Eugene Kinlow is a born and raised Washingtonian with a passion for community engagement, a love for the outdoors and an optimistic outlook on life. Having been brought up with a family of community activists from East of the river SW, giving back was always a part of his life and those formative years would shake to his foundation that being an active member of your community is a duty. In his younger years he was a participant of organizations that focused on youth leadership and collaboration around DC for policymakers and community organizers such as The DC Youth Advisory Council as well as the Mayor Youth Leadership Institute, advocating for Ward 8 on both.

Eugene majored in Chinese Relations and double minored in International Business focusing on marketing and Chinese language at The University of Vermont. While at UVM he grew his love for the outdoors and snowboarding but never gave up that duty to giving back to the community. He was the co-chair of his Fraternity’s Philanthropy Committee and lead them to one of the highest years in donations for their outstanding event ‘Sleep Out for The Soldiers’. The premise of which being members of The Kappa Sigma Fraternity from all over the Northeast coming together to raise money and awareness for The Fisher House Foundation. He also volunteered for Burton Non-Profit The Chill Foundation, which focuses on getting inner city and at risk youth into board sports such as snowboarding and skateboarding. Being a volunteer for the majority of his college career he helped in leading kids to gain skills like confidence, active listening and public speaking as well as doing more operational roles like logistics, delegation and facilitation of events.

After finishing college in 2015 Eugene went on to work for some of the biggest names in outdoor sports working as a social media coordinator for Burton and Patagonia, using his skills in networking and community engagement to drive visibility of the brands in a localized market. Working for these brands that aligned with his passions as well as them taking hard stands on issues like sustainability, equity, voting rights, indigenous land rights and a myriad of others; the communication work he did was more about educating the market and helping them get informed properly about issues. He wrote the monthly Patagonia newsletters for the region which garnered thousands of views but also a large amount of positive reception from the community, always trying to help elevate the knowledge by making information digestible and interesting.

During the spring of 2020 he co-founded OccupyDC, a local non-profit dedicated to racial justice, police reform, and the mental and physical health of civil rights activists. As Lead Organizer and Communications Director, he led a team of organizers who planned large-scale events on Black Lives Matter Plaza, including yoga sessions for protesters to find healing, educational movie and discussion nights centered around progressive and reformative thinking, and paint and protest events where people could express themselves creatively. His two shining achievements in OccupyDC were his organization and leadership of a political and cultural panel about solutions to ending police brutality and hosting an interview series with many of the candidates for DC city council. Eugene created content for and managed the organization’s Twitter, Instagram, and other communications, crafting effective messages that garnered significant participation, viewership, and engagement from a wide range of audiences for these in-person and virtual events. Quickly gaining a large following and using these platforms to livestream events including panel and interviews.