I felt like I flew home from California on a cloud. Any thoughts of quitting, any doubts about whether I was making a difference, had evaporated into thin air. Being honored as a CNN Hero wasn’t validation. It was a reminder. A reminder of the calling God had given me, of the honor it was to be trusted with these young people who looked to me for help, of the joy in seeing their lives change. I was on fire.
Even though I didn’t win the top CNN Hero award, the network still sent me home with a $50,000 check. My mind raced with everything I could do for the kids with that kind of cash. I had a plan for every cent even before I deposited it in the bank. I wanted new computers for the kids to do their homework—we were still using the old dinosaurs I’d bought with the money from selling James’s TV. I wanted printers. I wanted a fifteen-passenger van to load up even more kids and roll to rallies, block parties, and out-of-town trips. When a kid needed clothes or shoes, I wanted to drive them to the mall and buy them the best. I didn’t believe in only giving scraps to kids in need. They deserved better than that. In the past, that had always come at my own expense. I’d use any spare cash I had to buy a warm coat or shoes that would last. Once, when two boys hadn’t eaten in over a day, I took them to McDonald’s with maybe $72 in my pocket. Those boys ate up almost every dime I had. Teenage boys can eat. I just let them get at it. They needed it more than I did. I never saw it as a sacrifice. It was something I wanted to do. But now I had some help.
CNN had also set up an account where people who saw my story on TV could donate online. I hadn’t expected much to come from that. I’d accepted online donations for years and only saw maybe $100 a week, and that was on a good week. I doubted anything would change.
But it turned out I’d majorly underestimated the power of a national audience. Suddenly, money flowed in. I’m talking upward of $500 every day. I had to refresh the page and do a double take just to make sure it was real.
It couldn’t have come at a better time. In the midst of the CNN chaos, the moment I thought would never happen finally came. Kids Off the Block got a grant to move into a building down the street. After years of squeezing everybody into three rooms of my little house, we’d have 2,500 square feet of office space all to ourselves. I was over-the-moon excited but probably not as excited as James. That man was thrilled to get his castle back and reclaim his rightful spot as king.
The kids helped us haul every last computer, printer, amp, and chair into the new center. We tacked pictures and awards on the blue-and-white walls and slid desks and tables across the blue tile floor. A donated church pew sat by the front door where parents could wait for their kids after programming. We lined the south side of the building with computers and printers and found a spot for a big conference table somebody had donated to us, where I envisioned us talking out problems in mentoring sessions. Long folding tables on one end of the building were covered with art supplies. James built a cubicle-sized music studio in the middle of the wide-open space, with walls covered in soundproof foam so nobody would be disturbed when they recorded. I even got my own office. It was barely big enough to hold two chairs in front of my desk, but it might as well have been executive-sized. I felt like I’d really made it every time I sat down to review sign-in sheets or create basketball schedules in peace.
With more space came more opportunities. We didn’t have to limit ourselves to mentoring, homework help, and music. Now we had computer training. We had a representative from a job-placement business visiting us three times a week to teach kids about job applications and résumés. We had art classes and dance programs with space for all the girls to spread their arms and kick their legs up.
As much as the move was a blessing, it was also a leap of faith. KOB didn’t own its new home. We just rented it. A grant paid our rent for six months, but after that, we were on our own. That meant every single month, I may have to beg, scream, and holler just to hand our landlord a check on time. The Lord always blessed us. Somehow we got by. Thanks to the CNN exposure, we had all these donations from strangers that would more than cover the bill. It was another burden off my shoulders, one less thing to worry about.
A lot of these donors assumed I took a salary, that more donations meant I could get a raise. Everybody was shocked when they learned I didn’t get paid. I still don’t. Providing for the kids is my first priority. There was always something they needed, another opportunity I could get for them if only we had the money. I wasn’t worried about myself. James and I would get by. The Lord always made sure of that. But the donors looked at me like I was crazy.
