Henry Friaoo. on the scaffold at the Albina Mural Project headquarter*, ¡taint* a
■cene depicting the dog'* attack on civil rig ht* marcher* in Birmingham.
D arryl Clegg watches Isaac Shamsud^Un and Cbonitia Henderson ¡minting mural
that w ill be placed on the outside walls of the Albina Human Resource Center.
Albina Mural Project unveils first panel
PORTLAND
On February 10th, Mrs. Marie Smith -
a longtime community activist and
maker of Black history - will unveil the
first mural produced by the Albina Mural
Project.
OBSERVER
Volume 8 No. 6
Thursday, February 2, 1978
10c ;»er copy
Council candidate
hits park levy
The Jefferson High School Freshman Rally Squad - Lina Franklin, Jill Lundström.
Tracey Palmer. V anesaa Syke* | standing |, Loretta Har.ieie and Tafley Shreiner - will
Join the “Mother's March” Saturday, collecting money lor the March of Dimes. The
students will assist M rs M arilyn Sykes, Chairman lor the Northeast Area. The annual
AAve raise* money lor research and treatm ent of children w ith birth defect*.
Arnold Biskar, candidate for Position 2
on the City Council, now held by Commis
sioner Mildred Schwab announced Tues
day that he will oppose the city park levy
that is to appear on the Primary Election
ballot in May.
Biskar said he based his decision on a
management report made on the Port
land Parks Bureau by the Bureau of
Management and Budget. According to
Biskar the study was done at the request
of the new director of parks and was
submitted to Ms. Schwab in November.
He demanded that she release the study
immediately and that the City Council
reconsider its approval of the levy.
Biskar said his campaign staff has
"discovered that the management of
existing park programs and monies is so
poorly performed that we cannot in good
conscience stand by and allow the Council
to ask the people of Portland for another
19.7 million dollars from the people to be
used in a similar fashion.
An examination of the management
report on the bureau will reveal that the
bureau has insufficiently defined organi
zational goals and objectives; that plan
ning and development functions are not
thoroughly identified and understood;
that budget development responsibilities
and authorities are unevenly divided,
understood and executed; and that the
bureau is not properly organized to
achieve its mission."
Biskar stated that in his opinion Ms.
Schwab should complete the reorganiza
tion of the Bureau which she was directed
(Please turn to page 4 col. 3,
Legal Aid opens office for elderly poor
Legal Aid Service opened a new
program Monday, designed to aid low
income elderly people with legal prob
lems.
The project will concentrate on prob
lems associated with nursing homes,
government benefits, consumer com
plaints (hearing aids and dentures),
health insurance and funeral plans. Elder
ly people with other problems will be
assisted by an afternoon hotline service.
A survey by the American Bar Founda
tion showed that 23 percent of all elderly
poor people need a lawyer. Applied to
Multnomah County census data, that
figure means that about 4,870 older
people with low incomes here need legal
help. In 1975, Multnomah County I^egai
Aid records show that 835 clients 65
years of age or older were served. This
under utilization of the program is attri
buted to funding limitations on the types
-- ------------ — —- — — —
a vuvnil
In e mural consists of ten scenes from Black History. ”
of services being provided, the difficulty benefit programs.
of travel for many older people and a lack
Attorneys Mentzer and Richard Wy
of knowledge about available help. The man will be assisted by Jim Clark, a
new Senior Law Project, which will serve paralegal who has worked with social
people sixty years of age or older, is service agencies in Alaska and Hawaii,
intended to address all of these difficul
and Susan Tuno, office manager.
ties.
The Senior Law project is located at
A “hotline" will be in operation each the Northeast Portland office of Legal
afternoon to answer questions and make Aid, 517 N.E. Killingsworth Street. The
referrals. People with problems other Senior Citizen Hotline number is 284
than the five mentioned above will be 9413.
directed to other Legal Aid units and to
Appointments can be arranged in the
attorneys involved in a volunteer effort downtown Legal Aid office, 310 S.W. 4th
to help seniors with estate problems and Avenue, for seniors who find it difficult to
wills. The decision to concentrate on just appear at the Northeast Portland office.
five problem areas was based on an
The program will be conducted by the
assessment of how much casework two Multnomah County U g a l Aid Service
lawyers could competently handle.
and is funded by the CETA and Legal
The program will be supervised by Aid. CETA funding will end October 30,
Bonnie Mentzer, a Legal Aid attorney 1978, so the project will have to obtain
with extensive experience with legal the support of the Portland Aging Ser
problems having to do with government vices Division in order to continue.
