#HealthEquityHamOnt: A conversation about community health & Black health philosophies and actions in Hamilton by Terri Bedminster, interview with Kojo Damptey

The discussions around public health took a turn at the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. From the origins of the virus to who was getting infected the response was surrounded in ideas, policies, and practices of system racism. In addition, members of the community who lived in underinvested areas of the city were largely left behind with no resources for improved health outcomes. In Hamilton, several activists, community workers, community organizers, community health organizations, scholars and residents chose to work together to fight against what Ruth Wilson Gilmore calls organized abandonment – the intentional disinvestment in communities which in turn, creates opportunities for extraction, revenue generation and carceral enforcement to fill the cracks of a comprised social infrastructure (Riley, Schleimer, Jahn, 2024). Using an approach of community care in advocacy and action Terri Bedminster was pivotal in creating COVID-19 walk-in clinics alongside other concerned organizations and people.

I had the honor of interviewing her for this chapter to share her understanding of community and Black health in Hamilton and Ontario.

Kojo Damptey: You’ve been involved in community health initiatives for the longest time. But before we get into your community health work, how do you approach your work? What is your philosophy on how you do community health?

Terri Bedminster: It’s a good question, and it will come easy, because it truly is my approach. I think of my work as not something that I necessarily enjoy, but something that has a bigger purpose and if done well can truly impact communities. Not necessarily in a way, it hasn’t been done before, but perhaps in a way that hasn’t been valued. And so I approach my work with me in the back. It’s how I get to see the bigger picture. It’s how I truly get to center the things that matter. And if it means that I’m not recognized or seen as connected to the work. That truly is okay with me. And so, I truly approach my work with the bigger outcome on my mind. It’s the bigger fish we want to fry. It’s a bigger narrative. We want to undo and redo. If you think back in history we had a better narrative, so undo and redo, and truly give us the power to change what matters to us. And I say us. I obviously mean to the communities who have been often left behind.

Kojo Damptey: What I’m hearing is you are always centering your community. So, where does that come from? What brought you to that understanding?

Terri Bedminster: I mean I come from a Caribbean family and my aunt, who raised me for most of the time, taught me about centering my community, and I saw that she didn’t center herself. So it wasn’t necessarily a teaching. But I’ve seen the impact of her work in the community, how much she was respected, and she didn’t have to say her name. She didn’t have to be in front, and she didn’t have to lead in that kind of conventional, traditional way we think of leadership. But I saw the impact of her work often.

Miss Phoebe was there doing the work in the forefront, doing the work, but not necessarily wanting to center herself and knowing that truthfully when you center yourself, you’re just up for more scrutiny. You’re targeted. We know by whom you’re targeted for the things you do, you’re held to a different standard. But if you truly center what matters then you kind of shield yourself from scrutiny so that you can do the work because half the work involves protecting yourself and protecting the people who are involved in the work. And so if you’re not half the time focused on that, you can truly do the work. So, I don’t know where it comes from. But I just think that’s where it comes from, and just honestly, a personal desire not to be the face of the work, because the work matters more.

Kojo Damptey: One of the things that we’ve been exploring in this book is the way people do their work and exploring what motivates them and how that is translated in their community work. So you say, Miss Phoebe? What’s Miss Or auntie Phoebe’s full name?

Terri Bedminster: Phoebe James.

Kojo Damptey: Where do you think Auntie Phoebe James got the practice of centering community voices in community work?

Terri Bedminster: Maybe it is our family like we’re humble. And the fact that I’m even speaking about myself within the work is also uncomfortable and having to trace that back. It’s just a trait that I have, but I honestly think it’s intentional. At the same time I have seen instances where Black communities have done the work and credit is given to institutions that stood in the way of the work, then Black communities are erased and not acknowledged so I think sometimes self-recognition and community recognition should be part of our work in community.

I have been in spaces where this exact thing has happened, nevertheless, I primarily focused on system level changes that impact the lives of people in Hamilton. It’s more important for me to sit at the back of a room working on building relationships. Because we know when we’re in harmony, we have an impact in and with our community, the Black community. When we are in harmony, we’re pretty unstoppable.

And so, I spend a little more time building one on one relationships. And sometimes that’s a phone call that nobody hears about, or that’s a coffee meeting that nobody sees where I’m just spending time with people in the community, hearing their concerns, and working with them to ultimately make an impact across the city of Hamilton and sometimes beyond the city.

Kojo Damptey: Okay, that makes sense. Throughout this book we’ve been hearing from Sabriena Dahab, Koubra Haggar, Cassandra Garcia, and Dr. Ruth Rodney. And all of them have kind of talked about balancing the need to decenter oneself from community work because it’s not about you per se. It’s about the community. But at the same time, too. Sometimes you must be present so that people can say. Yes, Terry Bedminster did, ABC, and that resulted in this impact. So let’s talk about the impact you had in Hamilton in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Kojo Damptey: I have known you in the community for a long time, I think, prior to us working together. I knew you by name but we ended up working together in the worst possible time in the history of Hamilton during the COVID-19 pandemic. Can you speak to the work you did during the COVID-19 pandemic?

