“I’m a people person. Everywhere I go, I meet people,” says Darlene Harrison. “My kids always say, ‘Mom, you’re always talking to people. Do you know them?’ I say, ‘No, I just met them.’ That’s just how I am. I’m a really friendly person.”
That’s one reason why Darlene was chosen to be the designated “Resident Leader” at Talbot Bernard Homes, a 44-unit affordable housing project built in 2003 by CSNDC.
“I guess they saw something in me,” Darlene recalls. “I was already doing leadership stuff like when the residents had an issue with management, I would offer to go with them to support them. And I help management, too.”
Darlene has lived at Talbot Bernard for 20 years, since the buildings were first constructed. She lived in a three-bedroom apartment and then a four-bedroom apartment to accommodate the various housing needs of her family of seven daughters over the years. Now that her daughters are all grown, she’s downsizing to a one bedroom.
“Less to clean,” she says with a smile.
It’s also all on one level, which is critical to Darlene since she suffers from rheumatoid arthritis.
It was this condition that caused Darlene to leave her job in the Sterile Processing Department at the VA Hospital and focus her energies on her family and her community.
“I’ve been doing a lot of volunteering,” she says. “If people need help in the community, I just jump right in.”
And she’s passing that attitude down to her children, eight grandchildren, and one great-grandchild.
“When I have my grandchildren with me, we go out in the community and see what we can do,” she says. “Sometimes I don’t even need to ask them to volunteer. They see somebody’s having a yard sale and say, ‘Can we help?’”
When she’s not engaged with the next generation, Darlene is focused on helping another group in particular.
“I always wanted to be an advocate for seniors,” she reflects. “Seniors have a voice, but sometimes their voice is not heard. It’s not that they don’t want it to be heard. They just don’t know how to ask for help when they need help, because they’re set in their own ways.”
Darlene recalls the time when she helped her elderly uncle set up a virtual medical appointment during the pandemic.
“He didn’t know anything about how to connect virtually,” she says. “I called the clinic and said, ‘You’re asking these seniors to do virtual, but no one has taught them how to get on Zoom.’ If it wasn’t for me advocating for him and sitting with him, he wouldn’t have been able to do it. He would have missed the appointment.”
Like all of CSNDC’s resident leaders, Darlene is a graduate of CSNDC’s Resident Leadership Institute (RLI), a comprehensive training designed to ground resident leaders in the fundamentals of community organizing, policy advocacy, asset mapping, and facilitation of community-building initiatives.
“I got to meet a lot of people from different states and different nationalities,” she recalls. “It was a beautiful thing because they put you in groups, so you really get to know each other and learn different strategies about what worked for them and what can work for us. And even if it doesn’t work, you don’t give up.”
Darlene has taken that knowledge and attitude to heart in her role as Resident Leader.
“I love it because it’s helping the community make changes in the community,” she says. “Not only that, it’s working with the management, and helping tenants know their rights and understand the best way to approach things to get the changes they want.”
Although she believes she was a leader long before being asked to play this role, Darlene credits the training from CSNDC for making her a better leader.
“I’ve learned how to get to know the different dynamics in a group, like when you’re trying to set goals everyone’s not going to be on the same page,” she says. “But you have to listen and accept it and try to get everyone to get involved.”
“We’re just looking out for our neighbors. I think a lot of communities have lost those values. If more people do this, it’ll be a better place.”
