Patricia Mack: portrait of a joyful activist

by Elaine Klaassen

The worst you can say about her is she's too dogmatic, too sure she's right. The best you can say is she's passionate about justice—and life.

Patricia Mack has been an activist forever, although the word activist is too narrow to describe her. She has her own special style of living. If she could change the world and make it more fair and more compassionate, she would do that. Actually, she does. As a bureaucrat, she works on the committee-to-committee and organization-to-organization level. She prides herself on knowing how the system works, how to work within it to make changes. I've often heard her say, "Give it to me, I'll take care of it ... I'm a bureaucrat. I can deal with the bureaucracy." As a networker, she brings a wide variety of people together. On her card it says "Community Builder." As a creative individual, she works at a personal level, attentive to the details of people's lives. She commemorates the milestones of everyone she knows.

When I first met Patricia, about 20 years ago, she wasn't one of my favorite people. But over the years I've come to deeply respect her integrity and appreciate her completely alive spirit. We've shared our grief over the Gulf War and now the invasion of Iraq, over the deportation of innocent immigrants, and over immense injustices to Native American people. She's still not a personal friend in the sense that we go out for coffee, or talk on the phone for hours about our feelings, but I do count her as a friend; she is someone I go to for occasional advice and feedback, and someone I admire.

The other day I told her that when I first met her I was put off by her zealous concern for every imaginable cause and her over-the-top nitpicking about using exact language, politically correct and inclusive. She laughed and said, "Oh, like that poster a friend of mine has in his office: 'Often wrong but never in doubt.'" She knows she expresses no doubts about where she stands, but she doesn't believe she's often wrong.

As my friend Eric says, "You wouldn't hold the convictions you do if you didn't think they were right, would you?" in defense of people who hold unflinching points of view.

This woman with the East Coast accent and the cheery, abrupt manner has spent her lifetime trying to dissolve discrimination and level the playing field for many different groups of people—those who experience discrimination because of their race, age, sexual orientation, lack of resources, you name it. She wants to use her white privilege to make a difference for everyone. When she told me she was taking early retirement to devote the rest of her life to activism I was not surprised.

That was two years ago, and in December of 2002 it happened. Mack retired from HUD, the federal agency for housing and urban development, where she worked for 31 years. She said that in spite of a great boss and his ongoing support, as well as the opportunity to do lots of community outreach, she needed to "spend time with more people who are passionate." For the rest of her life she will do the same thing she's always done, but in a different setting.

The "rest of her life" got off to a rolling start: Patricia made media contacts for the Coalition for the Homeless; attended Listening House, a daytime shelter in downtown St. Paul: planned a fundraiser for MICAH (Metropolitan Interfaith Coalition for Affordable Housing), studied Spanish; and taught ESL at CLUES (Chicanos Latinos Unidos en Servicio). On March 18, though, she started winding down her activities and quit all the boards she was on in preparation for something all joyful activists have to do: take a retreat. In June she and her husband of 36 years will leave for the Scottish Orkney Islands to spend a year. "When people get married, it's supposedly to spend time together. That's what we're going to do," said Patricia. While they're doing that they will also pursue their own interests. Bob Mack, an architect and professor of architecture, will research historic buildings. Patricia plans to write a Bible study and, surprise, do some volunteer work.

In the midst of some final commitments, like attending the March for Women's Lives in Washington, D.C., at the end of April; working on voter registration; and cooking dinner for a gathering of Mennonites who want their congregations to be open and welcoming to GLBT people, Patricia's been busy cleaning the house and making arrangements to be gone. At her simple, comfortable home in the Seward Neighborhood, the familiar piles of projects were still there, along with new piles … stuff to throw away or give away. I found a place to sit anyway, next to the Gaelic greeting "Ceud Mile Failte" (A hundred thousand welcomes), and prepared to listen, take notes, ask questions and enjoy the green tea blend, whole grain toast and the blaze in the wood stove.

