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Arika Michaelis, TSN Executive Director, on More Than Just Surviving Her First Year Interviewed by Ed Conn Arika Michaelis, the newly appointed Executive Director for Toledo Streets, was hitting a work stride when the proverbial poop hit the fan. On March 17, 2020 Ohio Governor Mike DeWine and Amy Acton, MD then Director of the Ohio Department of Health, issued a stay at home order for non-essential individuals due to that rising threat of the Covid-19 virus. The usually bustling streets of downtown Toledo for the St. Patrick’s Day celebration were eerily quiet. Arika had 3,000 freshly printed copies of the newspaper on the shelves, vendors clamoring for information and rightfully concerned how this will affect their income, and the entire future of this organization she just took over in peril. Conditions that would make the most seasoned corporate leader panic, seemed to have the opposite effect on TSN Executive Director. Arika realized the fi rst thing was to create a safe environment for the vendors while trying to fi gure a way to bridge a source of income for them. An online campaign was started and reached its target within a month. The staff found a way to develop a digital newspaper and a digital map so that individual vendors could sell the newspaper virtually. The fi nancial bridge helped get TSN through the darkest months until vendors could get back on the streets with a printed product. Far from taking a victory lap, Arika moved on to fi nding larger space for the organization and continue to build relations with key organizations and donors. I felt honored to be able to sit down with Arika and ask her about this fi rst year and how she wants to drive the future for Toledo Streets Newspaper. Let’s start from the beginning. Tell us about the journey that brought you to Toledo Streets? I am originally from the Toledo area but I moved to West Virginia for school when I was 18. I graduated from Marshall University with a degree in communications. Just before I earned my degree, I decided to take an internship with the City of Huntington in Planning and Development. Eventually, I concluded I wasn't interested in pursuing planning and development BUT through my internship experience I learned about several cool local organizations that were serving the community. One organization I learned about was Unlimited Future, an incubator and development center for small businesses and budding entrepreneurs. Another was Create Huntington, an organization created to connect people in the community and provide matching funding to Huntington’s entrepreneurs, artists, musicians and community projects. Shortly after my introduction to it, a friend brought me onto Create Huntington’s board and I was almost immediately inspired to live a more community-focused life. In my fi rst year, while helping to champion our two big fundraisers and awarding minigrants, I felt truly aligned with what I found to be my life’s purpose: to help build and uplift people while cultivating a community. I knew I wanted to make a career out of my desire to serve the community. In the years to follow, I’d take jobs in software/hardware sales, bartending and bar management all while keeping my vision of eventually working for a community focused non-profi t. In Fall 2019, after having moved back to the Toledo area, I was connected to TSN’s board chair through a mutual friend and sitting board member, Lauren Webber (TSN’s current board chair), whom I had expressed my passion and career goals to. I had met several of our vendors while bartending on Adams Street and knew about Toledo Streets Newspaper’s impactful work. When Lauren and Bryce Roberts, then TSN board chair, an executive director, I submitted my resume for consideration. And the rest is history. It has been quite a year, Arika. What have been some of your biggest challenges? For the organization, I think one of the biggest challenges we are facing is fostering community through a pandemic. Before the pandemic, on any given day at the TSN offi ce you’d see 5-10 vendors hanging out, drinking coffee, working on the computers and chatting it up with each other, and vendor managers, John Keegan and Claire McKenna. Now, we allow one to two vendors at a time, to allow social distancing. Our vendors are encouraged to hang out with us in the front offi ce until another vendor pops in. We have coffee available, but it doesn’t feel the same as sitting down to have a cup of joe with other vendors. It makes sense that this is an area we’re struggling with, since we can’t gather. But community is a key element of success for the Toledo Streets program. We’ve been fortunate to continue providing weekly vendor meeting lunches through our partners, which helps bring a sense of community. But we’re very much looking forward to welcoming vendors back into the whole space and gathering for meetings, programs and events. For me personally, one of the biggest challenges has been trying to network during a pandemic. A year ago, I was pretty new to the scene and looking forward to meeting leaders serving our unhoused community, supporters of Toledo Streets and other movers and shakers in Toledo. The pandemic has made that increasingly diffi cult. Luckily, our board, staff and community have helped me in getting as connected as possible to spread the good news of Toledo Streets. What have been some of the successes you can share? The fi rst things that come to mind are our vendors getting housed and employed at the same rate as 2019. It’s proof that even during a pandemic, our vendors have been working on their personal goals towards stability and fi nancial independence. In 2020 we helped house nine vendors and four vendors acquired full-time employment, – that’s huge! I have also been told me they were looking to hire in awe of the way Toledo has shown up for our community. In March when we decided to halt paper sales, we were able to raise over $12,000 to give to our vendors to supplement their paper income. For two months, because of Toledo’s generosity, our vendors who do not qualify for unemployment could lay low, seek safe shelter and not have to worry about not making money from selling papers. Lastly, we have successfully moved into our new offi ce space! It is bigger, more accessible and central to community members we intend to serve. It was a huge project but with the help of the board, organizations and members of our community, we did it! As I previously mentioned, I am highly anticipating welcoming our vendors fully into the new space. Is there a particular vendor success story that has inspired you? My favorite vendor success story since working at TSN happened in Summer 2020. One of our beloved vendors, Andrew, had been experiencing unstable housing for nearly ten years. When I met Andrew, he was sleeping outside. Every morning when we arrived at the offi ce, Andrew would be shouting “Good Morning” from across the street at the library. Last summer, Claire worked tirelessly with him and his case manager to jump through all the hoops being unhoused presents and through their group effort, they succeeded in getting him stable housing for the fi rst time in nearly ten years! Though I miss Andrew greeting us every morning, he has a roof over his head and a place to call his own and that is a constant reminder of the impact our organization has. That reminder motivates me every day. Going forward into 2021, what are the opportunities and conversely the obstacles you foresee ahead? We’re planning on opening the offi ce up to vendors again this year. That will defi nitely present some opportunities and obstacles. It’ll be an opportunity to welcome vendors into their new space, foster that sense of community that’s been lacking and re-engage old and initiate new programming. It presents an incredible potential for growth for the vendors, our community and the organization. The hurdles I can predict are setting up the space, programs and events for safety, including social distancing and cleanliness, and reorienting vendors to our new normal. Additionally, 2020 gave us some hardship as far as our regular funding avenues. Fortunately, our supporters continued to show up for our vendors and our organization in different and unique ways. I’m hopeful the pandemic will be more managed by the end of 2021, which will allow us to revisit our previous fundraising opportunities while integrating the new tools we’ve gained. Do you see any changes in the three pillars of the TSN values proposition: Inspiring hope, fostering community, and cultivating change? In short, yes. I think as Toledo Streets Newspaper has continued to grow, adapt and evolve, we have absolutely seen changes within those concepts but our vision on serving this community is unwavering, so the values remain. Like I mentioned, while it still exists, we’ve had a hard time fostering community to the capacity we know we’re capable of. While these three pillars are really interdependent on one another, we continue to be able to inspire hope by sharing vendor success stories. We’re sharing space with vendors and meeting them where they are individually to help them cultivate change within their lives, which in turn cultivates further change in our community. Since we’ve been able to hold strong through one of the most unprecedented times, I am confi dent Toledo Streets will manage to inspire hope, foster community and cultivate change through constant evolution and adaptation to best serve our Toledo Streets. Page 5

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