YMICC Director Andrew Shannon Shares His Vision for the Historic Institution

In mid-April the YMI Cultural Center—originally the Young Men’s Institute—named Andrew Shannon its new director.

Though he’s a native of Wilmington, NC, the core of Shannon’s background comes from Newport News, Virginia, where he began a 35-year career shortly after finishing college at Winston-Salem State, which he attended on a basketball scholarship. Soon thereafter he married his high school sweetheart, and they have two grown daughters, both involved in types of public service.

But after college, Shannon’s career took him north on a journey that has encompassed community engagement, youth programs, Civil Rights, and a vision in which “you let your reach exceed your grasp.”

When we sat with Dr. Shannon for an interview shortly after his appointment, he began by laughingly explaining why he has always been interested in community engagement. “When I was growing up in Wilmington, they had one big event, the Azalea Festival. That was it. A festival about flowers, but not people!”

First stop, Newport News, VA

“When I moved to Newport News, I worked with the City Department of Parks and Recreation as a Park Ranger. It’s a city of 200,000 people, and it’s 26 miles long. The northern part is mostly white, and southern part, called the South East, is where most of the Blacks live.”

A Park Ranger’s job, he told us, is functionally that of a policeman. But from the outset Shannon directed his focus at interaction with the community, especially in South East Wilmington. He recalls with a chuckle, “They called me Ranger Andy. Because I wanted to get involved in the community. I did interpretive programs like nature hikes, and leading kite flights. I wanted to get to know people in the community—not to arrest them for doing wrong, but to talk about positive things.”

He told The Urban News that, not long ago, he returned to Newport News for a visit, and a man in his 40s approached him. “Hey, Mr. Shannon. I remember you. You gave me and my brother a pep talk, and it saved my life!”

Community Center Leader

After working as a Ranger, Andrew Shannon became director of the Doris Miller Community Center, named for the Black Navy cook who became a hero during the attack on Pearl Harbor.

“One of the things I did there was recreation—football, basketball—and I’d bring in sports stars like Allan Iverson and Aaron Brooks of the New Orleans Saints. But I have always loved the performing arts, so I started a dance troupe there, too. We combined contemporary dance, step dance, even gymnastics. You just don’t see a lot of inner-city children interested in gymnastics. But we also established a choir, and we put on plays: dramas, musicals … It really turned into flourishing community center.”

Shannon continues, “Because of my work there we got the whole community involved. I went out to meet with everyday people, what I call ‘blue collar, white collar, and no collar at all.”

His outreach included business leaders, small business people like a bookstore owner, as well as senior citizens, members of the Blooming Garden Club.

“There had always been big events in uptown Newport News, but South East didn’t have anything that would bring people together. So in 1991 I organized the Southeast Community Day parade and Festival.”

Through his community outreach, Shannon was able to get funeral homes to lend their limousines for driving guest speakers and VIPs; cemetery owners would lend their tents for outdoor events. And over time, it became a three-day festival, the largest in Newport News.

“The first year it was a one-day affair. But over time I was able to bring in national leaders, people like Martin Luther King III, Dr. Bernice King, Joseph Lowery, Jr.”

County Youth Director

After decades in Newport News, Andrew Shannon became the first Director of Youth Services, program development, and budgeting for the youth office of Fluvanna County, which lies between the capital, Richmond, and Charlottesville, VA.

“It’s a rural community. No stoplights, and very few streetlights. So once again I went around to meet community leaders and church leaders. I wanted to talk to children and find out what their interests are. And because Wilmington’s only festival had focused on flowers, not people, my journey took me to places where I could focus on people, on entire communities.”

What he found was that above all else, young people across Fluvanna County wanted jobs. So he began what he called the “Rent-a-teen” program, under which boys and girls between 13 and 19 were able to land part-time jobs in grocery stores, as baby sitters, yard work, and other work. It was, for a rural county, a real opportunity for workforce development.

Enlarging Youth Horizons

Shannon also established the Fluvanna County Teen Scene, a step-dance team. He wanted the boys and girls to expand their horizons.

“Whatever your environment is now,” he told them, “you have goals and aspirations. Let your reach exceed your grasp.”

In keeping with that vision, he made sure the youth group was visible beyond Fluvanna County. He took them to perform at “New York University, and Columbia University, and Howard University, as part of their journey. They even got to perform at Apollo Theater,” he told us with pride.

Cambridge, MD Empowerment Center

Both in Virgina and later as director of the nonprofit Empowerment Center in Cambridge, Maryland, Shannon worked to set a positive tone and create opportunities for young people.