The first person Patricia talked about was Gheretin Wilson, her mentor. I had heard Patricia talk about Gheretin, always in a tone of reverence, numerous times over the years, and had met Gheretin once, at a refugee benefit concert 10 years ago at the church Patricia and I both attended. (Patricia brought the lemonade and cookies … she's the kind of person who always has the time and energy for the little stuff, like, "What's so hard about lemonade and cookies?") I knew that Gheretin, this diminutive and powerful woman, was the one person Patricia could call in the middle of the night about anything, always. I wondered how many people have such a rock and solace in their lives.

Patricia met Gheretin the first day of her first job fresh out of high school at the AFL-CIO in Washington, D.C. The Civil Rights Movement was in full swing. Wilson, a widow raising her teenage son, worked as a researcher who looked into things like CEO benefits and company profits while Mack did clerical work. As Patricia describes it, their "lives became intertwined"—throughout Mack's next two summers at the AFL-CIO, her bachelor's and master's degree studies in geography and urban and regional affairs, marriage, motherhood, her career at HUD—and continued so until Wilson's death in 1999.

"She was a phenomenal person, one of six sisters in a middle-class African American family that blended their work with their community. She showed me by her example." Wilson's interests ranged far and wide. For example, she started a choir with the express purpose of singing in nursing homes and hospices, and she also served as president of the first African American credit union in Washington, D.C.

As one might expect, Patricia is dedicated to mentoring young people. She says, "I wanted to work on mentoring because I was so fortunate to have a life mentor." She has been involved with the Multicultural Excellence Program (MEP), a project of the St. Paul Public Schools, which mentors kids of many different backgrounds. At one time she served on the board of the College Encouragement Program (CEP), an unsuccessful attempt to start a similar program in Minneapolis. Now she's involved in an eight-week pilot program to mentor U of M students, recruited from MEP, by e-mail; she coordinates 10 mentors and 10 mentees. Through a mentoring program at Faith Mennonite Church, in the Seward Neighborhood, she mentored a young girl from Eritrea whose college graduation is coming up in June.

Mentoring doesn't have to be an official relationship, through an organization, though. "For two years I've had the joy of sending a postcard a week to a friend at Hesston College [in Kansas] because I knew that he was not getting other mail," said Patricia. "It was easy and cheap. Last week I had the privilege of attending his naturalization ceremony."

As a mentor, her ability to share herself so openly, can be attributed, in part, to a certain clarity and continuity in her life. She had the rare fortune to be blessed with a clear life direction by the age of 12. She knew she wanted to work with cities, and her father, who worked for HUD and its predecessors, gave her a sense of what that work was about.

At HUD she worked on SADBOC, (Small and Disadvantaged Business Opportunity Council) of the federal executive board of Minnesota, which represented minority women-owned businesses; businesses in economically depressed areas; and nonprofits that employ handicapped people. In the '90s, she had the opportunity to make sure SADBOC businesses were contracted for the new federal building downtown. She also spent five years on the Hispanic Employment Committee.

She was lucky to be aware of prejudice, to realize that "there are people who wake up in the morning who know if they look at someone cross-eyed, someone will call them bad names."

Since her retirement she has been lauded with the National Association of Minority Contractors Advocate of the Year award and the Small Business Administration Minority Small Business Advocate award.

When nominated for the award, she was asked to write a resume of her achievements. It was a difficult task but seemed important to do. Patricia believes that people at our age, especially women, should start looking back and see what we've actually accomplished, and we should keep track of what we work on. She came to the conclusion that her greatest achievement, besides her children, was keeping the Matthews Park Latchkey Program alive and well. That was in 1989. "It used to be under the school board—the Minneapolis Public Schools can barely handle K - 12—and we got it put under the Park Board. It had a huge impact on many kids' lives. It was about to be altered and there were many of us who didn't want it integrated into the system. We worked very hard to keep it going successfully."

