I
Community Coalition presents findings, school desegregation plan
The C om m unity C o alitio n for
School Integration will present the
results o f eighteen months o f re
search on desegregation in the Portland
Public Schools and its recommen
dations on M onday evening,
November 27th. The School Board
meeting will be held at Benson High
School at 7:30 p.m.
with wljjte schools. At least three of
the Albina schools would be 4th 9th
grade schools, serving students living
in the attendance area and the 4th-
8th graders from the paired schools.
The remaining Albina schools wouiu
be Kindcrgurten-4th grade schools,
serving children from the attendance
area and from the paired school.
The Coalition will recommend a
pairing system, in which the seven
majority Black schools will be paired
The schools receiving 5th-8th
graders should have specialized
programs to enhance academic
achievement.
They will recommend that none of
the schools receiving m in o rity
students have less than 20 percent
minority students.
Currently six o f the seven Albina
schools do not have upper grades,
varying from Humboldt with only
the 1st and 2nd grades to others with
5th grade. The Coalition found that
the upper grade Black students forced
out o f these schools are scattered
throughout the district, many find
ing themselves the only Black in a
classroom. There has been no effort
to place children from a neigh
borhood together in the same school.
The result is that 72 buses take King
students to 43 different schools.
The C oalition will recommend
that the current system o f “ A d
ministrative Transfers" he phased
out and that the pairing system be in
stituted by the fall of 1980.
The C oalition will recommend
that the T itle V II federal deseg
regation funds — which now go
to 29 schools — be concentrated in
the schools involved in pairing and in
the high schools they feed.
M in o rity S ta ff
PORTLAND
O B S E R /E R
Volum e • No. 47 Thursday. Novem ber 23.1978 10c per copy
MMIMS
The Coalition has found that the
district does not hire minorities in
“ reasonable balance” on its staff.
The m inority percentage in P ort
land’s work force is 8.4 per cent
and in the Portland population is 10
per cent. Twenty per cent o f the
students attending the P ortland
Public Schools are minorities -- 14.5
per cent o f these Black. Only 5.9 per
cent o f the district’s principals are
minorities; 5.1 per cent o f the secon
dary classroom teachers; 7.3 per
cent o f all teachers; 0 per cent
psychologists; 6.7 per cent o f
librarians.
The Coalition will ask that the
School Board set a p rio rity on
recruiting and hiring minorities in
positions that have daily contact with
students. The Board will be asked to
establish the proportion o f minority
students (currently 20 per cent) as
the long-term goal o f a “ balanced
staff” . The proportion o f teachers
should be the same proportion as
minority students.
In placement o f minority staff,
the teachers should be integrated
throughout the district, but they
should not be only one minority staff
member at a school.
Discipline
A Thanksgiving basket is being prepared by the family of
twelve social providers housed at the King Neighborhood
Facility. Helping are: Norma Thorson. Phenessee Robert
son, Anna Madden, Brenda Jackson, Dorothy Miller and
James Loving.
In June o f 1977, the U.S. Depart
ment o f H ea lth , Education and
W elfare found that the Portland
School District discriminated against
Black students in discipline. Accord
ing to district records the number of
Mediation project solves neighborhood problems
One o f the Metropolitan Human
Relation Commission’s newest and
most successful programs is the
“ Neighborhood M ed iation Pilot
Program.” Opened in May, 1978,
the three neighborhood mediation
centers provide an alternate to police
and court solution o f neighbor to
neighbor problems.
The pilot project, which is funded
through C E T A , is a model which city
and county officials hope will be the
basis for centers throughout the
county. The primary purpose is to
provide a process for conciliating
and mediating problems between
neighbors in a manner that is
mutually satisfactory.
Ms. Karen Powell, coordinator of
the Northeast Center at 407 N .E .
Mason #2 (at Union) explained that
most o f the initial referrals have
come from agencies that commonly
deal with neighborhood disputes —
the police, the Youth Service Cen
ters, the District Attorney’s Office
and the Bureau o f Neighborhood
Environm ent — but many come
from the social agencies.
