About
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LB is a passionate community advocate, grassrootsorganizer, and storyteller. LB returned to her Appalachian home and began working to create meaningful change by breaking down social barriers and creating a sense of community.
LB's work centers around cultivating cultures of belonging. As a public speaker, LB uses her own experience growing up in a rural Southern Baptist community as a queer woman and returning home in search of transformative justice, to infuse narrative with tangible skills to build community and connectedness.
A decade after returning home LB opened Merle's, a craft cocktail bar on main street that is dedicated to creating a place where the queer community can gather to been seen and loved within the community they call home. In its first year of operation, Merle's won the North Carolina Cocktail Competition and Small Business of the Year.
LB is a participant in Weave: The Social Fabric Initiative, she is a graduate of the North Carolina Rural Economic Development Institute. LB is an innagural Fellow of the Civil Society Fellowship and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.
LB is an aggressive friend and doting dog mom.
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