drive the station wagon, daddy would drive this other old car he had, and they would go pick up all the kids, and all

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the kids lived in Bragtown, so it wasn't like they had to go all over Durham, it was in Bragtown, but it was a, it was probably 25, 30 kids in the choir, and my sister Sheila and I were in it as well, and so this little choir that my father and my mother, you know, decided to start, and it grew to be 20 or 30 people, it

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became quite a sensation in Durham, like we actually opened for a concert that the Nightingales, and the Nightingales are a gospel group that, that at the time was one of the leading gospel groups in the country, and still, if you, you know, historically, they have a special place in history, and they're from, they were, at

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least two or three of them were from Durham, and so they had a connection here, and so when they would have, they would travel all over the country, and eventually the world, singing gospel, it's called the Nightingales, and when they would have their big Durham concert, it would be at Durham Auditorium at the

00:32:13.080 - 00:32:31.940

high school there, and it was a big deal, everybody would go, and, and so they would have an opening act, and so one of my fond memories was the Ebony Ensemble, my parents' little choir, with my sister Sheila and I, and everyone else, we were the opening act for the, for the Nightingales, but even today, that I, I

00:32:33.760 - 00:32:53.960

continue, every once in a while when I'm in Durham, I'll run into someone who was in that choir, and they talk about how it shaped who they are, and, and helped them get through, you know, some difficult times in some cases, so it really, sort of extraordinary, because I think about me, I would never be able to do that now, and

00:32:53.960 - 00:33:13.400

yet they found the time, so to your point, I guess I want to bring it back to your point, people, my parents experienced discrimination and racism in a way that we probably, that we, we haven't, but as opposed to letting it define them, or to focus on it, or to use it as an excuse to not do things, they went out and created

00:33:13.400 - 00:33:24.880

things, they, you know, they said, well, we're gonna, we're gonna take the talent and energy that we have, and instead of focusing on something negative, we're gonna build something, and create something, and I think that's pretty special.

00:33:25.340 - 00:33:44.580

Yeah, yeah, so we'll come back to that in a second, but as we sort of, it's been baked into a lot of, a lot that we've talked about, this civil rights movement, but when you think about, sort of, that movement in Durham at the time, and Durham, there were a lot of really powerful people around here, what, what

00:33:44.580 - 00:34:01.240

are your thoughts, in conjunction with the development of the Committee on the Rights of Black People, and all the things that were going on, and I know, like I said, I know a little bit about your family, and how, how active they were, just sort of across the board, what were your thoughts, as a young person, about

00:34:01.240 - 00:34:23.080

the civil rights movement in the space, Durham, that you were, that you were in? I'd, I'd, I'd sum it up by saying, I always felt like we were leaders in this movement, we meaning people in Durham, including my family, I had cousins, I don't know all the details, but they did, they did sit-ins, they were a little

00:34:23.080 - 00:34:46.880

older than me, I was a kid, I couldn't, at lunch counters that were segregated to try to get them integrated, I just, you know, when you, you have this sense that there's something big happening in the country, and I always felt that, even though we were in this small little town, relatively small town Durham, we were in

00:34:46.880 - 00:35:10.440

the thick of it, we were part of the leadership of this movement, and, and, and that, again, that's where I come back to, it connects to expectations about what you have for yourself, because of what you see people around you doing, and, and they didn't say it, but they kind of, they had a way of looking at you, and, and, and

00:35:10.440 - 00:35:28.240

making it clear, you need to do something with your life, there are, there are people who are pushing hard to give you opportunities, but you need to do something with your life, and I'm not saying they were like, you know, hammering in, but there was no doubt, there was no, there was, there was absolute clarity that

00:35:28.240 - 00:35:48.700

you have been given something special, and you ought to do something with it, and I think that's, that's, comes from being in Durham, and feeling like you are at the center of something important happening, and your family, and the people you respect, and you know are part of the leadership of that happening, it, it

00:35:48.700 - 00:36:08.600

shapes your thinking. Yeah, yeah, now this is, this is more of a personal question, so definitely feel free to, to hit the pass button if you, but as far as sort of segregation and racism, Durham is a southern city, can you share any, any

00:36:09.160 - 00:36:38.480

recollections of racism, overt, subtle, covert, that, that you experienced in your youth here, or at any point in your time at Durham, that you can share, or that you care to share with us, and sort of how it impacted or affected your feelings or thoughts, just as an individual, a citizen of Durham, a citizen of the United

