Let Birth Detroit Care for you through your pregnancy and postpartum journey.
Midwifing Safe, Quality, Loving Care
MEET OUR FOUNDERS
Char'ly Snow, CNM
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Char'ly is a Detroit native and proud alumna of the University of Michigan and Wayne State University. She was a proud member of the HF team for 16 years serving in various capacities including the Director of Midwifery Services. She is currently a co-founder and the Clinical Director of Birth Detroit. Birth Detroit’s mission is to midwife safe, quality, loving care through pregnancy, birth and beyond using the values of safety, trust, love and justice as our guide. She is the 2018 recipient of the Kitty Ernst Award from the American College of Nurse-Midwives. This award is given to one midwife each year who has been certified for less than ten years, and has demonstrated innovative, creative endeavors in midwifery and/or women’s health clinical practice, education, administration, or research.
Char’ly is also the founder Metro Detroit Midwives of Color (MDMOC). MDMOC is a non-profit professional organization, inclusive of all minority midwives that serve women in the Metro Detroit area. Ultimately all of their efforts will serve to reduce the prevalence of health disparities among ethnic minorities.
Nicole Marie White, CPM
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Nicole Marie White is a Licensed Midwife (LM), Certified Professional Midwife (CPM), and birth advocate with a public health degree from Wayne State University. She is a Co-founder and the Policy Director of Birth Detroit. Birth Detroit is a collective of birth workers and public health advocates committed to building a more just place to birth in Detroit and beyond while embracing a community organizing approach to birth center development rooted in deep equity and meaningful partnership. Nicole has been attending births for 20 years and has been a national and state midwifery policy leader. She received a fellowship to work on public policy to address maternal-infant health disparities in Michigan, served on the inaugural Board of Licensed Midwifery for the State of Michigan, and led the opening of Birth Detroit's first prenatal and postpartum clinic, and facilitated the development of Birth Detroits Birth Justice agenda. Nicole believes that increasing access to human rights-centered midwifery care rooted in racial and gender justice is critical to addressing high maternal and infant mortality rates locally and globally.
Leseliey Welch, MPH, MBA
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Leseliey Welch is a public health leader with a business mind and a visionary heart, holding love as a guiding value, a way of being, an action and a politic. She is Co-founder of Birth Detroit and Birth Center Equity, a mom and a tireless advocate for work that makes communities stronger, healthier and more free. Leseliey leads a team of birth workers, birth advocates and community leaders planning Detroit’s first freestanding community birth center Birth Detroit, and is proud of the launch of Birth Center Equity to grow and sustain birth centers led by Black, Indigenous and people of color across the country. She has nearly two decades of leadership experience in city, state and national health organizations. She served as interim executive director of Birthing Project USA, Deputy Director of Public Health for the City of Detroit, and consulted in the development of Michigan’s first comprehensive LGBTQ health center. Leseliey has taught at the university level for over fifteen years, contributing to the development of Wayne State University’s Bachelor’s in Public Health Program and creating courses on numerous health equity topics for undergraduate and master’s level public health students, medical students and medical residents. Leseliey currently lectures in the Women’s and Gender Studies Department at the University of Michigan. She earned her undergraduate degree in Women’s Studies, Masters in Public Health with a certificate in Women’s and Reproductive Health, and Masters in Business Administration from the University of Michigan.
