Nine individuals from rural Minnesota have been chosen to make up the 2024-2025 cohort of the Initiators Fellowship, a two-year program that develops social entrepreneurism through mentorship, leadership training, and business coaching. This article introduces one of the two initiators from Northwest Minnesota: Ben Cahill.
Ben Cahill knows how isolating a life without community can be.
Ben, who was adopted, was the only person of color in his family. He grew up in Washington state, raised and homeschooled in a conservative, white Christian family that socialized in like-minded circles.
“My only friends were from church, the only people I knew were church people,” he said, “and so, once I realized that I was different – I didn’t even know what gay was – but once I realized I was different, that’s when things started to get weird.”
His entry into adulthood changed everything.
“As I went to community college, that’s when everything opened up for me and I started to learn what it really meant to be a Black person, what it really meant to be in the LBGTQIA2S+ community,” he said. “What I realized was how isolated I was, because of those things, not realizing that there was a community out there for me to belong to. I spent a lot of time in my childhood, very isolated and alone, feeling like I couldn’t open up to family and friends, feeling like I was the only person out there who was like me.”
Today, Ben is committed to ensuring there is a community of support and resources for LBGTQIA2S+ people in and around Beltrami County.
Taking the next step
The Pride Support Network was borne in the wake of the first Bemidji Pride event held in 2021. From the beginning, Bemidji Pride has been a smashing success with hundreds of attendees taking part the first year and growing every year since. But following that first festival, the Pride planning team began to get a steady stream of questions and inquiries asking for resources, supports, and referrals: Who were the LGBTQ-friendly physicians, where could they go to access support groups, when would the next gathering event be held, etc.
“My friend and colleague Dr. Sarah Cronin and I kind of put our heads together and said, ‘OK, let’s create something to field these calls,’ but then also open the Pride event up to be able to get grant funding,” Ben said.
The Pride Support Network was founded, operating as a grassroots organization with a fiscal agent. From sharing information about support groups to hosting events, the goal has been to ensure that Pride is more than just a once-a-year festival.
But Ben, who works as a Community Health Worker, envisions a more robust organization in the future. He applied for the Initiators Fellowship to seek support and guidance on how to grow the organization to more fully meet the needs of the community.
“What I want to do with the fellowship is to take what I have now … to a place where we have community health workers working with community members … helping people navigate health care and social services systems, and advocating for youth throughout the school system,” he said.
He also envisions an event planner or coordinator to create more consistent events, to cultivate a more consistent feeling of community. An even longer-term dream would be to have a dedicated location and space for the LGBTQ community to gather.
Creating community by being in community
While the two-year Initiators Fellowship just recently began in January, Ben can already picture how the Pride Support Network might be able to best meet the needs of the community. With three community health workers dedicated to supporting LGBTQ people, each would be stationed at a different entry point, perhaps for example at the Rail River Folk School, in the school systems, and the Northwest Indian Community Development Center.
“You would have a rolling schedule so that they’re really embedded in the community,” he said.
But, for now, the first step is reinvigorating key supporters and volunteers to reinvest in the organization’s mission and goals.
“I’m still weighing the options, hoping to figure out what will work best for me,” Ben said. “That’s the beauty of the fellowship. They’re really holding your hand through all of these decisions that you have to make as somebody starting a social enterprise.”
A key component of the fellowship is a free consultation with a legal team, which will help Ben center on the ideal business structure for the Pride Support Network, whether it be a nonprofit structure or a hybrid approach.
“I am still learning,” he said. “But, before, it felt like an insurmountable task; now it feels like it’s a rocky road that I’m going to have my hand held to get through. I’m feeling very supported, which is a huge relief.”