00:36:38.480 - 00:36:56.960

States, a citizen of the world? Yeah, it's, it's a good question, and it, it, it's, it's a little difficult to answer, but I'll try to answer it. I think because of what we were just talking about, and the way I grew up, and the, the sort of

00:36:56.960 - 00:37:18.940

expectations that my parents, you know, had for, for, for us, and my two sisters and I, especially me, I feel like, you know, I'm the youngest of three, and so I got, but, and my oldest sister was, is eight years older than me, and, and, and, no, twelve years older than me, and then the next one is four years older than me, so my

00:37:18.940 - 00:37:34.320

oldest sister was sort of out of the house as I was, you know, in first grade, she had gone to college, and that set an, set an expectation, so I have to both really thank my sister, her name is Patila, because she was the first one to go to college, and she set the expectation.

00:37:34.480 - 00:37:50.320

There was no doubt that my sister Sheila and I were going to go to college, so she sort of set the bar, and so grateful to her for that, but she, and then she left because she was older, and then Sheila, you know, was four years older than me, and she had her own

00:37:50.320 - 00:38:12.480

friends, and I was her little brother, so she couldn't, she didn't want to be bothered with me, and so, and then she, so my parents, you know, could focus a bit on me, and so they, in their own way, they kind of, they kind of encouraged me as I was growing up to not focus on racism and bias.

00:38:13.140 - 00:38:51.620

They were, they didn't say this, but this is the way I interpreted their perspective, the sun is gonna rise, you know, and so if you know the sun's gonna rise, you shouldn't focus too much energy on talking about the sun rising, right? These are factors in life that exist. Yes, we want to improve them, and they were able to make this distinction, and it's an interesting distinction to make. They were able to make the distinction that we need to fight hard to make things better for everyone, especially black people who are discriminated against, but you, Abner, you can't use discrimination as an excuse to not achieve, so it's very interesting.

00:38:51.620 - 00:39:16.540

It's almost opposed thinking, but it really isn't. What they were saying was, yes, there are big problems, but you can't use those problems as an excuse. We don't want to hear it. You need to achieve, and so, and part of the way they, that way I interpreted that, at least, was I wasn't supposed to spend a lot of time thinking about people who didn't like me or who, or if there was racism.

00:39:16.980 - 00:39:31.200

The truth is, I, maybe I, maybe this is, I'll just say it. I looked, I ignored it and said, this is what I want to do, and, and, and if there are people who don't like me because of my race, they need to step aside and let me just keep doing what I'm

00:39:31.200 - 00:39:46.200

doing, so I really didn't focus a lot on it, and my, and, and what happened with me, and I'm not saying this happens with everyone, but with me, in my experience in Durham, in basically saying, if you don't like me because of my race, as far as I'm concerned, I don't see you.

00:39:46.280 - 00:40:20.560

I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing. I, I, I was able to get a lot of other people to support me and to, and to join me in that, and so from a very early stage, even in junior high, in elementary school, which was once we segregated schools, and then in junior high school, I was class president. I was, you know, I was school president. I mean, and these were schools that were, that were majority white, but I got, you know, I was supported by, because I didn't, I didn't think people should judge me by my skin color, and I made darn sure I didn't judge other people by their skin color.

00:40:20.820 - 00:40:37.620

You know, you judge people by their, their character, and, and who they are, and what their heart is, not what they look like, and so doing that, I, I found that I was able to, I, I don't want to give the sense at all that there wasn't a lot of racism, and bias, and

00:40:37.620 - 00:40:52.840

discrimination going all around me, right, but my point is that, that just the way I was brought up, I, I wasn't supposed to focus on that. I was supposed to focus on what I needed to get done. That may not be a great answer to your question, but it's honest.

00:40:53.120 - 00:41:50.940

That's the answer. The, the, the best answer is the answer that you experienced that you're willing to share, so you are, you are completely fine. So, one of the cool things about this project is getting to speak to people who lived it, did it, saw it, experienced it, and then we get to ask questions to see sort of how, how, how they, how they saw it, and one of the things that I'm always interested in asking are questions about things that are, for lots of reasons, unfortunately, underexposed or underexplored. So, what I'd like to ask you about now, you talked a little bit about your sister and your mother, but what role did you see women playing in the community as far as Durham goes in relation to civil rights and community cohesion and support and development?