“ The police have referred
problems that they felt would be bet
ter handled by a third party —
without police intervention. Recently
we have begun to get referrals from
persons who have been involved with
us. We hope that the word will get
around and that people will begin to
call when a problem comes up.”
In the first fou r months o f
operation, 311 cases were referred —
divided evenly among the three of
fices.
When a complaint is received a
Mediation Specialist goes out the
same day or the next day to interview
all o f the people involved and try to
concilliate the dispute. About 65 per
cent o f the complaints are resolved at
this time.
I f the parties are unable to agree,
a hearing is held before three trained
neighborhood volunteers. These
volunteers hear the in fo rm atio n
given by all the participants and try
to facilitate an agreement that is
satisfactory to everyone. Once a
mutual plan is reached, those in
volved sign the agreement.
“ We have found that if the parties
participate in reaching a solution and
are able to gain some satisfaction
with it, they are more apt to abide by
it,** explained Em anuel Paris,
coordinator o f the North Mediation
Office at 6313A N. Lombard.
Although the object is to solve
problems before they are severe
enough to get to the courts, Paris ex
plained that there are some failures.
“ The program was designed to be an
alternative to court action, but in
about fifteen percent o f the cases,
the problems are too deep seated and
far reaching to be solved at this
level. ”
Most cases involve multiple com
plaints. In the first 311 cases hand
led, there were 448 types o f disputes.
O f these, 58 percent involved
criminal offenses. About 38 percent
o f those involved juveniles. Adult
misdemeanors accounted for 20 per
cent.
Verbal abuse, disorderly conduct,
vandalism, minor property damage,
assault, trespass, harassment and lit
tering made up the bulk o f the
remaining cases.
“ Those cases that come to our at
tention usually involve m ultiple
complaints and have built up over
several years,’ ’ M s. Powell ex-
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Weather
Postponements
The N A A C P membership meet
ing, scheduled fo r Novem ber
19th, will be held on November 26th,
3:00 p .m . at Hughes M em o rial
United Methodist Church, 111 N .E .
Failing. The nominating committee
will report nominations for board
and offices. The C om m unity
Coalition for School Integration will
present its findings and recommen
dations.
The Northeast C o a litio n fo r
Neighborhoods will meet November
28th at 7:30 p.m. at King Neigh
borhood Facility. The agenda in
cludes election o f officers and a
presentation by Mrs. Marian Scott
on P D C neighborhood needs
requests.
Black students suspended is still
three times the number o f white
students suspended and more than
half of the students who are expelled
are Black.
Finding that “ School authorities
bear the most immediate respon
sibility for identifying potential in
school problems,” the Coalition will
recommend that teachers be respon
sible for direct contact with parents
concerning student behavior the first
time that the behavior becomes inap
propriate.
Categories o f disciplinary action
should be changed. Suspensions
would be classified: 1) Class ex
clusion - denying a student the right
to attend a particular class for two
days or less; 2) Minor suspensions —
denial of right to attend school for
one 24 hour day or less; 3) M ajor
suspension - denial o f right to attend
school for from two to five days; 4)
Reassignment — placement in an
alternative school. All suspensions
and reassignments would be reported
to the Superintendent by m inor
suspensions would not appear on the
student’s record.
No student would leave school un
til parents had been contacted and
homework would be assigned with
credit for completed work.
Curriculum
Although teachers are provided
multi-ethnic material to use along
with the basic curriculum, the extent
o f its use is not known. There is no
requirement that Black history or
culture be included in the curri
culum. According to a survey, 54
per cent o f the Black students
bussed for desegregation are in
classrooms that do not offer Black
history, culture or literature.
The C oalition will recommend
the listing o f minority cultures, with
emphasis on Black culture, under the
heading “ M ajor category” in Social
Science and Language Arts for Kin
dergarten through grade twelve,
making them an integral part of the
curriculum.
The Coalition will recommend tht
an independent survey be made of all
classrooms to determine the extent to
which minority culture is included in
classroom teaching.
