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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 16, 1983)
9 « '• . . M V> * * * u Page 4 Portland O b te rw c N o v m b f 16,1963 _________ High Tech fo r whom? EDITORIAL/OPINION by Dr. Manning Marable Demand lead-free water Portland’s pure water is poisoning residents who have not been informed how to protect themselves from lead poisoning. Connectors or pipes containing lead or cop per pipes with lead solders can cause lead to leach into the water supply in homes, schools and other buildings. Although expensive alter ations may be required in many buildings, a simple procedure will eliminate most of the lead intake. Let your tap water run long enough to flush out the pipes (about four to five minutes) before you take water for use. It is the City of Portland’s legal responsibil ity to insure that the water reaching the con sumer’s tap is pure, but the Portland Water Bureau has no policy of ihforming the con sumers of the danger or of quickly making the .♦W needed changes. The individual citizen can contact the Water Bureau and have the building inspected to see if the City’s or the individual’s pipes contain lead and to test the tap water. The identification and elimination o f the city’s lead-containing pipe and the identifica tion of improper private plumbing should be taken on as an emergency campaign by the neighborhood associations. Only extreme po litical pressure will move the City to perform its obligations. The public health and the development of our children is at stake. There should be no higher priority of city government than to pro tect its residents. I HAVE BEEN CPJ.CHED Ite E W A, LEAVE? CF THE NlCAtfAálAN B e ¿ ai < e his forces seek m I , HoWWEP. VAu TO SEE Mr/THtNe IKAPCcptC IK OUQ D196U&IOK MT&e A ll - HE'S A òovfctm ewT empinee OVERTHROW n w u w y o f T H e N lC A P tfr tlW Corporations and politicians alike have been feeding us a heavy dose o f ’ ’high technology propagan d a " in recent years. Many leading Democrats, including neo-liberals like Massachusetts Senator Paul Tsongas and presidential aspirant Gary H art, have claimed that the rapid expansion o f high technologi cal firms would resolve many of America’s long-term economic- problems But let's try to separate the political rhetoric from the harsh realities. How has the high technology and computer boom affected Black workers? Labor force statistics indi cate, first, that most Blacks perform at low-skilled positions in high tech firms. Blacks are almost never hired as managers, but as low level opera tives and clerical workers in such companies. Second, racial and sexual segrega tion is already an organic part o f high tech manufacture. Today, whites comprise over 96 percent o f all professional and managerial po sitions in high tech-related firms, such as insurance, computers, and banking. Women and nonwhites to tal over 90 percent o f the operatives and clerical workers in these com panies. Despite industry claims that high tech could generate a huge de mand for skilled workers, most poli tical economists predict that high tech will create only 900,000 new jobs over the next ten years. And be cause the vast m ajority of these new positions will be clericals and opera tives, Blacks and Hispanics now entering the field won’t benefit m a terially. Third, high technology is rapidly eliminating thousands o f jobs every year which were ’ ’ traditionally" the employment sectors o f Black, Hispanic and women workers. Sev eral hundred thousand Black wom en are currently employed as bank tellers, clericals, keypunch opera tors, stenographers,, etc. Employ ment in these vocations w ill drop by at least one-fifth during the next 10- 15 years due to the expanded use o f computers. T w o disturbing illustra tions o f this dynamic can be cited. One major New York bank re cently issued a statement telling depositors below a certain amount that they would not be permitted to see a teller for normal transactions. Instead, customers »would transact their business via a bank card ma chine. This move meant that the number o f tellers could conceivably be reduced. Since 1970, further more, the number o f telephone op erators has beeun cut 30 percent, primarily because o f the use o f com puters. Corporate technology prom ises to slash more jobs in the future. According to social historian Am y Dru Stanley, "Com puters and automated data processors have fragmented and simplified clerical and service work, multiplying the number o f low-wage positions." Today over 97 percent o f all office word processors are operated by women, Blacks and Hispanics. By 1990, according to Stanley, " 5 0 to 75 percent o f all service work will be computer-related.” Secretaries, cashiers, bookkeepers and other low-income white collare employees will be affected. Fourth, American banks have been largely responsible for subsi dizing the high tech explosion abroad, which in turn has under mined U.S. jobs. Between 1960 and f983, for instance, the sale o f fo r eign made steel in the U .S. has exp anded from 5 percent to 23 percent. Why? Examine the behavior o f ten major banks— C itibank, C hemic al Bank, Continental Illinois, M ellon, First Chicago, Wells Fargo. West ern Bankcorp, Security Pacific. J.P . M organ, and Rainier Bancorp. The pension funds o f U .S . Steel and Bethlehem Steel had, as o f the late 1970s, a total o f S I33 m illion invest ed in the stock o f these ten bonks. Using the same deposits, plus those of other American workers, these banks loaned Japanese steel com panies more than one billion, 165 million dollars. Japanese steel forms have taken U .S . workers' capital to develop high tech steel production, which in turn displaces the same steelworkers! The aggressive export o f high tech-oriented production facilities by U.S.