KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Staff at the Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Center in Kansas City want the facility to help people hold conversations on race following social unrest.
"You can't fix what you won't face," explained Glenn North, executive director of the Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Center.
Inside the center, exhibits and artifacts tell the story of political and social change for Black people in Kansas City.
"Kansas City, like just about every other city in America, has dealt with issues of race, has dealt with segregation," North said.
Recent protests calling for reforms to policing drew large crowds not seen since 1968.
North explained what led to protests in 1968.
"Students wanted to be able to stay home to watch Doctor King's funeral service and they wanted the schools to be closed that day and the city, the school district did not agree to do that," he said.
A portrait hanging inside the center shows Bruce R. Watkins leading the 1968 march.
Watkins was a political and social activist in Kansas City.
North hopes past struggles and victories the center highlights inspire a new conversation on how to move forward.
"We want to provide an opportunity for the community to come together, black and white. People of all backgrounds and nationalities to say what is it that we can do to change policy? How can we be more effective in the political arena so that wholesale change does take place and we don't have to keep repeating this cycle?" he said.
Demonstrations demanding police reform are not new, but North is optimistic change will come from the recent protests.
"I think things will change and I think that is what's starting to happen and I think that's what makes this moment different," he said.
The cultural center is currently closed because of the coronavirus pandemic. However, leaders hope to reopen to the public later this summer to get important conversations started.
