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VOLUME XX NUMBER 11
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"The Eyes and Ears of the Community"
MARCH 14,1990
House of Umoja to
Open in Portland
by Dante Che
The House o f Umoja, Philadelphia-
based safehouse for gang-related youth has
a new home in Portland.
Administrators David and Falaka Fat
tah have agreed to be the home's first house-
parents and have indicated that they will
stay here from two months to two years
until suitable local house-parents can be
recruited.
Lorenzo Poe, chairman o f the board of
the House of Umoja, Inc. said that the
Fattahs first cam e to his attention at the
Hope For Youth Conference held at V is
count Hotel. The Hope For Youth confer
ence addressed the issues of at-risk youth,
and the growing phenomena o f gang in
volvement of local area youth. The Fattahs
were speakers at the conference and aided
in the attendant workshops during the con
ference.
The Fattah's have over twenty years of
experience in the field of gang-related youth
rehabilitation. They first became involved
when one of their sons who was a gang
member, thus starting a program that has
successfully responded to the threat of gang-
related activity for over twenty years.
The new House of Umoja will be lo
cated on Seventeeth & Alberta in a building
which most recently housed the black edu
cation Center. Washington Federal Sav
ings and Loan has also donated to other
houses in same vicinity.
The program of the House of Umoja
incorporates traditional African tribal val
ues, in which there is a mother and father
figure, basic family principles o f respect
and love for the community, responsibility
for ones brothers and sisters, accountability
not only for oneself but the larger commu
nity as well, and strong work and educa
tional ethics with group dynamics, tutorial
components and counseling components.
There will be a computer lab to aid with the
tutorial com ponent as well.
The Umoja project has gained signifi
cant corporate, government, and commu
nity sponsorship in the entities o f Nike,
Inc., $100,000; City of Portland, $75,000;
Portland Police Bureau Sunshine Division,
$10,000; Oregon State Drug and Alcohol
Office, $14,000; and Washington Federal
Savings and Loan, two properties totalling
approximately $195,000 in contributions
thus far. However, according to Poe, the
projects still needs $150,000 to complete
renovations.
Referrals to the House o f Umoja will
be from three areas: local, county, juvenile
division, Oregon State Training school,
and community referrals for gang-related,
and youth at risk of being involved in
gangs. Due to the later aspect of the referral
system Poe said that it is very important to
secure funding from sources other than
government agencies.
Poe states that the gang issue is no
longer one of California import; it is how
our children, relatives, and neighbors' chil
dren who are the active participants in the
gang activities now. He estimates that we
have about five years to stem the tide of
social phenomena. We know the Umoja
model works and has worked for over twenty
years with these kind of kids and it works
effectively. The House of Umoja antici
pates opening by next Fall. Contributions
to the House of Umoja may be made di
rectly by contacting Iris Bell 287-7488, or
in the House of Umoja Trust Fund at W ash
ington Federal Bank.
Norm Rice, Seattle’s First African-American
Mayor Discusses Agenda for the 1990s
the Puget Sound Council of Gov
ernments for the tw oyears imm edi
ately after.
At the time of his election to the
Seattle City Council, Rice was
manager of corporate contributions
and social policy for Rainier N a
tional Bank.
He also was elected to Seattle’s
M etro Council in 1978, and served
for 10 years as chair of the council' s
personnel and finance committee.
During his 12 years in office.
Rice has established him self as a
recognized expert on issues rang
ing from crime and public safety, to
fiscal and budgetary policies.
Bom in Denver, Colo, in 1943,
he moved to Seattle in 1968 to
attend the University o f W ashing
ton. He is married to Dr. Constance
Rice, a successful small business
owner. Their son, Mian, is enrolled
at Eastern Washington University.
Persons wishing to attend should
call Commissioner Bogle's office,
248-4682, no later than Tuesday,
March 20. Cost of the luncheon is
$9.50. Seating is limited, and reser
vations will be accepted on a first-
come, first-served basis.
Norm Rice, who took office in
January as Seattle's first African-
American mayor, will discuss his
agenda for the 1990s Friday, March
23 at City Commissioner Dick Bogle's
first “ Commissioner’s Forum Lunch
e o n " of the year.
The luncheon will be held at the
Travelodge Motel, 1441 NE 2nd Ave.,
off Weidler.
A 1972 graduate of the School
of Communications at the Univer
sity of Washington, Rice earned the
Master in Public Administration
degree in 1974.
He first won election to the Seattle
City Council in 1978, and was elected
council president in 1983 and 1984.
He has chaired every major council
committee, including education,
finance, labor policy, personnel,
public safety, and transportation.
As an undergraduate at the
University of Washington, he worked
as a reporter for K.1XI Radio for two
years, and as a writer and editor for
KOMO-TV for two years.
He served as assistant director
of the Seattle Urban League while
attending graduate school, and as
director o f government services for
Will The “New” Immigration Destroy
Blacks-Before Drugs, That Is?
