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Page 2 Portland Obaerver Thursday. August 17,1978
A nother Black lo aves PSU
Affirmative talents w ill be missed
W e see the world
by Herb L. Cawlborne
through Black eyes
School Board igaores community concerns
The prediction of the people has come true.
Members of the School Board, after interviewing
candidates for the School Board vacancy, have
selected the person who reportedly has Gladys
McCoy's blessing, plus tw o additional can
didates
Since the possibility of a vacancy became ap
parent with Mrs. McCoy's primary victory in the
County Commission race, there has been no con
tact by the board with the leaders of Black
organizations or with those who have been con
cerned about current education problems and
school district policies. During this time, Evie
Crowell has been promoted as Mrs. McCoy's
choice to fill her position.
The deadline for candidates to file was Mon
day. The selections were made Tuesday
following a twenty minute interview with each of
the fifteen candidates. There was no time for
reaction from the Black population — no time for
expressions of support for any of the seven
minority candidates.
So the Board has done what they were asked
not to do. They have placed themselves — six
whites — in a position to select a person to
represent minority interests without bothering to
find out that person's standing in the community,
without finding out whether that person can gain
the support of the Black community which the
Board so badly needs
In so doing the Board has ruled out Darrell
Millner, who not only is eminently qualified but
who has been active in the community and has a
broad base of support. This is a man who people
trust to represent them.
The Board has ignored the wishes of the Black
community for too long. Its schools have been
raped, its children destroyed. In the past it has
been too small and too divided to fight. But those
days have ended. If the Board fails to recognize a
valid Black interest in this School Board appoint
ment and continues to select what it believes to
be best for Black people, it will find that the mood
has changed, in Portland. The detent will have
ended and the war begun.
PSU minority hiring not acceptable
It is with regret that we note the departure of
the Affirmative Action Director at Portland State
University. At a time when equal opportunity is
being questioned, when the thrust for reversing
historic discrimination is being weakened by
splintered court decisions, Portland State was
beginning to make progress under Dr. MacArthur
Darby's leadership. But the progress was slow.
The commitment has never been as aggressive as
it should have. And now Dr. Darby is leaving for
an appointment at the University of Louisville.
The efforts to bring progress to PSU's affir
mative action office should not be lost with Dr.
Darby's resignation. The PSU Black Caucus will
be a watchful eye. The Urban League and the
NAACP both have strong Education Committees
which ought to monitor and criticize the direction
PSU takes. According to the PSU Biack Caucus,
the affirmative action process is weak in terms of
a positive philosophy, graduate recruitm ent,
meaningful establishment of goals, enforcement
procedures, undergraduate recruitment, as well
as efforts to make the PSU atmosphere more at
tractive.
There can be no great institution of higher
learning in the Portland metropolitan area which
does not embrace the aspirations of the Biack
community. Our community needs the activism,
ideas, and independence of strong educators
working in a comfortable atmosphere at PSU.
The Observer hopes that Black organizations and
individuals will make greater efforts to monitor
PSU's response to affirm ative action in the
future.
Blacks.
Another oft stated rationalization
for the West’ s continued cooperation
with the Nazis o f South Africa is the
West’ s apprehension with A frica ’ s
growing “ enchantment with com
munism.” What the champions o f
these school of thought fail to point
out is that the Black struggle in all of
Southern Africa has never been an
ideological one. We have accepted
help from wherever we could and,
generally, the U.S. and Europe have
been less then enthusiastic in coming
to our aid.
There is a war going on and we
have to take arms w herever we can find
them to fight that war. We have,
however, not mortgaged our coun
tries in return for that aid. On the
other hand, the U.S., Britain, France,
West Germany, NATO, South Korea,
Taiwan, Israel and Iran continue to
arm the enemy. So, how can they
seriously expect A fric a to regard
them as allies? Western policy has
got to come into line with Western
rhetoric. I f you are truly supportive
o f our liberation effort, stop arm
ing and financing the enemy, then
you won’ t have to worry about the
“ communist threat in A frica .”