Terri Bedminster: So, it goes back to when we are in harmony, the impact we can make is beyond our imagination. And I remember the work you guys did before like that was important work, the advocating, the proposing of efforts, the highlighting of data.

Context intervention from Kojo Damptey: In the beginning months of the COVID-19 pandemic, academics, community health workers, anti-racism advocates asked Hamilton Public Health to collect socio-economic race-based data to address issues of disparity, access and public trust in public health. Here are some readings for context:

City to consider tracking race-based COVID-19 data after call from experts (May 2020)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/gender-race-income-data-coronavirus-1.5554966

Hamilton’s race-based COVID-19 data won’t be public until at least September (July 2020)

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamilton/race-based-data-hamilton-released-in-september-1.5636409

Social Determinants of health (October 2020)

https://pub-hamilton.escribemeetings.com/filestream.ashx?DocumentId=242579

Back To Terri Bedminster: We knew that was pretty out there. We knew how Black communities were impacted and how disproportionately they were impacted by COVID-19. And yet we saw that the responses didn’t align with the disproportionality in the data. Data that showed anti-Black racism, anti-Indigenous racism, disability injustice. Why weren’t we focused on redressing these disparities? So when you (Kojo), Dr. Ameil Joseph, Sarah Jama, and others were advocating for the collection of socio-economic race-based data (Hristova, 2020; Board of Health 2020). I was sitting back thinking. I know Hamilton Public Health is not going to listen and so when I came in it was to move the advocacy into tangible actions, which morphed into Restoration House.

Context intervention from Kojo Damptey: When vaccines were available Dr. Ameil Joseph (McMaster University), Kojo Damptey (Hamilton Centre for Civic Inclusion), Sarah Jama (Disability Justice Network of Ontario), Compass Community Health, Hamilton Urbancore Community Health Centre, the Hamilton Black Health Community Leaders Forum and others called for a COVID-19 walk-in clinic to prioritize Black, Racialized, and other marginalized communities who were impacted disproportionately by COVID-19. This advocacy resulted in the opening of Restoration House. You can read this article for details about Restoration House:

The Restoration House COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic: Challenging Systemic Racism and Ableism through Community Solidarity and Action. https://mulpress.mcmaster.ca/hro-ors/article/view/5435/4525

Back to Terri Bedminster: Our Black communities are always creating alternative spaces to support various demographics in the city. Why? Because our community is always an afterthought.

That is why and how I started Refuge Newcomer Community Health Centre because we didn’t have the resources and a bit of community arrogance around saying, Okay, you won’t give us this. You can see this is happening here like refugees don’t have the care they need. We’ll go ahead and we’ll start something. We won’t ask you for anything else. But we’ll look at ways to mobilize our own community to respond, which is what we did and built several relationships, like with McMaster University, at the time who gave us a free building, a free working space, things like that.

The Restoration House walk-in clinic was a culmination of the neglect from Hamilton Public Health that resulted in pain and the desire to do something different with the community and Hamilton Public Health. So I came in and said “BUN THAT” for real “BUN THAT” we’ll do this for the community and provide vaccines for the most marginalized and often forgotten populations.

I knew Restoration House was going to give vaccine access to folks with disabilities, pregnant mothers, and others which would eventually lead to building stronger partnerships with community organizations and the broader community at large.

Kojo Damptey: When COVID-19 vaccines became available and Health units were setting up walk-in clinics there were discussions about a booking system and if my memory serves me right you made several suggestions that were dismissed and then eventually your suggestions were implemented. Can you walk us through that whole process?

Terri Bedminster: Yeah, the booking system was such a critical part of ensuring that we were able to do what we were suggesting. I wanted the whole booking process to be accessible, manageable, and effective. Refuge had a booking system, yet Hamilton Public Health insisted on using another booking system that would delay our entire operations. Eventually, we riveted back to Refuge’s booking system. This is a clear example of how institutions like Hamilton Public Health erase and minimize the knowledge organizations like Refuge bring to the discussions around public and community health.

These dismissals lead to trauma that become the foundation for mistrust in working with institutions like Hamilton Public Health and others. Of particular note is that I heard from public health workers at the time who had discomfort with some of the decisions that were being made during the COVID-19 pandemic. Most commented about how decisions were often made from a top-down perspective as opposed to bottom-up consensus decision model based on community needs.

I was just glad we came together as a community to make Restoration House a reality which eventually contributed to vaccinating thousands of Hamilton residents. That is impactful work.

Kojo Damptey: We’ve talked about your philosophy when doing community work, talked about the work you did during the COVID-19 pandemic. All of this set the stage for the discussions around reforming the Board of Health (you played a huge role) and Black Health in Hamilton, since we have an Ontario Black Health Plan. So what is the status of Hamilton’s Black Health Plan/Strategy/Action?

Terri Bedminster: So you know, what’s amazing about the Black health plan for Ontario is the folks who did the hard work of putting it together. So, Dr. Connie Mckenzie, the folks from Black Health Alliance, Angela Robertson. Those are folks who did the work for us. So we have a framework that we can then take into our own communities and develop a bit of an execution plan. There’s a roadmap. We don’t need to recreate anything like it’s packaged for us ready to go. And so, coming from these trusted folks, knowing the amount of work that went into that, we have the blueprint.

