PHOTO BY LAURA PETRILLA

Rhonda Strozier
Executive Director, Fineview and Perry Hilltop Citizens’ Councils; Owner, M.O. Landscapes

Rhonda Strozier’s degrees in social work often inform her role as the executive director of the Fineview and Perry Hilltop Citizens councils.

“In many of the rooms I’m in, it starts to come to numbers and productivity and housing and development … and I feel like if you don’t have a social worker in the room, the people get forgotten, even with the best of intentions,” she says.

While she was instrumental in creating the transformative plan for the redevelopment of the Allegheny Dwellings public housing site, Strozier has also initiated programs on homebuyer education, youth development and financial literacy. When the pandemic hit, Strozier created a small business planning resource to address the disparity that exists in lending to Black women-owned businesses and has been a business coach to more than 100 Black women in the region.

“I decided I need to help other Black women business owners to access funding,” she says.