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0,her
PORTLAND OBSERVER
P O. Box 3137
Portland. OR B7208
A d d re s s
C i t y _________
______
Dr. M acArthur Darby, Director
Office o f A ffirm ative Action
Portland Stale University
After little more than a year, the
affirmative action director at Port
land State University is leaving. The
departure o f M a c A rth u r D arby,
PSU’ s energetic administrator o f fair
employment, highlights once again a
vicious syndrom e and a serious
deficiency — both o f which play
upon one another and stifle progress
in Portland’s Black community.
The vicious syndrome involves the
exodus of Black professionals from
Portland’ s major public institution
o f higher learning. The atmosphere
is not right; the genuine concern for
reversing decades o f racism is not
well developed; and the thrust o f the
system is designed to grind the strong
Black soul down to nothingness. The
syndrome is pervasive.
The serious deficiency is found in
our c o m m u n ity ’ s in a b ility to
challenge Portland State University
to rectify — not tomorrow but today
— its discriminatory atmosphere and
its biased system o f reward so that
more o f our people can thrive within
its structure. We are deficient in our
w ill; we are lax in our efforts; and we
contribute to the vicious syndrome
o f Black professionals leaving our
city.
D r. D arby, who came well
recommended from the University of
Indiana, leaves a job not quite done.
In spite o f this, however, his accom
plishments are many. Against the
resistence o f an institution soaked to
the brim w ith middle-aged male
tenured white faculty members. Dr.
Darby struggled fo r m eaningful
change. In less than a year’s time, be
transformed the affirm ative action
office from a decentralized structure,
accountable to no one. to a cen
tralized structure, accountable to the
director o f affirmative action. This
was his major achievements.
The transformation was not easy.
It took nearly a year. PSU’ s Black
Caucus has to engage in discussions
w ith several a d m in istra to rs to
strengthen the persuasion. Above all,
deep in the trenches o f the academic
structure, it was MacArthur Darby
who labored to persuade the
president o f PSU that no solid a ffir
mative action program could take
place under a loosely coordinated
decentralized approach. Dr. Darby
relentlessly argued that the power to
enforce against discrimination was
placed in the hands o f those who had
been, over the years, responsible for
the exclusion o f Blacks and others.
The decentralized system had never
worked before. It certainly would
not work in the future when we can
anticipate the spirit o f affirm ative
action changing into the philosophy
o f every (white) man for himself.
In July, w ith a somewhat sur
prising move, President Joseph
Blumel consented to the centralized
process o f a ffirm a tive action ad
ministration. He moved, as appears
to he his course in equal opportunity
matters, reluctantly. Clearly, it was
the persuasion o f MacArthur Darby
w hich strongly encouraged the
President to move in the right direc
tion. Now the caution must be noted:
W ith Dr. Darby leaving, there is an
invitation to the PSU administration
to slide cleaverly back into a stagnant
attitude toward equal employment.
We must not allow this to happen.
M a c A rth u r D arby cautions us
against this very real possibility: “ 1
think that unless Black folks and
other minorities learn how to put
group pressure on organizations and
institutions we are going to start
going backward in the near future.
The courts arc not a solid ground on
which to rest. The key is to make
clear in an aggressive manner that
there cannot he retreat; we must
make progress. In this sense the
Black community is key, and that
has been missing here in Portland.”
The departure o f the affirmative
action officer, coupled with Dr. Mel
Henry’ s resignation from the School
o f Social Work recently, is part o f
the vicious, revolving door syndrome
at ?SU. While the existence o f such a
syndrome tells on the atmosphere at
PSU, it also points to our own
deficiency.
We lack the ability to investigate
employment practices and proce
dures at PSU. We pay little a t
tention to the disgraceful figures. We
ignore a discriminatory promotion
process. We remain silent as our
friends and neighbors arc chewed up
in search com m ittees which arc
already stacked against them. We
minimize the fact that most Blacks at
PSU arc employed in the lowest
paying occupations. We are deficient
when it comes to fighting for a better
future in our city through an im
provement o f PSU’s response to our
educational requirements.
It is clear that the syndrome and
the deficiency are linked. The link is
appreciation in the following con
text. On a campus entrenched with a
history o f exclusion and racism,
those who fight arc isolated. The
fight is lonely, the victories are few.
There is only one sure way to endure
the struggle and gain the modest vic
tory: Community organizations and
individuals must provide support.
Unfortunately, such support has not
been provided.
It is with sorrow that we note the
resignation o f M acA rthur Darby.
