Mentors Honored, Torch Passed At Freddy Gala

A week before this year’s Elm City Freddy Fixer Parade, Rodney ​“Rock” Williams and his Green Elm Construction crew engaged in their annual spring cleaning of Dixwell Avenue to get the corridor neat and spiffy. It’s among a host of beautification efforts around the neighborhood that he leads, and that he’s been quietly doing free for years. 

“There’s doing work on the mountain, and that’s not doing work in the valley,” Williams told the dressed-to-the-nines crowd of 365 in attendance at the Elm City Freddy Fixer Parade Seventh Annual Awards gala on Saturday night at the Omni Hotel. ​“Like many of you, I’m in the valley.” 

That Williams, a long-time advocate for Black-owned contractors and prodigious mask distributor in the Black community during the pandemic, was the Edward Grant Community Service Award recipient, seemed fitting. It was Grant who one day in 1962 came out with a broom because Dixwell needed sweeping, and soon had his neighborhood sweeping the streets and marching for social change. The Freddie Fixer parade grew around that broom.

“To my mentors, I say thank you, you saved my life, I’m who I am because of you,” said Williams, amid the festive atmosphere in the brightly lit ballroom. He lauded the awards committee for recognizing younger recipients — among them, Time A Tell streetwear founder Joshua McCown and Ronald ​“Huggy Bear” Huggins, deputy director of the New Haven Youth and Recreation Department. ​“They are our future,” he said. 

The importance of mentorship was the theme at the gala, which was emceed with panache by Jessica Carl, Levon ​“Majesty” Whitaker, and Avery ​“SLAY” Washington, and marked by the passing of the torch to new Freddy Fixer executive board President Reese McLeod. 

Dr. Tamiko Jackson McArthur, the Health Care Award recipient, recalled riding on a New Haven Head Start float in the Freddie Fixer parade dressed as a doctor when she was 4. 

“We have to remember the youth,” said McArthur, a pediatrician who runs New Haven Pediatric & Adolescent Medical Services, the only privately-owned pediatric practice run by a Black woman in New Haven County. ​“If they don’t see the proper examples, if they don’t see us trying, they won’t do it either. They need us, so keep getting up and I’m going to be there along with you.”

Board of Alders President Tyisha Walker-Myers accepted the Community Service Award for West Hills Alder Honda Smith. ​“Honda works everyday at the Shack to make sure that the kids have a safe place to go,” she said. ​“And that’s really important because we all know we have to create space for our youth, the youth is the future.”

Chazz McCarter who, among other roles, leads mentoring programs with Chozen Generation and Upon This Rock Academy, sounded a similar refrain. ​“We all have a piece of the puzzle,” the New Haven native and Community Service Award recipient told the crowd. ​“Find out what your piece is and bring it to the table. We can do it together. No one has to do it themselves. Someone was standing in the gap for us and now it’s time for us to do that for someone else.”

Emcee Levon ​“Majesty” Whitaker serenaded ​“Huggy Bear” Huggins to the stage to wild applause. ​“This man here is saving the community, one youth at a time,” he said. 

“I was once told love is no good until you give it away,” said Huggins. ​“So New Haven, I thank you for the opportunity to share love.” 

Sgt. Cherelle D. Carr, who heads up the NHPD’s Special Victims Unit, expressed gratitude to Stetson Library branch manager Diane X. Brown. ​“I was just 4 years old when she had no reason to let me into a program but she did,” she said. ​“She embodies dedication to our community, a lesson I carry with me everyday.” 

Then Brown, who, alongside Petisia Adger, kept the parade afloat through leadership transitions, fundraising woes, and a global pandemic, took the stage. 

“This parade is one of the oldest in the country, and I stand before you this evening, beyond proud to be amongst my village and supporting and maintaining our rich cultural legacy and heritage,” she began.

She and Adger made several attempts to turn the parade over to younger generations. ​“We were getting tired,” she said. Then she met Reese McLeod who was spearheading a holiday toy giveaway at the Q House that involved 2,000 toys for 1,000 kids. ​“She was the one,” Brown said. McLeod initially said no. Then Brown asked again. ​“She said yes, with the condition that the former committee be close by to mentor and support her,” Brown said.

“We heard about mentorship tonight, and I’m here to tell my generation to stop being selfish with our skills and find some young people to mentor,” she said. ​“And young people, you have to allow yourself to be mentored because we’re not going to be here forever.” 

With that, she called McLeod to join her.

“This is not an easy job, not an easy task, and we don’t get paid for this,” said McLeod, after accepting flowers from Brown. ​“It’s another full-time job for me, but I love every minute of it, and we’re going to do it the right way, and we’re going to represent our community right.” 

“You did the damn thing, girl,” Brown said, wrapping her in a hug, as the bass rhythms from DJ Herman Ham transformed the ballroom into a dance party. ​“You did it and I’m so proud.”