ABOUT US

BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Carme Williams

Carme Williams

Board Chair

Donald Naylor, Jr.

Donald Naylor, Jr.

Vice Chair

Sherifat Lawal Price

Sherifat Lawal Price

Treasurer

Dale Lockett

Dale Lockett

Secretary

Beatrice Emanuel-Sims

Beatrice Emanuel-Sims

Board Member

Falayn Ferrell

Falayn Ferrell

Board Member

Darin Florenz

Darin Florenz

Board Member

Tolu Opeloye

Tolu Opeloye

Board Member

Derek Robinson

Derek Robinson

Board Member

Dominique D. Calhoun, Esq

Dominique D. Calhoun, Esq

Board Member & GHBC Foundation Chair

Marshall Bennett

Marshall Bennett

Board Member

Kim Roxie

Kim Roxie

Board Member

FOUNDATION BOARD

Dominique Calhoun, Esq

Calhoun Meredith, PLLC

Dominique Calhoun, Esq

Calhoun Meredith, PLLC

Carmen Herrera

CMHC Wealth Advisors

Carmen Herrera

CMHC Wealth Advisors

Kevin Riles

Kevin Riles Commercial

Kevin Riles

Kevin Riles Commercial

Deon Warner

Warner & Associates

Deon Warner

Warner & Associates

Dale Lockett

KHOU

Dale Lockett

KHOU

Carme Williams

Washburn & McGoldrick

Carme Williams

Washburn & McGoldrick

Leonard James III

J3 Advisory Group

Leonard James III

J3 Advisory Group

Courtney Johnson-Rose

George E. Johnson Properties

Courtney Johnson-Rose

George E. Johnson Properties

Dr. Asheli S. Atkins

GHBC President & CEO

Dr. Asheli S. Atkins

GHBC President & CEO

ADVISORY BOARD

Thomas Jones

Chair - McConnell, Jones, Lanier &
Murphy

Thomas Jones

Chair - McConnell, Jones, Lanier &
Murphy

Rhonda Arnold

Houston Airport Systems

Rhonda Arnold

Houston Airport Systems

Donovan Casanave

Shell

Donovan Casanave

Shell

Tony Council

TLC Engineering

Tony Council

TLC Engineering

James Davis

Gulfgate Dodge Chrysler & Jeep

James Davis

Gulfgate Dodge Chrysler & Jeep

Samuel Dike

Rice Management District

Samuel Dike

Rice Management District

Veronica Douglas

Houston Community College

Veronica Douglas

Houston Community College

Tanya Easter

Chevron

Tanya Easter

Chevron

Samuel Eaton

JNE Green Team

Samuel Eaton

JNE Green Team

Carla Lane

Lane Staffing

Carla Lane

Lane Staffing

Sherman Lewis III

TLG Fuels

Sherman Lewis III

TLG Fuels

Pamela McKay

Radio One

Pamela McKay

Radio One

Carry P. Yates

Yates and Associates

Carry P. Yates

Yates and Associates

BUSINESSES THRIVE IN COMMUNITY. JOIN US AND GROW TOGETHER.

Join the GHBC community, where hundreds of diverse Black business owners connect, collaborate, and thrive in Houston's innovative market. 

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Dr. Asheli S. Atkins is a trailblazing sociologist with over 15 years of experience in research, education, and organizational leadership. Currently serving as the President & CEO of the Greater Houston Black Chamber (GHBC), she leads with a vision to foster sustainable business growth and economic empowerment for marginalized communities.

Previously, Dr. Atkins was an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Prairie View A&M University, where she developed and delivered curriculum in sociology, race relations, social theory, and the sociology of entrepreneurship. During this period, she simultaneously engaged in extensive work with nonprofits and businesses, bridging academia and practical business development. Dr. Atkins has collaborated with influential organizations, including the Pearland Innovation Hub, Feed the Soul Foundation, Houston Minority Supplier Diversity Council, and numerous small businesses across Texas. Her work has secured funding for entrepreneurial and community-based initiatives, showcasing her ability to bridge academia and practical impact.

