Nexus Community Partners is a proudly Black-led, BIPOC-majority nonprofit working to build engaged and powerful communities of color for over 20 years. In honor of Black August and Black Philanthropy Month, we sat down with Repa Mekha, Danielle Mkali, and Chalonne Faleke to reflect on their leadership journeys and the importance of investing in Black leadership.
Repa Mekha, Founder & CEO
18 years with Nexus
- “I’m a father, a grandfather, and a great-grandfather. That brings with it a certain level of responsibility as an elder. Part of my role in this organization is to live out what it looks like to be a purpose-driven elder, and to teach principles and values that others around me can steep themselves in.”
- “As a Black leader, most of what I do is related to who I’m with. I spend a great deal of my time in the same spaces that I’m working on. And I have a great sense of accountability. Because I have to show up. I have to be present. This work around leadership, for me, is about real, authentic work.”
Danielle Mkali, VP of Programs & Strategies
12 years with Nexus
- “Black leadership at Nexus means bringing my whole self as a Black woman into the space. It has meant that Black folks have been able to coordinate and organize rooms and spaces to have conversations that center Black people and that we get to be the designers and the decision-makers on efforts that are for and by Black people here at Nexus, even within a multiracial organization.”
- “Black leadership is so important in this time because we are seeing incredible devastation and pain and harm every day, in a way that feels much more forceful and rapid and chaotic than it has before, and yet we know from our history and where we’ve come from that we know a lot about what we’re seeing right now. And we have been resisting and building and creating and moving together and organizing and sharing money, sharing land, sharing food, sharing answers and solutions to what we’re seeing right now. For as long as we’ve been here.”
Chalonne Faleke, VP of Operations & Culture
8 years with Nexus
- “Black leadership at Nexus has been a very beautiful thing to witness. I love working with a whole bunch of Black genius people. I love seeing all of that brilliance. And it shows up in so many different ways because Black leadership at Nexus is diverse. There’s not just one kind of Blackness. Everybody is Black in their own way. It shines through.”
- “Black leadership is critical to invest in. You can look at the patterns of when people choose to call on Black people—when you need creativity, when you need strategic thinking, when you need to figure out how to do a lot with not very much, when there is major transformation happening. Those are often times when you see people call on the leadership of Black people, and that’s across sectors. But I’ve always felt like, why wait? Why wait until we hit these pivotal moments, these dire circumstances, to listen to and follow Black leadership?”