VOICE OF DETROIT: The city's independent newspaper, unbossed and unbought

Rev. Edward Pinkney, President of the Benton Harbor Twin Cities NAACP (center in cap) with his supporters after initial court hearing on lawsuit he has filed against Michigan NAACP attempt to oust him, April 11, 2012. The court ruled that the parties should work the matter out between them, and canceled a special election the state NAACP had planned for April 16.

From Black Autonomy Network of Community Organizations (BANCO), Benton Harbor, Michigan

August 15, 2012

Rev. Edward Pinkney, president of the Benton Harbor Twin Cities NAACP, will burn his NAACP membership card along with eight different NAACP branches from around the country on Sunday at 5:30pm on the Pinkney to Pinkney show, blogtalkeradio.com!

Rev. Pinkney is asking every member of the NAACP to burn their NAACP membership cards. If a majority of members participated, it would send a clear message that we no longer tolerate the organization being run by corporations and people who comply with them.

Spread the word ! We need one thousand calls…………..call Gil Ford at 410-404-1408 at the NAACP National Headquarters. 

Rev. James Atterberry receiving award in 2007 from Lake Michigan College Officials. He headed a task force appointed by former Gov. Jennifer Granholm in the wake of the 2004 Benton Harbor rebellion against police brutality. Its promises of jobs and better economic conditions for the residents of Benton Harbor were never carried out.

A corporate-looking email is circulating. It states that the newly created Benton Harbor “Leadership Caucus” endorses a state NAACP organized election to oust Rev. Pinkney. People who made calls to Rev. James Atterberry of this “group” heard from him that Pinkney is too much of a “trouble maker.”

They want a new Twin Cities NAACP president. (Or, at least their overlord, Whirlpool, does.) James Atterberry is a black man who would be elected to handle the affairs of Whirlpool.

This is Rev. Pinkney’s response: 

Rev. Pinkney at May 26, 2012 rally against the Whirlpool-sponsored Senior PGA held on a luxury golf course which took over public park and beach land.

None of the current membership will be attending the unsanctioned election. The national office provided us the list of memberships paid by check from Whirlpool’s Marcus Robinson. It includes the Benton Harbor School Superintendent Leonard Seawood, Rev. Kenneth Gavin, Rev. Melvin Burton, Ms. Alloyd Blackmon, Rev. Nat Wells, Rev. James Atterberry, Mr. Corey Bell, and Mr. Jerry Price. These are the people who support Whirlpool and not the community.

Attorneys representing Rev. Edward Pinkney in lawsuit against state NAACP were (l to r) Buck Davis and Elliott Hall.

The election is in direct violation of the Wayne County Circuit Court order. Only the $100,000 law suit was thrown out because the national office did not have time to respond to activities of state pres. Yvonne White of Detroit and VP James Gill of Lansing.

It’s alleged that they must have this election in August to ensure that Whirlpool is given an NAACP business-of-the-year award.

The voices of the PEOPLE of Benton Harbor need to be heard. Unfortunately, the oppression has lasted for so many years, and the injustices are so profound, that the voices have been silenced.

This has been the Whirlpool plan all along. Eliminate as many jobs as possible, convict and imprison as many people possible, take away as many services as possible, and people are either driven away, or stay — in silence. Then, the land grab is easy. Instead of fighting the oppression (not too strong a word), the people who signed onto this “Call for new leadership” are playing a part in it.

God help the “Leadership Caucus” as we return to court with the membership list, the email from Whirlpool, and letters of compliance from President Jealous.

Contact: Rev. Edward Pinkney, 269-925-0001

President Benton Harbor Twin Cities NAACP

http://www.bhbanco.org

Blogtalkradio.com   “Pinkney to Pinkney”  Every Sunday 5pm

The Wright Museum of African American History contracted the UIN network to broadcast the African World Festival. This will be done as a Pay Per View to raise funds for the Museum. UIN will stream 3 days of great programming all for $9.95.

Click on the link below to sign up.
https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=8WTZV4C8U7BPU

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange (l) and Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa.

By NBC News and wire reports 

August 16, 2012 Updated at 8:52 a.m. ET

LONDON — Ecuador granted asylum to Julian Assange on Thursday, expressing fury at a threat by Britain to seize the WikiLeaks founder at its London embassy.

Ricardo Patino, the Ecuadorean foreign minister, told a news conference in Quito it was upholding international law by granting asylum to Assange.

Britain earlier said it would it would revoke the diplomatic status of Quito’s embassy in west London — where the Australian has been holed up since June 19 — in order to seize Assange irrespective of the asylum decision.