I have lots of great ideas. I’m sure you do. Whether you’re in the community or in the public health sector or not we would love to hear how folks want to contribute so we have a community centered plan. We have one of many meetings starting on July 24, 2025. We will be hearing from people with the hope of truly co-designing this plan/strategy/action. What that looks like is an appreciation for people knowing what they need to do for themselves, or what needs to be done for them, or what needs to be done in collaboration with them. We will build on the work done by folks like Dr. Gary Warner, Dr. Susan Archie, and Dr. Juliet Daniel and local health organizations and practitioners. Here, I am thinking about the Black Health Leaders Forum, Hamilton Urban Core Community Health Centre, Hamilton Health Sciences (Rochelle Reed, Director of Equity, Diversity & Inclusion).

Kojo Damptey: What would you say are some of the top challenges facing Black communities as it pertains to health in Hamilton?

Terri Bedminster: Wow, it’s a long list, I think. Right now I would say mental health issues, food insecurity, and anti-black racism.

Context intervention from Kojo Damptey: Dr. Akua Benjamin defines anti-Black racism as policies and practices rooted in Canadian institutions such as education, health care, and justice that mirror and reinforce beliefs, attitudes, prejudice, stereotyping and/or discrimination towards people of Black-African descent.

Back to Terri Bedminster: Anti-Black racism demobilizes us to be our own contributors to good health.

Kojo Damptey: Give us an example

Terri Bedminster: If we were in positions of power or at the decision making tables, we would know that mental health is on the rise. We would allocate resources to address this issue. As we speak, what investments have been made towards improving the health outcomes of Black communities? The city of Toronto has an anti-black racism strategy. And here in Hamilton we’ve had numerous discussions with Hamilton Public Health, the mayor and city Councillors about anti-Black racism and they refuse to even acknowledge that it exists. These institutions and decision makers would rather show up to celebrate Black History Month than develop an anti-Black racism strategy.

It is the daily grind of having to convince decision makers that anti-Black racism exists that takes a toll on your mental health. It is the practices of neglect for Black and other marginalized communities across our city that create food insecurity in certain neighborhoods.

I often think that the admission by institutions and decision makers mean that they will be held accountable. So if you do have an anti-black racism strategy, it means there’s anti-black racism, and it means that there’s accountability which should lead to action. Redressing the plight of anti-Black racism. Instead we see and hear the avoidance, the dismissing, negation, and the intentionality of calling some of us “vocal” leaders “trouble makers.”

In these moments of avoidance, dismissal, negation, and name calling it is important for the Black community to understand that our unity in addressing our issues comes from the diversity of our response. We shouldn’t lose sight of our power when we collectively understand how to dismantle the structures of anti-Black racism. We have done it before and we should keep working at it.

Kojo Damptey: Let’s transition into creating spaces where Black people can celebrate themselves and support each other. That’s the work that you’ve done with the John C. Holland Awards. What can you share about the legacy of John C. Holland and why are the awards so important?

Terri Bedminster: It’s important, because we know education is one of the many avenues to success, empowerment, and legacy building. So it’s really important for us to support Black youth, and let them see their own roles in building our communities right here in Hamilton. Black youth need scholarships and bursaries. We need to show them that we can come together as a community to support them financially, celebrate them in community, and share intergenerational joy among our evergrowing Black/African community.

It was important to me to ensure that the legacy of John C. Holland continued to live on. So I worked diligently with the Hamilton Black History Council members to keep the awards going. And so I believe in February we’ll be celebrating 30 years. And it’s 30 years of understanding the importance of having something like that and also nurturing others to do things where they celebrate our own youth and community leaders. You received an award yourself from the community. Yeah, the one of the highest awards as bestowed through the awards committee. So that’s important. It’s important for us to recognize, even in the midst of all these concerns and issues of anti-black racism, that there is a community, or there are communities continually supportive of who we become and that’s important to me.

At every awards celebration I am filled with joy to see young people celebrate their accomplishments with their families, I see community leaders share their knowledge with young people, I see our elders pass on their stories to a new generation of stewards in the city. I see Black joy, I see community joy and that is the impact that I strive for, always centering the community.

Kojo Damptey: Thank you so much for taking the time to talk to me about your philosophy(ies) as it pertains to community work, community health, and Black Health.

References

Bedminster, T., Joseph, A., Jama, S., Brockbank, M., Stearns, G., Damptey, K. (2023). The Restoration House COVID-19 Vaccination Clinic: Challenging Systemic Racism and Ableism through Community Solidarity and Action. Mulpress. McMaster. https://mulpress.mcmaster.ca/hro-ors/article/view/5435/4525

Ontario Health (2025). A Black Health Plan for Ontario. https://www.ontariohealth.ca/system/equity/black-health-plan

Riley, T., Schleimer, J.P., & Jahn, J.L. (2024). Organized abandonment under racial capitalism for public health research and action. Social Science & Medicine, Volume 343. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953624000200