A 2023 Cohort Member of the prestigious Goldman Sachs & Urban Institute’s One Million Black Women Research program, Dr. Atkins conducted groundbreaking research on the systemic challenges Black women face in corporate spaces. Her report, Exit Plan: How Racialized and Gendered Organizations Lead Black Women to Entrepreneurship, highlighted how systemic barriers in workplace environments propel Black women to pursue entrepreneurial ventures as pathways to professional autonomy and economic empowerment.

Dr. Atkins’ research focuses on the intersection of race, gender, and economic opportunity, particularly as it pertains to marginalized entrepreneurs. She explores how workplace discrimination, wage disparities, and structural barriers contribute to the racial wealth gap and how entrepreneurship serves as a viable alternative for economic mobility. Her work also examines the role of social networks, access to capital, and business development programs in fostering long-term success for Black-owned businesses. Through her research, she has contributed critical insights that inform policy recommendations and strategies for advancing racial and gender equity in business and employment.

Dr. Atkins holds a Ph.D. in Sociology from Texas A&M University, an MBA from Texas Woman’s University, and a BA in Communications from Prairie View A&M University. Her research blends sociology, business, and organizational theory to uncover strategies that foster the sustainability of marginalized businesses.

A passionate advocate for equitable opportunities, Dr. Atkins is dedicated to creating pathways for growth, education, and innovation that empower underrepresented communities and redefine success in the business world.

In 2015, Derek co-established Black Restaurant Week in Houston, a two-week celebration of the vast ethnic flavors and cultural variety black culinary professionals bring to Houston's restaurant scene.  The annual campaign features restaurants, caterers, food trucks and local black-owned businesses. Through partnerships with corporations such as Verizon, Pepsi, Urban League, Uber, UPS, Bacardi, BB&T, and Diageo Reserve, Black Restaurant Week continues to expand its efforts across the United States. To date, Black Restaurant Week to host 15 campaigns nationwide, including in Toronto, Canada strengthening its mission of stimulating local economies and promoting awareness of minority-owned businesses.

In 2020, amid a global pandemic, Black Restaurant Weeks LLC established Feed the Soul Foundation. The idea to establish Feed the Soul Foundation occurred as Black Restaurant Week traveled to various cities and noticed the systemic challenges of marginalized culinary businesses. Feed the Soul Foundation expands Black Restaurant Week’s mission to dismantle food injustice by working with marginalized entrepreneurs and professionals to ensure they obtain financial assistance, business development, educational training, and equitable opportunities.

Through its work, Feed the Soul supports business growth for BIPOC owned-culinary businesses to ensure a level playing field. By supporting the Black, LatinX, Indigenous, disabled, formerly incarcerated, LGBTQIA+, and other marginalized communities through business development, financial assistance, and mentorship, Feed the Soul is reimagining food justice and encouraging economic stability in the culinary community.

He is a very active member of the Houston community. He served as a member of the Houston Area Urban League Young Professionals (HAULYP), Texas Young Professionals (TYP), and Houston Rodeo Black Heritage Committee (BHC). He uses his talents to support these organizations by increasing their brand awareness in the community.

Darin Florenz is a Director of Market Segmentation at MassMutual, a Fortune 500 financial services company focused on financial planning, wealth management services, and insurance products for consumers and business owners; helping people to secure their future and protect the ones they love.

With over thirty years of experience in the financial services industry and as an entrepreneur, Florenz is known for his leadership and expertise in inclusive market growth, go-to-market strategy, market research, and business development. He has successfully collaborated with and led initiatives and ventures from seed stage to Fortune 500.

He is also known as a trusted thought leader on Black wealth and financial legacy, and recognized for his expertise on how corporations can enhance their value proposition and overall profitable growth by developing and executing inclusive growth strategies, based on sound data and insights.

Florenz resides in Houston, TX, and is also the owner of Tonka Power, a Houston based electrical contractor.