Ecuadorean Foreign Affairs Minister Ricardo Patino addresses the media during a news conference to announce the government’s decision over Julian Assange’s case at the Foreign Affairs Ministry in Quito August 16, 2012. Ecuador has granted political asylum to WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange, Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino said on Thursday, a day after the British government threatened to storm the Ecuadorean embassy in London to arrest the former hacker. REUTERS/Erick Ilaquize

Patino expressed fury at Britain’s earlier threat to arrest Assange, saying it was a direct threat to the Ecuador’s sovereignty.

Assange, who incensed American government officials by publishing thousands of secret U.S. diplomatic cables and Iraq and Afghan war dispatches in 2010, sought refuge in the embassy to avoid extradition to Sweden over assault and rape claims, which he denies. He exhausted all appeals after a 17-month legal battle.

Ecuador’s Foreign Minister, Ricardo Patino, accused the UK of making an “open threat” to enter its embassy to arrest Mr Assange, an Australian national.

Sweden immediately summoned Ecuador’s ambassador in Stockholm, according to foreign ministry spokesman Anders Jorle. He said: “We want to tell them that it’s [unacceptable] that Ecuador is trying to stop the Swedish judicial process.”

In his statement, Patino said there was a risk Assange would be taken to the United States where he “would not have a fair trial, he could be judged by special or military courts, and it is not unlikely to believe he would be treated in a cruel and degrading way, that he would receive a life sentence or death penalty, with which his human rights would not be respected.

A version of Patino’s statement was posted online by Ecuador’s foreign ministry (in Spanish).

Assange’s recognition as a political refugee by Ecuador’s leftist government was a big symbolic victory for the ex-hacker, but it did little to answer the question: `How will he ever leave the embassy?’

“We’re at something of an impasse,” extradition lawyer Rebecca Niblock said shortly after the news broke. “The U.K. government will arrest Julian Assange as soon as he sets foot outside the embassy but it’s very hard as well to see the Ecuadorean government changing their position.”

She said there was practically no precedent for the situation, invoking the case of a Hungarian cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty, who camped out at the U.S. Embassy in Budapest from 1956 to 1971. “One can’t see Mr. Assange doing the same thing,” she told BBC television. “One side will have to back down eventually.”

Outside the embassy on Thursday,  protesters chanting slogans in support of Assange tussled with police.

Protester supporting Assange is arrested outside Ecuadorean embassy in London Aug. 16, 2012.

“There was a serious escalation in the police presence, including a helicopter overhead,” said NBC News’ Keith Miller at the scene. “This has turned from a legal situation into a major physical standoff in central London. The next move will be interesting because the only way for Assange to leave the embassy is through the front door, where he would be immediately arrested.”

A Reuters reporter saw at least three protesters being dragged away by police as the crowd shouted: “You are trying to start a war with Ecuador.” About 20 officers were outside the embassy trying to push away the crowd of about 15 supporters.

“It is too early to say when or if Britain will revoke the Ecuadorian embassy’s diplomatic status,” a Foreign Office spokesman earlier told Reuters by telephone.

“Giving asylum doesn’t fundamentally change anything,” the spokesman said, adding that Britain had a legal duty to extradite Assange to Sweden.

After the announcement, a spokesman said the UK foreign ministry “disappointed” but would still carry out its “binding obligation” to extradite Assange to Sweden.

“Throughout this process we have drawn the Ecuadoreans’ attention to relevant provisions of our law,” the British Foreign Office wrote on its Twitter account early Thursday.

Ecuador: UK threatened to break WikiLeaks’ Assange out of embassy

“We are still committed to reaching a mutually acceptable solution,” it tweeted.

‘Colonial times are over’
Quito bristled at the threat.

“We want to be very clear, we’re not a British colony. The colonial times are over,” Ecuadorean Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino said in an angry statement after a meeting with President Rafael Correa.

“The move announced in the official British statement, if it happens, would be interpreted by Ecuador as an unfriendly, hostile and intolerable act, as well as an attack on our sovereignty, which would force us to respond in the strongest diplomatic way,” Patino told reporters. Continue reading →

Theresa Carter, mother of Chavis Carter, is interviewed by a news station following the candlelight vigil held in her son’s honor on August 6, at the First Baptist Church on Kitchen Street in Jonesboro, Ark. Chavis Chacobie Carter, 21, of Southaven, Miss., died following a traffi c stop on Haltom Street. The offi cers who made the stop, Keith Baggett and Ron Marsh, said the man committed suicide while handcuffed in the back of the police car. They remain on paid administrative leave pending the results of an investigation, Jonesboro Police Chief Mike Yates said. AP Photo/The Jonesboro Sun, Krystin McClellan

‘My child was never suicidal’

A grieving mother, family, friends and community are trying to get an answer about how a 21-year-old kills himself while handcuffed behind his back. Some are convinced Chavis Carter was killed by police in Arkansas and say his death is part of a longtime problem—the killing of Black males at the hands of law enforcement.

