By Askia Muhammad -Senior Correspondent-
Updated Oct 5, 2011 – 1:21:36 PM
WASHINGTON (FinalCall.com) – It was one of the most bizarre incidents during the NATO-supported uprising in Libya. The Rev. Walter Fauntroy, a retired member of the Congressional Black Caucus went missing in Tripoli for several weeks during a self-sanctioned mission to that war zone, as rebel forces advanced toward the capital and their eventual overthrow of Col. Muammar Gadhafi , who led the North African country for nearly 41 years.
Rumors spread that the former senior aide to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. had been killed. Then, on Aug. 24, the office of the Rev. Fauntroy’s successor in Congress— D.C. Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton—announced that she had “been in touch with authorities who have spoken with” Mr. Fauntroy. “Authorities have confirmed for Norton that (the) Reverend Fauntroy is safely in the care of the International Committee of the Red Cross and is expected to leave Libya soon.”
One day later Mrs. Norton issued another statement indicating that she “spoke with Ms. Dorothy Fauntroy, wife of former D.C. Congressman Walter Fauntroy. Ms. Fauntroy told Norton that the family spoke to (the) Reverend Fauntroy around 3:00 a.m. EDT and that he said he is in a safe place in Libya and expects to return to D.C. later this week. … Ms. Fauntroy did not know the circumstances of (the) Reverend Fauntroy’s visit to Libya. He told her of the trip only shortly before his departure in order to prevent her from worrying,” the statement concluded.
“And I went” to Libya, Mr. Fauntroy told The Final Call, after several days of thinking about whether or not to grant an interview. “And God knows, did I get in trouble. When I got there I found myself in the secure hotel that had been, by international law reserved for news media so they could go out and cover the war and come back and report it to the world in safety. I was there.
“But I found myself there among 37 so-called newsmen, and myself, all of whom were threatened, first by ones within the group. There were Gadhafi reporters who were so angry with the lies the reporters were saying that they were going to kill them, and told them they were going to kill them. And chop their heads off, and cut their right arm and left leg off and take a picture of it and send it to their friends. And they were scared to death, because they knew if we walked out of that place, they could do it.” Continue reading →
Early results of voting on the new Ford-United Auto Workers contract are nearly break-even, according to Detroit newspapers. Reformers in the union are organizing to get the 41,000 Ford workers to once again vote “no” on their national contract, as they did in October 2009.
Wisconsin: Now is the time to escalate the struggle for labor and a just economy/ Photo Mark Brennan Labor Notes
UAW reformers point out that the contract would freeze wages and substitute bonuses—which wouldn’t recover the losses from years of concessions—and it would permanently institutionalizes the two-tier wage system. Despite raises for the lower tier, it provides no bridge to higher wages.
With 7.3 percent of votes reported, production workers have voted “yes” by 50.1 percent and skilled trades “no” by 54.8 percent. Local 900, covering a Focus assembly plant west of Detroit where the shop chair opposed the agreement because of onerous “alternative work schedules,” voted “no” by 56 votes.
The Autoworkers Caravan group is circulating a leaflet asking workers to vote no. It says, “Ford is rolling in profits and Wall Street is tickled to see this contract.”
Labor Notes Conference 2008
Local 900 member Dave Dogonski described himself as a fence-sitter who had voted yes. “I would like to have voted no in order to make a political statement,” he said. “How can the union in one breath support things like Occupy Wall Street but at the same time let the corporations take windfall profits and not get us a raise?”
Ford is currently the richest of the Detroit 3, and the only company where workers have the right to strike. UAW President Bob King negotiated a package that is richer monetarily than the one ratified by GM workers last month. They will receive signing bonuses of $6,000 rather than $5,000 and annual bonuses of $1,500 rather than $1,000.
Judy Wraight, an instrument repairperson at Ford’s ancient Rouge complex near Detroit, pointed out that $1,500 is the monetary equivalent of just three of the concessions workers made in 2009 (one holiday, less daily break time, and a Christmas bonus). Two other concessions—a wage freeze in place since 2005 and the 99 cents-per-hour wage cut workers took when they gave up the cost-of-living allowance—were not addressed.
Auto company execs are clear that they want to shift workers to half wages—permanently.