00:41:52.180 - 00:42:12.920

Yeah, so that's a good question. So, it's kind of, it's kind of interesting that, I think I talked about how important community was for me, and, and it just gave me this sense of support that I belong somewhere, that I, you know, I was

00:42:12.920 - 00:42:30.880

connected to something special, and even though we didn't have a lot of money, it felt like we were the richest people around because of that, that kind of community cohesion, and as I think about it, it was women who were a central part of that.

00:42:31.480 - 00:42:49.940

Like, my, the whole time I was growing up, my Aunt Vallee, who was my father's sister, she lived in Braggtown, she lived across the street from my Uncle Taylor's store, and he lived just down this street and across from the store, so we were, I mean, this is the, and my aunt, my aunt, and I had two other aunts

00:42:49.940 - 00:43:05.760

who lived right near there, Aunt Rose and Aunt Sally, they weren't far away, but Aunt became this place where everybody gathered. I don't know what their grocery bill was like at the time, because there was always food, and it was

00:43:05.760 - 00:43:31.120

never, you know, the food never ran out, and people were always there, and my Aunt Vallee, you know, she was not, you know, college-educated in that way, but she created a place where people felt warm and welcomed, and so, and that sense of community that I'm talking about, that doesn't come, it's not something, you know,

00:43:31.140 - 00:43:45.080

that kind of is just words, and it's just something that people talk about, but there's no realness to it. The realness is somebody welcomed you into their house, no matter when it was, no matter what your circumstances were, no

00:43:45.080 - 00:44:07.080

matter, you know, and they didn't judge you, and they made you feel at home, and my Aunt Vallee's house was that, and so this was a woman who, you know, wasn't educated formally, but had managed to create, you know, something that, you know, people, community workers nowadays get big grants to try to create, and

00:44:07.080 - 00:44:31.640

it's interesting that that kind of thing is hard to create, because it's about trust, and welcoming, and rootedness, and a big grant doesn't produce that, you know, you need a person, a real person to create that kind of thing, and so to me, that's an example of where a woman who was a strong woman, who,

00:44:32.100 - 00:44:50.960

I don't know if it was her intent to create that, but that's what she created, and so, and there are, you know, there are other examples I can talk about, but women were really strong, and, you know, they were the backbone, really, of the community, and everyone knew it.

00:44:51.000 - 00:45:16.740

It wasn't like it was something that people didn't know, everyone knew it, and so I think, unfortunately, you know, maybe we don't have that kind of thing now, like we should. Okay, all right, so this leads into one of my favorite questions that we've kind of uncovered in working through this project. I'm gonna ask you, and I'm fascinated to hear you answer, because it's a big question. Okay.

00:45:16.980 - 00:45:36.400

It's a big question, and let me preface it by saying, sort of, again, based on my age, a lot of the huge movement that was made in the civil rights movement, the developments, the people who are known through history sort of had come and gone, their legacy

00:45:36.400 - 00:45:59.780

remained, but they had kind of come and gone in my formative years, so I would read about them, see them on TV, hear stories, but in our conversations with some of the people who participated in this, the idea of desegregation, right, came up, and you've touched on this sort of throughout our conversation, so this

00:45:59.780 - 00:46:54.540

is the question, this is the lead-in, but this is the question. From an on-the-ground community perspective, do you feel that formal and informal desegregation of communities has been a complete success, or do you feel that there are things that have not improved or gotten worse as a result of desegregation and community sort of diffusing out from their original homogeneity, for lack of a better term? Yeah, that's a good question, and there's no simple, easy answer. I think, let me start with values first.

00:46:55.180 - 00:47:20.160

I believe that we are a diverse country, we're a diverse planet, and that we have no choice but to embrace the diversity that our country has. We're on the way to becoming a majority-minority country, for instance, you know, according to the census, I think it's 2045, people of color will be the majority, and even in Durham, I go, I drive around, and

00:47:21.620 - 00:47:42.900

Bragtown, there's a whole lot of Spanish-speaking and Taquerias in Bragtown that weren't there when I was growing up, so it's changing, the whole country's changing, and we can take the view that some people in our country take that we gotta stop, you know, close the doors, and build some walls, and try to recreate a

00:47:42.900 - 00:47:58.460

period in the past when we didn't have as much diversity, and what diversity we had was quiet, and didn't talk about itself, and didn't show itself, and it sort of hid its diversity, so we didn't have as much, and what there was was kind of hidden.