Detroit Police Chief Ralph Godbee (l) and police commissioners express dismay at Council refusal to put tax for police on ballot, Aug. 7. 2012.

(VOD ed. note: this excellent article also describes the national epidemic of police brutality, which is currently being ignored here in Detroit in most media outlets. Instead, the daily media here attacked the City Council for refusing to place an extra “public safety” tax on the ballot for the police. In fact, the Law Department advised the Council it would mean a loss of state revenue-sharing funds for other services. Nothing was brought up about the continuing flood of police brutality lawsuit payouts in Detroit.)

By Charlene Muhammad -National Correspondent- | Last updated: Aug 15, 2012 – 8:59:51 AM

Theresa Carter doesn’t believe police claims that her son shot himself to death with his hands cuffed behind his back in a police cruiser.

She is hurting and wants to know what happened in the last moments of life for 21-year-old Chavis Carter, who died in the custody of Jonesboro, Ark., police after a traffic stop. A growing number of people also want the truth and others believe the young Black man was killed by police. The suicide story, they say, is ludicrous.

Chavis Carter (family photo)

“I’m just heartbroken. I just want to know what really happened. … My child was never suicidal. He would never kill himself. My son was full of joy, full of life, full of ambition,” Ms. Carter somberly yet emphatically told The Final Call in an exclusive interview.

There is a growing movement to get the truth about the death of Chavis Carter with Facebook pages calling for justice, an online petition and a protest scheduled for August 20 at the National Civil Rights Museum to press demands for justice and the story of what happened. At Final Call presstime, the Department of Justice was scheduled to hold a community forum at Greater Dimension Church, Jonesboro, Ark., on August 14.

Some five hours after the shooting, police said Chavis, who is left-handed, shot himself in the right temple after being searched twice, Ms. Carter said.

Brother Kareem Ali, member of Nation of Islam’s Southaven, Mississippi Study Group with the mother and family of Chavis Carter at an Aug. 6 prayer vigil in Jonesboro, Arkansas. Photo: Charles Wali Muhammad

Her son’s father and two brothers are also having difficulty coping, she added. “A day don’t go by I don’t cry. I’m just trying to be strong and hold up. I just want justice served,” she added. The mother was resolute after a Sunday evening vigil Aug. 12 for her son in Tunica, Miss.

“It’s a case that begs to be looked at and we’re going to look and see if we can tell exactly what really happened that night,” said family attorney Russell Marlin of the Cochran Firm. The lawyer called the case one of the oddest police custody incidents he has ever looked at.

Jonesboro Police Chief Michael Yates

As answers are awaited, police don’t know when forensics results will be ready but have requested priority on the case, Chief Michael Yates said in an Aug. 10 e-mail to The Final Call. Without the results, the chief said no further information could be released.

Authorities say Chavis Carter and two men were stopped by Jonesboro police July 29 for driving erratically. Police allegedly found marijuana, small plastic bags and drug paraphernalia in the vehicle and on Mr. Carter, in the back seat. He was searched twice, arrested for an outstanding warrant and placed in a police car. The other two people involved, both of whom were White, were let go, officers said

While officers were not looking, they say Mr. Carter shot himself with hands behind his back.

Youth protests death of Chavis Carter while in police custody and handcuffed.

Two days after his burial, the Tunica NAACP hosted a prayer vigil Aug. 6 where friends of Chavis Carter waved posters that read, “Am I Next?” and “Justice for Chavis.” More rallies and vigils are planned, according to Kareem Ali, an activist and member of the Nation of Islam’s Study Group in South Haven, Mississippi.

The Carter family is asking the community to keep them in prayer, share what they know, and stay vigilant for the truth, according to Mr. Ali.

“I met the aunt of Chavis Carter and I consoled her as she was in tears. She said, ‘Ya’ll don’t stop fighting! Don’t stop fighting!’ It was the moment I knew that we had to help this family,” Mr. Ali said.

