Kente Cultural Center Will Close At The End Of June

Citing a dwindling volunteer base and competition from other youth-oriented programs, the Kente Cultural Center will be closing its doors at the end of June.

Jane Bernoudy, director of the organization, said the decision to close was made by the board of director’s at the end of the 2012 fiscal year. She said the initial decision was to close in December, but the board decided to extend through the end of the 2013 fiscal year on June 30 to fulfill their grants.

“We’ve been phasing down,” said Bernoudy. “The decision to close came when the board realized they didn’t have the energy to do everything that needed to be done to keep Kente alive.”

Bernoudy said the board of directors has been active in volunteering to help run Kente’s programs, but that this participation has declined as members move out of New London or retire. In addition, the center has seen declining participation in programs as youth take part in programs offered by other organizations.

“It was hard to recruit children for a one person operation,” said former director Jane Glover. “Basically we ran on volunteers and one paid staff person, and then we’d hire consultants like artists and musicians to run special programs.”

Glover was among the community members and businesses who founded Kente in 1997 in response to a lack of African-American cultural activities in southeastern Connecticut. Kente officially began in September of 1997, when it was awarded nonprofit status and began its programming. Bill Cornish initially offered the space at 219 Bank Street rent-free, and the center has been there ever since.

Kente’s mission is to “promote the contributions and importance of African-American culture and history to society as a whole,” particularly to children ages eight to 15. Its programming has included a book club, “Male 2 Male” and “Chat & Chew” mentoring events, storytelling, and celebration of holidays such as Kwanzaa and Juneteenth.

Glover said that since the center opened, the one major change has been an expansion into the ground floor storefront to open a gallery and display space. Since that time, Kente has been participating in art openings and New London Main Street’s food strolls.

Bernoudy said she has been with the center since 2008, when she saw Glover changing out an exhibit in the gallery space. After chatting with Glover about the center, Bernoudy found herself hired as Kente’s program director.

When Glover became the chief administrative officer in Mayor Daryl Finizio’s administration in 2011, Bernoudy became Kente’s executive director. Glover said she did some work with the center after taking on this new role, but soon found she had little free time to do so.

Glover said that although Kente was not facing fiscal challenges, its budget was not large enough to hire additional staff to help run programs. She said this put Kente at a disadvantage in running programs when compared to organizations such as Writer’s Block Ink or New London Youth Affairs.

“I think those other entities do a good job. I’m not upset with them at all,” said Glover. “But I think they were kind of a springboard off of Kente.”

Bernoudy says Kente has enough funding left to pay for its expenses and two remaining scheduled programs. These include an etiquette workshop for children ages 12 to 17, taking place from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on May 11 at the Public Library of New London with a lunch to follow at Tony D’s, and the annual Juneteenth celebration of the end of slavery in the United States. This event is currently planned for 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. on June 15 at Williams Park.

Bernoudy is currently seeking volunteers and donations to assist with Juneteenth. She said she hopes to bring in three different acts and make the celebration bigger than it has been in the past.

“Even though we’re closing out, we want to go out on a high note,” she said.

Bernoudy is also looking to set up a closing sale at the end of this month to sell the center's supplies, with proceeds going toward the Juneteenth event. Bernoudy said the center plans to distribute any funds remaining after June 30 to the recipients of the center’s Mella Cornish Scholarship.

Bernoudy said other organizations might take Kente’s place in continuing some holiday celebrations. She plans to focus on her part-time job with New London Youth Affairs as well as her writing.

“Everything that Kente did fell right in with things that I’d been doing, and as an artist I had an opportunity to broaden some young minds on African and African-American culture that I’ve experienced,” she said. “It’s been a good run.”

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