(First of a Series)
By Professor McKinley Burt
There is a growing and a very upset
segment o f African-Americans who are
expressing fears that the rapidly escalating
number of new citizens-to-be reaching
American shores and borders portend anew
round o f economic and social disasters for
Blacks (no longer the m ajority among
hyphenated Americans). Their fears do not
seem at all groundless to those who work in
social services, ranging from employment
and housing to the criminal justice system.
The flames were fueled last month when
top Bush Administration officials approved
a plan to raise visa quotas and let in 140,000
more immigrants each year above the an
nual average of 490,000, citing "hum ani
tarian and economic concerns." Things
were not helped much when Representative
Bruce Morrison said he wanted to raise the
ante to 750,000.
Whatever the merits of that particular
argument. Black leaders and many others
know fully well that had not those early
millions of white immigrants been cut off
by German submarines in W orld War I,
Blacks would have ended up displaced to
reservations, just as the American Indians
before them. African Americans in the
nation's inner cities see a more direct,
visible and contemporary threat, not only in
job competition by new waves of Asians
and Latinos for the lower-paid, unskilled
minimum wage jobs that have always served
as an economic refuge for those at the
bottom of the ladder-but in the newcomer's
increasing acquisitions of those smaller
ghetto businesses traditionally a stepping
stone for Blacks into the world of com
merce. (There are two kinds o f immigra
tion: people and money.)
It has exacerbated the situation as Blacks
have perceived the new arrivals to have
much greater access to b an k loans, com
mercial leases, mall locations, and profit
able franchises. Also, they have that which
many of the immigrants are able to bring to
bear financial resources from their land of
origin, or from American combines of their
brethren-or are able to tap capital pools
formed by their American sponsors. Some
blacks are asking where in the world are
their leaders and urban organizations on
these issues, what programs have they in
the works.
Last year John E. Jacob, National D i
rector of the Urban League, made the fol
lowing statements in his weekly column (5/
18/89):
Tm increasingly annoyed by the ac
ceptance o f a new mvth about the poor.
You've probably heard it, too.
It goes like this: "The success o f the
new immigrants to these shores proves
that we don't need new government
programs to end poverty.”
Baloney. Our home-grown poor,
and especially the African American
poor, face a lack o f economic and edu
cational opportunities, as well as p er
sistent racial discrimination, that makes
such comparisons and conclusions odi -
ous.
Instead o f dealing with the very real
problems faced by America's poor people,
we're romanticizing an immigrant ex
perience that has little relationship with
reality.
O f course, many o f the new immi
grants are making it. But that shouldn't
surprise anyone, since immigrants are a
self-selected group -o n ly the most am
bitious, driven people leave their fam i
lies and countries to start life in another
land.
We shouldn't forget that many of
the current immigrants to America are
drawnfrom the educated middle class of
their countries, so they come with ad
vantages yesterday's immigrants and
many o f today's American poor don't
have.
O f course, a lot o f immigrants have
backgrounds that are not middle class.
Many, including large numbers from
south c f the border, come here to escape
starvation. They're willing to do any
thing at any price.
But young African Americans are
products o f our own system and rightly
expect the economic opportunities other
Americans have.
Finally, too many o f our kids are
ground down by discrimination and grow
up in crime and drug-ridden ghettoes.
racially isolated, consigned to schools
that don’t educate them."
(Continued on Page 4)
I
I
(Photo courtesy of the 'Oregonian')
David Fattah and his wife, Sister Falaka Fattah, will be the first house parents of the House of Umoja, a sanctuary
for street-gang youths. Organizers said this building on Northeast Alberta Street in Portland will be home for the
program, modeled after the Sister Fattah's House of Umoja in Philadelphia.
Retired Pepsi-Cola Vice President Discusses
Affirmative Action During 55-Year Business Career
NASHVILLE, TEN N .-W ith a bache
lor's degree from Harvard College and an
MBA Degree from the Harvard Business
School, H. Naylor Fitzhugh found in 1933
that he, and otherBlacks,could notget ajob
in Washington, D.C. as a department store
clerk.
stores until they either capitulated or closed.”
Fitzhugh's skills went instead into the
teaching of marketing at Howard Univer
sity and into “ The New Negro Alliance—a
distant localized forerunner of Jesse Jackson’s
People United to Save Humanity (PUSH)."
The Alliance's efforts were opposed
by local courts but upheld in the U.S. Su
preme Court in 1939. Fitzhugh told the
business students during his discourse on
"A n affirmative African-American Expe
rience in Corporate America.”
In 1955 Fitzhugh joined the PepsiC ola
Company. He has since retired as a Vice
President of Marketing but continues, at
81, to work for the company as a Project
Consultant
In a recent speech to the Minority
Students Association, Owen Graduate School
of Management, Vanderbilt University,
Fitzhugh said: “ For a while we picketed
"A n affirmative action approach to
corporate America calls for optimism as
well as realism ," Fitzhugh told the stu
dents . " I t calls for focusing on the half-full
glass, rather than the half-empty p art-fo r
lighting a candle, rather than cursing the
darkness."
