AURORA | The manager of an Aurora Mental Health & Recovery treatment program is under investigation for wearing blackface makeup and an afro-like wig in photographs posted to social media in 2011, the Sentinel has learned.
The makeup and wig were part of a Halloween costume worn by Hunter Kennedy, a therapist who Aurora Mental Health & Recovery says was hired in November 2022 to manage the agency’s Assertive Community Treatment Team.
In the photos, Kennedy wears the jersey of former NFL quarterback Michael Vick and holds a chain attached to a collar around the neck of another person dressed as an injured dog. Vick admitted to participating in a dog-fighting ring and was sentenced to prison not long before the photos of Kennedy were posted on Facebook.
Aurora Mental Health & Recovery launched an investigation into Kennedy’s conduct after the Sentinel was tipped off about the photos and Kennedy’s leadership role, and the newspaper contacted Kennedy and his employer for comment.
Kennedy later told the Sentinel that the idea of the costume was to satirize current events rather than mock the race of a prominent Black athlete.
“I don’t have a racist bone in my body,” Kennedy said. “It’s kind of bewildering to me that I’m being persecuted for a Halloween costume that was from so long ago. But if I would have known the picture was even on there to this day, I would have deleted it sooner.”
Aurora Mental Health & Recovery, formerly known as Aurora Mental Health Center, is a private nonprofit that delivers behavioral health services to thousands of Aurorans each year.
About 24% of the nonprofit’s revenue came from federal, state and local governments last year, Aurora Mental Health & Recovery spokeswoman Lori Mackenzie said. An additional 8% came from donations, while the rest came from clients and insurance companies.
As a state-licensed community mental health center, the nonprofit is also responsible for helping some of Aurora’s most vulnerable residents, including those without health insurance. The ACT Team specifically serves adults struggling with severe, persistent mental illness who regularly come into contact with police and hospital staff.
The ACT Team is publicly funded, with the primary backer being the Colorado Behavioral Health Administration, Mackenzie said. She said Kennedy’s role in the program was primarily administrative, with little public contact.
Kennedy is currently on leave, and Mackenzie said March 6 that the nonprofit was “still in the middle of the investigation, and the length of the investigation will be determined by the facts that are found along the way.”
“We take these matters very seriously and are committed to employing individuals who act in accordance with our Equal Employment and Unlawful Harassment policy and our organizational core values,” she said. “When that does not occur, we take appropriate and swift action.”
Mackenzie said the nonprofit was unaware of the photographs until it was contacted by the Sentinel.
Since at least the early 1800s, white performers have donned blackface makeup as part of acts stereotyping Black Americans. Blackface performances and minstrel shows were particularly popular following the Civil War, as some whites chafed at the emancipation of the country’s Black slaves.
Representatives of Aurora and Denver’s Black community said they thought Americans are generally more aware now than they were a decade ago of the painful history that underlies blackface.
But Aurora NAACP president Omar Montgomery said excuses like bringing up how someone has friends of color or how no one alive today was legally enslaved in the American South are still common and show a lack of understanding.
“This particular type of costume, or whatever you want to call it, has a history that has traumatized a whole race,” Montgomery said. “There’s still people who are extremely naive to the impact this has on certain communities and certain groups.”
John Bailey, chairperson of the Colorado Black Round Table, said many people prefer not to think about how the United States has mistreated people of color, mentioning the reluctance of some educational institutions to teach students about slavery and other elements of Black history.
He said forgiving someone for wearing blackface would need to start with that person apologizing and reflecting on why others find blackface offensive.
“You can be apologetic about insensitivity, but you do need to be held accountable,” he said. “If the person didn’t apologize, they’re taking a privileged approach.”
Kennedy didn’t apologize for the photos taken more than a decade ago but said he wouldn’t have worn his costume today given the likelihood of offending someone.
He argued that the photos shouldn’t overshadow his decade and a half of leadership at behavioral health treatment facilities in Texas and Colorado.
“Some of my best friends are of all different races and creeds. There was no malicious intent,” he said. “My curiosity is who went back in my social media so far back in my pictures 12 years back to pull it out, and send it to you, and call your attention to it. Of more concern to me is, have I created an enemy that I’m unaware of?”
As much as I enjoy watching leftists eat their own, when will we admit that everyone has something in their past that seems misaligned with the current woke standards? It’s simply a matter of who’s more determined to dig for the “dirt.”
I am consistently amazed how leftists have every excuse in the book for criminals as “victims of circumstance” yet are eager to define good people by the worst thing they can find about them.