Another commitment, despite her pacifism, or perhaps because of it, is to homeless veterans. She was raised in the Christian church, but not a denomination with a pacifist tradition. Nevertheless, she says she's been a pacifist her whole life. When she met her husband, he was signed up to serve four years in the Air Force. So when they got married they went to live on a military base in South Carolina. Needless to say, Patricia didn't fit in, and left six months early. But the experience gave her a special perspective; she became aware of the plight of veterans. She believes that "as long as there's going to be a military it should reflect diversity … not just be made up of poor kids."

During her career she represented HUD at the annual Stand Down for Homeless Veterans, which is held at the sports field on the north side of Washington Avenue. Army tents are set up in which services, such as haircuts, help with legal issues, job, mental health and spiritual counseling, medical attention and so on, are provided for vets . "It was the most depressing professional job I ever had. The people were in such incredible need. Most of them served two years … and they didn't ask to go."

Patricia said it was hard to get volunteers from work to go to the Stand Down. She was unhappy about their unwillingness. She said, "All vets have served our country and I think deserve to get some attention." She continued, "If you make your money on the backs of poor people, which is what social service agencies do, you ought to [at least] be out in the community offering your services."

One of Patricia's particular goals at HUD was to make services available. She did outreach at events like Juneteenth, Rondo Days and Cinco de Mayo to inform people of services available to them in relation to housing and discrimination.
It would seem almost impossible to raise a family with the level of activism in which Mack has been engaged. But it worked because she believed in her lifestyle and wanted to give it to her children. "I made some of my children's activities my opportunity for activism. I was Douglas' Sunday school teacher for nine or 10 years … that is one way to make sure one's child hears inclusive language in Sunday school. I was Elisabeth's Girl Scout leader for seven years … because I wanted to make sure her leader was a feminist." The kids learned to do mailings and went to demonstrations at an early age. Once Elisabeth "informed us that there were too many night meetings," so Patricia cut back.

I told Patricia I had observed, while her children were growing up, that she was probably the only parent I knew who went to every PTSO meeting and helped with every school fundraiser. She was quick to point out that her husband is very supportive to her, as she is to him.

They also had no TV. "It's easier to be an activist mother without TV. There's not so much competition for other values." Both kids—Elisabeth is a teacher in Seattle and Douglas is a writer/editor at a small nonprofit in St. Paul—now say they will raise their own children without TV. Focus on family also included, for many years, having only one car. That decision was specifically directed at saving money for college. I had always thought it also had to do with the environment. Patricia wishes she could claim that, but, no.

I guess what really amazes me about such a person, whose life is dedicated to causes, is all the fun, lyrical stuff that accompanies her work. Patricia puts her unique stamp on the countless, thoughtful things she does. The things she has done for me are just a few examples of her attentiveness to the vast circle of people she inhabits. When I turned 50 she showed up at my house with a mutual friend, her husband, a cake and a paper crown she had made for me. When she heard I had cancer she sent me a page of jokes and a bright, but bright within the bounds of good taste, note. One year she gave me a miniature carpenter's level for a key chain to show her support for my attempt to write balanced articles about Minnesota's energy use and the campaign to protect the northern environment and aboriginal people.

The other lyricism I appreciate about Patricia (and Bob) is the Christmas party they hold every year to which you are perpetually invited once you've been invited the first time. But you are expected, during the Christmas season, to take the initiative to find out the exact date.

To Patricia, your faith is all about how you live in the world. She lives the way she does because she believes it's a good way to live. In our formal "interview" she was talking about doubting her faith. I thought, "Is she worried about the virgin birth or the trinity or something like that?"

"What kind of doubts?" I asked.

"Totally not understanding why some people of faith are so hateful to gay and lesbian people … I don't get it," she answered. "And why some people of faith don't want to share resources. Why is anyone greedy?"

While I haven't seen Patricia go around groaning that other people don't live like she does, with her passion for righteousness, it would follow that she would wonder how the gospel influenced—or didn't influence—other Christians.