GM CEO Dan Akerson and UAW President Bob King
GM CEO Dan Akerson said recently that although “we don’t need to get there tomorrow,” his aim is to replace higher-paid workers with those now starting at $15.78, partly through buyouts of senior workers and skilled trades.
But the contracts contain no pension increases, for the first time, and they take away the small Christmas bonus most retirees had received.
The UAW says that Ford will invest to create new jobs, but the reformers counter: “What does the record tell us about promises like that? Ford will invest in what it thinks is profitable. Every contract for decades has been presented as a ‘job security contract,’ but UAW-Ford has lost half its membership since 1999.”
Ford is rolling in profits and Wall Street is tickled to see this contract. But we don’t even get the concessions back–from COLA, to Annual Improvement Factor, to Easter Monday. Retirees lose the Christmas bonus and the legal services plan is being phased out—read on and find out more. We voted NO in 2009 to preserve the right to strike, but you wouldn’t know it from this contract.
COLA is gone forever if we can’t restore it now, when Ford is making big profits. Bloomberg News quotes Bob King: “Would [the members] like fixed rate increases? Sure they would. I’d like to give it to them, but they know the competitive structure as well as I do.”
UAW and Ford at the bargaining table
A lump sum is not a Cost of Living Allowance keyed to inflation. King’s words ”fixed rate increases” mean increases in the base hourly rate, like the 3% Annual Improvement Factor and COLA that we lost. Scott Houldieson of Chicago Assembly has a good comeback for President King: “Frozen COLA and second tier wage increased to full wage combined would have reduced profits for 2010 to a mere $6.41 billion dollars! How is a company to survive on that?!” A 4% wage increase for the first year of the contract would amount to $95.5 million–less than the stock awarded to Mulally and Bill Ford in 2011. What a time to eliminate Equity of Sacrifice from the “Unpublished Letters”!
Second tier comes up only to average NON-union industrial pay. Ford needed this anyway to get workforce stability. If we sell out our children, they won’t defend our pensions. They only get 13 weeks SUB. UNITY = Equal Pay for Equal Work, not second class citizenship. Brother Houldieson also wrote: “Forget all the happy talk about the FTPM Morale Matrix. The company knows it has a better chance of controlling us if they can keep us divided.” Gary Walkowicz of Dearborn Truck wrote: “The biggest concession is that 2-tier will continue.” Do you believe any 2nd tier will become 1st tier with this contract?
If Ford hires permanent 2nd tier workers, the contract contains loopholes that let them hire way more than the so-called 20% cap–including some whole plants that are 2nd-tier only. Either way, everyone is undermined by non-equal pay for equal work. Will Ford even hire true 2nd tier? Last time we checked, all but 100 nation-wide were LTSs, not permanent 2nd tier. We have a three tier membership. Why is insourced work not counted toward the 20% cap on entry level numbers?
Pensions: New low for the UAW: No increase. Retirees lost their Christmas bonus.
• VEBA: Health care is still inadequately funded. New VEBA funds come only from the profit-sharing gamble. 30 & Out means little–if you’re afraid to retire before Medicare!
“Manufacturing Work Groups” combine production and skilled trades. This undermines trades classifications andunderminesproduction workers’ chances of real advancement through apprenticeships.
• Overtime: Time and a half after 8 hours is not restored. Increasing Alternative Work Schedules are designed to eliminate overtime pay as much as possible. We should make enough to not need overtime.
• Without real barriers to outsourcing, the outsourcing will continue and increase. “Sourcing moratorium remains intact,” say the Highlights. But we see outsourcing all the time.
Working conditions: Lost break time is not restored. Alternative Work Schedules undermine working lives and family lives.
The 2011 UAW Bargaining Convention endorsed domestic partner same-sex bereavement pay, but it’s not in this contract.
We need a contract that helps organize the unorganized at Toyota, VW, Honda, Mercedes. Non-union workers need to see us as a fighting union. There has been no national Ford strike since 1976!
ACH workers should simply be made full Ford workers now—rather than waiting for openings.
What’s the alternative to voting Yes? Vote No–send them back to the table to get what we deserve. And show Ford some real strike preparation.