Most all of it is a tempest in a teapot.
Any idiot who believes it’s okay to appear in blackface deserves to be called out for it.
So Jeff, you probably never watch Saturday Night Live either! It is ok if it is done on TV? It was Halloween over 12 years ago. Sounds like someone had something against Hunter and went digging to find dirt! I don’t see the Sentinel exposing the person who brought this to their attention and why? Just another show of reporters looking to publish any sensational story and not getting to the root cause and being impartial about the facts! Let’s just destroy someone’s career because they got someone upset.
What about Jane Fonda and how she was a traitor to the military – I don’t see anybody pushing that issue any more! Should we now have every military person out protesting in front of every one of her new movies and sitcoms! Come on people, get over yourselves!
OK, then you should spread the word amongst democrats. They seem to be the ones inclined to do it. This guy, and remember Virginia’s Gov. Northam and AG Mark Herring?
If this is really news, deserving to be reported, it seems to be a dozen years too late.
Just another reason this newspaper/blog is quickly headed towards bankruptcy.
Hunter, your enemy is the Aurora Sentinel. I wonder, as a mental health professional, can you figure any of this out? Go counsel with CM Sundberg and have some talk about black vs white issues and you will come up with an answer.
The Aurora Sentinel likes to promote negative illusion on the subject.
I am weary of the racist witch hunt. It doesn’t help race relations. We were better off when we could actually talk about things. Having everyone on pins and needles and afraid to say anything or do anything that could possibly be interpreted as racist doesn’t help anyone. When I was young, my parents repeated this phrase “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me”, to help me through life. The world doesn’t revolve around me. How will the protected youth of today deal with real life? Will they commit suicide at the first insult? Will they kill others who insulted them? Shouldn’t we be condemning black people who dress in clothes that appear too white? When was it an insult to dress up like a football player who is black? We can take this cultural appropriation and equity to really extreme limits. We should do that to show the absurdity of it. From now on, there can’t be more than 12% black NBA or NFL players. Oh yea, we need to balance by national origin. We need a survey off where everyone’s ancestors came from. We can carry this to extreme limits. But, it is interesting to see someone liberal caught by the witch hunt. Sad. It is just like the McCarthy era. We see the sadness of that time now. How long will it be before we understand that we are just doing damage now?
I agree with your comments but why are you assuming that the person in this article is liberal? Just curious?
I work at AMHR and from the inside I can tell you the whole organization is racist. Hunter’s excuses reek of it. And Lori and leaderships response to put him on admin leave is useless. AMHR mostly serves POC. Aurora is highly diverse and this organization continues to promote harm towards those its suppose to serve. The whole leadership team is middle aged white (or presenting) people. Its all good when you’re a white male, with black friends and have years of privileged experience. I know they don’t have that same tolerance for non white, non middle age, non male employees.
Well, there are a couple POCgals in leadership (& are both people I know & respect) – but the entire public-facing executive leadership team is 100% women, so it is odd (but true!) that white males at AMHR are above the law & never err. Been watching that for decades. Even without the untenable lack of remorse for Hunter’s ubermensch-like actions (except that he regrets he neglected to take the post down!) the fact that the manager of the ACT team department finds it amusing that anyone might hang, drown, electrocute, “slam”, or shoot a helpless, innocent being – the clients in his care being the very people in Aurora who would symbolically be the mauled & murdered dogs in the dogfights of life – is REALLY what underscores the need for this guy to GO, in my opinion as a former AuMHC high user.
And this is how we repay a man that has devoted 25 years of his life to helping fellow humans through crisis. Make him fearful for his career. Wow…just wow… Tearing him down for a picture that was taken 12 years ago in a time when we were all less enlightened. I’m ashamed and saddened by our lack of compassion.
A partial list of celebs who appeared in blackface. Although each of them was the subject of performative outrage, they kept their multimillion-dollar jobs, remained marketable and continued to succeed: Ted Danson, Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Kylie Jenner, Robert Downey, Jr., Jon Hamm, Jane Krakowski, Joy Behar, Dan Aykroyd, Billy Crystal, and Sarah Silverman.
I hope this latest smear campaign does not rob this man of his entire reputation, in accordance with the “celebrity rules.”
How are going to have blackface on social media and work for one of the most diverse cities in Colorado?
How are you going to work in Aurora and wear blackface? It’s the most diverse city in Colorado. How dumb do you have to be? It’s been wrong to wear blackface for generations. Let me guess, this guy is in leadership somewhere in this company.