Tolu Opeloye is a 2021 Forbes NEXT 1000 Honoree; 2019 Houston Business Journal 40 under 40 honoree and was awarded the Mack H. Hannah Upstart Award through the Greater Houston Black Chamber in 2019. He is a promising serial entrepreneur and general management executive with extensive and diverse experience in business development. His expertise includes understanding the changing climate of the healthcare industry and the impact this has on operations and business strategies. Over the course of ten years, Tolu worked for two notable home health agencies (Aveanna Healthcare & National Nursing & Rehab) where he quickly climbed the ranks. He acquired Amazon Health Services in 2017 & Med Shop Plus in 2021 and is known for building high-performing accountable cultures and strong, innovative teams that deliver excellent results.

Tolu is committed to empowering young men to become responsible and productive members of their families and communities. He serves as the Board Chairman, for the Urban Enrichment Institute and a board member for the Elliott Chandler Foundation where his focus is mentoring, public relations, and marketing. He is a proud member of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Inc., a Class 7 Graduate of the Houston Black Leadership Institute, a Class 41 Graduate of Leadership Houston, and a Class 44 Graduate of United Way Project Blueprint. He also enjoys serving at Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church where he has been a member since moving to Houston over a decade ago and became Ordained Deacon in 2019.

Tolu’s life is guided by three core values: faith, family, and fitness. His faith is demonstrated by radiating cheerfulness, extreme graciousness, and the enjoyment of encouraging others to pursue excellence daily. Tolu’s family serves as his motivation to work for the desires of his heart. He is a devoted husband of 12 years to Brittany Opeloye and the proud father to my two sons, Tolu Jr. and Ezekiel. Tolu believes that the proper maintenance of your physical well-being drastically enhances all other phases of your life by leaps and bounds. He is a workout addict and regularly attends a gym 3-4 days a week. Additionally, Tolu enjoys all sports, especially cycling, and has participated in the annual MS150 bike ride from Houston to Austin for 7 of the past 13 years to fund research and provide support for everyone affected by multiple sclerosis.

In 2016, Falayn Ferrell partnered with Warren Luckett and Derek Robinson to organize Black Restaurant Week in Houston, TX, and now serves as a Managing Partner over Operations for the initiative. The annual national awareness campaign showcases over 1650 black-owned culinary businesses and professionals with 15 regional Black Restaurant Week campaigns across the United States and Canada. Black Restaurant Week garners over 400 million impressions for the black culinary industry annually. The campaign and its participants have been featured in local and national media outlets such as Good Morning America, New York Times, Essence, Bloomberg, and more. In 2021 Black Restaurant Week was awarded a Crystal Award by the American Marketing Association for its remarkable work in special events marketing.

In 2020, Black Restaurant Week established Feed the Soul Foundation to support sustainability and growth amongst minority culinary businesses. Since 2020, Feed the Soul Foundation provided over $1,955,000 in business development and financial support to Black-owned and Latin-owned businesses across the US. The foundation established a National Emergency Relief Fund to aid culinary businesses across the nation and has provided $34,000 to assist businesses with unforeseen and natural disasters and restaurant equipment repair. The foundation has also awarded $75,000 in scholarships to minority hospitality and business students at Dr. Kirk Lewis Career & Technical High School, Careers through Culinary Arts Program, University of Houston, Texas Southern University, Florida A&M University, and Morehouse College.

Falayn continues her passion for serving others through her community efforts by serving on the Dean’s Advisory Board for University of Houston’s Conrad N. Hilton College of Global Hospitality Leadership. Falayn was recognized for her contributions to the culinary industry last year. In July 2023, Sysco honored her at the Annual Women en Blanc Honors Brunch during the Essence Festival. In September 2023, the US Black Chamber included her in the Power 50 Under 40, celebrating Black business leaders nationwide.

Beatrice Emanuel-Sims was born in Detroit Michigan, but raised in St. Louis, MO. She was raised as an only child by her grandmother for whom she is named and her grandfather. She received her bachelor’s degree in marketing and MBA from St. Louis University. She is a serial entrepreneur and has owned several businesses. Her most successful business, Sweet Granny Bea’s, a provider of delicious southern classic hard-to-find desserts, is located in downtown Humble TX, and is celebrating 7 years in business. In association with Sweet Granny Bea’s, is Soul Food Sundays a YouTube Cooking Show dedicated to helping families get back into the kitchen to fellowship, have fun, and share a fantastic meal. She is also the author of a Cookbook called Traditions and co-author of The Viral Network, a guide to business networking. She co-owners a second business called Inspired Edifice, a real estate company.

