Barton Jackson takes the reins at nglccNY

Award-winning New York City banker Barton L. Jackson II has big plans as the new executive director of New York’s chapter of the National LGBT Chamber of Commerce (nglccNY).

nglccNY announced Barton’s new leadership role in an Oct. 16 news release.

The New York chapter of the NGLCC is the LGBTQ business voice of the Empire State and a business community providing advocacy, business development programs, support, and networking opportunities, and certification.

Jackson is a longtime nglccNY volunteer. For eight years, he actively served as a member of the Ambassadors Committee and as an LGBT Business Enterprise (LGBTBE) certification site visitor, among other roles.

After 12 years at TD Bank, Jackson’s last day was Oct. 31. On Nov. 1, he succeeded Kellie Parkin as nglccNY’s executive director, who suddenly passed away in September. Parkin took the helm in January 2023, according to an nglccNY news release from Dec. 29, 2022.

“I would have never left if it weren’t for this opportunity that the chamber has given me,” Jackson said about TD Bank. “I’m really excited to get to work.”

Jackson, 39, a gay man, has big goals and a long laundry list for the staff of two, including himself, at nglccNY. He plans to make the business case for investing in LGBTQ businesses: Create more programing and strategic partners. Grow corporate and professional engagement. Foster, facilitate, and support small business and corporate partnerships. Grow the chamber’s influence in local, state, and federal government — especially to lobby on behalf of LGBTQ small businesses and “enshrine” LGBTQ business certification in New York state and city government’s diverse supplier initiatives. Explore global trade for queer small businesses in the State of New York. Pay more attention to LGBTQ businesses in the broader state beyond the chamber’s hub in New York City. Create more space for non-profit organizations at the chamber.

Own It

Jackson pointed to Own It: TGX Entrepreneur Capacity Building Program — a virtual entrepreneurial intensive designed for transgender, non-binary, and gender expansive aspiring business owners — as a model for the types of programing he wants to develop to help more LGBTQ entrepreneurs in the Empire State, especially New York City, and across the United States.

Jackson co-created the free virtual national transgender business accelerator program as a volunteer with his friend, Sean Coleman, founder and executive director of Destination Tomorrow. The program is a partnership between TD Bank, nglccNY, and Destination Tomorrow, which is a Bronx-based grassroots agency and LGBTQ center which now has additional locations in Atlanta and Washington, DC. Coleman was unavailable for comment.

Transgender entrepreneur Braxton Fleming, founder and CEO of Stealth Bros & Co., a stylish and functional medical accessories company, was in the program’s first cohort in 2021. He became the poster boy for Own It. Fleming received backing from ABC’s Shark Tank’s Barbara Corcoran and Mark Cuban on the second episode of the 14th season of the show in 2023.

“I was, like, screaming, all excited at my TV,” Jackson said. “I love Brax to death.”

Fleming was unavailable for comment.

The program recently graduated its third cohort from its fourth year, Jackson noted. The program has impacted more than 100 transgender entrepreneurs since its launch, with the help of the more than $1.9 million parent organization, NGLCC, which provides the national access and reach to chambers across the country, he said. 

“I’m incredibly proud of that program,” Jackson said excitedly.

Jackson is an expert at making connections and business. He spent more than a decade fostering small business relationships — especially for the LGBTQ entrepreneurs — as a relationship manager in the regional commercial Manhattan Bank at TD Bank. According to the release, he co-chaired Metro New York Forever Proud, the bank’s LGBTQ2+ business resource group, and he was a leader on the Metro New York Regional Diversity Council. On the council Jackson developed LGBTQ community programing and is a dedicated coach and mentor to entrepreneurs and small business owners.

Jackson is widely recognized for his work by TD Bank as well as by many business publications and organizations. Gay City News recognized Jackson with an Impact Award in 2020.

