Our Staff at Community Change Inc.

A Chicago native born on the crossroads of working-class, Black and female, Shay
Stewart-Bouley’s career since 1997 has focused on weaving these intersections into her
daily life and professional work. Since the mid-1990s, Shay has worked in the non-profit
sector, during the earlier years working primarily with marginalized groups and in the
later years focusing on non-profit administration working both as an executive director at
a small faith-based non-profit in Southern Maine and as a non-profit consultant/grant-
writer to other organizations. In the early-2000s, Shay moved from her native Chicago
to Maine and, as a Black woman living in one of the least diverse spaces in the United
States, found herself writing regularly about race relations, social justice, and white
supremacy.

Shay is a prolific blogger at her award-winning blog Black Girl in Maine Media, where
race is a major theme but also her daily life as a Black, middle-aged woman in a world
where these traits frequently are not valued. Shay wrote for the now-defunct Portland
Phoenix, crafting a monthly column titled “Diverse City” that ran for over 10 years.
Shay’s work has been published in national publications and her work has appeared in
several anthologies. In 2016, Shay did a TedX talk entitled “ Inequity, Injustice…
Infection .” In 2021-22, Shay served as vice chair of the Portland Maine Charter
Commission.

Shay holds an undergraduate degree from DePaul University, where she self-designed
a program to focus on African-American Health and Wellness and health disparities;
she also holds a master’s of education degree in Administration and Supervision from
Antioch University New England. Shay is the mother of two and grandmother of four.
In 2024, Shay celebrates her 10th year at the helm of CCI, where she is still as
passionate about racial justice work and the necessity of CCI as when she started.
While she is no longer as young as she was when she came onboard in 2014, she still
decompresses with Ashtanga yoga, which remains one of her many passions, aside
from work and family.