One of those donors was a lady named Donna Baker. She called me one day after seeing me on CNN. “Oh my gosh!” I heard her exclaim when I said hello. “You answer your own phone?” She cackled so loudly I had to laugh with her.
Donna was a white woman from the suburbs, but she told me she used to live in Roseland back when she was in high school. She remembered how beautiful it used to be and told me how heartbroken she was to see how far the neighborhood had fallen. She asked me all kinds of questions, too, wanting to know who my husband was and how long I’d been married and practically my whole life story. It seemed like every other phrase out of her mouth was “Oh my gosh!” She was blunt and direct, and I liked her right away. She didn’t just want to talk. She wanted to help.
“I want to come out there and see what you’re doing,” she said.
I’d heard that from supporters many times. They never followed through. But Donna did. She and her husband, Bobby, pulled up to the center one day with giant bags of candy for the kids. If they weren’t sure about her when they first laid eyes on her, they certainly changed their minds when she handed out that candy.
Donna had told me she was short, and she wasn’t kidding. She couldn’t have been taller than four foot three. But this lady was a powerhouse. She marched into the center and surveyed the space, nodding absently. By the time I’d shown her around, she had a whole list of supplies we needed. Then she went out and got them right then and there.
Her husband, meanwhile, never came out of the music studio. Once he found out we had one, that was it for him. It turned out he was a musician and used to play clarinet with Miles Davis. Zeek and a few other boys kept him busy listening to tracks and adjusting mixes.
My stomach hurt from laughing by the time I waved goodbye to Donna and Bobby. Something about her take-charge attitude connected with my spirit. I knew she was going to be important to me for years to come.
Donna promised she’d be in touch. True to her word, she called almost every week to find out how we were doing and what we needed. She mailed checks and sent supplies regularly. Over time, she became more than just a donor. She became a friend. I smiled every time I saw her name on my screen when the phone rang. On paper, we didn’t have much in common. She was a staunch atheist, while I was a proud follower of Jesus. She was well-to-do, while I had to get on my knees and pray just to pay my bills every month. She lived in the suburbs; I lived in the city. And yet, somehow we just clicked. She told me she admired me and my work, but to me, she was the one who was inspirational. She’d been sick most of her life with illnesses I’d never heard of and couldn’t pronounce. I knew she spent more time than she’d like stuck in bed, waiting for a new medication to kick in and get her back on her feet. I respected her tenacity, her determination, and her commitment to help the kids of KOB.
And she wasn’t the only helper my appearance on CNN had brought to me. For years, I’d leaned on James and my mom to help me keep an eye on the kids and run my programs. Now I had new volunteers. There were Tasia and Bree, who worked with the media, hung up flyers, and talked to people in the community to maximize our exposure. There was Ruby, who kept our books in order. Dominique, who acted as my community liaison. Trey, who ran our mentoring program and lined up volunteers. Zeek, who had come so far from his bad-attitude days that he now rode around the community talking to young people and bringing them to the program.
Aisha was twenty-one by now and living on her own. She was out helping people, too, working as a youth coordinator for Safety Net Works. But she still stopped by almost every day to help me and see what we needed at KOB. If I said, “Nothing,” she put her hand on her hip and stared at me. “Ma!” she’d holler in that voice that meant I’d better tell her something or she’d come up with something to do on her own.
By now, I’d learned how to delegate. I had to. Between our league’s thirtysomething basketball teams and the seventy-five-plus kids in and out of the program every day, I had to come to grips with the fact that I couldn’t do it all. I had to relinquish some control. That wasn’t easy. When Aisha and Tasia told me they would take care of something, my insides tensed up. If they were leaving to pick up food, I’d think, but you don’t know what they really love to eat like I do! Or I’d convince myself that no one else could manage registration like I could. I thought I was doing what was best for KOB. I did some research online and discovered something called “founder’s syndrome.” One look at the description and I knew that’s what I was doing. So when I caught myself falling back into that old trap, I could recognize it and stop myself. And if I didn’t, Aisha would roll her eyes at me and shout, “Ma! We got it!”