00:47:59.640 - 00:48:17.720

There are people who want to go back to that time, I'm not one of those people, I don't think we should, I don't think we can, so I think realistically we have got to embrace the country, and frankly the world, but let's talk about our country, and our state, and Durham, we've got to embrace

00:48:17.720 - 00:48:37.160

the Durham that we're becoming, this is a diverse place, and are there some fond wonderful memories about Durham in the past that I wish I could bring some of those memories, but not all of them, because it wasn't all good, right? People look back, they're like, oh that part was wonderful, but there was a whole lot that wasn't wonderful.

00:48:38.400 - 00:48:54.160

I think we feel like if we could bring back some of the good, but not the bad, we could do it, but life doesn't give us that option, we don't get to do that, and so I think we've got to be realistic about the Durham that we are now, and the state, and the country that we are now,

00:48:54.560 - 00:49:14.420

and so are there challenges with the diverse, sort of embracing that diversity, and making sure that the sort of the promise, and the opportunities are there for everyone, not just some people, no question, you know, have we arrived at a point where opportunity is evenly spread?

00:49:14.520 - 00:49:30.520

No, we haven't, and people with money and advantage are much, you know, they get an unfair advantage, and folks who are born through no fault of their own into certain circumstances start out with disadvantages, and frankly, you know, again,

00:49:30.980 - 00:49:47.000

a lot of what happens in your life is a result of your own decisions, and so a lot of people aren't making good decisions for themselves, and we've got to be honest about that, it's not all society making us do stupid stuff, you know, if you see somebody do something stupid, and there's a lot of

00:49:47.000 - 00:50:01.860

stupid stuff going on, some people will say to you, well, that's racism, or that's the society, a little bit of racism, a little bit of society, but mostly some boy making bad decisions for themselves. Now, do we have an obligation to help educate them to make better decisions?

00:50:02.040 - 00:50:21.720

Yes, but I don't think we, I think that desegregation was inevitable, you can't fight it, it's almost, to me, you know, saying that we should resegregate is almost like saying, you know, we should try to build a wall, you know, it's not gonna happen, well, life doesn't go

00:50:21.720 - 00:50:36.040

backwards, even though we want it to, even though we wish it would, even though we have nice thoughts about it, it doesn't go backwards, so my thought is, we've got to figure out how to make America, and North Carolina, and Durham work for everybody, that's what we should be focused on, not trying to move backwards,

00:50:36.040 - 00:51:16.120

but trying to figure out how we make, you know, Durham a place where everyone has an opportunity to be the best them that they can be. Right, all right, so here we are, the third and final act, and in our interview, I really appreciate you spending this time, but what it is that I'd like to talk to you now is about your professional and adult life, kind of post-Durham. Now, you spent some time going to school in and around Boston, including Harvard, can you tell me a little bit about that experience and how that area was different societally than Durham?

00:51:16.780 - 00:51:33.080

Sure, so when I first left Durham, I went to a boarding school, Governor's Academy, so I spent three years in Northeast Massachusetts at a boarding school, I got a scholarship, and then I went to Harvard, which is in Cambridge, Massachusetts, so still in Eastern Massachusetts, and Cambridge,

00:51:33.080 - 00:51:52.960

Boston in particular, is in some ways, it's similar to Durham, because Durham is kind of an education-oriented city, because you've got, you know, Duke and NCCU, and State just around the corner, and a few others that I'm not thinking of now, and Boston is sort of like that, it's a very much, a very

00:51:52.960 - 00:52:16.200

educated community, lots of schools, Harvard, you know, MIT, BU, BC, the list goes on and on, and so there were some similarities there, but I think the big difference for me, and Durham, it has changed and it's starting to catch up, but Boston was very diverse, you know, people, because of the schools, how

00:52:16.200 - 00:52:32.280

they attracted people, it was a very diverse community, not, lots of people from other parts of the country and other countries. One way that it was very different from Durham, as well, is that there wasn't a huge black community in

00:52:32.280 - 00:52:50.940

Boston, and the black community that was there was the opposite of the black community that I had experienced in Durham, so it was unorganized, it was struggling to be heard, it didn't have a lot of equity that it had built its own institutions, like we have, you know, Durham had, you know, huge businesses

00:52:50.940 - 00:53:23.820

and the Boston black community didn't have that, so it was kind of strange. I remember thinking about it when I got there, I was like, this is a strange black community, they don't seem to have, they're not organized, because I was coming from a place where people didn't have as much money, but they had their stuff together, you know, they organized and they got stuff done, so it was a contrast to Durham in that way. So here we are, here we sit in this government building, but you are not a stranger to government.