Chavis Carter (Facebook photo)

He is helping to organize the upcoming prayer vigil and rally at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis. Mr. Ali suggested the museum, the former Lorraine Hotel where Dr. Martin Luther King was murdered, as a good location for the mid-South. The staff is working to help make the event successful, he said.

Meanwhile a website to increase awareness about the case is in the works, a petition demanding justice has been launched on Change.org and a Justice for Chavis Carter Facebook page has been created.

Fear of a police cover-up

Shortly before the shooting, Mr. Carter called his cell phone, said Demetris Itson, his best friend. He regrets not picking up.

“I don’t know if he called to say, ‘Hey man, I’m in trouble,’ or ‘They’re fixing to do something to me.’ I don’t know what he wanted and that’s something that bothers me day in and day out,” Mr. Itson said. Continue reading →

Media, You Tube censored video above

Man was stopped for smoking marijuana, police say

NYPD officers shot and killed a knife-wielding man near 37th and 7th in front of a large crowd of shocked bystanders. The victim was taken to Bellevue Hospital around 3pm where he later died Aug. 12. Police claimed the man was approached for smoking marijuana and ran away. They gave chase.

They claimed he lunged at them, but he is seen continually backing away during the chase. Police cars surrounded the large crowd of police obscuring bystanders’ views as they shot the man to death. A man is heard at the end of this cell phone video saying, “That wasn’t a justified kill.”

The New York Times displayed the video above on their website, but cut it short after only a few seconds. You Tube flagged the video, forcing viewers to sign in with their user name and password and give their birthdate before viewing it.

One bystander commented in another video that the man appeared dazed and panicked, as if he didn’t know what to do.

Bystander’s photo of police aiming guns at man, who has not yet been identified.

Detroit water department workers and their supporters march outside Coleman A. Young Center Aug. 2: SAVE WATER DEPT! SAVE DETROIT! STRIKE!

By Diane Bukowski

August 13, 2012 

DETROIT — Michigan Governor Rick Snyder and Detroit Mayor Dave Bing, aided and abetted by the local daily media, are constantly insisting that Detroit’s Public Act 4 “Fiscal Stability (consent) Agreement” (FSA) is solidly in place despite the suspension of PA 4.

Local 207 is mobilizing for a city-wide strike to save Detroit. This protest Aug. 2 was the second in a series planned across the city.

The State Board of Canvassers voted to place a measure that would repeal PA 4 on the ballot Aug.8, after the Michigan Supreme Court ordered them to do so. The Act is thus null and void until a popular vote in November, according to state law.

Bing told the Associated Press Aug. 12 that the suspension of PA 4 “shouldn’t change” what Detroit has already done under the FSA. That includes his shutdown of three federally funded departments,  the unilateral imposition of a “City Employment Terms” edict on Detroit’s unionized workers, plans for thousands of lay-offs including 81 percent of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department work force, and plans to lease Belle Isle to the State.

Regarding changes in four other cities and three school districts since the suspension of PA4, he told the AP, “They had an emergency manager. We have a financial agreement. That’s the difference. That’s a big difference.”

Marchers blasted Bing during his 2010 State of the City address.

The city’s Corporation Counsel, attorneys for Stand Up for Democracy, members of Free Detroit-No Consent, city workers, and even Wall Street’s Fitch Ratings Agency disagree strongly with the Snyder-Bing stance.

The City Council is set to hold a special closed session Tues. Aug. 14 at 9:45 a.m. on specific matters related to the consent agreement. They will consider two Law Department opinions issued on the administration’s transfer of funds and equipment in the Detroit Workforce and Health and Wellness Promotion departments to private entities. Public comment is scheduled prior to the closed session.

(Click on  CC Special Session -08-14-12 to view Council agenda, and on http://voiceofdetroit.net/2012/08/11/did-city-directors-steal-fed-for-private-agencies/ for earlier VOD story.)

Detroit Corporation Counsel Krystal Crittendon

“Without an enabling statute, the State and City are not authorized to vitiate provisions in a home rule charter, which have been adopted through a vote of the people,” Corporation Counsel Krystal Crittendon told the Council in a formal opinion April 1.

“Although the city may enter into the proposed Agreement [FSA], the City Council should be cognizant of the possibility that the Agreement may be invalid if the petitions to repeal Public Act 4 are certified, or Public Act 4 is repealed. Further, although the City may enter into the proposed Agreement, the City Council should be cognizant of the potential legal challenges that may arise concerning the proposed Agreement.”

