Community organization 517 Living (517Living.com) has been promoting goodness in the Greater Lansing (517) Michigan Area since 2014. Founded by Sarah Pierce, the website and social platform uses its ONE Calendar to build awareness of the Best Events happening throughout the year.
In 2022 Pierce introduced the prestigious merit 517 Living Community Member of the Month, bestowing the honor to Tashmica Torok of The Firecracker Foundation in January of 2023.
In this interview Torok shares details about who she is, what she does, and what she loves about living in the Greater Lansing Michigan Area.
Who are you?
As a Black adult survivor of childhood rape and incest, Tashmica has spent much of her life asking what kinds of interventions could have prevented the harm and violence of sexual abuse that she endured as a child.
Born stargazing to a white mother from the midwest and a Black father from the Bronx by way of the south, Tashmica was raised an army brat in the border town of El Paso, Texas. Her hometown is situated next to Fort Bliss, a military base occupying stolen Muscalero Apache and Tigwe land. It was there — standing at the edge of vast differences — that Tashmica gained the uncanny ability to see the possibilities of the in-between spaces.
In 2013, she founded The Firecracker Foundation at an event where people she loved and trusted were invited to help her build a community invested in the healing of children who had survived sexual violence. She wanted to create a place where healing for survivors was the main priority.
In 2015, Tashmica was honored to become a member of the inaugural cohort of Just Beginnings Collaborative where she was introduced to a beautifully diverse community of survivors from across the nation. It was there that her questions eventually propelled her toward the values of transformative justice and abolition.
While Tashmica has served on several local, state, and national committees and boards working within interdisciplinary teams, in this season of her life, she is excited to focus her work on the local level.
She is currently working with One Love Global to design a Racial Equity Accountability Process (REAP), serves on the Racial Equity Advisory Committee at the Community Foundation, and is a member of the Metro Detroit Justice Network Cultivating Committee housed within the Detroit Justice Center. She recently relaunched the Reimagining Transformative Community Services Team and is the co-founder of the new Transformative Justice Parenting Network.
As a nationally recognized survivor activist working to end child sexual abuse, Tashmica is a sought after thought partner, public speaker, and a published storyteller. She has trained hundreds of parents, educators, social workers, and other community stakeholders in topics related to child sexual abuse, trauma, militant self-care, and prevention. She is also a powerhouse fundraiser, social entrepreneur and movement maker who has raised more than a million dollars and countless volunteer hours in support of this critical work.
She is often involved in cross-movement acts of resistance where the safety and well-being of historically marginalized people is being protected and fortified. This has built a strong network of Black and brown leaders from which she enjoys solidarity, joyful connection, and shared collective wisdom. Tashmica believes what Fannie Lou Hamer taught us, “Nobody’s free until everybody is free.”
When Tashmica is not visioning, cultivating, and facilitating her own heart work, she is raising the free people in her home, playing in her garden, helping leaders build their own dreams, and teaching and modeling how to create safer spaces for all.
If you own or represent a business or organization, tell us about it (or them).
The mission of The Firecracker Foundation (TFF), a 501(c)3 organization founded in 2013, is to honor the bravery of children who have survived sexual trauma by building a community invested in the healing of their whole being. As founding CoDirector, Tashmica grounded TFF in ideas inspired by her own experiences and a desire to provide her community with a healing-centered response to child sexual abuse (CSA). Through her dedication, vision, and hard work, the foundation is now a vibrant organization that serves as a model of what is achievable through community-based, grassroots organizing that is survivor-led, trauma-informed and focused on healing as the main priority for youth and their families.
TFF’s program offerings include:
Comprehensive mental health services for child survivors and their families, which includes individual therapy sessions and caretaker support groups for parents and guardians
Trauma-sensitive yoga for children and teens
A healing-centered social justice education program for young survivors of color
Perinatal advocacy programming for pregnant and parenting teen survivors of color that includes midwifery care, doula services, and childbirth education and parenting classes
Title IX advocacy for K-12 students who experience gender-based violence at school
Community outreach and education with the intention of creating safe spaces for informed community members to support children, families, and advocates.
Services are provided at no cost for families without medical insurance or an inability to afford the expense of copays.
Since its inception, TFF has centered the stories of survivors who use their voice to contribute to TFF’s growing practice of utilizing storytelling as a critical practice: as gender expansive children of color shape their survivor narratives in therapy, they reimagine their stories as artists/subjects in our multimedia art project, Soulfire, offer profound insights as participants in Restorative Justice Circles, and guide the work of the organization as members of our board and volunteer community. The diversity of their experiences drive program development, the curation of their healing spaces, and public advocacy and awareness efforts that are survivor-led and healing justice centered.
Tell us about a recent uplifting experience you had in the Greater Lansing Area.
On December 6th, 2022, TFF + statewide advocates working to improve maternal health outcomes came together to spread awareness about the real-time experiences of Black teens seeking maternal healthcare at McLaren Hospital, demand policy changes, and discuss the importance of the Black Maternal Health Momnibus Act and other legislation that aims to improve maternal and infant mortality rates for Black women and children.
It was a profound experience to witness elected officials, birthworkers, public health professionals, and community members come together to support TFF’s client with encouraging words and a commitment to future work that ensures that situations like what she experienced are less likely to happen again.
What’s the most recent “new” (to you) local business or organization you’ve enjoyed discovering?
Anyone who knows me knows that I have a deep and abiding love for books. Recently, I enjoyed introducing my niece to Socialight Society, a Black owned bookstore located in the Lansing Mall. Placing children’s books in her hands that featured young Black girls and their stories was such an uplifting and inspiring experience. Not to mention the fact that I left with the Black Girl Baking Cookbook and a copy of What the Fireflies Knew by emerging novelist (and personal friend) Kai Harris.
What is one thing, big or small, that you love about living in the Greater Lansing Area?
As someone who wasn’t born and raised in the area, I am so grateful for the network of loved ones that I have had the privilege of building over the course of my 20 years as a Michigander. The people I love will always win my top award for what I love about living in the Greater Lansing area. They are generous, creative, justice-oriented people and I could not accomplish my work without their friendship, generosity of spirit, humor, and encouragement. | By Sarah Pierce
Sarah Pierce is the founder of the website and social platform 517Living. Promoting goodness and the best events in the Greater Lansing (517) Michigan Area, the process of building the platform helped Pierce overcome social anxiety, gave her a more purposeful life, and introduced her to the fascinating behind-the-scenes movers and shakers of her community who are much more “walk” than talk! 517 Living has enriched Pierce’s life, and she hopes it does the same for you.