00:53:25.000 - 00:54:02.500

That sounds like for better or worse, right? So you've served as chief policy advisor, chief secretary, and undersecretary of transportation and construction for multiple governors in Massachusetts, you've been chairman of the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV AIDS under George W. Bush, and you've contributed as a member of the Biden-Harris Policy Committee. What is it about government or its purpose that causes you to be willing to continue to lend your strength and energy and expertise to its function?

00:54:03.820 - 00:54:56.400

Yeah, good question. I think that although government, you know, in the U.S. is sometimes, you know, it gets beat up and people are hypercritical of government, I think that government is the reason why we have the quality of life that we have in this country, and that quality of life is pretty much unrivaled around the world. Yes, people will criticize here and there, but you don't see a lot of Americans trying to get out and live somewhere else. You see a lot of people trying to get into this country, live here, and if you ever travel outside the U.S. a little bit, and I've done this, and it surprised me actually, when you get back here you kiss the ground, and so this is a great country.

00:54:56.640 - 00:55:17.700

We've had our weak points and there's enormous room for improvement, but I can't think of a better place on earth to live, and I think the major reason for that is the government that we have, that we have constrained it so it doesn't smother us, but we have empowered it to

00:55:18.220 - 00:55:44.480

help us as citizens to achieve the kind of things that we can achieve in our lives, and I think that we have given the government the go-ahead to acknowledge that while we have a sort of market-driven capitalist society, and I support that, we need to have a safety net so that people don't fall below a

00:55:44.480 - 00:55:59.600

level, and that's really the role of government. So I believe in government. I think it's really important, both federal, state, county, city. I think it's really good when it's local because they understand people better, but I don't think there's a better calling in life than working in government.

00:56:00.360 - 00:56:21.840

I really respect people who work in government. It's incredibly important work, but it needs to continually be refreshed with good people going into government. So one of my concerns is that we talk about government in too negative of terms, and some of the smartest people I know have been reluctant to go into

00:56:21.840 - 00:56:41.430

government because, so they're choosing other things, not because they don't think that they could make a huge difference in government, it's that they don't think government can make a huge difference, and so I think we need to do a better job of being sort of proud of the government that we have, and I'm

00:56:41.430 - 00:57:08.490

proud of my service in government, and I'm not done. I have things that I want to do going forward. Right now, I'm really focused on my company, but I believe in the power of government to lift people up and to do good things for people, and I'm grateful that I had a chance to work in government, and I, like I said, I have some thoughts about getting back into it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:57:09.270 - 00:57:49.890

So now, your career arc in both public and private sector really speaks to a strong advocacy for increasing health equity, not just in this country, but you've done work in that area around the world. What motivated you or inspired you to sort of pursue that path of ministering? But sort of what is it that drove you or pushed you into that area or space? It was sort of by accident, actually.

00:57:50.370 - 00:58:20.950

I didn't think I was gonna be doing health care, but I was chief policy advisor for the governor of Massachusetts, and I get a call from the appointments office at the White House, and my boss was a Republican, but she was the governor in Massachusetts, and Republicans in Massachusetts are like Democrats everywhere else, but George Bush, the son, George W. Bush, had just been elected. I get a call from the White House. They want to appoint me to this advisory council on HIV and AIDS, and I actually said no, because I was like, first of all, I don't trust George Bush.

00:58:21.570 - 00:58:50.810

I had my doubts about him, and I didn't think I was an expert in health care, and I said no, and so like a second later, 30 seconds later, I got a call from my boss, the governor. She says, come talk to me, and I came in, and she set me down. She said, you know, let me give you an analogy. You're on a baseball team, and when you're on the baseball team, you don't get to decide what position you play, and I still didn't quite get it, and then she said, so you need to get up and call them back, and then I got it.

00:58:50.910 - 00:59:13.190

Okay, I got it, so I sheepishly got up and went back to my desk, called the White House, and said, I made a mistake. I misunderstood you, so I'd love to be on this council, and then they have, once I joined the Presidential Advisory Council on HIV and AIDS, APACHA for short, they appointed me chairman of the International Committee, and at that time, we were in the middle of a pandemic. It was HIV-AIDS pandemic, sort of like now. It's COVID, then it was HIV-AIDS.