“Creating” and “saving” jobs?? What does the record tell us about promises like that? Ford will invest in what it thinks is profitable. The contract will not force Ford to add jobs if business conditions are not good and we don’t have a fighting union. Every contract for decades has been presented as a “job security contract,” but UAW-Ford has lost half its membership since 1999. Now Twin Cities MN and Walton Hills OH plants will close. And as the Autoworker Caravan wrote about the GM contract: “Shifting work from one plant to another isn’t ‘new’ work. Laying off autoworkers in Mexico is not ‘creating jobs’. Talk about new work, why didn’t the Union challenge the corporations to make fuel-efficient buses that every U.S. city could purchase?”
Gary Walkowicz, 313-737-3166, gwalk32@att.net; Judy Wraight, 313-272-0307, jswraight@aol.com; TO ADD YOUR NAME TO NEXT EDITION OF THIS LEAFLET, WRITE OR CALL:
Today the United States Supreme Court rejected a request from the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office to overturn the most recent federal appeals court decision declaring Mumia Abu-Jamal’s death sentence unconstitutional. The Court’s decision brings to an end nearly thirty years of litigation over the fairness of the sentencing hearing that resulted in Mr. Abu-Jamal’s being condemned to death. Mr. Abu-Jamal will be automatically sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole unless the District Attorney elects to seek another death sentence from a new jury.
The NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) and Professor Judith Ritter of Widener Law School represent Mr. Abu-Jamal in the appeal of his conviction and death sentence for the 1981 murder of a police officer in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Supreme Court’s decision marks the fourth time that the federal courts have found that Mr. Abu-Jamal’s sentencing jury was misled about the constitutionally mandated process for considering evidence supporting a life sentence.
“At long last, the profoundly troubling prospect of Mr. Abu-Jamal facing an execution that was produced by an unfair and unreliable penalty phase has been eliminated,” said John Payton, President and Director-Counsel of LDF. “Like all Americans, Mr. Abu-Jamal was entitled to a proper proceeding that takes into account the many substantial reasons why death was an inappropriate sentence.” Professor Ritter stated, “Our system should never condone an execution that stems from a trial in which the jury was improperly instructed on the law.”
Mr. Abu-Jamal’s case will now return to the Philadelphia County Court of Common Pleas for final sentencing.
Block Reportin’–The Book, by Prisoners of Conscience Committee Minister JR Valrey
Click on www.blockreportradio.comto order Minister JR Valrey’s book. Also click on http://www.393films.com/online-store.phpto order the DVD of JR Valrey’s award-winning film about the Oscar Grant police brutality rebillions in Oakland, “Operation Small Axe.” See trailer below.
In the very controversial “prison version” of “They Don’t Care About Us,” Michael Jackson showed that he, as an artist, cared about the issue of mass incarceration and had the courage to speak out on behalf of prisoners in a way that made the whole world listen. Prison hunger strikers need today’s artists who have the ears of the world to advocate for ending solitary confinement, which is officially considered torture.
by Mutope Duguma, s/n James Crawford, for the Pelican Bay Human Rights Movement
Prisoners are being held in solitary confinement indefinitely on the word of a prison debriefer – i.e., snitch, informer, rat, turncoat – or some false prison gang validation. Therefore, we seek your support and give you all the right to advocate on our behalf:
Chuck D originally of Public Enemy
MC Lyte, Baby, Keyshia Cole, Lil Wayne, Eve, Jay-Z, Goapele, Scrappy, Lil Kim, Kam, Yoyo, Kwame Kweli, Nicki Minaj, The Coup, Erykah Badu, The Game, Foxy Brown, Kanye West, Free, Mos Def, Diamond, Chuck D, Queen Latifah, MOB Deep, Rashida, E-40, Terez McCall, Snoop Dogg, Jada Pinkett, Rihanna, Scarface, Lena, Ryakin Rip, Slim Thug, Solange, Tyrese, Solē, Bun B, Jamie Fox, Will Smith, Chris Brown. Jadakiss, Gorilla Zoe, Black Rob, Rev Run, Busta Rhymes, Ice-T, Ice Cube,WC, Mack-10, Ti, Dr. Dre, Joe Budden, Eminem, T-Bone, LeCrae, Drake, Too Short, Flame, 50 cent, Loyd Banks, Raphael Saadiq, Maino, Terrence Jenkins, Rosci Diaz, Big Boi, KRS-One, DMX, 2-Mex, Gucci Mane, JT The Bigga Figga, Chino XL, Chingo, Bling, Rebel Diaz, Fat Joe, Tego Calderon, Pitbull, Bubba Sparks, Cypress Hill, Nas,
And all the original hip hop heads etc.
