Laura Glesby Photo
Dawn Leaks Ragsdale (center), Yale VP Alexandra Daum & Mayor Justin Elicker.
A local champion of entrepreneurial equity has been chosen to to lead the New Haven-focused “Center for Inclusive Growth” that Yale promised to build in 2021 — and now will start trying to define two years later.
Dawn Leaks Ragsdale, who previously served for two years as the executive director of the local business incubator Collab, is the center’s new executive director. She is also the founder of Lioness Magazine, a publication that spotlights women entrepreneurs.
University administrators and local politicians convened a press conference to announced this news on Tuesday afternoon at 65 Audubon St., the office that the forthcoming $5 million center is slated to occupy.
Leaks Ragsdale said her work at Collab has given her insight into how local Black, Brown, and women entrepreneurs in particular have less “access to capital, access to networks, even media representation of who is considered an entrepreneur.”
“This center has the potential to do so much good in the city of New Haven,” she said.
Yale and city leaders acknowledged that two years had passed since the center was first announced in November 2021 as part of a broader $52 million agreement between Yale and the City, and the hiring of a director.
“It took a long time to get to this point because we wanted to find the perfect person,” said Mayor Justin Elicker. “And with Dawn, we believe that we have.”
Yale President Peter Salovey described the center as “a source of innovation, ideas, and programs” designed around a vision that “economic development will spread to every neighborhood in the city.”
So what will the center actually do?
When presenters were asked that question, Elicker replied, “We don’t fully know yet.” He stressed that today was “Day One” for Leaks Ragsdale.
“Part of the answer is that Yale has a lot of resources” that could benefit the city, he said. For example, he suggested, “Yale has a lot of buildings and they purchase artwork.” The university could perhaps focus on supporting local artists. Or, “Yale purchases a lot of food” and could collaborate with local food businesses.
Another possible component of the center would entail researching policy initiatives that the city can implement on topics like the housing crisis, Elicker said.
Leaks Ragsdale added that she plans to focus on helping local businesses and nonprofits grow and access funding. She also said she would examine how Yale can support the city’s priorities as laid out in the American Rescue Plan Act and Cultural Equity plans crafted by local policymakers.
Board of Alders President Tyisha Walker-Myers expressed enthusiasm for the how local businesses might grow as a result of the center, while stressing that the center should make sure to benefit the entire city — including lower-income, majority Black and Brown parts of the city.
“I grew up here,” she said. “I know we have so many wonderful ideas in our neighborhoods.”
Yet another example of how the connected keep the money and the disenfranchised are left on the sidewalk. Do you need $5 million for that? How about using that money to get more cops or teachers instead of more desk warming bodies? And then asking for more money on tax hikes without even trying to save, not even a little? am a life long democrat, and I would never vote for Trump or anyone who supports him, but shenanigans such as whats mentioned in this article are what created Trumpism and give democrats and progressives a bad name. No priorities whatsoever? If we educate or future generations with teachers not looking to run away and keep them safe, places like this would not need to exist in the first place. We are so lost!