Other companies that she has owned and managed, are Voice-Tel of Michigan, the fourth largest voice messaging company in the United States, Voice-Tel of Central Michigan, and Voice Response Corporation, a telemarketing and database marketing company. Barbara also opened and developed Voice-Tel of Australia, a company with 11 offices throughout Australia and New Zealand for the Voice-Tel franchisor. With her experience, Barbara has been able to incorporate her skills in management, her strengths in communications, and her considerable energies in powering her fledgling companies to secure a solid foothold in the rapidly expanding world of communications. Prior to becoming a business owner, Barbara previously served as Vice President of Customer Service and Senior Vice President of Research and Software Development for World Computer Corporation in Michigan for ten years where her team designed and installed new financial services software for credit unions. Altogether, she has been a business owner and corporate executive for 20 years, and has successfully sold 3 of her four companies.
For many years, Barbara has been an active supporter for small businesses, and women and minorities in business in particular. She continues this work both nationally and internationally. She has linked together thousands of small business owners with her voice messaging network, enabling them to communicate directly with one another to improve their businesses, learn of programs, opportunities and appointments in the communities, improve the climate of entrepreneurship, and play a part in public policy making. Her efforts to unite various organizations, has enabled small business owners to share information with each other, learn from one another, and become better informed in economic and political issues. Barbara speaks nationally and internationally on issues concerning leadership and advocacy for business women.
Barbara was named on October 15, 2007 to the National Women’s Business Council. The Federal appointment is for a 3 year term. In addition, Barbara currently serves as Co-Chair of the National Global Trade and Technology Board of Directors, whose mission is to help reverse the long standing trends in balance of trade deficits by making the task of finding, selling and delivering US products and services into global markets as simple as doing business next door. She is also a media resource for the White House Project and has been recently cited as CEO of one of the top 3 most powerful non-profits in Washington, DC.
In addition, Barbara has previously served as President of The National Association of Business Owners in Detroit, Vice President of Public Policy for the national NAWBO organization, SCORE and on various community Boards, including: Detroit Edison Community Relations Board, Forgotten Harvest, International Institute and Majority Business Initiative. Barbara has served on the national Board of Directors of the Women’s Leadership Forum for the Democratic National Committee and served as the Small Business Chair for Kerry for President. She has helped develop new and closer relationships with the US Small Business Administration, Small Business Development Centers, Department of Commerce and local, national and international corporate leaders. She also advises for the Committee for Working Families for Wal*Mart. Barbara has served as a Delegate to the White House Conference on Small Business, was an invited delegate to President Clinton’s Midwest Regional Economic Summit and was the recipient of the State of Michigan Women in Business Advocate of the Year in 1995.
Please visit: www.WIPP.org
Colleen Mills
Colleen Mills is the president and founding member of the Citizens for Peace, a nonprofit, grassroots group whose “mission is to be responsive community leaders centered on learning, educating and facilitating the practices and principles of non-violence in our world. Citizens for Peace encourage the empowerment of an active citizenry and the passage of the Department of Peace legislation currently before the House of Representatives.”
The group came together for the first time at a conference to organize Michigan’s Campaign for a Department of Peace in the fall of 2003. Colleen had just retired after teaching in Detroit for 35 years, and the group suggested she take on the role of leader. For the last six and a half years, the Citizens for Peace has reached out to the public with the focus on creating a culture of peace.
The Citizens for Peace meetings are the second Tuesday of the month at Unity of Livonia. Colleen is proud of the informative, interactive, educational and inspirational meetings. The group has never missed a meeting because of the dedication to their peace work. This April, the meeting will be the second Peace Essay Awards Ceremony for the group. The Citizens for Peace sponsored a Peace Essay Contest for all Michigan High School and College students for the Season for Nonviolence. The six winners will read their essays and receive a cash award and a certificate.
Colleen Mills has published three issues of “The Michigan Department of Peace Political Action Guide”, a guide for citizen activism. She has presented workshops at the AAUW State Conference, the National Department of Peace Conference, and the Pax Christi Conference. She has spoken to high school students at their assembly ceremony of their Peace Pole dedication, and in high school classes. Her outreach has reached countless people as she represented the Citizens for Peace at numerous events around the state of Michigan.
The Citizens for Peace Educational Fund, spearheaded by Rosemary Doyle, has donated over 200 books on nonviolence to the Livonia Library. She and Ann Abdoo have developed a Peace Bibliography of over 560 titles. In addition, working with the Wayne County Regional Educational Service Association, we helped provide training to school personnel in Restorative Practices, a method of dealing with violence in a productive, not punitive manner. Because of our efforts, the Hamtramck School System, one of the most diverse in the country, had adopted Restorative Practices citywide.
The Citizens for Peace has partnered with many other peace groups in Michigan. The group is a member of the Detroit Area Peace with Justice Network and the Michigan Peace Network. Colleen Mills has been on the planning committee responsible for organizing Nagasaki Day events, concerts, fundraisers, and the ONE PEACE events for the last two years. ONE PEACE celebrates the International Day of Peace. (www.onepeace.us.)
For more information please visit www.citizensforpeace11.blogspot.com.
These are a sampling of the many achievements and activities of the Citizens for Peace.
Some of these activities include:
Sponsoring a Peace Essay Contest for all Michigan High School and College students for the Season for Nonviolence.
Presenting a workshop at the Global Nonviolence Conference in Detroit in 2005.
Publishing the Michigan Department of Peace Political Action Guide.
Providing nonviolent communication courses – The Human Connection, based on the work of Marshall Rosenberg.
Holding monthly meetings open to the public.
Publishing several op-ed pieces and numerous letters to the editors.
Tabling at events around the state to educate the public about peace and nonviolence.
Meeting with Congressmen, Senators and other civic leaders.
Presenting at the regional & national Department of Peace Conferences and the AAUW Convention.
Planning three Nagasaki events with the DAPJN.
Starting a Peace Speakers group to educate the public about the Department of Peace.
Co-sponsoring and helping plan the ONE PEACE event s at celebrating the UN International Day of Peace in 2008 & 2009.
Creating a Peace Bibliography of over 560 books anddonating several hundred books to the Library.
Sponsoring a Season for Nonviolence Peace Essay Contest for all Michigan high school and college students. In 2009 & 2010.
Showing the MCHR film series at Madonna University for 5 years.
Working with RESA to educate about the Restorative Practices Program for schools.
Holding monthly meetings since Veteran’s Day 2003!
After teaching 35 years in the Detroit Public Schools, she is devoting her life to creating a culture of peace.
Barbara Kasoff is the President and CEO, and Co-Founder, of Women Impacting Public Policy, Inc., a non-profit, bi-partisan public policy advocacy organization with over half a million members including 49 business organization, educating and advocating on economic issues for women in business. 