00:59:13.950 - 00:59:34.110

Millions of people around the world were dying, particularly in the poorest countries where they didn't have access to the life-saving drugs, and so George Bush, the president, said he was going to do something. I actually didn't believe him, but I thought, you know, let me stop judging and give this a chance, and so they appointed me chairman of the International Committee, and I went to Africa, and I actually

00:59:34.110 - 00:59:51.010

took some folks, staff, CODEL, took some members of congressional staff with me, and I'll shorten this by saying, ultimately, Bush lived up to his word, and proposed a program called the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, or PEPFAR for short.

00:59:51.190 - 01:00:43.690

It was to provide billions of dollars to provide, to pay for drugs, antiviral therapy, in some of the poorest countries in the world, mostly in Africa, and I spent time in Uganda, rural Uganda. No running water, no electricity, no paved roads, no healthcare infrastructure to speak of. People live in huts with thatch roofs by the millions, and so what Bush proposed, and what the United States also paid for, so we paid for, was to provide the funding to buy the drugs to get to these people who live in this crazy rural, I mean, it took four hours to get out there from the next largest city, because it's in the, they call it Bush country. There's no, so we not only paid for the drugs, but we built the roads, and electricity, and running water, and healthcare infrastructure.

01:00:43.810 - 01:01:37.270

We built clinics from which people could get treatment, and the key way that we got the drugs out into the Bush country was community health workers riding motorcycles with a thermos on the back that would keep the drugs cold, and they would go out for a day's ride, and go from hut to hut to hut, and provide this life-saving treatment. So for me, I remember standing there in rural Uganda, and seeing what U.S. compassion, and technology, and generosity was able to do, and we were able to build all of that infrastructure, deliver a complicated treatment to the point where now HIV AIDS is a chronic condition. People don't die of it in those countries. It's chronic just like it is in the U.S. We lifted, you know, the healthcare system so that it's comparable to the first world, like U.S. healthcare.

01:01:37.810 - 01:02:04.690

When you see that, I saw it firsthand. It's transformative, and but one thing it did, it changed my expectations about what we ought to have in the U.S., because if you're still, I'm sitting there saying, this is one of the poorest places on earth, and we've been able to do this, and yet we have the wealthiest nation in the history of the world, in the U.S., and we don't have a healthcare system that works for everybody. That's ridiculous. It's downright scandalous, and so I said to

01:02:04.690 - 01:02:20.450

myself, okay Abney, you can talk about it, you can get mad about it, you can stomp your feet about it, or you can actually do something, and that's when I decided I wanted to sort of focus on health equity, and that's when I decided I ultimately led to the creation of the company I run now, Counselor Tame Sky Health, where we're

01:02:20.450 - 01:02:50.810

focused, we're doing our part. We can't do it alone, obviously, but we're doing our part to make our healthcare system more equitable, but it was really an experience in the bush country in Uganda that led me to understand that we ought not tolerate the healthcare system we have in the U.S. We shouldn't tolerate it. It produces terrible outcomes, and particularly for people of color, and so I want to be part of changing that. Yeah, yeah, and it's stories like that.

01:02:50.850 - 01:03:51.640

I've been accused of being toxically positive, and when this was sort of shared with me, this sentiment was shared with me, it bothered me a little bit, but when you hear stories like that, I mean, you who sound like you might have had some different political views from the individual who hired you for the position, but we can literally do anything if we pull together. I mean, think about what you just said. Anything, and that's what's lost on so many people, and somehow we've got to convince more people that what you just said is true. Okay, so as you pursued initiatives in the Caribbean, Mexico, Africa, across the U.S., where engagement with diverse populations was a necessity, not just a, oh, well, we'll look into it, but you had to engage with these people.

01:03:53.120 - 01:04:32.920

The idea of cultural awareness seems to be vital. As Durham continues to grow and diversify, can you share a little bit about what cultural intelligence, cultural intelligence is, and what you think its value add is to groups of people and communities who can employ it properly? Yeah, that's a great question, and I'm, you know, I'm no expert, but I can share my thoughts. I think one thing is, I think it's really important for us to sort of get away from tolerating diversity.

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I think that we are still too much in the mindset of saying, okay, country's changing, Durham's changing, so we've got to tolerate this diversity. We've got to make a shift from tolerating diversity to actually celebrating diversity, because it's the mother's milk of all good things. You know, if you look at other countries around the world, one of the things that they, you talk to people from other countries, they marvel at the U.S.

