Student journalist finds racism in Salem, Oregon
by Gail Harris
Although I was a little skeptical
when I came to Salem in June 1 knew
the city would have few Black resi
dents besides myself, but I never ex
pected to find what 1 found.
When my friends in Los Angeles
heard that I had been offered a news
paper internsh ip in Salem, they
urged me to go. They said Salem was
a beautiful city filled with clean air
and good drinking water.
Believing that I ’d learned a lot and
become more independent by spend
ing the summer in a strange new
place, I accepted my first real news
paper job.
'I was looking forward to meeting
another intern, a Black student from
Middlebury College in Vermont. She
« S í : iS ; » :/
would be my roommate while in
Salem.
When we arrived here. 1 was im
pressed. The city looked cozy, clean
and smogless. Trees and greenery
seemed to line almost every street.
On our second day here, as my
roommate, Dori, and I waited for
breakfast at a restaurant, to our sur
prise a balding man approached our
table.
As he nervously eyed his surround
ings, the man, dressed in a suit, handed
me a note, then walked away. It
said " I would like to get to know you
better, if interested contact. . . ” A f
ter Dori convinced me that I should
not bother to run after the man and
tell him o ff, I sat at the table seething
with anger and hum iliation. I was
too furious to enjoy my pancakes.
S its ;S. ,.
When we were looking for a place
to live. Dori and I saw a notice for an
unfurnished apartment near where
we worked. I called the manager to
inquire about rental and deposit fees.
Once the manager got a glimpse o f his
prospective tenants, the deposit fee
doubled in size. He said it was $80
instead o f the $40 quoted to me over
the telephone.
After those incidents and others,
Dori, a native o f New York City, and
I, became so paranoid that we had
trouble sleeping at night.
A noise at the kitchen window
frightened us one night, to the point
that we thought about leaving the
apartment and asking a friend to
take us in until morning. I thought
the Kian had come to visit.
I took a few knives out o f a drawer
i!.
for protection and we mustered up
courage to check the w indow .
Moths, attracted by the kitchen light,
were knocking against the window.
1 wrote home to tell my family and
friends about Salem, especially how
people stared at us wherever we
went. My mother demanded that 1
leave im m ediately, but I refused
because 1 liked working for the news
paper and needed the experience.
On July 17th, a cloudless day
where temperatures exceeded 90
degrees, Dori and 1 walked to work
as usual. The day was beautiful until
we were nearly run over by a car
whose driver laughed as we jumped
out o f the way. The day before I had
a similar encounter with a woman
driver who seemed to think I had no
right to cross the street. The car in
■: > ....
cidents unnerved us more than any
other because we had come close to
being h it several times before.
During each o f the near disasters we
had been in crosswalks and obeying
walk signals. Dori said, **I feel safer
in New York than in Salem.”
1 replied, "th e law p ro h ib itin g
Blacks to live here was repealed in
1926, but as far as I ’ m concerned
lawmakers could have kept it on the
books. What Black person would by
choice want to live in a city like this?
I certainly d o n 't.” It wasn't until I
came to Salem that I became an ex
pert car-dodger, or was approached
like I was a prostitute, or been stared
at like I was an animal in a zoo.
I got more upset when I tried to
tell some o f my co-workers about
these problem s. A few people
samc-sw««
believed me, but most said I was too I
race conscious and that such inci- I
dents could happen to anyone,
regardless o f color. "There are a lot
o f bad drivers here,” they'd say. " A
car almost ran over a friend o f mine
the other day.
“ It's not happening to you be
cause you’ re Black. It happens to
everyone.”
When I mentioned the incidents to
some o f the Blacks that I met here,
none were surprised. Most o f them
had encountered sim ilar or worse f
problems.
A Black man I know came here in 1
July for a two-day business trip. On S
his first night in Salem two men ap- 1
proached him in a restaurant parking ■
lot and asked him if "the prince o f S
(Please turn to page 7 column 3)
PORTLAND OBSERVER
Volume 9 No. 36
Thursday, September 6. 1979 IOC
USPS959 680
Parks advises unity in struggle
MRS ROSA PARKS
“ You have to struggle not only for
those who are willing to go, but for
those who refuse to g o " , Rosa
Parks, known as the mother o f the
modern civil rights movement, told
those attending the Portland Branch
N AAC'P’ s Founders Day Banquet
F riday evening.
