She4She

Kenzie Bok is the Administrator/CEO of the Boston Housing Authority (BHA), Boston’s largest housing provider, serving 60,000 residents. Before her appointment by Mayor Wu this year, she was the Boston City Councilor for District 8, representing Mission Hill, Fenway, Back Bay, Beacon Hill, and the West End. On the Council, she chaired the Ways & Means Committee in her first term, steering the City’s finances through the Covid-19 pandemic and two mayoral transitions. In 2021 and 2022, she led Boston’s appropriation process for the American Rescue Plan Act, sending hundreds of millions into new affordable housing programs and establishing the new PowerCorps green jobs training program for Boston’s young people.

Prior to running for Council in 2019, Kenzie led policy and planning at BHA. She also helped organize the successful 2016 campaign to pass the Community Preservation Act for Boston, raising more local funds for housing affordability, parks, and historic preservation.

Kenzie earned a Ph.D. in the history of political thought from Cambridge University, which she attended as a Marshall Scholar, and previously held a Lectureship at Harvard. She is an active lifelong member of Trinity Church Boston and serves on the board of the Massachusetts Affordable Housing Alliance. As a child growing up in nearby Bay Village, Kenzie attended CMCB’s SummerARTS program for many summers and studied piano at the Center.”

Senator Lydia Edwards is a career advocate, activist, and voice on behalf of society’s most vulnerable. She was raised all over the world by her military mom but chose to make East Boston her home.

Prior to being elected to the State Senate and Boston City Council, Lydia worked extensively in the legal field. She worked as a public interest attorney with Greater Boston Legal Services focusing on labor issues such as fighting for access to unemployment insurance, back wages, fair treatment for domestic workers, and combating human trafficking.

Senator Edwards coordinated a statewide campaign to pass the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights – and she won. Following the bill’s passage, she was named Bostonian of the Year, Honorable Mention, by the Boston Globe. In February 2023, Senator Edwards was named chair of the Joint Housing Committee in the MA state legislature.

In addition to her role as a State Senator, she serves as First Lieutenant Officer in the Massachusetts National Guard working as a Judge Advocate General, where she addresses military legal matters.

porsha olayiwola is a native of chicago who writes, lives and organizes in boston. olayiwola is a writer, performer, educator and curator who uses afro-futurism and surrealism to examine historical and current issues in the black, woman, and queer diasporas. she is an individual world poetry slam champion and the founder of the roxbury poetry festival. Olayiwola is the 2021 artist-in-residence at the isabella stewart gardner museum as well as a 2020 poet laureate fellow with the academy of american poets. porsha olayiwola is currently teaching in her role as the jacob ziskind poet-in-residence at brandeis university. she is the author of i shimmer sometimes, too. olayiwola is the current poet laureate for the city of boston. her work can be found in or forthcoming from with triquarterly magazine, black warrior review, the boston globe, essence magazine, redivider, split this rock, the academy of american poets, netflix, wilderness press, the museum of fine arts and elsewhere.

Danielle has more than 25 years of experience in the human services industry in addition to holding two master’s degrees: Master of Business Administration from Simmons School of Management and Master of Social Work from Boston University. She was most recently the Deputy Commissioner for Clinical Services & Program Operations at the Department of Children & Families. Danielle holds the highest level of independent licensure in social work (LICSW) and was a practicing clinical therapist for 15 years. Her training and primary practice are with “high-risk” children, youth, and families with a clinical specialty in trauma and attachment. Danielle’s programs at Rediscovery specialized primarily in “aging out youth,” and unaccompanied homeless youth. Additional areas of professional interest and experience include early childhood development, dyspraxia, and autism. Danielle developed an innovative program, YouthHarbors, which is based in high schools and designed to prevent unaccompanied high school students from becoming homeless or to rapidly house these youth when they are homeless. Danielle has served on many task forces designed to evaluate and address the issues facing homeless, unaccompanied youth, and youth involved in state care.

Danielle teaches at the Boston University School of Social Work in the Policy Department and has provided expert consultation on cases related to the clinical impact of foster care and programs designed to work with young-parenting adults who have experienced trauma and substance abuse. She has trained nationally on topics related to child welfare, homeless youth, and education.

Cappy & Sam Daume

Joe Popolo/Friends of the Heights

AEW

Arbor Associates

Eastern Bank

Professional Women in Construction – Boston Chapter

The Snow Family

HYM Investments