U.S. Pres. Barack Obama
We ask that you all support us in our struggle to be liberated from these man-made torture chambers by doing the following:
1. Support the peaceful hunger strike by having your fans contact the governor of California, Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown Jr., and the president of the United States of Amerika, Barack Obama, to end torture in California prisons, where prisoners are held indefinitely in solitary confinement – in PBSP SHU, Corcoran SHU, New Folsom SHU and Tehachapi SHU.
2. Donate $10 or more to our Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity coalition, via California Prison Focus’ PayPal account, which can be accessed at www.prisons.org, and mark it for the hunger strike coalition, or mail your donation to California Prison Focus, 1904 Franklin St., Suite 507, Oakland CA 94612. Watch our blog, www.prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com, for information.
Hunger strike supporters demonstrate in Montreal, Quebec
3. All of you have power, and that power is in your voice. We ask that you lend that power to our hunger strike. Yes, we will make the sacrifices. There are countless prisoners held in solitary confinement throughout this nation, who come from exclusively poor communities, being tortured. Contact the following New Afrikan prisoners who have been held in SHU since as long ago as 1976 to 2011:
• Mutope Duguma, s/n James Crawford, D-05996, PBSP, D-1-117, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Michael Mutawally Cooperwood, C-46411, PBSP, D-1-214, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Abdul Olugbala Shakur, s/n J. Harvey, C-48884, PBSP, D-4-212, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
California protesters supporting hunger strike
• James Baridi Williamsun, D-34288, PBSP, D-4-107, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Yafeu Iyapo-I, s/n Leonard Alexander, B-73388, PBSP, D-3-104, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Marcus Tashiri Harrison, H-54077, PBSP, D-3-122, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Abasi Ganda, s/n Clyde Jackson, C-33559, PBSP, D-2-101, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Kubaua Gitu, s/n Rubben Williams, B-72882, PBSP, D-2-121, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• Paul Redd Jr., B-72683, D-2-117, PBSP, P.O. Box 7500, Crescent City CA 95532
• J. Heshima Denham, J-38283, COR SHU, 4B-1L-46, P.O. Box 3481, Corcoran CA 93212
• Michael Zaharibu Dorrough, D-83611, COR SHU, 4B-1L-53, P.O. Box 3481, Corcoran CA 93212
Palesitinian prisoners in Israel supported California hunger strike
It is important that you in the public know that all of us come from the very communities you all come from. Unfortunately, we have been held in these solitary confinement units from 10 to 40 years, simply put, for nothing. The CDCR (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation) has used every strategy and tactic to get us to debrief, as the only way for us to get out of solitary confinement.
Since we refuse to be emasculated and become the prison stoolie for the prison gang intelligence unit, CDCR has sanctioned the torture of each and every last one of us. Therefore, we prisoners, all races, decided to come together in order to end this cruel and unusual punishment.
Last year's Georgia prison strike: Georgia prisoners of all races pray together in special unit at Calhoun State Prison, prayer groups not allowed in general population
Yes, many of you have heard or know firsthand of the horror stories CDCR officials have used to propagate us to the world in order to label us the “worst of the worst” held in Pelican Bay state prison solitary confinement units. Yet ALL RACES – i.e., New Afrikans, Mexicans South and North, and whites etc. came together to end and fight against the torture we all have endured for 21 years here at PBSP SHU by way of a peaceful hunger strike, which we intend to carry out indefinitely.
END SOLITARY CONFINEMENT THROUGHOUT CALIFORNIA and THIS NATION!
We, Sitawa Nantambu Jamaa, George Franco, Arturo Castellanos and Todd Asker, the four principle negotiators and representatives of the Pelican Bay hunger strike, are requesting for all bodies and minds who are participating in the Sept. 26, 2011, human rights movement to be mindful that we prisoners are in a protracted struggle so that no other prisoners will be held in solitary confinement. All California-held prisoners can be subjected to inhumane, torturous and intentional harsh treatment by CDCR officials, enforced by their subordinates, if the use of solitary confinement is not stopped.