For the past eight months -- a group ot
artists have been designing and painting
a huge mural that will cover two sides of
the Albina Human Resource Center. The
mural depicts ten scenes from Black
history, four demonstrating the Black
experience in Oregon and the others
showing Black contributions to the world
and the nation.
The Albina Mural Project, which is
sponsored by the Center for Community
Mental Health employs seven artists
through a CETA grant. Although panels
were designed by individual artists, and
therefore show varied style, the artists
are all involved in painting each scene.
The first section to be completed depicts
scenes from the life of Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr.
The mural is being painted off-site and
will be attached to the building as panels
are completed. This insures that if the
Albina Human Resource Center, a state
agency, leaves the building at Vancouver
and Alberta, the mural can be moved.
All of the artist/designers are profes
sionals. Isaac Shamsud-din, a well-known
Portland painter, is director of the
project. Henry Frison, trained in com
mercial art, is in great demand as a
portrait painter. Larry Scott, a sculptor
and painter has produced super-graphics
on buildings in the community.
Chonitia Henderson, a graduate of the
University of Colorado, is a costume and
clothing designer, interior decorator and
painter.
Jenny Harada, a native ol
Japan, is a graduate of the University of
Oregon in Fine Arts. She is a painter and
print maker.
Charles Tatum is a Portland sculptor
He is producing a low relief wood sculp
ture that will go over the Vancouver
Avenue entrance of the AHRC building.
Documentarian for the project is
Darryl Clegg, who has documented the
progress of the project in film. Clegg has
been involved in television set design,
graphic arts, directing and producing and
in film making. He also is a painter.
The unveiling ceremony will be held on
February 10th at 1:00 p.m. Mayor Neil
Goldschmidt, City Commissioner Charles
Jordan, AHRC Manager Ben Talley, and
other public officials have been invited to
participate.
Residents protest empty houses
t 11
a a MB
~. J _
J
_ a
a l* .
Over SV**
one ft* hundred
residents
of e Albina
met to confront owners of abandoned and
dilapidated houses in their neighbor
hoods. Also invited to the meeting was
Doug Miller of the City Bureau of
Neighborhood Environment.
The meeting was sponsored by Albina
Fair Share, a new community action
agency that is affiliated with Oregon Fair
Share.
Among the empty houses discussed
were: 3813 N.E. 9th Avenue. This empty
house is owned by Adolphus Clay, 2136
N.E. 9th Avenue, who appeared at the
meeting and said he had been out of work
for three years and had not been able to
repair the property so it could be rented.
The group referred Mr. Clay to Marion
Scott of the Portland Development Com
mission to explore financing.
536 N.E. Knott Street. This house
burned on Labor Day and has not been
repaired. Although the law states that
burned houses are to be boarded up in ten
days, it has not been boarded. The City
has just posted the property for condem
nation and has been informed that it will
be torn down. The house is owned by Hal
Investment Company, 2600 N.E. Union
(Lampus).
4305 N. Kerby is owned by Armand
Scarci of 11441 S.W. Collins.
This
property is partially boarded. Scarci also
owned two houses at Skidmore and
Commercial that were moved onto the
property approximately a year ago and
have not been repaired or occupied.
According to one neighbor, a good house
was torn down and then two dilapidated
houses moved there -- “There are piles of
dirt and rats." “We could not get a
response from PDC.”
4022 and 4028 N.E. Rodney are owned
by the Multnomah County Urban Invest
ment Corporation of 5133 N.E. Rodney.
Mr. Bush, who appeared at the meeting
for the company, said they would decide
within ten days what to do with the
property. In the meantime, one house
had been boarded and the other partially
boarded. This house was described as
being open and empty, with debris in
the back yard and an old car in the
garage.
The Portland code says, “4.6.070 Un
protected Structures: It is unlawful for
the owner or person having control of any
real property to permit any building or
structure in which doors, windows or
apertures are open or broken, to remain
in that condition for more than ten days
without boarding over or otherwise close
openings, so as to prevent access by
unauthorized persons. A building or
structure that has an opening to it
unclosed for more than ten days is a
public nuisance, subject to abatement as
provided in this chapter.” The code goes
on to say that if the requirement is not
met, the City shall have the building
removed.
Miller explained that it takes 150 days
to condemn a building but that “when
property is condemned, it .is torn .down?
Citizens took issue to this statement,
saying some buildings had been con
demned two or three times and were still
standing. He also added that if the
property is boarded, it cannot be con
demned.