Mrs. Parks explained that her
refusal to give up her seat on a M ont
gomery bus, setting o ff a year long
boycott that ended segregation on
the busses, was not a single act o f
courage but a way o f life.
“ A ll o f us fell in line and did what
we were supposed to do, but as far
back as I can remember I did resist
and hated segregation. My mother
never accepted the idea that we were
not as good as anybody else because
o f color. She believed we should be
free and equal in all walks o f life ."
Her defiance came at a time o f
c o n flic t in Alabam a. The U.S.
Supreme C o u rt had ordered
desegregation o f the schools and six
teen Black parents in Montgomery
found the courage to petition their
school board. Their plea was ignored
but they were exposed. Emmitt T ill
was murdered and his body found
badly m utilated. The people were
aroused.
In March o f 1954, a fifteen year
old girl was arrested for refusing to
give up her seal on the bus.
On December I, 1955 Mrs. Parks
boarded the bus on her way home
from work and sat in the “ colored"
section. As the bus filled, a white
man remained standing. The driver
asked her to stand so he could be
seated and she refused. She was
arrested and led away in handcuffs.
" I had trouble many times on the
busses, but this time the people took
notice and decided to stay o ff the
busses to bring the changes needed.
People no longer remained com
placent and indifferent to the con
ditions.”
This act began the Montgomery
Bus Boycott which thrust a young
Baptist m in iste r, M a rtin L uth er
King, Jr., into a leadership role.
M rs. Parks was active in the
N A A C P in M ontgom ery and an
organizer o f the Youth Branch. She
remains active in the c iv il rights
movement.
She has received several citations
fo r her outstanding co n trib u tio n .
The Southern Christian I eadership
Conference (SCLC) sponst an an
nual Rosa Parks Freedom Award; in
1976 M ayor Coleman Young o f
Detroit named a street "Rosa F >rks
Boulevard” . In 1977, she receiv'd
the U nited A u to W orkers Social
Justice Award and the Humanitarian
Award from the Catholic U niver
sities o f A m erica. In 1978, the
Progressive National Baptist C on
vention presented her with the Mar
tin Luther King, Jr. Award.
Mrs Parks is art administrator in
the o ffic e o f Congressman John
Conyers. Jr. o f Michigan.
“ If you have firm convictions, you
w ill move forw ard,” she said. "H o w
much better it would be if those
around you would take a moment to
listen, to think whai it means to be
unified and to cooperate to move
toward the goal we seek.
“ A ll have to go together. We can’ t
be divided by age or financial status.
Together we w ill succeed There arc
too many forces at work against us
for us to be divided or fearful -- we
shall succeed only if, as a people, we
work together."
M am bers of the In n er N o rth e as t Econom ic
D evelopm ent Council toured St. Johns and the
Vaughn-Thurm an corridore to examine economic
developm ent projects in other areas of the City.
Citizens view development policy
In a final hearing on the current
d ra ft o f the C ity 's proposed
Economic Development Policy four
o f the approximately twenty mem
bers o f the appointed c itize n s’
Ecomonomic Development Advisory
Committee listened, along with Eric
Hovee, Econom ic Developm ent
Coordinator in the Office o f Plan
ning and Development, to about
twenty-five citizens. Representatives
o f the Urban Indian Council, the
Burnside Council and others made
comments on the proposal.
Need for real neighborhood input
in City undertakings was expressed,
as was the need for financial and
technical assistance to neigh
borhoods, p a rtic u la rly to assist
m inority business enterprise. Em
ployment needs and neighborhood
economic development proposals
were topics o f citizen comment.
Thaaa children are welting for their school bus on
Seventh Avenue one half block from King School,
New school district policy allows all children to w ait
for the bus at their neighborhood school and requires
that they be provided shelter and supervision.
Above they enjoy lunch at Cathedral Park, under the
St. Johns Bridge, in St. Johns.
The Council will recommend zone changes and in
dustrial sites for the Albina area
The following comments are from
a statement presented by Claudia
Fisher.
The City seems to have collected
some socio-economic data regarding
local conditions but it has fallen
short o f having data on specific
targets o f employment strategies and
the effects o f programs on them. The
targets to w hich I refe r are
m in o ritie s , women and sm all
businesses. It seeks to correct this
through establishing "a ffirm a tiv e
action in fo rm a tio n se rvices".
