Kirbie Mack is originally from Chicago, IL and was raised by a family of advocates. Her childhood community laid the foundation for the personal and professional endeavors she would pursue, all to serve her people. Speaking with her, she notes that public service was instilled in her as a child. With both her father and brother running for various political offices, she has had a front row seat to public-service in action, but she didn’t stay seated for long.
After graduating from Northern Illinois University, Mack moved to Madison and began her career. Even though she wasn’t sure of her exact first steps upon graduating, she knew the direction she was headed.
Mack spent most of her career in equal opportunity at both the local and state levels of government. She was responsible for “finding issues and solving them”, and that is just what she did. She spent years advocating for more equitable hiring practices to ensure she wouldn’t be the last person of color or woman in any space she occupied. Mack was committed to prioritizing diversity on the leadership level first, to set a new precedent for hiring throughout. She reminds us all of the importance of not only securing a seat at the table but also pulling up a chair for someone else. Along with impacting the ways these institutions hired professionals, Mack was also instrumental in formulating policy to help people of color. She noticed quickly that these same institutions claiming to help and uplift communities of color, often left those very communities, out of the conversation and decision-making process. She shared with me that she was always looking for the policy, practice, or process that had been created to correct the adverse impacts being experienced by her people. She knew that at the heart of any public-serving role, one must be in tune with the communities they are meant to serve and make a genuine effort to know the people. Mack has continued to put the community first and not slowed down for a second since retiring in 2011.
In addition to an admiral career, she is simultaneously involved in several community organizations; President and CEO of K-Mack Enterprises, LLC, Vice-President and Intervener of Blacks for Political & Social Action of Dane County, Vice-President of Jeffery Frazier Mack Jr. Academy, Charter member and 1st Vice-President of the Madison Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., and former President of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People Dane County Branch.
Kirbie Mack has recently become involved in various environmental initiatives in Madison that shed light on the realities of environmental injustice and racism. She began in 2023 with rate cases aimed at Madison’s two energy providers, Alliant Energy and Madison Gas & Electric. In her pursuit of more equitable rates, education, and transparency for communities of color, Mack was realizing the gravity of the situation. She was astonished at the energy burden (the % of a household’s income that goes toward utilities) being experienced by marginalized groups. Most home’s energy burden is 6%, for single family, low-income, and/or communities of color, the rate is anywhere between 20% and 30%. To alert the community of this passive injustice, Mack rallied a group of dedicated Black women to visit local churches, attend hearings at the Public Service Commission of Wisconsin (the regulatory body for utility providers), meet with representatives from both energy companies, and engage in what has become a continuous fight for equity and awareness. Mack stands by her methodology of going straight to the community and was able to bring thousands of eyes to this ever-present oppression.
Mack admits she came in without much background knowledge but was able to involve herself in various spaces to educate herself on different environmental issues. The Clean Energy Coalition of Wisconsin (CECW) was one such group. She learned about the energy burden, its disproportionate impact on communities of color, and the uncanny similarities of citizens of color in Milwaukee, who experience the same financial strain from their dominant energy provider, WE Energies. In her learning, she also became involved in the Dane County Home Energy Guide Program as a Home Energy Guide.
When asked, “Why should Black, and all people of color care about environmental causes?”, Mack answers in one word, “Health!”. The Darbo-Worthington neighborhood, situated right off East Washington Avenue, is home to a new target of Mack’s advocacy. PFAS or polyfluoroalkyl substances, are better known as “forever chemicals”. These forever chemicals live in Starkweather Creek that outlines Darbo-Worthington. Children play in and by the creek, people fish in the creek, and the level of awareness of the dangers that reside in the water is tenuous. Mack has been partnering with different community organizations to host events and meet the community. These efforts are not only to alert the community of the dangers but to empower them to join the cause, educate others, and hold city/county officials responsible for the environmental hazard happening right before our eyes. She knows her work in Darbo-Worthington is far from over, and looks forward to continue fighting the good fight, all to serve her people.
Kirbie Mack is a living legend who takes every opportunity to educate, uplift, and respond to the issues affecting, as she likes to put it, “her people”. Through years of community involvement, decades in a career focused on equal opportunity, and a lifetime committed to advocacy, Mack represents the change she wants to see in the world and is proud to bear witness to it. For her, public service has always been about helping people maneuver. Whether that’s a governmental body, institution, or just their rising utility bill, Mack knows, “there are answers” for the problems everyday people face; and she is committed to finding them. She trusts in God for the direction her life is headed and knows her advocacy will continue playing a major role.