Miller told the gathering that the
Bureau of Neighborhood Environment is
not enforcing the code requiring boarding
up abandoned buildings. There are an
estimated 161 abandoned houses in Al
bina.
Miller also said there are more house
fires in Albina than in any other district
and often owners have to wait several
years to collect their insurance money. If
arson is suspected the insurance com
panies do not have to pay until the
statute of limitations for catching the
arsonist has passed. When this situation
exists, the city is lenient in enforcing
condemnation.
Blaming the deterioration of the neigh
borhood as lack of code enforcement by
the City, many members of the audience
determined to pursue the problem with
the City. “We are not going to stand by
and let City Hall degrade our property.”
United Airlines promotes Wasson
Edwina Wasson, a native of Portland,
has been appointed assistant to the
regional vice president of United Airlines
in Washington, D.C.
Miss Wasson is the daughter of Mrs.
Isaac Wasson of Portland. She attended
Vernon Elementary School and Jefferson
High School. At Jefferson High she was a
member of the acapella choir and tra
veiled with the choir to Japan.
A member of Bethel African Methodist
Episcopal Church she was a member of
the Usher Board and the choir.
Miss Wasson graduated from Portland
State University with a degree in Socio
logy.
She and her younger sister,
Jennifer, were the first Blacks on the
PSU rally squad. Miss Wasson was one
of the founders of the Martin Luther King
Scholarship Fund of Oregon.
She has been with United Airlines for
nearly six years, joining as a flight
attendent in Chicago in 1972. Later she
was a supervisor of in flight services at
Chicago, then was personnel representa
tive for the western region at San
Francisco.
Miss Wasson reports d ir e d v to the
vice president of the Mid Atlantic Region
and is responsible for coordination of
marketing, scheduling, food service and
operations in the area that includes
Philadelphia, Allentown, Baltimore, Rich
mond, Norfolk and Newport News.
W A SSO N
Is America heading into a new cycle of racism?
by Joel Dreyfus*
|P N S| - Now that the victories of the
civil rights movements have become
history, there is a growing fear among
Blacks that racism is again taking hold in
America. The revival is seen by many as
more subtle and elusive than in the past,
and thus harder to fight, because a
majority of white Americans, supported
by an influential body of intellectuals,
denies it is real.
The controversy over the Bakke case
and affirmative action is partly respon
sible for reopening the debate on race
relations that had been dormant since the
1960s. It has also exposed, quite clearly,
the new sophistication of racial attitudes
that have continued unabated since the
1950s.
“Racism is alive and well," says Dr.
Price Cobbs, a Black psychiatrist and
co-author of the best seller Black Rage.
"You run into good, well-motivated
people who think they are fair, who feel
they have turned around from attitudes
and beliefs they grew up with. But they
continue to view Blacks in a deficit model:
less than,' not as good as.’ 'if we could
only do such and such to bring them up to
speed.’ ”
The notion that racism is no longer a
significant force in America is implicit in
the work of Nathan Glazer, one of the
leading intellectual champions of neo-con
servatism.
In his book Affirmative
Discrimination, Glazer announces that
racism has been defeated and calls on the
courts to withdraw from the battle for
equal opportunity so "the forces of
political democracy in a pluralistic society
can do their proper work.”
The concept is attractive if you believe
that race is now a benign factor. But
many Blacks see signs of just the opposite
signs in unemployment and income statis
tics, in surveys of white racial attitudes,
or in the portrayal of Blacks in the
popular media.
A Louis Harris survey last summer
reported that "a majority of Blacks feel
discriminated against while a majority of
whites feel Blacks are not."
“Much of what passes for benign race
relations," says Dr. Cobb, “is some kind
of social comfort on the part of whites
who are dealing with Blacks. There
many whites who can be comfort
with Blacks socially but who don’t I
any idea of the depth and degree of t
remaining negative assumptions al
people who are different."
The white complacency goes bad
the period following the death of
Martin Luther King, when the Nixoi
ethic of law and order submerged
race debate. Edward C. Banfield, a Ni
urban affairs advisor, provided an ii
lectual rationale for dismissing the i
issue in his 1970 book The Unheavi
City.
"The lower class individual lives in the
slum and sees little or no reason to
complain," wrote Banfield.
“Features
that make the slum repellent to others
actually please him.”
Banfield s attitude has become wide
spread today, according to Stanford
University sociologist Seymour Martin
U pset, another neo conservative.
Most whites, says U pset, "accept the
reality of at least some racial discrimina
tion but see Black problems as stemming
(Please turn to Page 6 Column 3)