For this struggle to go forward, we need supporters to donate $10 or more to our prisoners’ cause, to shut the SHUs and all solitary confinement units within the state of California and spread this resistance across the U.S. by way of peaceful hunger strikes and other peaceful demonstrations.
Prisoner Hunger Strike Solidarity is a coalition of non-profit organizations that have been working many years on prisoner rights issues and shutting solitary confinement units throughout California and the U.S. We prisoners appreciate and continue to need their legal support.
Note: California Prison Focus is the member of the coalition responsible for meeting with the spokesmen for the prisoners. Donations will be used to travel to Pelican Bay once a week and to travel to the other SHUs as often as possible this winter in order to report to the state legislature and to protect the spokesmen as much as possible. Each trip costs $300 to $400 for two investigators for two days for gas and lodging only.
MIN. JR VALREY AT FOREFRONT OF PUBLICITY FOR HUNGER STRIKE
JR Valrey faced charges for covering Oscar Grant rebellions in Oakland, case was finally dropped
Do you know who broke the story of the California hunger strike on KPFA? According to General Manager Andrew Phillips, it was our own Minister of Information JR, the volunteer host of two weekly shows on KPFA, as well as associate editor of the Bay View! Until the mainstream media picked up the story in the last few days, if you weren’t listening to KPFA or reading the Bay View, you might not know that 12,000 – yes, 12,000, according to the court-appointed receiver – prisoners across California are literally starving themselves, risking their lives, to end the state’s unconstitutional torture of their brothers in security housing units (SHUs).
The prisoners themselves count on KPFA and the Bay View to help them organize and build the strike, because they aren’t allowed to speak or write letters to each other, those in the Pelican Bay SHU can’t send or receive mail that mentions the strike, their attorneys have been banned and this past weekend their families weren’t even allowed to visit them.
But KPFA’s super-powerful 59,000 watts, boosted by KFCF in Fresno, reaches millions of Californians, including tens of thousands of prisoners, throughout Northern and Central Cali. And we mail the Bay View to hundreds of prisoners, which infuriates their keepers.
The prisoners love JR because he respects them as newsworthy. You know that if the media don’t mention you and your issues, you’re nobody in the world today. You might as well be Dred Scott, who, when he sued for his freedom after his “owner” wouldn’t let him buy himself, was told by the U.S. Supreme Court that he and all Black people are “so far inferior that they had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” In California prisons – and much of the rest of the world – that’s still the rule. Continue reading →
Oakland – As the renewed prisoner hunger strike enters its second week, the federal receiver’s office released information that at least 12,000 prisoners were participating during the first week. Prisoners are continuing a hunger strike that they temporarily suspended in July.
Originating from Security Housing Units (SHUs) and Administrative Segregation Units (Ad-Seg and ASU) across California, prisoners held at Pelican Bay State Prison, Calipatria, Centinela, Corcoran, Ironwood, Kern Valley, North Kern, Salinas Valley, California Rehabilitation Center in Norco, Pleasant Valley State Prison, San Quentin as well as West Valley Detention Center in San Bernadino County are currently participating. Over 3,000 California prisoners held in out-of-state facilities in Arizona, Mississippi and Oklahoma have also refused food.
This corridor of the Pelican Bay SHU is the epicenter of the California prisoners' hungr strike; photo by Michael Montgomery, California Watch
“This is the largest prisoner strike of any kind in recent U.S. history,” says Ron Ahnen of California Prison Focus. “The fact that so many prisoners are participating highlights the extreme conditions in all of California’s prisons as well as the historic opportunity the state has been given to make substantial changes to SHU and Ad-Seg policies.”
Family members of striking SHU prisoners reported that their visits this weekend were denied by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) citing security concerns. “A number of family members received notice that they were not going to be allowed to see their loved ones as long as the strike continues,” says Dolores Canales who has a son in the Pelican Bay SHU.
“Denying visits only heightens the isolation that the prisoners and family members experience, especially at this critical time.”
Solidarity rally at Cal. Dept. of Corrections HG in Sacramento; photo by Bill Hackwell
Advocates and lawyers have expressed concern that banning visits, along with other tactics including the possibility of violence on the part of CDCR are being used in attempt to break the strike.
