Meet Grace

I was born in Cuba in 1987 just a few years shy of the fall of the Soviet Union which maintained a close relationship with Cuba. Cuba had been financially reliant on the Soviet Union since they didn’t produce, nor do they allow a private sector to exist. Once they lost the financial backing of the Soviet Union, it led to severe starvation for a nation that was already using a food ration card. I experienced hunger, lack of basic necessities such as tooth paste, soap, clothes, shoes etc. While having to listen to my teachers speak of the success of the communist revolution. I often found myself searching all over my town over 8 hours for eggs to accompany the rice we had for dinner. The idea of eating candy, owning toys or having my own room was vivid in my imagination as I watched American films, it was a dream I never thought would eventually become a reality. Many memories like that make me appreciate the country I live in. At the age of 11 my family was exiled from Cuba, however before that happened my father endured 4 years of maximum security prison for preaching the word of God and expressing his thoughts. In 1998 the Pope John Paul II requested his freedom along with other political prisoners and my family and I were given asylum in this great country. We arrived to Kansas City on September 28th, 1998 and have fallen in love with Historic Northeast and Kansas City since then. I have 17 years of experience in administrative health, most of those years were spent in nonprofit community health centers where I had the joy of working with many refugees like myself. I helped develop a call center and was very involved in quality and streamlining processes as well as training and supervising. I highly value a model of leadership that involves serving, listening to needs and feedback, providing the resources my team needs to succeed and being very familiar with the smallest details of the job. I believe these characteristics are key to bringing effective change and improvement to the city.  I have always worked towards bringing the community together in different forms and settings. What I want more than anything is to see a prosperous and innovative City with thriving communities that can afford to take care of and uplift our own residents.