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SEPT. 3, 1997
Page A2
( T h e P o r i L t t t h ’C l ^ h s d 'r i u ' r ----------------------------------------------------------
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RESERVED, REPRODUCTION IN WHOLE OR IN PART W ITH
B y B ernice P owell J ackson
Civil Rights Journal
Government, Poverty And Cities
ver since I read William Julius
W ilson’s book, when Work
Disappears, I’ve been thinking about
how government policies, both in
tentionally and non-intentionally,
have played a part in many of the
problems that our urban communi
ties face and are now held respon
sible for. A recent article in the Cleve
land Plain Dealer also pointed that
out, but shows an opportunity to
turn one past government mistake
into a positive, if only the opportu
nity is used while the proverbial win
dow is open.
W ilson’s book points out how
government housing policies after
World War II shut out blacks, who
found it impossible to move to the
segregated suburbs, where federal
housing loans were available M ort
gage capital was not made available
to the inner cities, where blacks could
live, but government dollars did sup
port the building of large develop-
E
TO
(Tl)«.' ^ o r tla n h (Observer
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T hank Y ou F or R eading T he P orti ani ) O bserver
Second Letter To The Editor
Dear Editor:
Watch out all persons with dis
abilities who rent in the state of
Oregon. If you have poor living con
ditions because of a negligent land
lord and take it to court using the
first Amendment of the Constitu
tion to defend your tenant rights,
the chances that your rights will be
denied are 99%. I am a physically
disabled person and I can attest to
this, based on my recent devastat
ing personal experience which be
gan October 31, 1996 continuing to
this day in 1997
Why was I denied my rights un
der the First Amendment of the Con
stitution in Portland, Oregon on
October .31.1996? This happened in
Judge Mary O vergaard’s court,
when my landlord, Mr. Michael J.
Penney was petitioning to evict me
without cause The Judge would
not allow testimony about my dis
abilities; my speech impediment, my
hearing deficits, my eating require
m en ts nor a c c e p t all o f the
defendant’s exhibits in my behalf .
I lived twenty years in the same
apartment, yet went without a work
ing stove (shut off at the fuse box by
the Fire D epartm ent) for three
months. I have friends who can verify
this. I am extremely ataxic with de
scending neuropathy causing me to
sometimeschoke when eating and I
require special food preparations.
Is this why my landlord refused
to put a working stove in my apart
ment for three months? Or is it my
speech and hearing im pediment
caused by nerve damage the reason
Judge Overgaard did not want to
listen to my testimony?
I call the Oregon State appeals
Clerk in Salem weekly (1 -503-986-5555
ext 3) just to check on my court case
(CA A 95188) to find out what the
final court judgment costs will be.
Since I have no money and no means
to pay the court. I am afraid that the
Sheriff can come and seize what little
property that I have even to the ex
tent of beating me.
Before I became physically handi
capped, I can honestly state that I
created lOO.s of businesses and
l,00(),s of jobs in Portland, when I
helped start the Portland Saturday
Market. Little does this matter now.
I am lucky that I have found a
place with a friend (on a m onth to
m onth basis) so at least I am no, on
the streets.
I do not want to im pose on my
friend, how ever I do not know if
and when I will ever be able to find
another safe place to live. I may
never feel safe no m atter w here I
live. I left my safe neighborhood of
20 years, which protected me from
physical and m ental abuse.
T hough the courts have throw n
me out into the streets, I will never
give up on the fight for the rig h ts
o f d isa b le d and p h y sic a lly c h a l
len g ed p erso n s to live in a safe
env iro n m en t.
T hank you for taking the time to
read my letter. Any response can
be directed to:
Form er State Senator: M r. R ob
ert W . B oyer
K ing N eighborhood Facility C o
ordinator
Portland Public Schools
4815 N E 7th
P ortland, OR 97211
(503) 916-5835
"end welfare as we know it.” Indeed,
the irony of the formal name of the law
which changed the welfare system.
The Personal Responsibility Act" has
not escaped me While I believe that
each individual must take responsi
bility for himself or herself and their
family, I know that many poor people
are poor not because they are not
hard-working, but because of gov
ernment policies and economic con
ditions for which they have no re
sponsibility.
All of this has been in my mind as
I hear the poor - all the poor, working
or not - increasingly being demon
ized in the public debate. As I listened
to the debate on the new tax changes
earlier this summer, I have heard it
said over and over again that poor
working people who pay no income
tax because of their low incomes, but
who do pay payroll taxes and sales
taxes and real estate taxes, should not
be able to receive the tax credits for
their children that the res, of us will.
Somehow it feels a little like robbing
the poor to feed the poor to me.
The sign of hope in all of this is
buried in the new tax laws which
virtually repeal capital gains taxes on
the sale of personal homes. While
this does discriminate against the
poor, most of whom never have the
opportunity to purchase a home, it
may have a helpful impact on the
cities, many of whom are struggling
with the abandonment of the middle
class.