Additionally, Bea is a professional fundraiser and has over 20 years of experience in the field, personally raising more than $25 Million throughout her career. She currently serves as Regional Director of Development at Texas Southern University. She has also worked as a Major Gift Officer at Prairie View A&M University where she played a role in securing a $50 Million gift, the largest in the University’s history.

She is the mother of 5 children, Joseph, Elexas, Zaria, James, and Dionne, and grandmother of three, Eva, Airaz, and Noah. She has been married to Dionne Sims – The Marine- for nearly 18 years and they live in the Humble area, just northeast of Houston. Bea enjoys singing, cooking, giving back, spending time with her family, and traveling!

Carme Williams founded WilliamsCL Consulting, LLC. in 2021 after almost three decades in corporate and non-profit leadership positions. In her consulting, Carme works with private, independent, and public educational institutions, as well as art and social service organizations with assessments, development structure, feasibility studies, operations, strategic plans, major and principal gift strategies. Carme also serves as a Senior Consultant with Washburn & McGoldrick LLC.

Carme is an experienced leader in alumni relations, donor relations, principal and major gifts, stewardship programs, dean and faculty development, board development, and communications. Carme is an instructor at the Rice University Center for Nonprofit Leadership, where she is currently teaching a course titled Art of Fundraising – Advanced Principles and Practices: Strategic Planning and Fundraising. Carme is also an instructor with Texas A&M University Center for Nonprofits & Philanthropy – The Bush School.

Carme received a bachelor’s degree in business management from North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC and received her Certified Fundraising Executive certification in 2009. She served on the NC State University Wolfpack Women in Philanthropy Steering Committee as Chair of the Philanthropy Committee. Carme is a past president of AFP Greater Houston chapter. Carme currently serves on the NC State Foundation Board, United Nations Houston Chapter, Greater Houston Planned Giving Council, and African American Development Officers (AADO).

Currently, Donald works as Senior Counsel, Corporate Transactions and Trademarks, Americas for the Intellectual Property Department of Air Liquide USA LLC, the U.S. affiliate of the French global industrial gases company Air Liquide, S.A. In this role, Donald provides legal counsel to Air Liquide’s family of companies in the United States, Canada, the CCAM (the Caribbean, Central America, and Mexico) and elsewhere regarding matters involving all aspects of contract negotiation and counsel for the company’s intellectual property and technology assets, as well as, other corporate transactions while also assisting in managing the company’s global trademark and brand portfolio for its affiliates in the United States and the Americas. Donald is licensed with the State Bar of Texas and the Louisiana State Bar Association. A native of Meridian, Mississippi, Donald graduated from Xavier University of Louisiana and the Loyola University New Orleans College of Law. For almost twenty years he has practiced commercial litigation and transactional law within other Fortune 500 in-house legal counsel and law firm positions. During this time he has been a member of the Houston Bar Association, a Fellow of the Houston Bar Foundation, the Houston Minority Intellectual Property Lawyers Association, and the Houston Lawyers Association. Donald also provides service through a number of other community-focused organizations including Phi Beta Sigma Fraternity, Inc., 100 Black Men of Metropolitan Houston, Inc., and others.

Dale Lockett is the Director of Local Programming and Community Marketing at KHOU-TV, the TEGNA owned CBS affiliate in Houston, Texas. He is responsible for the production of non-news programs & specials and the station’s community marketing initiatives. In addition, Dale oversees KHOU’s morning talk show Great Day Houston.  

Dale spearheaded the creation of the station’s current “KHOU Stands For Houston” brand. He has successfully reinforced the station’s brand promise through the power of music. Dale has produced award-winning music video campaigns for KHOU 11 with Grammy Award-winning Houstonians Lyle Lovett and Yolanda Adams.