“You set the tone, you set the environment, and you can have wholesome family activities and programming. Everything gets built around that. For example, September is Gospel Heritage Month. So you reach out to gospel musicians, headliners like Master Bobby Jones, Luther Barns, Keira Shera Clark. We want to do similar things here, like the concert of Kim Waters and his daughter Jocelyn, which Gene Ellison arranged recently.”

Civil Rights a Passion

Shannon is not at all a shy man; he makes sure that the programs he develops are recognized and publicized. YouTube videos of his work with youth groups and special events are widely available. And so, when other leaders research him, they find his step team, and his drum line, and a gospel festival. As a result, he was asked to go to Washington to do programs with the Department of Energy; he served as the Human Rights Advocate for the Commonwealth of Virginia, where he investigated civil rights complaints; he was appointed to review civil rights policy for the Department of Homeland Security.

Shannon also served on the Virginia Advisory Committee to the US Commission on Civil Rights, along with Dr. Curtis W. Harris, the first black mayor of Hopewell, VA. Harris had been a body shield for MLK Jr. and when he introduced Andrew to civil rights leaders, and to members of the King family, it opened further doors. “In the Civil Rights community, like anywhere else, if you have someone to vouch for you, you’ll get respect.”

Vision for the YMI

Shannon’s appointment comes as the YMICC nears the completion of its $6.4 million renovation and redesign. Located at the corner of Eagle and S. Market Streets, the YMI has long been considered the heart of “the Block,” Asheville’s historic Black community.

Parts of the building were long unused, such as the basement which originally contained a swimming pool. Now that space and additional basement areas will contain classrooms, a state-of-the-art conference center, and accessible community rooms for meetings of groups large and small.

In announcing his appointment, the YMI Board wrote, “Andrew brings with him a wealth of experience and expertise in diversity, equity, and inclusion, as well as a strong background in community engagement and coalition building. [He] brings over twenty-five years of supervisory and management experience, effectively collaborating with federal, state, and local governments, as well as various community organizations and leaders.”

That experience, Shannon told us, coupled with the YMI’s mission to “enhance and uplift black history, legacy, and the community, is in line with what I’ve done all my life.”

He continued, “We want to be the heart and soul of the community. To do that we have to galvanize the community to come back. If you’ve left, forgotten, been forced out, come back and take a look at us now.”

To get there, Shannon said, we have to do specific things:

Listen to the whole community—young people, seniors, to the voices of all ages. People have ideas and opinions. Sometimes you just have to listen. We want to be intergenerational here in Asheville. I want the whole community to take a look at us now.

Get young people engaged. Engage youth; without their influence, you won’t have a long-term continuation.

Enliven the human spirit. That means presenting the performing arts and cultural arts. It means providing a myriad of programming, a buffet for those who like different delicacies: music, classical, contemporary, even like House of Prayer’s New Orleans Jazz, with tuba, trombones, all the elements of New Orleans Jazz.

Be holistic. Play to our strengths, to the performing arts, creative arts, cultural arts. Find and renew previous programs that have fallen by the wayside—a band, choir, and education programs and classes.

Partner with other community agencies. Work in conjunction with other organizations like financial management, budgeting, so we can offer programs on health and wellness, housing, community needs. They have expertise in the field, so we bring partners and organizations together to host health and wellness expos. All of them right here, at the YMI.

The Right Man in the Right Place

Andrew Shannon seems to be the right man in the right place at the right time for the YMICC. He is enthusiastic about bringing more acts that celebrate the Black musical heritage of gospel and jazz to the community, as he did with the Andrew Shannon Gospel Music Celebration which played in Wilmington, Wrightsville Beach, and Carolina Beach over Thanksgiving weekends from 2010 until the Covid-19 pandemic.

He and the board are looking at the possibility of establishing a membership structure, both to bring in regular annual income but also to help the community feel buy-in and ownership of the historic center.

The YMI is planning its Grand Reopening Celebration to coincide with the Goombay Festival over the weekend of September 27-29, 2024. With opening ceremonies taking place a few days before, he plans to meet with numerous stakeholders and community leaders. And he has plans for a Health & Wellness Expo on October 19, 2024.

As he notes, this will be a renaissance—a rebirth of the YMI Cultural Center and its storied history. As Shannon told us, “I like the story of a lady who was going through some mess and throwing out old lottery tickets. You had to claim a prize within 30 days. So this young lady happened to discover that one ticket had a winning number, and she still had one day to claim it. The moral is that sometimes you’re looking for things that are right here in front of you.”