By the Texas Metro News Team
Abounding Prosperity (AP) founder and CEO Kirk Myers-Hill was found dead in his office at Abounding Prosperity Inc. on Tuesday morning, April 4, 2023.
Known for offering a variety of healthcare and wellness services specializing in HIV care in South Dallas, especially for the Black community; Myers-Hill’s impact in the African American LGBTQ community was – to use a familiar word: abounding.
Myers-Hill, was the unstoppable founder and chief executive officer of the nonprofit.
One could say that AP put the issue of alternative lifestyle on the map in Dallas’s African American community, particularly among LGBTQ Black males; while also calling attention to the treatment of the transgender community.
He is also known for his familiar and inspirational quote:
“We can’t wait for others to save our community,” Myers-Hill said often. “It is up to us to save ourselves.”
When he founded AP, 18 years ago in 2005, his efforts lifted many heads that had been bowed in secret shame, living undercover because of their gender reversal – either a choice or compulsion to live as the other gender, the one different from their birth.
Myers-Hill proudly led numerous public service efforts, in and around the South Dallas/Fair Park community and throughout Dallas for the marginalized community that greatly respected him. He battled health disparities and lacking social services for the Black male LGBTQ community.
He helped increase care for individuals with HIV/AIDS who previously had struggled to find health care and made available educational and outreach services.
Myers-Hill and co-sponsors offered entertainment venues annually and periodically that drew audiences from throughout the city, state and region.
Researchers say that Black males living with HIV/AIDS are said to be 25 percent of the population in several zip codes that AP serves: 75215, 75216, 75231, and 75243.
Myers-Hill’s AP headquarters made the corner of South Central Expressway and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard a familiar landmark for the community he serviced.
News of Myers-Hill’s death spread quickly in the community, with many expressing shock and disbelief.