Prior to joining KHOU, Dale served as Creative Services Director for KENS-TV in San Antonio, where he was responsible for the station’s promotion and advertising efforts. During his career, he has served as a Promotion Producer at KHOU-TV, KIRO-TV in Seattle and WFOR-TV in Miami.  He began his broadcasting career as a Public Affairs Producer for KTXH-TV in Houston.

Dale graduated with honors from the University of Houston’s School of Communication. He is a recipient of the McCormick Tribune Fellowship and attended the Management Development Seminar for Television Executives at Northwestern University in 2006.  Dale is a 2013 graduate of the Center for Houston’s Future-Business/Civic Leadership Forum. He served as the Chairperson for the CBS Promotion Caucus from 2006 to 2013. In 2015, Dale was honored with the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Drum Major Award from the Greater Houston Frontiers Club. He currently serves on the Board of Directors for the American Red Cross-Houston Chapter, Greater Houston Black Chamber, and Literacy Now.

Dale has been honored with multiple broadcast industry awards, including Lone Star Emmy Awards, Telly Awards, PromaxBDA Station Summit Awards, and the CBS Eye on Excellence “Best of Show” Award.

Sherifat “Sheri” Lawal Price is the Senior Vice President of Lending at Unity National Bank in Houston, Texas, where she oversees a loan portfolio exceeding $100 million. In the first six months of 2024 alone, Sheri funded over $20 million in community-based and corporate loans. Unity National Bank of Houston (UNBH) is a Minority Depository Institution (MDI) and the only licensed and federally insured African American-owned and led bank in Texas, with locations in Houston, Missouri City, TX, and Atlanta, GA.

With over 16 years of experience in the banking and financial service industry, Sheri provides mainstream financial products and services to all communities throughout the Greater Houston and Atlanta Metropolitan areas. She is enthusiastic about helping businesses and individuals achieve economic success and financial security. In her current role, Sherifat is responsible for creating and implementing business development opportunities for Unity National Bank, using various strategies to drive new business and enhance the bank's image. She also focuses on strategically expanding and diversifying the organization by addressing top-level strategy issues, such as identifying new business activities, positioning, and marketing those activities, and investing in relevant technologies.

Sheri graduated from Lawrence E. Elkins High School in Missouri City, Texas, and holds a bachelor's degree in finance from Fisk University in Nashville, TN. In 2014, she earned an Executive MBA specializing in Banking and Financial Institutions from Sam Houston State University in Huntsville, Texas. During her undergraduate studies, Sheri interned as a Compliance Intern at Unity National Bank of Houston. After graduation, she joined UNBH as a Credit Analyst and was soon promoted to Business Development Officer. Within two years, she was promoted twice, first to Assistant Vice President of Business Development and Marketing Officer, and then to Assistant Vice President of Lending. In 2018, Sheri left Unity National Bank to join BB&T (now Truist) as the Vice President of Small Business and Consumer Lending. At BB&T, a Fortune 500 bank, she emphasized lending, deposit acquisition, and non-interest income generation for consumer and small business segments, while managing long-term, profitable relationships with clients.

Sheri serves as a Board Member of the Texas Bankers Association and Chair for the Bank Leadership Council for the 2024-2025 year. She is also a member of Jack and Jill of America Inc. South Belt Houston Chapter, an active board member of the City of Houston TRIZ 24 and Greater Houston Black Chamber, and a second-term board member for the American Red Cross. Previously, she served as PTO Financial Secretary at Shirley Dill Brothers Elementary in Alvin ISD for the 2017-2018 school year, Co-Chair for the Greater Houston Black Chamber's 23rd and 24th Pinnacle Awards Gala, and Vice Chairperson for The Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Black Heritage Committee from 2014 to 2016.

In her free time, Sheri enjoys traveling, reading, and creating lasting memories with family and friends. She is a wife and mother of two. Sheri has conducted over 1,000 financial workshops for small businesses, students, and individuals, and believes that financial fitness is just as important as physical and mental fitness.

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