Crittendon cited numerous sections of the FSA which are enabled only through PA 4. She noted that even PA 4 does not authorize the establishment of the nine-member corporate-controlled Financial Advisory Board appointed under the FSA. Lawyers for the city’s unions have argued the city has no right to abrogate collective bargaining agreements, pursuant to state statutes not overturned by PA 4.

Attorney Butch Hollowell (l) with City Councilwoman JoAnn Watson and Detroit NAACP head Wendell Anthony demand PA 4 go on ballot at Court of Appeals.

“Clearly, the financial stability agreement was negotiated within the Public Act 4 context,” Attorney Melvin “Butch”  Hollowell, one of four lawyers who represented Stand Up for America, initiator of the PA 4 referendum, told the AP. “There is no court that wouldn’t understand that. You can’t put illegal provisions in a contract and expect them to hold up. . . . My sense is probably the actions going forward are under serious legal question. You can no longer impose your will by dictatorship.”

At a Council session Aug. 6, members of Free Detroit No Consent called on the Council to undo the harm they have already done by voting for the FSA. Many of the five Council members who voted for it have since expressed dismay at its consequences. Council President Charles Pugh has said he would not have voted for it if he had known it would mean union-busting.

Free Detroit-No Consent truck outside CAYMC Aug. 7, 2012.

“I urge you to pass not a resolution but an ordinance pursuant to the Michigan Supreme Court decision,” Valerie Glenn of Free Detroit-No Consent said. Meanwhile U-Haul trucks ready to evict the Financial Advisory Board and officials including Project Manager Kriss Andrews circled the building with huge signs declaring “MOVE OUT NOW.”

Dr. Gloria House read parts of the group’s letter to the Council.

Dr. Gloria House, Edith Lee Payne and Valerie Green asked City Council to undo the damages done by the consent agreement, during session Aug. 7, 2012.

“We in Free Detroit No Consent are confident that the people will vote to repeal Public Act 4 in November,” she said.

“In the intervening weeks, we call for the suspension of all measures that have been initiated by the emergency manager of Detroit schools and by the City Council through the Consent Agreement and the Financial Advisory Board. These decisions, which have violated the rights of workers to collective bargaining, allowed the dismantling of city agencies which provide health and welfare support to thousands of citizens, and fostered total chaos and demoralization in our public education system, must be reversed.”

She asked the City Council to take action to “undo the mistake it made by entering into the Fiscal Stability Agreement.”

Detroit City Council took oath to uphold the City Charter during their swearing-in ceremony.

In addition to possible legal challenges from the Council, the City Charter gives it the power to put the decision back in the hands of the people, where many have said it should have been in the first place.

Andrew Daniels-El (r) with city charter during Call ’em Out rally to save water department Jan. 28, 2009. Agnes Hitchcock, Local 207 President John Riehl on stage.

Sec. 3.105 of the Charter says, “The City Council may submit, by resolution adopted not less than seventy (70) days before any election or special election, any proposal to the voters of the city.”

Thus the Council still has time to submit a proposal to voters asking them to affirm or negate  the FSA  Nov. 6. Such a move would cut short the long-drawn out legal process that PA 4 advocates have counted on to dismantle Detroit.

Even Fitch Ratings recognized the impact of the suspension of PA 4 on the FSA.

Fitch Ratings said PA 4 repeal may nullify Detroit consent agreement.

“As Detroit’s fiscal stability agreement has several features that rely on the existence of PA 4, most notably the ability to suspend collective bargaining, the repeal of PA4 could weaken or nullify the agreement,” Fitch Ratings said in a statement after the state Supreme Court ruling.

During the Council session Aug. 7, Tyrone Travis of Free Detroit, and the Coalition to Stop Privatization and Save Our City, called on the people themselves to take action.

Tyrone Travis and Valerie Burris of Free Detroit No Consent address city council Aug. 7 in opposition to consent agreement.

“They are treating Detroiters like N’s,” Travis said. “I call on Detroiters not to vote for any bonds, and on elected officials to put any taxes to the state in escrow. Then prepare to shut the city down. They have condemned us to slavery and our children to prison.”

Valerie Burris said, “We can take our power back. The Detroit Free Press and News websites are full of racist comments from suburbanites against our city. The city has been overtaken by corporate rulers putting public power in private hands.”

Water department workers and supporters at CAYMC Aug. 2, 2012.

On Aug. 2, city water department workers and their supporters marched again in front of the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center. Members of Local 207 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) are mobilizing for a city-wide strike against the city’s proposals in DWSD, by DWSD workers as well as the rest of the city. (See Local 207 newsletter below this story.)

