Meet Dre’mon Miller | Christian

We had the good fortune of connecting with Dre’mon Miller and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Dre’mon, we’d love to hear more about how you thought about starting your own business?
Street Smartz Over Safety, LLC was created as a way to help fill the gap in educating our community on safety, wellness, and building relationships. Due to the strain on law enforcement and community relationships, the business was created. The lessons, seminars, and other opportunities of learning focus on strengthening trust between police agencies and the communities they serve. In addition, career readiness skills are taught such as professionalism, communication, and collaboration. Participants also learn how to respond to peer pressure, and gang violence while focusing on staying healthy both physically and mentally. No time is as good as the present to permit youth, teens, and adults to walk with power knowing their full self-worth! Our classes are an innovative way to teach the community to know their self-worth and push them to be successful, healthy, and outspoken, while having FUN! Street Smartz uses the complex and exciting curriculum of criminal justice principles to empower, build confidence, and improve cardiovascular health & nutrition while also teaching career readiness skills that extend well beyond the classroom.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
As a native of Richmond, Virginia I grew up in some of the most impoverished neighborhoods which pushed me to starting this business and doing my part in empowering youth and adults alike. I understand the dynamics of the area and I am able to connect to all levels while making learning fun. I have seen firsthand the effects of our youth feeling neglected or without a voice and unfortunately this leads to some choosing fatal decisions for their lives. I choose to be a helping, calm, reassuring voice to remind the community, but youth more importantly that they have a life worth living. I too, while growing up struggled with feeling accepted, out cast, and sometimes not understanding why I always felt lonely. I saw domestic violence in my home, I experienced inappropriate acts, I was arrested as a juvenile, and I lived in hotels while going to school. Even though the previous stated things are true, they were not the defining qualities of me because I also was one of the top ranked students in my class, a leader, and a mentor who hadn’t realized my potential yet at a young age. This led me to deciding to create a platform that is safe, and accepting where the community can learn various topics. My career started with being a summer intern for Michael Herring’s office in 2010. He was serving as the Commonwealth Attorney of Richmond City, at the time and I had an opportunity of debating against him during my high school years. Afterward I went to Virginia Commonwealth University, where I receive a Bachelors of Science in Criminal Justice with a minor in Homeland Security. Not shortly after, I started working as a Correctional Officer with Juveniles at Bon Air Correctional Facility. Working here was one of the most challenging jobs I had ever faced. I was 20, supervising some juveniles who in some cases were almost my same age, who helped teach me resilience. After about two years, I decided to become a police officer with the Division of Capitol Police of Virginia. I serves as an officer for a little over three years. Then I became a teacher with the City of Richmond where I teach criminal justice and 911 dispatching. I feel in some way that my whole life I have been teaching but just at certain points I never realized people were watching. In my current role I teach for the city school district, I adjunct for J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College, I mentor, I teach music, I am apart of a Board of Directors, I play tennis and I own Street Smartz Over Safety, LLC.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
If my friend came in town for a visit we would have a great week. We would visit some museums to include the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and the Valentine Museum. Then we would catch lunch at Southern Kitchen for some good soul food or either go to LULU’s. We would go to River City Roll to do a little bowling and have a drink then we would go to battery park at some point to play tennis. At night time we would either go to Shockoe Bottom or Carytown to hang out and maybe go shopping at some of the local stores.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I would like to shout out God, my grandfather, Frankie R. Miller Sr., my late grandmother Georgia Miller, my siblings, my mom , Lindy Bumgarner, and Peter Paul Development Center. Each one of these individuals or organizational entities have had some part developing and molding me into the individual that I am today. My grandfather is the strong male figure that has always been present in my life. He has taught me everything from building pieces of furniture to growing a garden in the backyard, while always adding in some type of life-lesson that I carry with me each day. My late grandmother, my “Big Georgia” was the head lady of my family, the nurse, the educated one and most importantly the person who always spoke up when something was wrong and that’s where I get it from. My siblings, Antoinette (Toni), Atie’sha (Tiesha), DeVonte (Bus), and Astasha are all my biggest supporters and my my biggest headaches. Each one of them in some way or another have shown me what true love, friendship and support looks like. Having them prepares me to be able to face the challenges that working with the world. My mother, who instilled the importance of education and has shown me the importance of understanding growth because life is a continuous journey, I thank you. Your decisions taught me lessons that make understandable, set apart, and able to stand alone. Lindy Bumgarner saw something in me during my high school years and decided to help put me into rooms where at that time I did not feel I was worthy of being. Due to her, I pursued a career in the criminal justice field. Lastly, Peter Paul Development Center, an non-profit organization who sets out to serve the community in all aspects of life, I thank you. I thank you for being the first organization to take a chance with allowing Street Smartz Over Safety, LLC to host programs and work with your youth. Because of you the surrounding communities and organizations have had a chance to be apart or work in connection with our business.

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