-based multinationals, com bined with the suppression o f fo r eign workers’ wages, has sent hun dreds o f thousands o f Americans to unemployment lines. Small wonder that the percentage o f foreign made electrical components in the past 23 years has soared from 1 percent to 26 percent; the percentage o f con sumer electronics, 6 percent to 95 percent; and the percentage o f cal culators, 5 percent to 45 percent. High technology could be used to serve the interests o f the labor movement, rather than the destruc tive prerogatives of the banks and the corporations. Technological ad vances must serve the public policy goal o f a full employment economy at home, combined with the imple mentation of more effective a ffir mative action guarantees which ad vance the interests o f Blacks, La tinos and women. Washington Hot Line by Congressman Ron Wyden as _____ Letters. to tjie Editor. Open letter to District 18 residents •hree candidates, immediately after the community vote offered his full support and endorsement of the comm unity’s choice, Margaret C ar The Nov. 5th Community Forum was the beginning o f something good. It was an invitation to the Black comnmunity to become in volved in the decision-making pro cess o f the State o f Oregon. The primary organizers of the forum , Herb Cawthorne, Ron Herndon, M arion Scott and Rev. John tiarling to n. developed and presented an opportunity for all re sidents of District 18 to hear Black candidates present their positions on six major issues and receive ques tions from the audience. Following the question and answer period, re sidents were asked to cast a vote as to which o f the candidates they felt would best represent the concerns and needs of people in the district. The organizers are to be com mended for their diligence in devel oping and presenting the forum. The openness with which the meet ing was begun and the organizers* willirgness to openly review at the forum how major decisions were made, resolved the concerns for process integrity. ter. Although the forum was a positive step for the Black commu nity, it was only one step. It is now up to the community, the forum or ganizers and the 22 supporting or ganizations (as stated by the organi zers) to carry the momentum fo r ward. The forum was successful at fo cusing on the need for political unity in the Black community, a need so often expressed by Jesse Jackson. A case in point for the beginning o f such political unity was demonstrat ed when Luther Strong, one o f the " ™ ™ I I I I I I ■ I I ™ ™ For the first time in this commu nity’s history there is the beginning o f a true political power base, the Black vote delivered as a block. But for this power to be realized the community must demonstrate its ability to vote as a block. It must act positively to realize the full potential of the forum's strategy. However, a Black candidate can neither be elected by nor only repre sent Black voters when 56 percent of the electorate consists o f whites, His panics, Native Americans, Asians and others, as is the case in District 18. For this reason, any candidate se lected by the Black community must seek and gain the support and in volvement o f all the people of the district. Although the block o f Black votes is a powerful tool, the ability o f legislators to secure pas sage of critical legislation is largely dependent upon broad district sup port as well as personal attributes. The block vote and community unity are extremely important, but so is your involvement as a volun teer informing your neighbors on critical issues and motivating them to become involved in the political process. Equally vital is dollar con tributions. The cost o f printing ma terials and getting a message to all residents o f the district is an expen sive undertaking. The block vote for Black people can become a reality in Oregon and the most diverse district in the state can be unified. But all residents must make the effort; they must vote, volunteer their time and help to pay costs. And the community's candidate must meet and work openly, accountably and responsib ly with all the people o f District 18. Fred M ilton The Observer welcomes Letters to the Editor. Letters should be short, and must contain the writer's name and address (addresses are not p rim ed). The Observer reserves the right to edit f o r length. 