“Historically, prison officials have used extreme measures, including physical violence to break strikes,” says Dorsey Nunn, executive director of Legal Services for Prisoners with Children and a member of the mediation team working on behalf of the strikers.
“As this peaceful protest continues, it’s essential for lawmakers and the media to monitor the actions of CDCR. The department should not be allowed to use underhanded methods to resolve the strike.” Late last week two of the mediation team’s lawyers were banned from CDCR facilities with the prison administration citing unnamed “security threats.”
SHU cell; photo Cal. Dept. Corrections and Rehabilitation
The prisoners resumed their hunger strike on Sept. 26 after the CDCR failed to address demands made when prisoners initially went on strike for almost the entire month of July. They have also reported heightened levels of intimidation and retaliation from prison officials since July. Prisoners are demanding changes to long-term solitary confinement, gang validation and debriefing processes and other conditions in the state’s Security Housing Units as well as in other parts of the prison system.
Representatives of the hunger strikers have indicated that this may be a rolling strike, with prisoners coming on and off strike periodically, allowing for the possibility of a protracted struggle. Activists and family members internationally are planning protests in support of the hunger strikers in the coming weeks. For continued updates and more information, visit www.prisonerhungerstrikesolidarity.wordpress.com.
California Department of Corrections threatens prison hunger strikers, bans lawyers
by Jean Casella and James Ridgeway
In response to a renewed inmate hunger strike to protest conditions in the California prison system, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation has taken a hard line, threatening participants with disciplinary action and banning two lawyers who represent the strikers. According to the Contra Costa Times: Continue reading →
Even Republicans object to president’s proposed cuts
They include 50 percent cut to LIHEAP program which funds THAW
(VOD ed.: More coming on Detroit’s situation with focus on utility profits; regardless of federal cuts, DTE and others must STOP SHUT-OFFS! They can afford it! Also read earlier article, OBAMA CUTS TO HOME ENERGY ASSISTANCE TO HAVE DEVASTATING CONSEQUENCES, by clicking on http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/mar2010/heat-m27.shtml.)
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. — As winter approaches in this prosperous-looking northern Michigan city, it is clear the safety net has ripped. Thousands of households can’t afford to heat their homes and aid agencies predict many people will be forced to choose between eating and staying warm. Yet there are signs Republicans in Washington may be listening.
Pres. Obama proposed 50 percent cut in LIHEAP
First, the bad news. The Obama administration, under pressure from Republicans to cut spending, has proposed a 50 percent cut to the main federal program that helps people keep their heat on. The latest White House budget, issued in February, proposed slashing funding for the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, known as LIHEAP, from $5.1 billion to $2.57 billion, a move that would bring the program’s funding back to its 2008 level.
The program got a big budget increase under the president’s stimulus program, which Obama now says needs to be scaled back.
“We doubled the home heating assistance program when I first came into office in part because there was a huge energy spike,” Obama said at a press conference announcing the cuts last February. “Energy prices have now gone down but the cost of the program has stayed the same. So what we’ve said is let’s go back to a more sustainable level.”
In Traverse City (population about 14,000) and surrounding Grand Traverse county, Obama’s proposal would cut emergency heating assistance — given to 3,633 households last year — almost in half.
The fighting over the LIHEAP budget in Washington has forced Michigan officials to lower the cap for emergency assistance, according to Whitney Skearns, customer assistance coordinator for Consumers Energy and co-chair of the Coalition to Keep Michigan Warm. Until Oct. 1, a family could get up to $800 to turn back on the utilities, Skearns said. Now the maximum is $450. (VOD ed: The Coalition to Keep Michigan Warm includes the utilities as well as groups like the Michigan Poverty Law Center. Its website is at http://www.coalitiontokeepmichiganwarm.com.)
Family waits for assistance at United Community Housing Coalition in Detroit, which also administers a THAW site.
At the same time, the need for energy assistance is growing, despite the fact that Traverse City has flourished in the last decade. Unlike much of the state, northwestern Michigan has gained population with the arrival of retirees and people escaping Flint and Detroit. Filmmaker Michael Moore has rehabbed the city’s State Theater and launched a film festival that sold 128,000 tickets this summer. Downtown, once home to Woolworth’s and Big Boy, is now lined with stores that sell designer vinegars, equestrian garb and gelato.