A lth o u g h the percentages o f
minorities and women are known, as
well as the low percentage o f
businesses owned by these groups,
no targets are set fo r increasing
business ownership o f minorities and
women.
Though the training programs o f
the C ity w ill e n ro ll women and
minorites in proportion equal to or
exceeding their numbers o f disadvan
taged, no mention is made o f City
employment policies. A part o f the
C ity’ s economic development policy
should be to hire by the stated stand
ards rather than just to train.
While first source agreements are
significant tools, no sanctions are
mentioned against firm s receiving
City assistance and location approval
w hich are then found to have
discriminatory hiring practices.
No mention is made under "o bje c
tives” o f the C ity’s goal o f a ten per
cent m in o rity business u tiliza tio n
requirem ent fo r construction bid
awards.
The C ity ’ s policy to encourage
employers to give preference to City
residents should not exclude non-city
minorities or women if no qualified
minorities or women can be found,
as is frequently maintained.
The policy mentions that the
City w ill develop "v o lu n ta ry " incen
tives for employees to hire neigh
borhood residents. W ith federal
money being received by the City
partly on the basis o f the population
numbers in disadvantaged areas, and
with a first-source City policy, there
is no reason not to require hiring and
training o f vicinity residents first.
W hile tax breaks such as in
crement financing and other ongoing
governmental assistance is available
to large business and industry, the
policy’ s stated goal is that “ alter
native technologies and organiza
tions responsive to com m unity
needs” be “ self-sustaining".
The proposal’ s weak statements
describing how the City “ met with
neighborhoods” and had an “ ad
visory committee” gives no evidence
in itself that participation was exten
sive, meaningful or representative.
No fu tu re citizen p a rtic ip a tio n
processes are defined. It promises
“ a” woman and " a " minority on
im p o rta n t commissions but since
commissions are usually large and
appointed, such a promise means
nothing as far as insuring respon-
sivensess to minorities and women.
F o llo w in g
c o m p ila tio n
of
testimony from the public hearings
the proposal w ill go to the C ity
Council. Copies can be obtained at
City Hall and written comments can
be submitted before September 10th
to Eric Hovee.
Parents receive student assignment options
As a result o f negotiations with the Black United Front
leading to new school district policies, the following ex
planation o f student assignment options was mailed to
parents o f administrative transfer students.
A fo u rth grade w ill be added at E liot School. Third
grade students residing in the Eliot area who attended
other schools last year may attend the school to which they
have been assigned or may enroll in the fourth grade at
Eliot this year. A ll fifth grade students who live in the Eliot
area may continue at the school to which they have been
assiened, or they may attend either Beach or Boise School.
A th ird grade class w ill be added to Hum boldt School
f o r the 197901980 school year. A ll third grade students
living in the Humboldt attendance area may attend the
school to which they have been assigned or may choose to
attend the H um boldt third grade class. This choice is
available to students who attended H um boldt in the
second grade last year and to the students living in the
Humboldt area who attended other schools in the second
grade last year. Fourth and fifth graders who live in the
Humboldt area may continue to attend the school which
they are now attending or they may choose to attend Beach
or Boise School.
The Policy o f the Portland Board o f Education always
has permitted students living in the attendance areas o f
Eliot, Boise, Humboldt, King, Woodlawn, Vernon, Ir
vington and Sabin who attend schools outside their resi
dent attendance area to return to the neighborhood
primary, middle or high school if they so choose.
For the school year 1979-1980 Beaumont School w ill be
an optional attendance school for the sixth, seventh and
eighth grade students living in Area I portion o f King.
C olum bia/W hitaker w ill be an optional attendance area
for those grades for students in the Area I portion o f
Woodlawn. Fernwood w ill be an optional attendance
school for sixth, seventh and eighth grade students who
live in the Hum boldt area. I f space is not available in those
schools, or i f the 50 per cent m inority lim it is exceeded,
students can be assigned to Beach, Ockley Green, Chief
Joseph and Kenton Schools on a space available basis.
Requests fo r changes in school assignment w ill be
received until September 28th. Inform ation can be ob
tained at the schools or at the school district office, 249-
2000
Students returning to neighborhood schools must attend
the school in the attendance area in which they live, if their
grades are offered in that school. No student can be turned
away from his neighborhood school because o f lack o f
space. Principals have been advised to make arrangements
to accommodate all children residing in their attendance
area who wish to attend the school.