He said, "T here may be occasions
when such an affirmative approach seems
beyond our reach; however, we should try
hard not to let it escape from us when it i t
within our reach."
Fitzhugh said, “ By ‘affirmative’, I mean
a realistic, creative, positive, productive
approach. To those who disparage the term
as preferential treatment or reverse dis
crimination, I say, ‘consider the draft sys
tem in major-league sports. If the first-
place teams were given the first draft choices,
the games would quickly lose their charac
ter and popular appeal. ’'
Saluting Commissioner Mary Wendy
Roberts, Bureau of Labor and Industries
Mary Wendy Roberts was first
elected Commissioner of the Bu
reau of Labor and Industries in 1978,
. and was re-elected in 1982 and 1986.
She is the first woman labor com
missioner and the first woman Demo
crat elected to a statewide office in
Oregon.
As commissioner, Roberts is
charged with enforcing state and
federal laws prohibiting discrimi
nation in employment, housing and
public accommodations and the
statutes regulating payment of wages
and hours of employment, basic
working conditions and child labor
laws. She also oversees the Bu
reau's apprenticeship and training
program and chairs the Oregon
Apprenticeship and Training Coun
cil.
She first entered public service
in 1973 as a member of the Oregon
House of Representatives, the young
est woman ever elected to the state
legislature. Two years later she ran
for the state Senate where she served
from 1975 to 1979. She was a member
of the Joint Ways and Means Com
mittee, State Emergency Board,
Senate Labor Committee, Consumer
Affairs Committee and Apprentice
ship Task Force.
As a member of the Oregon Legisla
ture, Roberts played a key role in the reor
ganization of the Human Resources De
partment, and her legislation created the
Secure Treatment Unit for Emotionally
Disturbed Children at the Oregon State
Hospital in Salem. She sponsored and suc
cessfully pushed through a bill prohibiting
employers from discriminating against
women employees because of pregnancy.
Roberts is immediate past president of
the National Association of Governmental
Labor Officials, which is comprised of all
the directors and commissioners of state
labor and industrial departments. She is
currently serving a second term as presi
dent of the National Apprenticeship Pro
gram Board, an organization representing
state apprenticeship programs in working
with the U.S. Department of Labor.
Commissioner Mary Wendy Roberts
She is also on the Oregon State Job
Training Coordinating council, and the
Oregon Advisory Committee to the U.S.
Civil Rights Commission. She was Advi
sory Council on Career and Vocational
Education, and the Oregon Council on
Economic Education.
Roberts earned an M.A. in Political
Science from the University of Wisconsin
and a B.A. in Political Science from the
University of Oregon where she was a
member of the Honors College. She was the
recipient of a National Defense Foreign
Language Fellowship to the University of
Colorado's Chinese-Japanese Language
Institute for Chinese language study.
Prior occupations have included cur
riculum consultant to M l Hood Commu
nity College, court counselor for Multnomah
County Juvenile Court, social worker,
and real estate agent for S.J. Poun
der Realty and Award Realty in
Portland.
She lives in Portland with her
daughter Alexandra, who is eighL
Earlier this year, Roberts testi
fied in Washington, D.C. on the
federal Parental and Medical Leave
Bill of 1989, at the invitation of
Senator Chris Dodd of Connecticut,
Chairman of the Senate Committee
on Labor and Human Resources Sub
committee on Children, Family.
Drugs and Alcoholism. The Bureau
enforce's Oregon’s parental leave
law. Roberts also testified on behalf
of Washington state’s Family/
Medical Leave bill and submitted
testimony to the Pennsylvania Leg
islature which also is considering
Parental and Medical Leave Legis
lative Roundtable in Boston later
this year, sponsored by the National
Center for Policy Alternatives, Wash
ington, D.C.
As President of the National
Apprenticeship Program, Roberts was
invited to attend an International
Symposium in Paris on Apprentice
ship in 1988.
Under Commissioner Robert's
leadership, Oregon has been very
involved in the forefront of child labor
issues. Recently the State Court of Appeals
upheld a landmark case affirming the c o n ^
stitutionality of the Oregon Child Labor
Laws and affirming the Commissioner's
decision on a door-to-door candy sale case.
This victory included the assessment of
$45,000 in civil penalities against North
west Advancement for 75 child labor law
violations in the use of minors in door-to-
door sales.
Her efforts on behalf of migrant work
ers earned her two awards in 1989. On June
9 she received a Special Recognition Award
from the Oregon Human Development
Corporation and on S ept 15, the Oregon
Commission on H ispanic Affairs presented
her and the Bureau a plaque in recognition
of "outstanding service to the farmworkers
of O regon."