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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 24, 1977)
PORTLAND f OBSERVER Volume 7 Ne. 48 Thursday, N eveaber 24, 1977 ROBERT W •o ve a STRAUB Ittr .1er eo.iy November 15, 1977 STATEMENT BY GOVERNOR BOB STRAUB The day of Thanksgiving has roots that extend back to the time when people paused following the harvest to view what they had accomplished and offer thanks. Today, most of us have accomplishments that are not related to harvests, accomplishments that have little to do with the seasons, accomplishments that leave little time for stepping back to see how fine our lives really are and how much we, as Oregonians, have to be thankful for. In America the tradition goes back over 300 years. Our first National Thanksgiving dates back to November 1, 1777, by the Continental Congress, establishing a national tradition that every American has known since infancy. A white THANKSGIVING? Portland traffic camo to a H ands« ill Tueaday as the city recovered fro« overnight Thanksgiving 1977 marks the Bicentennial of America's most beloved tradition. coowtall of six inches. Therefore, as Governor of Oregon, I extend an invitation to all Oregonians to join with me as we pause and reflect on our lives, our families and our many blessings and celebrate this 200th National Thanksgiving. CSA suspends Albina Action Center grants The Albina Action Center has received word from the Seattle Office of the Community Services Administration that it has been summarily suspended as a CSA grantee as of November 15th. According to Joh?i Finley, Region X Director. the agency was suspended because "it is the judgement of CSA that an emergency situation exists in which there is a serious risk of lues of project funds. 'This summary suspension action arises because TAAC lacks the core staff necessary to carry out its CSA-funded program. TAAC has no executive direc tor, acting executive director, accountant or bookkeeper. T A A C has failed to establish a certifi able accounting system for the disburse ment of CSA funds. There is no bond coverage for any official of TAAC. “These deficiencies demonstrate that the TAAC Board of Directors lacks adequate control over TAAC operations and has failed to implement the special conditions of its recent grant.” Bettye Overton, Chairman of the TAAC Board said the Board has replied to the Region's questions and expects someone from the Region to come to Portland to determine whether the grant should be reinstated. Mrs. Overton blames the suspension on the inability of the agency to meet its (Please turn to Page 6 Column 1) Bob Straub Governor of Oregon Straub names Florice Walker to Tri-Met Board Ms. Flonce Walker was appointed to the seven member Tri-Met Board of Directors by Governor Bob Straub. The Tri-Met board is responsible for main taining public mass transit within Mult nomah, Clackamas and Washington Counties. - - Ms. Walker, who is a research assistant in the office of the vice president for academic affairs at Portland State Uni versity. will represent District 5 in Northeast Portland. She replaces Ron Buel. editor of Wills mette Week. Four new appointments were made in response to legislation requiring that board members live in designated dist ricts. Board members are: Attorney Gerald Drummond; Nellie Fox, AFL- CIO; Ellsworth Ingraham, Oregon Bank; John Frewing, Portland General Electric; Bob Murray, Murray Chevrolet; and Attorney James Goodwin. The appointments, which must be approved by a Senate committee, will take effect on December 4th. Threat of suit hits Civil Rights Division Several citizens who have filed Civil Rights complaints with the Oregon State Bureau of Labor and who are dissatisfied with the way their cases have been integration and about the schools foster handled plan to file suit against Labor ing positive self-esteem in Black children Commissioner Bill Stevenson and Attor and in preparing them academically so ney General Jim Redden next week. that they can be successful." The complaints allege that the Civil Mrs. Bryant is a native of Berkeley. Rights Division has not aggressively She came to Oregon in 1968 to attend persued redress in their cases. These Willamette University. After a year persons and others state that cases have there she transferred to Mt. Angel not been investigated within a reasonable length of time and that when evidence of College and graduated in 1972 with BAs in Behavioral Science and General Stu discrimination has been found, the Civil dies. Rights Bureau has not gone ahead with the concilliation process. Mrs. Bryant earned her Master of Social Work degree from Portland State The complainants first asked Steven University in 1974. Among her work son to adopt procedures and schedules for placement while in school were the the Civil Rights Division that would University of Oregon Medical School, insure that all cases are handled expedi Crippled Children's Division; Rural Men tiously. This they believed, would give tal Health, and the Port of Portland. She Stevenson an opportunity to strengthen also was a counselor for the Salem the Division's activity and to go to the Neighborhood Youth Corps. Emergency Board for more employees if She was employed as a planner by the that were necessary. Tri County Community Council, then in “We are naturally upset that we 1976 became director of Community haven't received the kind of service that Options for Child Care. the State