With all the recognition, donations, and volunteers, I thought my battle for legitimacy was over. All I’d have to do was point to the CNN Hero clip about me and say, “See what we’re doing over here? If it’s good enough for CNN, it’s good enough for you!”
But instead, I found myself bending over backward trying to prove myself even more. I wasn’t just “Diane over on Michigan” to my community anymore. I was “Diane the CNN Hero.” They walked into the center with their arms crossed, expecting to be impressed. The trouble was, I wasn’t any more impressive than I ever had been.
It only got worse when I won a BET Shine a Light award. The kids had been excited about the CNN award, but when they found out about BET, you’d have thought I’d been knighted. This was some hood fame. I had to prove myself all over again. And the exposure didn’t stop—one of the biggest instances, I didn’t see coming. It started as just a TV news story. I was busy in the center one day when two white people—a girl and a guy—walked in.
“Are you Diane Latiker?” one of them asked. They told me they were from LA 40 Productions, and somebody had recommended that they do a story about me. “Would you be willing to let us hang with you for a couple of days?”
After I said yes, they told me they’d be back the next day. They opened the center’s front door the next day with a short, middle-aged white guy in tow.
“This is Steve,” the woman said. “Would it be okay if he volunteered with you while we’re taping?”
“Sure. Hey, Steve!” I said. I never said no to a volunteer, and Steve seemed nice enough.
The kids and I were about to head outside to paint and clean a viaduct. Steve helped us gather up our equipment and introduced himself to the kids as we walked through the front door. I didn’t take him for much of a handyman—he had this look about him like he hadn’t done much manual labor. But he jumped right in like he’d worked with us from day one, laughing and joking with the kids and suggesting what we ought to do next. This guy’s alright, I thought. Cameras recorded our every move—footage for the story, the people from LA 40 told us.
Steve was back the next morning, and the next, working his tail off and asking the kids questions about their parents or school or what it’s like living in Roseland. But as the days went by, I stood back and frowned. Those cameras that followed us around weren’t pointed at the kids or the viaduct they were painting. They were pointed right at Steve.
I have never been known as a woman who keeps my mouth shut. If I feel something, I let it out. So when I saw a producer walking around our project, I marched up to him in a huff. “You told me you were doing a story on the kids, right?” I said, not in the nicest tone. “But every time I turn around, the camera is on Steve.”
He assured me the story would focus on the kids, and I went back to work. Still, every time I looked at a camera, the lens was zoomed in on Steve. After a few days, I’d had it.
“That’s it,” I snapped, setting down my paintbrush and standing up. “I’m tired of this.” I walked straight back to the center, muttering to myself the whole way. “These people are getting on my nerves. This story should be about the kids. They’re the most important.”
“Diane,” a voice said in my ear. “We can hear you.”
In my frustration I’d completely forgotten about the microphone strapped to my body and the earpiece in my ear. These producers had heard every bit of my little rant.
I was too frustrated to be humiliated. “Oh really?” I shot back. “Well, hear this.” I snatched off the microphone and threw it down as I walked into the center.
The producers rushed inside in a flash, their faces twisted with concern. “What’s wrong?” they all asked at once, as if they hadn’t heard my list of grievances. “We’ll do better, we’ll do better, we promise!”
I swallowed my pride and returned to the viaduct. We finished painting, and the kids and I headed back to the center. I still couldn’t shake the feeling that something was going on that they weren’t telling me, but since I couldn’t put my finger on it, I figured all I could do was let it go.
But that evening, as I sat with my mom on my porch, we saw Steve walking down the street, heading nowhere in particular. Three cameras followed him as he noticed us on the porch and waved. He didn’t cross the street but kept on walking.
“Something is wrong here,” I said quietly, keeping my eyes glued on Steve.
“What do you think it is?” my mom asked.