Nonetheless, the Great Recession is felt almost everywhere.
“The middle class is struggling to even stay afloat but yet there is a very affluent upper class here and I know — and God knows — there is a lot of people who have barely enough to survive,” said Richard Tomey, street outreach worker for Goodwill Industries, which runs the town’s homeless shelter.
The Father Fred Foundation, a Christian charity in Traverse City, reports a 41 percent increase in visits since last year from people needing help keeping their utilities on.
Nothing can replace LIHEAP, says Martie Manty, the foundation’s executive director. “Leaning on the nonprofit sector is not very realistic because the nonprofits are dependent on the community and the community of donors is stretched,” she said in an interview. Continue reading →
Greg Thrasher at State Capitol rally April 13, 2011
By Greg Thrasher, VOD Contributing Editor
Director PLANE IDEAS
http://planeideas.blogspot.com
Right here..Right now…For many Black people living in America from the gritty urban venues of neighborhoods like Detroit to the contours of cul de sacs of suburbia these are perilous times even in the post racial era of a Black Man in the White House. The velocity of negativity is at web speed from the media accounts of entire industries collapsing and people being laid off into forever to tales of young children body parts being tortured and burned in shabby 3rd world urban shacks. Life in America is perilous; the revolution is being televised and it is on every channel with surround sound and 3D pictures.
Right here..Right now..This is a moment for the community to step away from the insanity and madness and the aura of hopelessness and decadence and confusion and reach out and hold on to each other from family to friends to associates and maybe even strangers. People are under enormous stress and duress all manner of thoughts, excuses, plots are in the heads of even normal responsible people. The dreams people have now are nightmares full of nothingness.
Harlem Blues by Romare Bearden
Right here..Right now.The Black community more than any other aggregate of people in this nation must get a grip and stop the descent into raw insanity. Our pastors, uncles, aunts, cousins, sons and daughters must reach into their collective souls and memories to create a place where a safe refuge exists, not just a real place but a sphere where the unspoken word is supreme and positive thoughts are cultivated and rewarded and embraced .
The Black community needs a life altering transfusion of humanity and hope. This force must be new and novel and life altering . It must be more than prayers, testimonies and tired sound bites. We have to create a harvest of love even in the dirt of concrete streets and alleys. We must carve out a new real time miracle that enters in our homes and our minds. We need a sound, a noise, a creation of powerful bond that elevates us from the present day insanities. We are in perilous moments 24/7 everywhere in America.
Navigating through hopelessness
Right here..Right now…The Black community must regroup and create a safe haven where love, honesty, civility, decency, trust, sharing, all the ingredients of civility and love must break though. We are in a dark era where fear, anger, frustration, pain, and evil is becoming an accepted norm and custom. Our values and purpose are floundering. We are shaky and unreliable for each other.
Right here..Right now.. Across this great nation in every enclave, backyard, front porch, pew, gym, office, basement, church, temple, playground, bedroom, kitchen our community needs a cultural reset and return to the genius of basic truths and straight forward truth. Our community must step up and correct all the wrongs which have us at the end of cliff.
Right here..Right now….We must save ourselves from each other ….This is where our lives must change ..Right where YOU are when YOU read this…Reach Out and help our community navigate to a new promise land..Right Here..Right Now:
Espinoza family and friends reunited for a short time Sept. 27: (l to r rear) Pedro, Luis Jr , Cornell Squires, Oscar Gutierrez, Mabel Love; (l to r front). Luis Sr. holding Leonardo, mother Cecilia with Genoveva in front of her
Espinoza children at Family Court Sept. 27 as custody trial begins
By Diane Bukowski
Oct. 3, 2011
DETROIT – The five children of Luis and Cecilia Espinoza of southwest Detroit were very happy to finally see their mother again in Wayne County Family Court Sept. 27. They have only been able to see her one hour a week, pending the results of a trial on a petition for temporary custody that began that day before Referee Charles Wilson.
Attorney Frederick Smith
Three of the children, including Genoveva, 6, told Children’s Law Attorney Frederick Smith before the hearing, “I want my mother to come home.” Smith is the court-appointed Guardian ad Litem for Genoveva.