owes us, but we are more Mrs. Bryant is a commissioner on the interested in making the Civil Rights Metropolitan Human Relations Commis Division more responsive to those who sion, a member of the league of Women have valid discrimination cases," one Voters, the Oregon Women’s Political complainant explained. "People who are Caucus and the Urban lea g u e and is a denied jobs or who are mistreated on the Democratic Party Precinctperson. job can't afford to wait for three or four She and her husband, Jess, who is a year or more for redress. These are forestry technician, have a three year old emergency situations and should be son, Mark. treated as such. Carol Bryant files for Legislature, District 14 Carol Bryant has filed for the Democra tic Party nomination for State Represen tative for District #14. the seat currently held by Dr. Howard Cherry. “It is time tor accessible and responsive leadership in the District," Mrs. Bryant said. She plans to use the primary campaign to discuss the issues with the residents of the District and to learn their concerns and bias. “Of course there are issues that 1 am particularly concerned about, but I want to emphasize that I am most interested in finding out what the voters want. It is important to be a listener and that is something this dis trict has not had." CAROL BRYANT Among the issues Mrs. Bryant plans to address are the need for low income bousing, rising utility rates, child care needs, unemployment, and education. “I am concerned about the high unem pioyment rate, as all of us are. I would like to see what the State can do about both generating jobs and developing skills in the unemployed - especially among Black young people. "Relief for the elderly is another high priority. The elderly need income and supportive services so they can maintain their homes without living in abject poverty. “I am also concerned about school “We are of the opinion that Commis sioner Stevenson has not given the attention he should to this problem.” The complainants do not believe that Stevenson has replied directly to their request that he set timetables for each step of the investigation - concilliation - hearing procedure. Stevenson asks, "Why now? Where have they been for the last three years when we have been to the legislature and the E Board asking for more money? They haven't been there. “If they were that concerned they could have helped. Why didn't they get interested three years ago when we were so far behind. Now that we are 99 percent caught up, they threaten a law suit. “We are also interested in prompt resolution. Minds can differ, but we have accomplished a hell of a lot based on the dollars received. Guidelines are all right providing that we have the capacity to see that they are realized, but it is a disservice to raise expectations that can't be met." Saying that it is the function of the Legislature to determine what is timely and what it wants the CRD to achieve, Stevenson will go before the Emergency Board in December with several options and requests for additional staff. "Until the E Board allocates dollars to fund their definition it would be faulty for us to define definite guidelines." He said this request is not a response to the threaten ed suit, but is one of a series he has made over the past three years. The 1977 Legislature cut his staff request from 33 to 28 investigators. Stevenson states that his office reor ganization and “four year plan” has allowed the Division to process about 1500 old cases that were in the CRD before he took office, plus an additional 5,000 complaints that have been filed since. His department has collected a million Collars in civil rights remedies since 1975, $220,073 of it during the last 140 days. (This does not include the half-million consent degree against the State of Oregon negotiated by the federal government.) "If they file a suit, and they have that right, it will be counterproductive. All it will do is take resources from what we are trying to do. Attorneys will have to spend time working on the suit instead of on people's civil rights complaints.” Stevenson said he had discussed the office’s procedures with the complain ants’ attorneys and shared information with them and that he fails to see why they would file a suit at this point in time. “In my more cynical moments I wonder if it is to justify funding for a Private Right of Action Clinic that Legal Aid is said to be considering establishing." The last Legislature passed legislation, at Steven son's request, that would allow persons to take a “Private Right of Action" - go directly to the courts - if the CRD does not respond within 100 days. gamut of military functions: guarding sea lanes, monitoring Soviet ships and sub marines, commanding naval operations throughout the South Atlantic, maintain ing airlift capabilities to land troops fast in trouble spots and training officers from all over Latin America. With a long history of U.S. troop landings in the region (as recently as 1965 in the Dominican Republic) actual mili tary intervention cannot be ruled out. The three major American bases all sit in volatile Caribbean Countries: • Guantanamo. Sitting in the heart of socialist Cuba, Guantanamo is a mon slrous base that covers 45 square miles and is surrounded by 50,000 American mines - the largest minefield in the world. The U.S. Navy depends on Guanta namo to monitor the Soviet surface ships, submarines and fishing vessels that re fuel