Meanwhile, the Metro Times published an article Aug. 8 blaming global banks for the distress of cities like Detroit, but only advocating bankruptcy as a solution. Many activists are calling instead for a moratorium on Detroit’s $12.6 billion debt to the banks, which have already profited from trillions in taxpayer bail-out dollars.

Detroiters campaign for moratorium on city’s debt to the banks May 9, 2012 at CAYMC.

LOCAL 207 PRESS RELEASE ON EMA THREAT TO CUT 80% OF JOBS

AFSCME Council 25 President Al Garrett is personally inviting you to join us in Lansing!  He is requesting that every labor union, every church, every organization get a bus, car pool, or van and come to Lansing on Wednesday, August 15, 2012 at 10:00 a.m. – MI State Capitol Building and let the Legislators know we mean business – Democracy is here to stay!

Please copy the attached document and pass it on!  Thank you very much – together we can do this!

If you would like to ride to Lansing with AFSCME, we have reserved one bus–see information listed below!

To print copy of flier, click on LOBBY DAY JOIN US.

Detroit Board of Education meets for first time Aug. 9 after suspension of PA4.

• State statute MCL 8.4 does not allow PA 72 EFM reinstatement, says community
• Hearing on EM Roy Roberts’ suit to maintain control over DPS Aug. 14, 10 a.m. Wayne County Circuit Court Judge John Murphy, CAYMC

 By Diane Bukowski 

August 12, 2012 

DETROIT – Detroit’s Board of Education declared Aug. 9 that they are taking back their power as elected officials over the Detroit Public School (DPS) district. The day before, the state Board of Canvassers placed Public Act 4, the “emergency manager law,” on the ballot, suspending the it until the State’s November  elections.

Board President Lamar Lemmons II and member Wanda Akilah Redmond.

The Board’s first action was a vote to restore 15 schools to the district by terminating the DPS “Educational Achievement Authority” (EAA) contract with Eastern Michigan University. They also terminated a contract with “Teach for America,” which provides idealistic but barely-trained individuals to teach classes in the EAA.

“We are terminating the inter-local agreement with EMU and demanding the return of our schools,” declared Board President Lamar Lemmons II. “According to a lawsuit filed by AFSCME, EM Roy Roberts had no authority to take those schools.”

The “Educational Apartheid Authority,” as board member Elena Herrada termed it, is allegedly a state-wide district but includes only Detroit schools. It targets the “lowest-performing” five percent of schools in the state.  In addition to removing the schools from DPS control, it also removes them from the supervision of the State Board of Education. (Click on http://voiceofdetroit.net/2012/07/29/teach-in-against-the-phony-educational-achievement-authority/ for a listing of the schools involved.)

Critics say that instead of improving students’ performance, it will subject them to isolation in computer-run classes provided by lucrative corporate contracts, untrained teachers, the elimination of services for special needs students, who are to be folded into regular classes, and possible further charterization.

Keith January, presiden of AFSCME Local 345 which represents special education aides, denounces EAA and charter schools.

Keith January, president of AFSCME Local 345, which represents 500 special education aides, gave an impassioned presentation against the EAA during the board meeting.

“We have been informed that Wayne RESA is cutting funding for the DPS,” he said. “Forty-nine special ed classes are being disbanded and lay-off notices are going out. There are 195 children in the EAA along with 600 students with special needs. How do you you put students with special needs in failing schools? They just want the federal special ed money. Make sure our education process is not corrupted by corporate Gordon Gekko types. There are also 60,000 students in Detroit in charter schools, most of them for-profit.”

He said the board must begin the process to get not only the EAA students, but the students in charter schools back to fully-functioning Detroit public schools immediately.

Youths in Highland Park gather outside HP School Board meeting April 29, 2004 as most of their teachers were being laid off.

“We have anarchy in the streets right now, video games are being played out in reality. This is nothing but the result of the hopelessness these young people feel. It is not going to get better until we build a road for them to come back.”

The board’s vote to disband the EAA was a direct challenge to Gov. Rick Snyder and DPS EM Roy Roberts, who also chairs the EAA board. The EAA board declared the same day that it will maintain control, voted on EAA contracts, and has continued recruiting students.

Edith Lee Payne shows state statute which prevents repealed laws from automatically being restored.

During the meeting, Edith Lee Payne, a litigant in a class action lawsuit against Public Act 4, and former Detroit school board member Marie Thornton challenged Gov. Rick Snyder and State Treasurer Andy Dillon’s assertions that PA 4 is currently replaced by PA 72. That act allowed appointed managers control only over the finances of municipalities and school districts and did not allow abrogation of union contracts.