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because, you know, we're not that old of a country, and yet we have become the most successful country in the history of the world, and a lot of people believe, and I'm one of them, that one of the reasons that that we've been able to become so successful is because we have figured out a way to let almost anybody come

01:05:22.240 - 01:05:51.040

here and do their thing, to be the best they can be. It's the sort of the immigrant story. Now some people, they've been here, you know, a little while, and they forget that they were immigrants. They act like they've been here the whole time, but the truth is, if you look at the country, you don't have to go back more than a couple generations for almost anybody here, except for the Indians, and they are immigrants, and they came here, and this country, it wasn't easy.

01:05:51.300 - 01:06:07.920

It's not like America made it easy for anybody, but they came here, and the combination of kind of our values, and frankly, our government structures and Constitution, all that stuff, I don't want to get, you know, too in the weeds here, but frankly, this is a

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place where people could come and bring their talent, and develop their talent, and to not put their talent in a hole, but instead to lift it up, and to say, I can do this, and that's a key part of what has made this country great, and I'm not just guessing here, it's factual.

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If you look at, you know, some of the major inventions, major leaders, the history of our country is really the history of immigrants coming here, and either one or two generations, they all of a sudden are doing incredible, almost unheard of things. That's what's made us great, and I believe that that is the future. We need innovation. We need new ideas, and one thing that we know, and there's a lot of data on this, if you have all the people who look alike, act alike, talk alike, come from the same place, think alike, that is not an environment where innovation will thrive.

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We'll die. What we need is to sort of build on what has worked for us, and lean into what has worked for us, and that is, how do we create a place where we encourage diversity, and not so, not just tolerate it, but we need to celebrate it. We need to actually clap when people, diverse people, you know, want to move into our communities, into our cities, into our country. We ought to find a way to embrace them, and give them some support, because you know what, some, and some of those people is the next big idea.

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It could cure cancer. It could, you know, cure climate. We think we've got big problems, but what we know as humans is that we can, we can address big problems if we're willing to kind of use this special thing that we have, our brains, but it's not just one group of people's brains that we need. We need everybody's brains, so that's a long answer to your question, and I'm not being crisp, but the point is, we, Durham is, it's a good thing that Durham is, is, is increasingly diverse, not a bad thing.

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We just got to make sure that everybody benefits and has an opportunity to be the best, you know, person they can be. Yeah, yeah. Now, you touched on what might actually be your ultimate answer to this, this question, but there might be something sort of a little bit deeper in how you answer this question, but based on your work and experience, what is a social problem that you feel has kind of gone under the radar? I mean, we talk a lot about there, they're big things out there, but in working with the California Black Health Network or whoever, is there, is there a social challenge or issue that is, that is underneath all of these other layers that you see or experience that we do not have our eye on as a community?

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I mean, I, you know, I don't have a magic bullet answer. I think my answer is probably the answer that a lot of people would say, and it's really not about health care, it's really about education. I think that the problem we have, and I talked about this earlier, when I was growing up in Durham, one of the things that really made a difference was that

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people believed in education, and there was an expectation that you were going to go to school, and the teachers knew your, their parents, if you acted up, you know, you wouldn't act up for long, but there was this, this priority emphasis put on education, because what everyone accepted, and as, as truth, and I think it

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is truth, is that the best way to move forward in our, and as a person, is to, is to have education. It's this tool that once you have it, people can't take it from you, and you can deploy it in any way, in all sorts of ways, but you got to

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get it to deploy it, and so we, I grew up with that, and I think that we have lost that as a country, frankly, every state is struggling, and for people, and for low-income folks, and people of color, it's a particular problem, because higher-income people have some other resources that can kind of supplement

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for some of that, that lack of focus on education. They can catch up, but they can get, they've got some tools that they can deploy to help them, but for lower-income people, and a lot of people of color, there's only one thing that most of us, outside of maybe having some special skill, like, like being a great ballplayer, and God bless you if you are, I'm not, but that's a tiny minority. For the vast majority of people, there's only one thing that is going to be able to give them the opportunity to make decisions for themselves, and to shape a life for themselves, and that's, this is about freedom, right? Being able to decide for yourself what you want to do, and to do it.

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There's only one thing that gives you that, and that's education, particularly for low-income and folks, and a lot of people of color in that category. So I'd say education, it's a complicated problem. I don't have all the, I don't claim to have all the answers, but if we got to figure something, figure out how to improve that. Yeah, yeah.