and reprovision at Cienfuegos, a nearby port on Cuba's south coast. A vast system of undersea micro phones code named SONUS - picks up the sound “signatures" of passing Soviet subs. • Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico. All U.S. Navy ships in the Caribbean and the Atlantic east and south of the Caribbean are commanded from Roosevelt Roads - the Pearl Harbor of the Atlantic - and nearby San Juan. From here the U.S. military dominates vital sea lanes like those used by oil tankers carrying Vene zuelan oil to the U.S. Vieques Island, off Puerto Rico’s east coast, also provides the Navy and Marine Corps with 26,000 acres of training facilities, used largely to practice air borne and amphibious beach assaults, and a huge underground ammunition depot. • The Panama Canal Zone. The zone performs for the U.S. Army the same pivotal role Puerto Rico plays for the Navy. From the Canal Zone the U.S. Force Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) carries out all U.S. military and intelli gence activities in Latin America, includ ing extensive training of Latin American officers. Despite the new treaty with Panama. American forces aren't getting ready to pack up and go home. The treaty guarantees the U.S. military land needed to "protect” the canal even after the zone is f^iven back to Panama. Will US m ilitary intervene in simmering Caribbean? by John Markoff | Pacific News Service 1 - Growing unrest and rising Cuban influence in the Caribbean are once again raising the spectre of United States military inter vention there. U.8. policy makers, who have long ignored that area of the world in favor of Asian. European and Mideastern con cerns, now reali7e that America could be confronted by “two, three...many Cubas." Former CIA Director William Colby told the Congressional (inference on National Security, held earlier this year in Washington, that threats to U.8. security exist directly to our south. He called the Caribbean a “cesspool of corruption, poverty and overpopulation.” Mexico will also become a major threat, Colby said, because of the poverty of its population. Leaders like Oolby contend that the way to avert crises is to strengthen the international alliance of major capitalist powers and promote development and stability in the Third World. But previous U<6. intervention in the Carib bean, where American business invest ment totals 17 billion, has demonstrated the U.S. is prepared to use force when necessary. Pentagon officials are now analyzing possible military responses to political unrest in the oil-and bauxite-rich Carib bean region. One study the Pentagon is now conducting deals with the kind of military force that would be necessary to protect the Panama Canal against guer rilla attack. The Joint Chiefs of Staff are on record in support of the proposed Panama Canal Treaty because they feel that such a treaty will make military defense of the canal easier. However, recent congreasional testi mony led to a rare display of public disagreement within the military when Adm. Thomas Moorer, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a vocal opponent of the Panama Canal Treaty, testified before Congress that the treaty could quickly lead to a “Soviet and/or a Cuban presence" in the country of Pana ma. High ranking officers believe at least 100.000 soldiers would be needed to defend the canal against a 10,000 man forte of guerrillas but even that might not be enough. An army officer recently told a U.S. newsweekly that the "jungles of Panama could easily swallow up 100,000 GIs." Most U.S. military officials believe that keeping the Panama Canal open in the face of a concentrated guerrilla attack would be virtually impossible. STRATEGIC TRIANGLE An imaginary triangle drawn from Guantanamo, America’s huge Cuban na val base, south to the Canal Zone and back to Roosevelt Roads in Puerto Rico demarcates a powerful U.S. military network. But along with Panama, it also runs through several of Washington's other political headaches - Cuba, Jamaica and Puerto Rico. These nations, aiong with a number of smaller countries, represent what has become a leftward rush in the Caribbean in recent years. Cuban influence in the region, due in part to Castro's demonstrated success, is on the rise. Castro recently toured Jamaica in a move that symbolizes Cuba's strengthened ties with other Caribbean nations. Carter Administration officials are viewing the Caribbean with growing concern. Assistant Secretary of State for Inter American Affairs, Terence Todman, re cently told the House International Rela tions Committee that "I do not believe this new ‘security’ concern is a chimera. If the present adverse trends in the region continue, and we take no effective action, I think we can count on unfortunate developments." U.S. strategists also worry about pos sible Soviet influence in the region. Writing in the Spring 1976 issue of the Strategic Review, Adm. Moorer and Dr. Alvin Cottrell, research director of Wash ington's influential Center for Strategic and International Studies, predict that "in the next two decades the Soviet naval presence in the Caribbean and South America is likely to become stronger." This naval presence "would be design ed to add muscle to Soviet diplomacy and trade ambitions and to enhance the influence and effectiveness of anti Ameri ca forces." To counter unrest and outside in fluences, 21,000 U.8. troopsare based in the Caribbean triangle. They run the
