Eugene has a 1.8% Black population according to the U.S. Census Bureau. The University of Oregon, which is home for nearly 24,000 students, is home to only 633 Black students. 

Lane County’s Black Cultural Initiative, created in 2022, aims to create a community of support, guidance and a better sense of belonging for marginalized people across Lane County and in Eugene.

The BCI “offer(s) a wide range of self-sufficiency programs where we take unique respectful approaches to empowering our community to live more stable lives,” according to its website.

Of the 23% of U.S. adults that have experienced mental illness, 19.4% identify as Black, a report by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration finds. 

In Lane County, that would translate to roughly one in every three Black individuals suffering from mental illness. 

Talicia Brown-Crowell was raised in San Jose, California. She grew up in a culturally diverse neighborhood, but when she moved to Oregon in 1992 and eventually to Eugene in 2000, her connection to the Black community began to fade. 

“There’s something that’s really missing, like I’m missing cultural diversity,” Brown-Crowell said. 

That’s why she began the BCI in 2023. Before establishing BCI, Brown-Crowell organized a Black cultural event in 2020 after the murder of George Floyd, a Black man who was killed by a white police officer. 

Organizing this event laid the groundwork for what would ultimately become the BCI, she said. 

“Having this kind of a space really provides a resource so that people feel more grounded,” Brown-Crowell said.

Symone Moore, a third-year University of Oregon student and a Sacramento, California native, found the adjustment of coming from a culturally-rich community to a less diverse community leaving her feeling lonely, anxious and depressed.

“During my freshman year, I thought that I was isolated because I was like no one gets me, no one can understand my life struggles and there’s no resources,” Moore said. “I needed a therapist real bad because, again, there were no resources. I wanted a Black woman therapist and that was, you know, very much impossible in Oregon, let alone Eugene.” 

Moore eventually found a therapist who is the right fit for her, but it’s an online counseling service based in California. Simple and accessible assistance seemed out of reach for her.

If Moore had known about the BCI, her experience in finding mental health support in Eugene might’ve been different. 

UO offers its own resources to Black students through its Black Cultural Center, but it often lacks both attention and funding. 

Dr. Cecile Gadson, a senior staff psychologist and African American and Black student specialist working at BCC said via email, “My entire line of Black Students Services that was built and primarily run by me speaks to your point of the limited opportunities for Black mental health to be centered in Eugene.” 

The BCI has its own difficulties. Being the first of its kind in Eugene, retention sets a limitation on the non-profit.

“It’s hard to make ourselves visible and known when it’s all white dominated,” Brown-Crowell said in an interview with Oregon Public Broadcasting in 2024. She said the goal of the BCI is to make Black people in Lane County feel more connected, through different health, arts and culture and financial literacy projects.

The BCI offers multiple in-house services to uplift the morale of the Black community and provide communal support. It hosts cultural events, holds a community garden, gives out culture-specific foods and looks to assist local Black and People Of Color families. 

Mental health professional and one of few Black therapists in Eugene Shauna Washington, works at the BCI. She is supported by the BCI to grow her practice. 

The BCI has a Small Business Development Center that gives Black and People of Color guidance and access to resources to build their businesses in a white-dominated community. 

Maya Thornton, a patron of the SBDC, is aiming to create her own audio engineering business. She utilizes the SBDC’s weekly conference in expanding her business development. 

“The BCI just helped me spread my branches,” she said. “They made sure I was partnered with somebody of color. They send me Zoom links and resources to help me out.”

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