Payne pointed out that state documents show PA 72 was repealed March 16, 2011, the day that PA 4 was declared effective. She noted that MCL 8.4 says clearly,

“Whenever a statute, or any part thereof shall be repealed by a subsequent statute, such statute, or any part thereof, so repealed, shall not be revived by the repeal of such subsequent repealing statute.” 

Thornton, who was present during oral arguments before the State Supreme Court on putting PA 4 on the ballot, said Chief Justice Robert Young specifically noted at the close of the hearing that PA 72 could not replace PA 4. 

DPS EM Roy Roberts

However, Roberts filed suit to maintain his powers over both financial and academic aspects of DPS immediately after PA 4 was placed on the ballot.

“He’s trying to be declared king for life,” George Washington, who has been retained as the Board’s attorney, said sarcastically.  A hearing on Roberts’ suit is set for Tues. Aug. 14 at 10 a.m. before Wayne County Circuit Court Judge John Murphy in the Coleman A. Young Municipal Center.

Board member Tawanna Simpson listens as board attorney George Washington addresses meeting..

“An entire generation of students has been damaged forever by the state’s Tuskegee-like experiment with Detroit schools,” Washington said. “Lansing’s attack has gone on for the last 13 years and must be stopped.”

He said the board plans to ask Judge Murphy to formally re-imstall them to prevent further confusion and damage.

DPS enrollment has dropped from 140,000 since the first state takeover in 1999, when district students were achieving high scores. The district had a surplus of $99 million in 1999, but has had repeated deficits during the two state takeovers, largely due to excessive borrowing by the state-appointed officials.

Over 80 percent of the district’s school aid is held apart by a state trustee to pay the district’s debt to the banks.

Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette

The board held a closed session with Washington on the Roberts lawsuit, as well one filed by State Attorney General Bill Schuette, challenging the seats of seven school board members. He claims claiming DPS is not entitled to “first-class” school district status because its enrollment has dropped below 60,000.

“The whole community will wrap its arms around you for de-certifying the EAA,” DPS teacher Steve Conn told the board.

Catherine Ferguson students at rally celebrating declaration their school would remain open.

Nicole Conaway teaches at the Catherine Ferguson Academy, where students sustained arrests last year for a sit-in to keep their school open. The sit-in received national coverage. The school, which welcomed young mothers with their babies as well as pregnant teens, remained open although DPS transformed it into a charter school.

“Act NOW,” Conaway told the board. “Re-open all closed schools, and order Roy Roberts and his staff to vacate their offices.”

Newly re-elected U.S. Reprentative John Conyers, with staff members Marion Brown and Isaac Robinson attended the meeting.

U.S. Rep. John Conyers addresses board.

“The work you are doing today is so important,” Conyers told the board. “People are very concerned about how our children are trained, culturized and education in the 21^st century. More and more the House committee on Education is trying to concern itself with keeping our children in the public school system.”

Conyers said he planned to speak with President Barack Obama the next day about federal action against Public Act 4. A letter he sent to Attorney General Eric Holder Dec. 2 asking for an investigation of violations of the National Voting Rights Act under PA 4 has gone unanswered.

The Board additionally voted, with two abstentions, to install Dr. John Telford as interim superintendent pending the election in November. Board member Tawanna Simpson told VOD after the meeting that the Board’s intended to appoint Telford only temporarily and establish a search committee later.

He gave a lengthy generalized descriptions of his plans.

Edith Lee Payne and Valerie Glenn confront DFT president Keith Johnson.

While he gave a special welcome to Detroit Federation of Teachers (DFT) president Keith Johnson, Free Detroit No Consent members Valerie Glenn and Edith Lee Payne confronted Johnson during a break, asking why he has not taken a more militant stance since Roberts’ abrogation of the DFT contract.

Johnson said he has no plans for the DFT to take a strike vote, and is depending instead on the union-sponsored ballot proposal to amend the Michigan constitution to make collective bargaining a right for all workers.

Maybury Elementary parent with child tells board they must have specific plans.

A mother holding her child who is Vice-President of the LSCO for Maybury Elementary school called on Telford to propose specific plans for the future instead of generalized statements.

“Because we organized to save Maybury, it was the only school that survived the last round of closures,” she said. “We want to make sure that we are not dragging our kids through the mud again this time.”  Click on http://save-maybury.org/2012/03/26/dps_22marzo/.