Teacher Training
The Portland School District has
sponsored a large number of classes
and workshops in m ulti-ethnic
education but these are not man
datory and 73 per cent of the sur
veyed teachers in schools receiving
Black transfer students said they had
no specific training relative to
teaching
in
a
desegregated
classroom.
The C oalition will recommend
that the district make a long term
plan to insure that all teachers, ad
ministrators, School Board members
and staff dealing with students have
training in group dynamics in an in
tegrated setting, multi-cultural per
spectives and Black culture. It will
recommend that the office in charge
o f district wide desegregation plan
ning (instituted at the request of the
C o a litio n ) develop an in-service
training program.
The C o a litio n re p o rt, titled:
“ Equity for the Eighties” will be
form ally presented to the School
Board and to the public at the
November 27th School Board
meeting.
Tucker discusses 'Jock Trap’
On Thursday, November 23rd,
Ullysses Tucker, J r., a Senior in
communications at the University o f
Portland, and a freelance journalist
w ill be a special guest on J .W .
Friday’ s “ Thanksgiving Soul A n
niversary Show.” The special will be
aired from 2:00-10:00 p.m ., (KBOO-
90.7 F M ) Tucker’ s efforts will be
broadcast between the hours o f 4:00
and 6:00 p.m.
Tucker, a published poet, will read
from the works o f several contem
porary Black writers, as well as his
own poetry. The following Friday
morning at 10:00 a.m ., Tucker will
host K B O O ’s “ Open Forum .” He
will share his opinion on the “ Jock
T rap Youngster in A thletics in
America.”
Tucker received an associates arts
degree in journalism from Southeast
C om m unity College, F airb u ry,
Nebraska in 1977 where he studied
under the noted Fulbright Fellow,
D r. Drew Byers who is currently
teaching at several universities in
Denmark.
Tucker’s experiences in athletics
range from the year 1967 when he
played basketball for the Police Boys
Club in the nation’s capital, to being
named to the All-Midwestern Junior
College basketball team as a
Sophomore in Nebraska.
Tucker is currently the basketball
coach and educational advisor at
Linnton Community Cent .
In August, 1977 Tucker enrolled at
the University o f Portland where his
ULLYSSES TUCKER, JR.
basketball career was cut short by a
foot in ju ry . It was then that he
realized the value o f education. He
decided that a profession in com
munications would be more reward
ing than burning up priceless energy
trying to make it to the N BA. While
“ cold turkeying” from basketball —
Tucker became Dean’s List student
— the first time in his academic life.
Tucker feels that there are millions
o f youngsters “ chasing rainbows and
trying to become professionals. The
odds are staggering and highly
against them. So, all o f you young
‘Jocks’ , tune in — parents too!
Ku K lux Kian on the rise
'We burn a cross to show the white race excludes darkness’
by Boyd Lewis
A T L A N T A , G A . (PNS) — “ We
do not burn a cross but rather we
light it to show that the Christian
religion and the white race excludes
darkness,” the speaker declared.
“ This is a symbol that does not
desecrate the cross but rather lights it
up and shows that light expells
darkness.'*
Several hundred men, women and
children were gathering in the
furrows and stubble o f what was
once a bean patch in north central
Alabama. To the front is a flat bed
trailer where a half dozen speakers
take turns addressing the crowd over
the roar o f a portable generator.
About 100 yards to the rear is a 30
foot high wooden cross wrapped in
burlap and soaked in oil. The air this
night in early O ctober was cold
enough but the words the men spoke
add an almost electric chill:
“ Out children, even we adults, are
being brainwashed day after day, in
race-mixing churches that preach the
false doctrine o f racial equality, on
television where we see T V program
after T V program belittling the white
man, building up the nigger race. In
the schools they call it social studies
where they teach Black history.
They call Martin Lucifer Coon the
greatest living American.”
The Ku Klux Kian is back. Found
ed by Confederate veterans o f the
Civil War in 1867 the Ku Klux —
which comes from the Greek word
“ kuklos” meaning circle — feels its
fortunes have come full circle after a
decade o f F B I in filtra tio n and
relative calm following the heyday of
the Civil Rights movement.