7-ówñeTnewspaper, Subscribe today! PORTLAND OBSERVER News fo r and about you. 1 2 (Continued from page I column 6) The City or private laboratories yzed, but the results can be altered by the sampling procedure. I f sam ples are taken where the tap has been allowed to run and the pipes are flushed out, a minimum o f lead will be found, so samples should be taken o f stagnant water that has been standing in the pipes for sever al hours. Solution Barring o f lead solders w ill be considered by the Oregon Health Division at a public hearing Friday, November 18th but this will affect only future plumbing. The C ity has the responsibility to replace all rected to take into account the needs of the elderly and other groups that would have trouble affording a phone when establishing their pro grams. Taken together, these measures are a significant step toward keeping the phone a common utility, avail able to all. And I believe that is what we must do. I have said again and again that the value of a phone is linked to the universality o f the whole phone system. In other words, it doesn't do me any good to have a phone if 1 want to call some one who doesn’t have one because they can't afford it. There is still much work to be done. The legislation must pass the Senate, be reconciled with the House version and, finally, be signed by the President. But, at least we are over the first big hurdle and that much closer to ensuring a ffo rd able phone service for all. offending pipes on public property, but changes in internal plumbing are the responsibility o f the owners. A relatively simple and low-lost solution would be the addition of lime to the water to reduce its corro sivity and prevent it from absorbing lead. Although Burt has attempted to influence the W ater Bureau to take the threat o f lead poisoning ser iously, he has received little cooper ation. The Safe Drinking W ater Act requires that water services notify their customers when contamination exceeds allowable standards but the Portland W ater Bureau has not complied. A small notification, sug gesting flushing o f pipes, appeared in the newsletter mailed with water bills but the item did not explain why this is necessary. Following publicity over the City o f Seattle’s corrosion problem, which causes millions o f dollars worth o f damage to water pipes, the Water Bureau commissioned a study o f the results o f Portland water corrosion but the 1982 study did not include health factors. Burt continues his work, urging Portland residents to protect their own safety until the City is forced to act. This action could be hastened when the first diagnosed lead poi soned resident files suit against the City for violation of the Safe D rin k ing W ater Act. Further inform ation can be ob tained from Citizens for a Lead Free Environment. PO Box 20696, Port land. O R 97230. Yes, I w o u ld Ilka a s u b s c rip tio n ! to the Portland Observer. □ I have enclosed my check or money order for 116, for a one year I J ™ •Al MR! * 1 O reqo't Iff 1 • Newspaper 1 Publishers Association i 1 Portland Observer ■.a' fiwa. Th« P o rtla n d O t o r r .t r IU S P S 959 M O i >s p u b lis h « ! avant Thursday by Eue Pubbsh-nq Company. Inc 2201 North Killings worth Portland Oregon 97217 Post Ottica Bo« 3137 Portland Oregon 97208 Second class postage paid at Portland Oregon Tha Portland O tn e r .tr was established m 1970 Subscriptions »15 00 par year at tha Tn County area Post m aster Sand address changes to the Portland O t n m e r P 0 MEMBER Bo. 3137 Portland O»*qori 97206 local Bell companies. But the fee was plainly unfair. Under the access charge decision, telephone customers would be charged a flat montly fee o f from $2 to $6 for access to long distance lines even i f they never made a single long distance call. In addition to removing this un fair charge for small businesses and residential customers, the House legislation would establish a fund, the “ Universal Service Fund,” which would guarantee that in rural areas and other areas o f high cost phone service, the phone rates would not rise substantially above the national average. The bill would also create a " life line service,” under which state public utilities commissions are di rected to provide reduced rate local service for recipients o f Aid to Fam ilies with Dependent Children, food stamps or Supplemental Security In come. State PUCs would also be d i Water carries lead poison____ __ PLEASE PRINT Mail to Portland Observe! I I For months, the battle to ensure affordable phone rates has been waged both here in the Capitol and across the country. Late last week, that battle finally came to a head in the House o f Representatives and I'm glad to report that common sense won out. At that time, the House o f Repre sentatives passed the Universal Tele phone Service Preservation Act of 1983 bringing us a step closer to keeping millions o f consumers from having to pay unjust and inequitable fees for their phone. The legislation, as passed by the House, would exempt millions of small businesses and residential cus tomers from paying the Federal Communications Commission's flat monthly "access charge." This fee. which is a charge for ac cess to long distance lines, was de signed to replace the revenue which local phone companies would lose when A T A T splits away from the 283 2486 Boa 3137. Portland. Oregon 97208 N a m e _______ A lfred L Henderson. Editor/Publisher A l Williams. Advertising Manager A d d ress ____ C ity _ _ _ _ _ S ta te Association - founded TBB9 N a tio n a l A dvertiam g A ap raaantativa A m algam ata«! Rubliabara Inc N a w York f t . . . I I