“Barton’s unwavering leadership and relentless dedication to economic empowerment, combined with his tireless commitment to creating equal opportunities for LGBTQ+ entrepreneurs, make him the perfect choice for this critical role,” Justin Nelson, co-founder and president of NGLCC, said in the release. “We are thrilled to welcome him to nglccNY, where his vision will continue to uplift our members and expand our reach in the vibrant New York market.”

Commitment to service

Hailing from a banking family in Idaho’s capital, Boise, Jackson wanted to be an artist, not a banker. An early work discrimination experience, recognition of a lack of resources for the LGBTQ community in his hometown, and support from his family and later professional mentors turned his “young gay rage” into fuel to drive his passion and leverage his profession.

“I fortunately had really loving parents who were both very keen in terms of critical thinking and business minds,” said Jackson, who joined the family trade.

Jackson’s family, along with a caring gay boss at a credit union after he moved to Seattle after college, helped him “navigate” his sense of injustice and transform it into a force for good that informed him “from my head to my heart with business purpose,” he said.

That carried on to New York City at TD Bank, where the bank and his boss also encouraged him to be himself and get involved in the community and do business.

“It let me marry my business experience in banking with my community passions,” he said, noting that the ability to openly navigate his career without bias “tends to be an intrinsic part of becoming a leader.”

Checking ‘performative allies’

Talking about the recent trend of corporations backing out of diversity, inclusion, and equity programs and sponsorships of the LGBTQ community, Jackson pointed out there’s a difference between “the monolith of the business or the organization” and “all the people inside of it.”

“Generationally, we’re seeing more diversity in terms of the queer community,” he added, pointing to Gen Z. Gallup found more than one in five Gen Z adults (7.6%) identify as LGBTQ+ in a study released in March.

Kelley Robinson, executive director of the Human Rights Campaign, which publishes the annual Corporate Equality Index, which rates corporations based on its support for LGBTQ employees and the community, agreed in an op-ed in Time on November 1. She also pointed to Gen Z warning that backing out of DEI initiatives “could cost businesses billions.”

The harm is happening now for queer small businesses, such as Hudson Valley queer and trans couple and business partners Ash Molesso and Chess Needham of Ash & Chess, and Texas-based wife-and-wife team Veronica Vasquez and Jennifer Serrano of JZD, the Bay Area Reporter reported. The business owners’ dreams getting a deal with Target left them feeling angry and betrayed when the company pulled back on its Pride Collection following right-wing attacks in the last two years. The couples didn’t shoulder the financial fallout from Target’s caving into the pressure, but they lost business opportunities focusing on fulfilling the large order. The entrepreneurs reported business is slow.

Jackson told Gay City News that the chambers should help small businesses by allocating and providing knowledge and resources for their conversations with corporate partners as much as finding opportunities for small businesses, nonprofits, and career professionals.

Recalling his time in Seattle’s LGBTQ business community with the Greater Seattle Business Association, the Emerald City’s LGBTQ chamber, and working with the Port of Seattle, Jackson touched on the importance of also helping LGBTQ small businesses understand global trading and the impact on the supply chain in the city and state.

In June, Jessica Stern, special envoy to advance the human rights of LGBTQI+ persons, hosted a discussion with US Trade Representative Katherine Tai, who explained the impact on restructuring trade to consider inclusivity with international partnerships and transacts and how it benefits disadvantaged communities, reported the Bay Area Reporter.

Jackson believes it’s important for nglccNY to foster a similar discussion about global trade and LGBTQ business as he saw in Seattle.

“Having that level of elevated discussion, where we’re really not just talking about one thing, but really getting into navigation of resources and the economic climate in New York State, so that we can understand that as a community and thrive is really something I look forward to,” he said.

Jackson’s purpose and vision is identifying and advocating for the business case to extend funding to support the economic needs for the LGBTQ business community. For him, creating a forum, opportunity, visibility, and “voice to the economic part of the LGBTQ+ community is really important.”

“We are worth the investment. We’re not meant to be invisible,” Jackson said. “We are contributors and deserving of equitable attention and acknowledgement.”