His talents w ill he missed. I have
worked alongside him. He is ex
tremely thorough, staunchly fo rth
rig h t, and as p rin cip le d an ad
ministrator as I have ever known. I
hope we w ill heed his warning:
“ I f we do not learn how to come
together and work together, the little
progress we have made w ill not he
maintained. I cannot say that I have
seen such coming together here in
Portland at this time. I hope it will
develop in the future.”
JLetiMi to due, &bfM
Apartheid: Nazism revisited
(Continued from Page I Column 6)
leaves us disenfranchised and subject
to arrest, harassment, beatings, tor
ture and outright murder. Far from
weakening apartheid, the Sullivan
Principles would actually strengthen
it by providing badly needed foreign
cash.
Bishop Sullivan, who dreamed up
the Principles, is a member o f the
Board o f Directors with Ford, one
corporation that has refused to pull
out o f South A fric a . As such his
judgement is determined more by eco
nomic considerations than concern
for the human rights o f his fellow
" I am a bit disappointed. They say
they are sorry to set you go, that they
wish things could be different, but
they d on‘t mean it. I think most are
happy to see me go, and th e ir
behavior demonstrates that to me.
H hen I look at my situation in light
o f what has been said by other
Blacks and m inority faculty, I realize
that ! have the same reaction. That is
to say, i f the Portland State Univer
sity administration is so unhappy to
see someone leave, then why does it
not respond positively and with sin
cere concern in the firs t place?”
Prisoners demonstrate lack of priorities
To the Editor:
Since I ’ m at the prison annex and
unable to com m unicate w ith the
O.S.P.’ s Correspondent, Mr. Larry
Baker, I have taken the initiative to
forward this communication direct.
A fte r reading the August 3rd.
publication (“ Behind the W all” sec
tion) 1 felt an overpowering need to
inform the public and the readers of
the Observer, just where things are
really at. In this article, the public
was exposed to a misrepresentation
o f facts, a poorly constructed list of
grievances, a frightened convict men
tality and the glorification o f prison
officials who’s merit isn’ t justified.
Here we are, the inmates at
Oregon State Prison, with a prime
o p p o rtu n ity to get constructive
changes made through the Justice
Department and look what happens.
We present a list o f grievances such
as. asking for greater access to legal
envelopes and a notary o f public,
asking for religious diets to be placed
on the menus, equal choice in selec
tion o f outside entertainment, em
ployees not being willing to escort
m inority inmates out on speaking
engagements and projects. H ell!
What we should be asking for and
lite ra lly screaming about, is fo r
prison officials to discontinue search
ing a M A N S ’ rectum and other
dehumanizing practices, to provide a
better and more accessible medical
and dental facilities, to give us are
due human rights and respect, to
raise standards fo r hiring prison
guards, opening the prison up and
giving us the general responsibilities
o f human beings, p ro vid in g
vocational training programs that
will be meaningful to a man and (hat
he can take pride in, to do something
about the parole board and their new
matrix system! In short, ask for the
necessities that w ill instill pride, self
respect, and productive skills that
w ill benefit a convict returning to so
ciety. These arc the issues that should
be o f paramount concern.
The Warden says that he welcomes,
and that his office is always open for
these kind o f suggestions. What
W arden w o u ld n 't be when a
frightened man asks for more legal
envelopes and a notary o f public,
when he should be asking for respect
and dignity?
As 1 said previously, we have a
prime opportunity to demonstrate
the power o f collective efforts. We
have finally brought the conditions,
the riff-ra ff, and the racism to the
public. We have the support o f the
NAACP. the Department o f Justice,
and representatives from the Gover
nors Office to deal with the issues we
present. Please, do you hear me,
PLEASE! don’ t let this opportunity
get away from us, behind petty fears
and down right plain lack o f man
hood.
To all my minority brothers inside
(he walls, I want to remind you, " fo r
your e ffo rts in our struggle fo r
human rights, they may hassle you
and try to intimidate you into hurt
ing yourself for being a man and
speaking out. But they sure as hell
can't mess with the affirmed dale
baby!” Remember, if we can get our
fu ll human rights, respect and
dignity, everything else w ill fall in
place.
Respectfully,
Stevie Hoggans 838921
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