This provision is due to the re
search and hard work of Thomas Bier,
the head of the housing policy re
search center at Cleveland State U ni
versity, who had examined the impact
of the 1951 tax law which in effect
forced homeowners to buy more ex
pensive housing or pay federal taxes
on the difference/This single federal
policy meant that inner cities had no
where to go but down .
r e s
A Dream Deferred O r A Dream Inferred
p
e
r
OUT PERMISSION IS PROHIBITED.
The Portland Observer—O regon’s Oldest Multicultural Publica
tion—is a member of the National Newspaper Association—Founded in
1885, and The National Advertising Representative Amalgamated
Publishers, Inc, New York, NY, and The West Coast Black Publishers
Association • Serving Portland and Vancouver.
S ubscribe
ments of suburban tract houses.
Meanwhile, federal dollars supported
the building of highways and trans
portation systems to the suburbs
while they destroyed black commu
nities by building these highways
through the middle of city commer
cial and residential areas. Local gov
ernm ents subsidized the suburbs
with new water and sewage systems,
quality schools and economic devel
opment monies for businesses relo
cating to the suburbs.
Federal housing laws thwarted the
maintenance and/or development of
viable city communities, so that pub
lic housing became an institution
which isolated families by race and
class, Wilson contends. Thus, they,
too, have responsibility for the job
less urban ghettoes which many large
cities now must deal with.
All of this has been on my mind
during the recent public debates about
the welfare system and the need to
eelaring a racial
I‘’Apocalypse Now” in
his inim table sty leo f
m etaph or and snappy
the Rev. J esse Jackson
h is follow ers acro ss the
Icon last T hursday (T he
:nStatc Bridge). T h is was
‘high-point o f along andbitter
p ro test a g a in st C a lifo r n ia ’s
position 209, the law that
linated race and sex in hir-
education and contracting
not age o r d isability o r vet-
statusk
igan ironic coincidence that
mark the rveentdeath
lack administrative assis-
io coined the p h ra se“ Af-
•tMk
to war among various govern
mental, educational, political and
B y H ugh B. P rice
P resident
N ational U rban L eague
he shocking sexual assault by
at leas, one white New York
City police officer against Abner
Louima, a Haitian immigrant, is only
the most depraved of numerous ex
amples of police misconduct that has
produced a rising tide of mistrust
among African- American and His
panic- American citizens.
That the savagery occurred within
a police precinct-wherc at least ascore
of officers could hear Louima’s an
guished screams, and know that, af
ter the attack, he was left on a jail-cell
floor for nearly 90 minutes before
being taken by ambulance to a hospi
tal-only underscores that something
is seriously wrong with the attitudes
and conduct some white police offic
ers have toward some of the people
they’re sworn to protect and serve.
Thankfully, the Haitian commu
nity of New York City has spoken out
forcefully and clearly-and their com-
ments about longstanding disrespect
and mistreatment by some police of
ficers have shredded the myth that
only US-bom African Americans have
a problem with the police.
Yes, this was an “isolated inci
dent," as New York Mayor Rudolph
W. Giul iam and Police Commissioner
Howard Safir have kept repeating,
even as they've quickly moved to
arrest those who committed the crime
and punish those who knew it oc-
T
s
p
e
legal groups. A long, bitter and divi
sive struggle looms ahead for this
state.
Republican Gov. Pete Wilson has
filed a lawsuit in superior Court that
seeks, ultimately, a state appellate
court ruling declaring all five catego
ries of state affirmative action laws
unconstitutional so that they can be
removed from the statues. This in
cludes the three preference cited ear
lier as ‘remaining on the books: Age,
disability and veteran status. The law
abolished only programs benefiting
women and minorities.
A Portland Observer reader in The
Dalles, Oregon who listens to "Radio
KGO. San Francisco which comes in
clearly after the sun goes down",
says that his favorite commentator
has compared the dismantling of
Affirmative Action programs to the
dynamiting of the high-rise struc
tures which shelter so many black
families around the country. It was
suggested that in neither case is there
provided - or indeed intended - ad
equate preparation for the social dis
ruption that necessarily must ensue.
It should be stated that the ban
does not apply to private corpora
tio n s or o th e r n o n g o v ern m en t
groups, nor to federal affirmative ac
c
/
tion programs - or get this! - to state
programs needed to maintain eligibil
ity for federal aid. The method in this
ambiguous madness is quite obvi
ous. Many groups of contractors,
public school and university teach
ers and similar ‘special’ groups had
enough weight in the California State
legislature to be darn sure their “Af
firmative Action" monies were pro
tected.
