By Isaiah Singleton
PawKids began in 2015 as an after-school enrichment program for children in Grove Park and has expanded over time in response to the needs of children, their families, and the community.
Founder and executive director, LaTonya Gates Johnston launched PawKids in a neighbor’s backyard with five children. PawKids are a faith-aligned community hub that exists to empower, provide holistic resources, and build genuine self-sustainability in the lives of Atlanta neighbors.
With support from two churches (historically Black, Paradise Baptist Church and majority-white Atlanta Westside Presbyterian are the basis for the “PAW”) Johnston purchased a former trap house on Donald Lee Hollowell Blvd and renovated it to provide a safe, loving environment for the kids after school.
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The program quickly grew to thirty, and LaTonya, who herself was raised in poverty, determined the kids needed not only enrichment, but learning support, behavioral health support, and family support to thrive. In 2017, she opened another space, the Gathering Place, to provide respite for parents, parenting support groups, and opportunities for counseling.
Running PawKids for nine years, Johnston spoke with the Atlanta Voice to talk about her life, the non-profit, and more.
The Atlanta Voice: Why did you decide to start PawKids?
LaTonya Gates Johnston: The main reason I started PawKids was to give hope and to be a voice for the voiceless. When I was growing up, my mom was addicted to drugs all my life and I also had a grandmother whose highest education was second grade. My grandmother gave us a lot of love and discipline for her was number one, however, the resources that were there, they weren’t afforded to us. So, understanding the importance of resources and providing resources to women and families who look like me and families whose communities were how I grew up, it’s important to me.
AV: How do you feel running PawKids for nine years?
LGJ: I drive on my campus sometimes and honestly sit in my car and cry just because of His goodness and His grace. I was not the smartest kid, and I didn’t start reading fluently until 13 or 14 years old because of the disabilities and my mom did a lot of drugs, so it messed with us and messed things up. On top of that, you must factor in trauma, molestation, anger, not having those resources being put into classrooms and I look at my life and it doesn’t add up to what statistics should say. Ultimately, I was kicked out of all DeKalb county schools, the Atlanta Public Schools were the only ones who allowed me to go to school. I graduated from St. Luke’s Academy, a school for kids who had been kicked out and society said they’re done with. APS gave me a second chance.
AV: What are your business goals for the remainder of the year?
LGJ: If people walk onto this campus, they’re like, ‘it’s beautiful, she’s not hurting for anything’, but that was a lie. I’m a black woman in Atlanta and my budget is $1.5 million a year. How hard do you think it is to raise that? It’s difficult, especially being a nonprofit to be sustainable and raising money. It’s hard to take care of your people. If everybody gave $5, it would help us to be able to empower more people and take care of them. We have three buildings, but the original house the kids came to needs to be rebuilt. We need help over here.
AV: Going into the 10th anniversary of PawKids, where do you see your non-profit in the next five years?
LGJ: In the next five years, I want us to have that new building for one and empower more people. I personally don’t want to be running PawKids in the next five years, but I want to be out there in the community raising money to help bring awareness to what’s going on. I want to see these kids in college and working. I also want to see these kids remain in our neighborhood because of affordable housing, the way it’s going in Atlanta, we won’t be here. It’s sad because this is the neighborhood that you even walk in and now, I have kids telling me about White Street, and I’m like what is that, and the whole street is white. It’s the truth. I want to see my kids stay here and enjoy the new school that was just built for them and all the new places and resources for them. It’s their neighborhood.
AV: What kind of advice do you have for future business owners?
LGJ: Running a non-profit, I hear so many people say, ‘I want to run a nonprofit’, and my response is why? It’s not as easy as people think. The first thing I would tell people is to work for a nonprofit. Join forces with a nonprofit and make sure it’s sustainable in that community. Also, please stop coming into our communities thinking that you know more than we know, and you think you can tell us what we need. This is our community, and we know. If you partner with us and lock arms with us, we can go farther, but the disconnect is setting us and you back. More crime, you don’t talk, and they come in and you just roll over to people who are here. So, what do you think will happen? I see every day. If we worked smarter and leveraged our resources, Atlanta could go farther and to the Mayor’s Year of The Youth, how many grassroots leaders have you talked to? I promise you, if you sit down and talk to us, we can help you.
For more information, visit https://www.pawkids.org.
This post was originally published on The Atlanta Voice.