According to the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference
(SC LC), reports o f increased Kian
activity, rallies, and cross burnings
began coming in over the summer
and spring from Louisiana, Georgia,
Mississippi, Michigan, Illinois and
on m ilitary bases throughout the
country.
Kian cross burnings and in
tim id a tio n shut down a voter
registration campaign in south
eastern Arkansas operated by
the Voter Education Project. VEP
officials in Atlanta have reported an
outbreak o f Kian activity in the
northern panhandle o f Florida.
“ There are a lot o f white people
tired o f being pushed around, start
ing to wake u p ,” one man at an
Alabama rally said bluntly. “ I ’m
white, aren’t I , ” a woman answered
when asked why she had come to the
raliy.
Throughout the summer Black
demonstrators and Klansmen have
been exchanging threats and at times
gunshoots in Tupelo and Okolona,
Mississippi.
On the first and second days of
October, the Kian showed up in force
at C u llm an , A labam a, about an
hour’s drive north o f Birmingham to
stop a march o f Black demonstrators
organized by the SCLC. The demon
strators were attempting to march on
the Cullman County courthouse to
protest the selection o f an all-white
jury to hear the trial o f a Black man
accused o f raping a white woman.
The man, 26-year-old Tommy Lee
Hines, is retarded. The trial had
begun in Decatur, Alabama but con
stant clashes between SCLC and the
Kian resulted in a change o f venue to
C u llm a n , about 35 miles to the
south.
The Reverend R.B. Cottonreader
is a project director for SCLC and
has led protests over the trial in
Decatur and Cullman, Alabama. In
early October he led a march to the
Cullman city limits where he was met
by a much larger group of whites,
Klansmen among them and many of
them heavily armed. “ We have the
same white folks we dealt with in the
Sixties. We have the same racism,”
Cottonreader said. “ The only d if
ference is that in the Sixties Klans
men weren’t robed. Now they are.
“ I don’t think it’s really a revival.
I think they’ve always been here but
they’re just beginning to robe and
come out.”
The Kian is also flexing its muscles
in Arkansas. Mrs. M ary Budd, o f
Crossett, Arkansas, is president of
the local N A A C P chapter. The arrest
o f a Klansm an last m onth for
harassing Black school children at a
highway school crossing touched o ff
a wave o f cross burning in Crossett
and throughout the delta country o f
southeastern Arkansas. As a result,
the voter education campaign run by
Mrs. Budd collapsed for fear of what
the Kian might do next.
“ It was a disaster," she said. “ Not
right away, but people just gradually
pulled out. They refused to be part
o f it, because we were told they just
didn’t want to get involved with the
situation."
For B ill W ilkin so n , Im p erial
Wizard o f the Invisible Empire o f the
Ku Klux Kian, this and other con
frontations have won many new
members for his organization.
“ Look at the tremendous response
we’ve had at the rallies," he said.
“ A t our first Decatur rally — 5,000.
Our second rally — 11,000. Our
march on the Cullman courthouse —
over 1,000 people inside o f four
hours, just by placing a sign on the
grass.
“ Since spring and early summer of
1978 the Invisible Empire has over
doubled its membership nationwide.
And I ’d say a large proportion of
that was in the South. There’s no
doubt in my mind that before *78 is
out we will have tripled, and if things
keep accelerating at the rate they are,
we may quadruple our strength.”
An official at the Atlanta office of
the FBI said he had no information
about expansion o f the Kian’s mem
bership.
Resurgence o f Kian rallies and
membership has puzzled many
political observers, but Bob H all,
edito r o f Southern Exposure
magazine in Chapel H ill, N o rth
Carolina, doesn’t find it surprising at
all.
“ It ’s been a relatively short period
o f time that revulsion existed in the
South or even nationally against the
Kian or against lynching," he point
ed out.
“ W ith a shrinking economy, with
suspicion o f public officials and with
a general frustration at trying to
make ends meet, people look for
scapegoats. We had a period when
Blacks were not allowed^to be used as
scapegoats. Now that time seems to
be over.
“ What happens is that the sheriffs
and the mayors and the businessmen
allow the Kian to come into the
community, have some rallies in a
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