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Now, you answer the next question, which was going to be an opportunity that we're now looking at, but all that sort of this was encapsulated in your answer, but sort of synthesizing those two ideas, what is a blind spot that exists within communities that organizations like a county government, like Durham's, could start engaging in to develop a more relevant cultural intelligence? Now that was inartfully worded, but I guess the question is, is what are some things that organizations that do have the resources and wherewithal of, as a sort of a county government, can do to begin that process of embracing and celebrating, to your point, that you've seen that have been potentially useful? You know, it's, I'm sure there are multiple steps that are necessary, but I think one of the things that's most missing is what I would call sort of genuine listening. Listening is so important, but I think we don't listen.

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We think we're listening, and we're not listening, because usually we come in with an agenda, or we've got some idea about what should happen, or somebody gets hired and they've got an idea about what should happen, or sometimes, unfortunately, this is the way

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government works, the funding is tied to doing a certain thing, even though that's not what the community needs, that's why the funding came, so all of a sudden this is what we're doing. So I think we've got to figure out a way to, particularly when it comes to government, to genuinely listen to what people are saying, to what they think their needs are, and you can't just listen to one person.

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You've got to kind of make sure you're hearing from diverse voices, even within that diverse community. I think that's one of the things that is missing most, because unfortunately the way government works in particular, and I'm repeating myself here, but it's generally somebody else higher up is providing some funding, and it's kind of tied to some sort of purpose, and by the time it gets to the county, or you're trying to do a program, it's constrained. This is what this funding is for, and we can't really spend outside of that use. I think we've got to figure out a way, and this is some learnings, to make sure that before decisions are made about what we're going to fund, that we do the sort of genuine listening, because I think a lot of money is not being spent in the most impactful ways, because by the time the money is ready to be spent, that need is not what it was when the law was made to provide the funding.

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Right, right, right. Well you have just about run the gauntlet of questions. I have one more formal question for you, and this goes back to my toxic positivity. What are you hopeful about?

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What is, what are you hopeful about in the space that you operate in, the people that you engage with, the things that you see, the places that you go? What is something that gives you hope? Two things. One is young people.

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You know, I'm not in that group anymore, and as I encounter more and more young people, I'm talking people, you know, under say 30, they are the most talented group of Americans in terms of skills and knowledge that we've ever had. And they also have a sense of openness about the kind of, I should call it, I guess openness about the kind of America they want to live in. They don't want to live in their parents' America. They want an America that is, that works for everybody.

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They're much more diverse. They're much more inclusive. So I guess that's the word I'm looking for. They want to, they want to build an inclusive America.

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And so what I'm optimistic about is, first of all, they have more intelligence, raw intelligence and skill, than any generation. And so this tells the second thing that I'm really optimistic about. Technology. We have the, what we can, what technology can do for us today and going forward is beyond even our comprehension right now.

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Like we're not, we're just beginning to understand what technology can do for us. And yes, you know, some people would be negative and say you can use it for bad things, blah, blah, blah. Yeah, you can do something bad with anything. You can do something, yeah.

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But you can also do some amazing things that were never possible before with the technology and the innovation that is happening and that will happen. And so if you combine a group of Americans who are young and energetic and smart and talented, and you're going to give them tools, technology tools, that are beyond like, you know, our wildest imagination, the next decade or two or three is going to be, I mean, I'm, you'd be crazy not to be optimistic and you'd be crazy not to want to live, you know, live long enough to experience it. Because there's some amazing things that are going to happen. So I think it's the young people and the technology, the two things.

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And they're going to bring them together in ways that we're going to be very, very proud of them. Thank you. So that concludes just about all my questions. Is there any parting wisdom or idea or sentiment that you care to leave us with?

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You've left, you've given us a lot and there may not be, but is there just kind of... No, just, you know, I just encourage you to, I think you're already doing this, but, you know, to talk to diverse people, you know, in a diverse group. Because I, first of all, commend you for doing this. I think it's great.

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As a person from Durham, I'm really proud that it's happening. But imagine this, 50 years from now, people are looking at these interviews, right, and listening to you interview people. You've done a tremendous thing, but you want to make sure that it tells the whole story. That we aren't, that we're not, you know, it's not one history of Durham, but it's the history of Durham.

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So I just encourage you to keep doing what you're doing. And I'm honored that you would take the time to talk to me, so thank you. Thank you. Mr. Mason, truly appreciate your time.

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Thank you so much. No problem, thanks.