Chaz Fortune is normally inundated with requests for advice from youth, but at the Bronzeville Way Healing and Safe Space, a community resource center and park, he is taking a moment for himself.
Still buzzing, he set his phone down on a table.
To him, this is a benefit of the space.
“As soon as you step foot in here, it’s chill, it’s organic,” Fortune said.
Bronzeville Way is a community-driven project dedicated to promoting wellness, mental health and positive change in Bronzeville. Located at 2776 N 6th St., the upcoming community resource hub is built out of a shipping container surrounded by a courtyard with some green space. Although most of the construction is complete, the center is still a work in progress.
Co-founded by Fortune and his business partner, Trenell Henning, Bronzeville Way is almost complete. The two finished the first phase of construction on the project in 2023, soft launching the outdoor space with free resource fairs and wellness events.
Now Fortune and Henning have a great deal of work to do as they enter the final phase of construction and fundraising before officially opening the long-awaited healing space.
The goal is to open the space by the end of 2026.
Responding to the community’s needs
When Fortune finally picked up his phone, it was filled with notifications from those who needed his help with youth and family advocacy.
“I hear what the community says they need,” said Fortune, who is heavily involved in the neighborhood as a youth advocate and business owner.
Fortune and Henning are co-owners of SS&J Investment and a trucking company called ASAP Reliable Freight. The two also serve as credible messengers with the Youth Advocate Program (YAP), a Milwaukee County-backed organization that helps mentor at-risk youth.
This is part of the reason why Fortune and Henning decided to open Bronzeville Way as a healing space and resource hub.
It is a place where youth can hang out and recharge, and community members can find resources for jobs, mutual aid, recreation, mental health and more.
“We got information for whatever someone might need,” Henning said. “It can be from concrete to roofing to mental health.”
Currently, the inside of the converted shipping container serves two distinct purposes.
The left side will be a resource center with free Wi-Fi and brochures from local organizations, and the right side will sell concessions and merchandise from local businesses. The inside space is not yet open to the public.
The outdoor green space offers an additional lounge area and hosts community events.
Henning said he wants the space to be uplifting and adaptable to a variety of community needs.
Since the space partially opened in 2023, they have hosted several outdoor events.
“There was this group that came from around the neighborhood and just had a birthday party there,” Henning said.
“That’s what we want from this place.”
A clothing shop on display inside the Bronzeville Way Healing & Safe Space on Sept. 17, 2025, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The co-owners seek additional funding so they may repair the foundation and add additional amenities to the space before opening to the public.
Dreaming of the space
The vision for the next phase of Bronzeville Way is clear.
Before officially opening the center, Henning and Fortune are hoping to add a rotating art gallery and furnish the space with indoor and outdoor seating, computers, and at least one staff member who can connect people to the different kinds of resources they need.
“I would like to have someone here who looks like them and talks like them,” Fortune said. “Someone who is culturally competent to what is going on, so they are able to connect.”
The back wall of the space, facing the outdoor green space, will be fitted with a screen for movie showings and presentations, an addition Henning believes will help with engagement.
“It is a way for people to get into it,” he said. “Really engage the community and show something like an old movie.”
The plan and the progress
Co-owners Trenell Henning and Chaz Fortune pose for a portrait outside their business, Bronzeville Way Healing & Safe Space, which aims to host events and point people to community resources, on Sept. 17, 2025, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The co-owners seek additional funding to repair the foundation and add amenities to the space.
Fortune and Henning are actively fundraising to make the vision for Bronzeville Way come to pass.
Before the two can open the space to the public, they need to install a bathroom and update the foundation to bring the building up to code. Both projects will be the two largest investments.
Money from the final funding push will also cover the additional seating, the outdoor projection screen and art gallery.
Fortune and Henning purchased the lot for Bronzeville Way in 2016 as one of their first investment properties.
The business partners have invested their own money from their trucking company into the center, but they are now asking for community support on GoFundMe to get the project to the finish line.
“We try to invest and reinvest in the community,” Fortune said.
“You see so many people doing GoFundMe’s for negative stuff and getting all this traction,” Henning said.
“We are trying to do something positive and hope to get the same kind of response.”
Everett Eaton covers Harambee, just north of downtown Milwaukee, for the Journal Sentinel’s Neighborhood Dispatch. Reach him at ejeaton@gannett.com. As part of the newsroom, all of Everett’s work and coverage decisions are overseen solely by Journal Sentinel editors.
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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: ‘Healing space’ in Harambee looks for funding to open its doors