Block Club President Wayne Bernard told the board, “Stay away from Luther Keith and that ARISE Detroit crap. They are doing nothing but thriving off our money. Get rid of the Detroit Parent Network (DPN) and evict them from their DPS building.”

The DPN, which has ties to the Skillman Foundation and other privatizers, was formed in an effort to replace the elected LSCO’s.

DPS Board member Elena Herrada speaks at EAA teach-in Aug. 2, 2012.

At the conclusion of the meeting, board member Elena Herrada said the struggle to restore DPS to properly educate the city’s children will depend not on court or electoral action, but on the will of the people to take direct action.

For more on the Educational Achievement Authority, click on http://critical-moment.org/2012/06/25/the-educational-achievement-authority-detroits-top-secret-school-district/. VOD covered the teach-in against the EAA Aug. 2 and will also be reporting on that. For more information contact Herrada at 313-303-3809.

Lansing, 2001: Detroit Public School Teachers walked out of classes to protest in the state’s capitol against a bill that would have allowed more charter schools in Michigan. This was the last militant action taken by the DFT, which has fallen prey to to inactivism of its top leadership since then President Janna Garrison was defeated.

By Stephanie Simon, Reuters | Aug. 2, 2012

(reprinted from the Business Insider) 

Rob Lytle, education consultant from Parthenon Group.

The investors gathered in a tony private club in Manhattan were eager to hear about the next big thing, and education consultant Rob Lytle was happy to oblige.

Think about the upcoming rollout of new national academic standards for public schools, he urged the crowd. If they’re as rigorous as advertised, a huge number of schools will suddenly look really bad, their students testing way behind in reading and math.

They’ll want help, quick. And private, for-profit vendors selling lesson plans, educational software and student assessments will be right there to provide it.

“You start to see entire ecosystems of investment opportunity lining up,” said Lytle, a partner at The Parthenon Group, a Boston consulting firm. “It could get really, really big.”

Indeed, investors of all stripes are beginning to sense big profit potential in public education.

The K-12 market is tantalizingly huge: The U.S. spends more than $500 billion a year to educate kids from ages five through 18. The entire education sector, including college and mid-career training, represents nearly 9 percent of U.S. gross domestic product, more than the energy or technology sectors.

Traditionally, public education has been a tough market for private firms to break into — fraught with politics, tangled in bureaucracy and fragmented into tens of thousands of individual schools and school districts from coast to coast.

Now investors are signaling optimism that a golden moment has arrived. They’re pouring private equity and venture capital into scores of companies that aim to profit by taking over broad swaths of public education.

University Club in NYC, private social club located at 1 West 54th Street at Fifth Avenue in Manhattan, New York, NY.

The conference last week at the University Club, billed as a how-to on “private equity investing in for-profit education companies,” drew a full house of about 100.

OUTSOURCING BASICS

In the venture capital world, transactions in the K-12 education sector soared to a record $389 million last year, up from $13 million in 2005. That includes major investments from some of the most respected venture capitalists in Silicon Valley, according to GSV Advisors, an investment firm in Chicago that specializes in education.

The goal: an education revolution in which public schools outsource to private vendors such critical tasks as teaching math, educating disabled students, even writing report cards, said Michael Moe, the founder of GSV.

“It’s time,” Moe said. “Everybody’s excited about it.”

Not quite everyone.

Professor Diane Ravitch

The push to privatize has alarmed some parents and teachers, as well as union leaders who fear their members will lose their jobs or their autonomy in the classroom.

Many of these protesters have rallied behind education historian Diane Ravitch, a professor at New York University, who blogs and tweets a steady stream of alarms about corporate profiteers invading public schools.

Ravitch argues that schools have, in effect, been set up by a bipartisan education reform movement that places an enormous emphasis on standardized test scores, labels poor performers as “failing” schools and relentlessly pushes local districts to transform low-ranked schools by firing the staff and turning the building over to private management.

Move to profit from public education is bipartisan. President Barack Obama and his education secretary Arne Duncan favor charter schools.

President Barack Obama and both Democratic and Republican policymakers in the states have embraced those principles. Local school districts from Memphis to Philadelphia to Dallas, meanwhile, have hired private consultants to advise them on improving education; the strategists typically call for a broader role for private companies in public schools.

“This is a new frontier,” Ravitch said. “The private equity guys and the hedge fund guys are circling public education.”

Some of the products and services offered by private vendors may well be good for kids and schools, Ravitch said. But she has no confidence in their overall quality because “the bottom line is that they’re seeking profit first.” Continue reading →