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PA Local Heroes: Meet the community organizer helping boost Black homeownership rates
Spotlight PA link: https://www.spotlightpa.org/news/2025/06/erie-black-wall-street-homeownership-pennsylvania-greenwood-tulsa/
Erie’s Black Wall Street started off as a Facebook group to bring the area’s Black community together. In the late 2010s, Kyra Taylor, co-founder of the group alongside her friends Angelica Spraggins and DaVona Pacley, used the page to connect local businesses and share events, the name paying tribute to the Greenwood District of Tulsa, Oklahoma.
But when they saw a financial outlet list Erie as one of the “worst cities” for Black people to live based on certain economic stats, the trio was inspired to expand their community-building, Taylor told PA Local.
“We are the type of people … we’re not going to complain about a problem without offering a solution,” she said.
In 2020, they turned Erie’s Black Wall Street into a nonprofit, of which Taylor is currently the executive director. It has since “ballooned and blossomed,” she told PA Local. Its small staff — many of whom “donate their time” and put in work beyond the number of hours they work on paper, Taylor said — run initiatives that aid prospective homeowners, foster entrepreneurship, and more.
- more at link -
But when they saw a financial outlet list Erie as one of the “worst cities” for Black people to live based on certain economic stats, the trio was inspired to expand their community-building, Taylor told PA Local.
“We are the type of people … we’re not going to complain about a problem without offering a solution,” she said.
In 2020, they turned Erie’s Black Wall Street into a nonprofit, of which Taylor is currently the executive director. It has since “ballooned and blossomed,” she told PA Local. Its small staff — many of whom “donate their time” and put in work beyond the number of hours they work on paper, Taylor said — run initiatives that aid prospective homeowners, foster entrepreneurship, and more.
