In St. Pete, Generational Wealth Is Being Taught at a Folding Table
by Avery Anderson
St. Petersburg doesn’t lack talent. It lacks pipelines.
That’s the quiet problem the city’s first-ever 45 Days of Excellence is trying to name—and solve. What kicked-off with the Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade has expanded into a 45-day, citywide framework connecting history, health, culture, and economic mobility under one umbrella, led by the Tampa Bay Collard Green Festival.
At the center of that ecosystem is Samantha Harris, the festival’s executive director, who has spent the last decade doing something deceptively radical: building systems where Black excellence doesn’t have to restart every generation.
That work becomes clearest in the festival’s Youth Entrepreneurship Accelerator, a six-week incubator that teaches teens how to launch businesses—and then places them directly into the St. Pete economy as vendors at the festival itself.
Not simulations.
Not hypotheticals.
Real money. Real customers. Real responsibility.
From a Social Media Post to a Sold-Out Afternoon
For Tameka Harris, the pipeline became personal.
“Samantha saw my post with my son and his business Homemade by Chef Cam on my social media,” Harris said. “And she does a lot in the community with the youth and helping them be successful with their businesses.”
Harris herself is a business owner and operates Always Truth Incorporated. So she knows a thing or two about marketing.
That single post led to her son Cameron being selected for the Accelerator.
“It made a tremendous impact on him,” Harris said. “He was able to receive a food safety certificate, so we actually added that to his résumé.”
Participants receive a stipend at the end of the program. Cameron used his to reinvest—purchasing supplies, upgrading equipment, and creating a professional setup that signaled he wasn’t trying entrepreneurship. He was practicing it.
Then came the Collard Green Festival on the Deuces Corridor.
“He sold out within like three hours,” Harris said.
That detail matters—not just because it’s impressive, but because it shows what happens when opportunity is placed inside the community instead of somewhere kids are told to aspire toward later.
Cameron Harris sells homemade fudge at the Tampa Bay Collard Green Festival after completing the festival’s Youth Entrepreneurship Accelerator, a six-week program that prepares teens to launch real businesses and sell directly in their community. Cameron sold out of his products within hours of opening. His mother, Tameka Harris, said the experience helped him reinvest in his business and learn hands-on financial skills. Photo courtesy of Tameka Harris.
What “Exposure” Actually Means in St. Pete
In St. Pete, exposure doesn’t mean going viral. It means being seen by people who already share your geography—your schools, your churches, your grocery stores.
“Some people came to his table who didn’t even know he had a business,” Harris said. “People we knew.”
That’s the Collard Green Festival’s real power. It collapses distance.
“One person said, ‘My son sells as well,’” Harris said. “And then it led to more connections.”
This isn’t networking culture. It’s neighbor culture. And it’s how local economic ecosystems actually form.
Teaching the Things Schools—and History—Didn’t
Harris has been an educator for 26 years. She’s clear-eyed about what kids are—and aren’t—being taught.
“My son knows about opening a bank account. He knows about creating a ledger,” she said. “That’s accounting. That’s finances.”
She’s intentional about keeping money visible.
“I tell parents to use cash so kids can count it and say, ‘I’m depositing this money into my account.’”
That might sound small. It isn’t.
This is how financial literacy becomes instinct instead of theory.
“It teaches them to save and budget,” Harris said. “Which sets them up for a future of wealth.”
Then she names what most programs don’t.
“They can create generational wealth for their children,” she said. “Why not start early?”
In a country where entire communities were structurally denied that foundation, this isn’t enrichment. It’s repair.
Why the Kidpreneur Conference Exists—and Why Now
Later this month, Cameron will return to the pipeline from the other side—as a speaker at the 2nd Annual Kidpreneur Conference, held March 28 at Roberts Recreation Center.
“We want to help ignite that passion,” Harris said. “A lot of times they don’t know where to start.”
Presented with C3 Coopers LLC and Always Truth Incorporated, the conference brings together elementary, middle, and high school students alongside parents. They’ll learn how to create logos, file EINs, understand systems—and see other kids who look like them already doing it.
The Collard Green Festival is part of that conference too.
Same people. Same neighborhood. Same long view.
This is what 45 Days of Excellence looks like when it isn’t symbolic.
Why This Matters
During the 45 Days of Excellence, St. Pete isn’t just celebrating Black history. It’s interrogating the future.
What happens when excellence isn’t an exception?
What happens when kids don’t have to be “the first” every time?
What happens when opportunity doesn’t disappear after one day?
A teenager sells out at a festival.
A mother teaches him how to deposit cash.
A community builds the room—and keeps it open.
“We have to think about what our children are telling us,” Harris said. “And ignite that passion within them.”
In St. Pete, that ignition isn’t accidental.
It’s organized.