Genoveva, in a pretty lavender dress, shyly hugged her mother. Leonardo appeared relieved, and ran around joyously after the hearing. He thought his mother was not coming home because she did not love him anymore, according to family friend Cornell Squires.
Family friends Oscar Gutierrez, Mabel Love, and Cornell Squires were there to lend their love and support.
“It is not right what they are doing to this family,” Gutierrez said. “I’ve known them for many years, and they have been together for too long to be broken up like this. Genoveva especially needs her mother. She is getting older, and there are no other girls or women in the home.”
Consuelo Meade, 83, lives in this luxury condominium in Warren while the Espinoza family lives in a poor neighborhood in southwest Detroit
Consuelo Meade, Cecilia’s adoptive mother, claimed in a July 8 child abuse complaint against Cecilia that she gave Genoveva a black eye on Father’s Day, June 19. Genoveva went to visit Meade with her parents’ permission the same day, but Meade never brought her back home and appears to be seeking custody of the family’s only daughter.
In a preliminary hearing Aug. 3, Referee Mona Youssef ordered the child to return to her family, but ordered her mother to move out temporarily.
Meade’s version of events has been disputed by others in the family, including the oldest child, Luis, 13, the prime witness. He told VOD earlier that his mother was not home when Genoveva was injured, that she had crawled under her bed as she sometimes does and hurt herself, and he had to lift the bed off of her.
Luis Espinoza, Jr., 13, protested with his family outside Family Court at first heearing;; he wants his baby sister and his mother back home
But Children’s Protective Services worker Shanitra Bowman testified that she conducted a “forensic interview” with Genoveva July 9 in which Genoveva accused her mother of hurting her.
“Genoveva said she received a black eye from her mother because she had not urinated on herself at her grandmother’s, but she did at home,” Bowman said. She said Genoveva told her the incident took place when Meade brought Genoveva and her brother Gavino home.
“I did forensically interview her at her grandmother’s home,” Bowman contended. On cross-examination, she admitted she had been working for the Department of Human Services since April, 2011, three months at the time she interviewed Genoveva.
Bowman said the interview took 20 minutes, and that she did not know where her notes taken during the interview were. Continue reading →
Snyder budget slashes $1 billion in corporate taxes
Taxes pensions, cuts education funding a total of 17 percent
Cuts local government aid by $100 million
Cuts public assistance by $70 million: 50,000 suffer first month
Michigan‘s Gov. Rick Snyder signed the FY2012 $47 billion state budget into law on June 21, 2011. The budget eliminates $1 billion in corporate taxes and initiates taxes on pensions. It also cuts school funding by 2.2%, higher education funding by at least 15% and lessens aid to local governments by $100 million.
The state’s fiscal year begins on October 1st and ends on September 30th of the following calendar year.[4]
Michigan has a total state debt of $69,418,882,370 when calculated by adding the total of outstanding debt, pension and OPEB UAAL’s, unemployment trust funds and the 2010 budget gap as of July 2010.
FY2012 State Budget
Gov. Snyder asked the legislature for $38.25 million from the state’s general fund to pay a portion of the $106 million the state owes in interest on Michigan’s $3.1 billion federal unemployment insurance debt. The remaining portion of the interest payment will come from a state solvency tax that went into effect this year on Michigan employers, and from state unemployment penalty and interest funds.
On June 21, 2011, Gov. Rick Snyder signed the FY2012 $47 billion budget into law. ]The two budget bills signed by the governor were House Bill 4526 and House Bill 4325. The last time the state had a completed budget in place this early was 1981.
The budget assumes $265 million in savings in 2011-12 from employee concessions. The governor hopes to convince state employee unions to reopen their contracts to provide those concessions, and delayed making layoffs in September 2011. The union contracts do not expire until the end of the 2012 calendar year. One of the concessions the governor seeks is having employees increase the percentage of health care costs that they pay for from 10% to 20%. At the unions’ urging, the governor agreed to study whether the state government had too many managers, and to consider reducing the number of managers. The state’s ratio at the time the study started was 6 employees to each manager. The union claims that if the ratio was 7 to 1 that the state would save $75 million. (VOD: Enough to restore public assistance cuts by itself.) Continue reading →