This Proposition 209 went into
effect Thursday, August 28 bu, the
American Civil Liberties Union plans
an appeal to the Supreme Court in an
attempt to stop the law - this after the
9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
denied an attempt to block the law on
Tuesday. There possibly (and hope
fully) will be time for a successful
turn-around before too much dam
age is done. State and county offi
cials forecast a long and typical bu
reaucratic delay in dismantling the
many programs.
The smiling, happy face of Ward
Connerly is being seen all over the
television screen. He is the African
American member of the California
board of Regents whose vote was
decisive in ending Affirmative Ac
tion in California Universities. The
consequences have been disastrous
To Be Equal
curred and kept silent.
But the Louima case does come
against a particular backdrop in New
York City: for one thing, there have
been several recent killings of black
and Hispanic m en-innocent of any
crim e-b y white police offices under
controversial circumstances. For an
other, according to one news report,
the city government paid at least $22
millionin 1996 alone,osettleclaimsof
brutality against the police depart
ment.
And the I .ouim a case Fits a larger
national pattern.
That pattern includes the killing
and beating o f black and H ispanic
men at the hands of white police offic
ers u nder questionable circu m
stances; the police use of traffic laws
to arbitrarily stop black and H is
panic drivers on city streets and high
w ays because their skin color “ju s
tifies” th eir being su sp ected o f
crim e; and the “routine” disrespect
on the street, in their hom es and at
the station house people o f color re
ceive at the hands of too m any white
police officers.
Something must be done—and
done quickly-at the local, state and
federal level.
One way to star, is for President
Clinton's newly established commis
sion on race relations to take up the
issueof police abuse ofcivilian rights
The Louima case is just the latest to
underscore that the conflict between
white police officers and people o,
color is a major flashpoint of racial
tension today. I, cannot be ignored
any longer.
The commission should put the
spotlight on the socalled blue wall ol
silence behind which police officers
retreat whenever one or several of
them are accused of wrongdoing.
That practice—which has played a
prominent role in the Louima case—is
a disgrace to law enforcement. It has
to be outlawed by imposing severe
penalties on those who adhere to it.
Secondly, America must stop pre
tending that the police and get-tough
crime policies alone have produced
the significant decreases in crime in
the nation’s cities.
As criminologist Christopher E.
Stone pointed out in the Urban
League’s The Stateof Black America
1996, the most effective cause of de
clining rates of violent crime “is more
likely to lie in something that is new
and powerful within black communi
ties: no, just a good police strategy or
a good neighborhood program, bu, a
determined focus on reducing crime
and violence in black communities
that unites the efforts of local police,
local activists, and local residents.”
He concludes: “The remarkable
thing... in these neighborhoods is
with minority enrollment in some fields
like law and science dropping cata
strophically for blacks, hispanics and
women.
Mr Connerly, the sharp business
man he has always been, has launched
a new venture which already prom
ises to be quite profitable. Perhaps
even more so than the “contract pref
erence - affirmative action” enter
prises that made him a wealthy man.
His new, perfectly-times operation is
the “AmericanCivil Rights Institute”
and is guaranteed to bring in big
bucks from Industry, Chambers of
Commerce, and' right W ing’ organi
zations of all kinds.
Semantics and other language
barriers may stand in the way of an
early implementation of this racially
and socially divisive law; what is a
“race conscious or gender conscious
preference.”
Many officials see long (and ex
pensive) legal struggles ahead. Also
to be kept in mind is the fact thatmany
state governments across the land
are watching this drama. There are
other governors like Pete Wilson who
would like to go down in racist his
tory as blocking a doorway of oppor
tunity like the notorious pair, Gover
nors Faubus and Wallace.
No Justice,
No Peace
th at both go v ern m en t a g en cies
a n d c o m m u n ity in s t i t u t i o n s ,
w hile in m any instances d is tru s t
ful o f one an o ther, seem to be
w orking tow ard the sam e ends
and re in fo rc in g each o th e r’s e f
fo rts .”
It is that still-fledgling com bina
tion of individual and com m unity
initiative along with solid police
work and appropriate governm ent
support that local, state and fed
eral agencies as well as com m unity
organizations must work to su p
port.
T h a t’s why Dennis M. W alcott,
president of our New York Urban
League affiliate, co-chairs the C.P.R.
in itia tiv e -th e in itials stand for
“C ourtesy, Professionalism , R e
sp e c t-P o lic e C om m issioner Safir
developed when he was appointed.
African Am ericans, w hether US-
born, or from Haiti or elsew here in
the Diaspora, have as great a vested
interest in an effective police force
as anyone, for they know all too
clearly the need law -abiding c iti
zens have of police com m itted to
their protection.
But they also know that a mutual
commitment to ju stic e -a n d tocour-
tesy, professionalism and respect-
are vitally necessary parts of any
true program of crim e reduction.
W ithout it, there will be no peace.