chances are you have Wafa Dinaro to thank.
When COVID hit, Dinaro was the director of development for Wayne County and led program that provided millions in support to small businesses, most of them minority and or women-owned.
When Pamela Lewis, the highly regarded director of New Economy Initiative, announced she was leaving the organization, she personally tapped Dinaro to replace her.
NEI has been the leading advocate for Detroit's small businesses since its founding in 2007, and in new role, Dinaro oversees the organization's program and grantmaking activities, and its policy work..
Prior to that, she worked corporate marketing and as trainer and Middle East for Department of Defense — job the 4 science grad learned about through fair.
Small business work became part of Dinaro's portfolio and it was the pandemic that put it front and center..
In very short time, we did $70 in grants to small businesses, just to give them cash flow, to be able to pay their rent, to be able to pay their employees. .
At that time, Dinaro began talking to Lewis about expanding NEI's work countywide, and that's when Lewis recommended Dinaro apply for job.
I get to do development, and I get to see the impact of my work on daily basis, she says.
Once the in communities gets spent in the communities, it helps to build the individual communities...
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