Box 4, Folder 4, Document 27

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Box 4, Folder 4, Document 27

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For Release:

Thursday PM, January 2, 1968

From: Community Relations Commission
1203 City Hall, Atlanta, Georgia 30303

BENNY T. SMITH NAMED FIELD REPRESENTATIVE FOR

COMMUNITY RELATIONS COMMISSION

Benny T. Smith, widely known community leader, has been named field
representative for the Atlanta Community Relations Commission and will
assume his new duties immediately. It was announced today by Nat Welch,

executive director for the Commission,

As field representative, Smith will head up CRC's expanded Town Hall
Meeting Program for 1969 and will act as a communications link between

the Neighborhoods and the Commission,

"We have expanded the scope of this position and are delighted to have
secured the services of such an able and experienced leader as Benny T.

Smith," stated Welch.

Smith was raised in Vine City and educated at Booker T. Washington
High School, Morris Brown College and the Blayton School of Accounting.
With funds he won on the national TV show, "Strike It Rich," in the mid

fifties, Smith opened and operated a dry cleaning firm in Vine City. He
Page 2

Press Release January 2, 1968

Benny T. Smith ,

later was the proprietor of a neighborhood grocery store in the Poole Creek
Community. Smith was subsequently employed by the U.S. Postal Data

Center and the Georgia Department of Labor where he played a key role in

the Jobmobile Program in cooperation with the National Alliance of Businessmen.

Smith was a prime mover in the organization of the Community Relations
Commission ast two and a half years ago. He helped organize the Price
and the the Pittsburgh EOA centers and the Model Cities Program. He isa
former vice president of the All Citizens Registration Committee, former
president of the Metropolitan Atlanta Grassroots Council, president of the
Southeast Community Council, board member of the Metropolitan Atlanta
Summit Leadership Congress, and former vice president of the Fourth
Ward Improvement Council. He served as chairman of the transportation

committee for the Poor People's Campaign to Washington.

CRC's new field representative has received awards for community service
and leadership from the Peoplestown Civic League, the Atlanta branch of
the NAACP, the Excelsior Knight Civic and Social Club, the Southeast

Community Council and the Veterans' Administration Hospital.

Mr. Smith is a member of the Wheat Street Baptist Church and Prince Hall

Masons. He resides at 209 Archcrest Drive.

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