I shook my head. “I don’t know. But why would those cameras be following him?”
When my phone rang that night, it was Steve. He didn’t say a word about the cameras but had a different request.
“Can you have everyone meet me at the lot tomorrow?” he asked. “I’m heading out of town, and I wanted to say goodbye to all the kids.”
The next morning the kids were at my house around nine—they were already planning to arrive early because we were working on summer projects around the neighborhood. When I told them Steve was leaving that day, they dissolved into whines and protests. I knew they liked him, but I hadn’t realized how much.
We headed across the street to the lot and waited, the morning sun just starting to warm the asphalt. It wasn’t hot yet, but I could tell it would be soon if Steve didn’t get a move on.
The kids grinned and waved when they noticed Steve walking to the lot. But they froze when they heard a loud trampling. We all looked at one another, our eyes wide. “What in the world?” I asked.
Before anybody could answer, at least forty people, all dressed in black, rushed onto the lot holding giant cameras. They looked like they could have been dressed in tactical gear for all I knew. I was right, I thought. Something is up. This dude has been lying to us. I stared at Steve. “What is going on here?” I demanded.
Steve smiled. “Diane, I have something to tell you. I’m not who I said I was.”
“What, your name’s not Steve?” a boy behind me yelled.
He laughed. “No, my name is Steve.”
He paused for a moment. We all leaned in, anxious to hear this guy’s big reveal, whatever it was.
“Actually, I’m part of ABC’s Secret Millionaire,” he said.
My jaw nearly hit the ground. I’d imagined something was going on behind the scenes, but this wasn’t exactly what I’d had in mind.
“You’re . . . you’re a millionaire?”
“Yes,” he said simply. “And I’m really impressed with what you guys have done. I want to help you grow.”
By now my hands were cupped over my mouth, as if they could hold back the sobs. I couldn’t believe this was happening. For years, I’d dreamed about somebody dropping out of the sky and extending a helping hand. I’d written to Oprah more times than I could count, thinking she could be my guardian angel or something. But to experience it in real life was more than I could have imagined.
Steve reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper. I knew it was a check. Is this guy really giving me $10,000? I thought. My head spun thinking about all we could do with that kind of money.
He handed me the check and I dove in for a hug. Then I took a closer look at the check. I started counting the zeros. Three, four, five. This check was for $100,000.
I screamed and jumped up and down like I was a Publishers Clearing House winner on Super Bowl Sunday. “Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh!” I hollered over and over. I was in shock, still trying to comprehend what this man was doing for us.
And he wasn’t done. “I’ve got something else for you,” he said. Two trucks pulled into the lot out of nowhere, and men unloaded boxes of Mac computers and printers. When a guy carried out a box holding a big-screen TV, James and I laid out laughing. I’d forgotten that I’d told Steve about selling James’s TV.
“Don’t you touch this TV!” James said as everybody laughed.
Every single one of us cheered and hugged one another. It was a celebration like I’d never experienced.
And he still wasn’t done. A giant truck roared down the alley as Steve pulled out a poster. He unrolled it to reveal the most beautiful basketball court I’d ever seen.
“I’m going to build you a new basketball court,” he said.
If the kids were excited before, they were out-of-their-minds ecstatic now. They nearly tackled Steve, hugging him so hard that I was worried for his back.
I watched those boys trash talk one another and brag about who was going to dunk on whom and who was going to score the most points. These kids are gonna have the best, I thought. After all this time of refusing to give them scraps and giving them the best that I could afford, someone had stepped in to do me one better. Someone was giving them world-class computers and a world-class basketball court, helping me provide world-class programs.
Somebody saw us. Somebody believed we were doing important work. I’d shouted it from the rooftops since the beginning, always feeling like nobody heard. And now, somebody did. Lots of somebodies. I still didn’t feel like I deserved any of it, but it sure was helpful.
God, I don’t know why You’re using me like this, I prayed. But thank You.