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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 20, 1999)
JA N . 20, 1999 t / I p * Attention Readers! Mease take a minute to send us your comments. We 're alnays trying to g i y o u a better paper and we can 'tdo it without your help. Tell us what you Ukeand what needs improvement... any suggestions are welcomed and apprecated. We take criticism nell! Ge, your powerful pens out NOW and address your letters to. Editor. Header R e f u s e . P.O.Box 3137. P u t i u t U l R l X a L ®1|C ^ o rtla n h (©bseriier Editorial Articles Do Not Necessarily Reflect Or Represent The Views Of (Clip :{3ortlanb ffibsm w r p e r Larry J. Jackson, Sr. E ditor I 1, l Joy Ramos Copy E ditor G ary A nn Taylor B usiness M anager Iesha W illiam s Laphael K night G raphic D esigner G raphic D esigner M ark W ashington D istribution M anager C ontributing Writers: Professor M cK inley Burt Lee Pearlm an Y em a M easho 4747 NE M artin Luther K ing, Jr. Blvd., Portland, O regon 97211 503-288-0033 • Fax 503-288-0015 Email: P dxobserv@ aol.com Deadline fo r all submitted materials: A r tic le s .F rid a y . 5 :0 0 p m A ds: M o n d a y. 1 2 :0 0 p m PO STM A STE R : Send A ddress C hanges To: Portland O bserver, P.O. Box 3137, P ortland, O R 97208. Periodicals p o sta g e p a id a , Portland. Oregon. Subscriptions: $60.00 p e r ye a r T he Portland O bserver w elcom es freelance subm issions. M anu scripts and photographs should be clearly labeled and w ill be returned if accom panied by a self addressed envelope. All created design display ads becom e the sole property o f the new spaper and cannot be used in other publications o r personal usage w ithout the w ritten consent ot the general m anager, unless the client has purchased the com position o f such ¡d. © 1996 THE PO R T LA N D O BSERV ER. A LL RIG H TS RE SERVED, R E PR O D U C T IO N IN W H O LE O R IN PA R T W ITHOUT PERM ISSIO N IS PRO H IBITED . The Portland O b se rv e r-O re g o n ’s O ldest M ulticultural Publica- tio n -is a m em ber o f the N ational N ew spaper A sso ciatio n -F o u n d ed in 1885 and The N ational A dvertising Representative A m algam ated Pub lis h e r . Inc, N ew Y ork, N Y , and The W est C oast Black Publishers A ssociation • Serving Portland and V ancouver. SU B SC R IB E TO W ^ortlani» (©hseruer The Portland Observer can be sent directly to your home for only 60.00 per year Please fill out, enclose check or money order, and mail to: S ubscriptions ©»SHKWiK; PO Box 3137 P ortland , O regon 97208 N am e ;___________ __ — ---------------------- A ddress:. City, State. Zip-Code: _ ------------------------------- p e c t i r e s Showing My Race: Politically Incorrect Essays On Identity (DSPS 959-680) Established in 1970 C harles W ashington P u blish er s P u o i I s s llK Ml K IM I 1 B l HI B y P rof . M c K inley B urt I was not surprised that som e read ers needed an extra week or so to mull over my-rather disquieting com ments on the U.S. C ensus process (Per spectives, Jan. 6, 1999). But, they are back on the phone and fax, now, after m y deferm ent last w eek to the birth day ofD r. Martin Luther King Jr. - the m artyr whose personal census took in “all o f G o d ’s children”. A nd no one proved surprised that 1 leaped right on the issue o f direful econom ic consequences should the Y ear 2000 count be structured to the preferences ofth e ‘Right W ing’ poli ticians and their fellow-travellers who i t l ffirm U U l U ative V i ’ V i A c vehem ently y oppose i A tion, Equal Employment Opportunity, and sim ilar concepts. The “undercounting ofm inorities’ was seen to seriously im pair govern ment and business decisions affect ing every category o f their existence - from em ploym ent and housing to health care and elections. A m ong those strongly w arning against a re peat o f the 1990 errors, we find Mr. High B. Price, president - N ational Urban League. A nd others w am against the deceitful “color blind” rhetoric o f those to whom race has always m attered and alw ays will. There follows here the governm ent’s proposed schem e for restructuring the count o f you-know -w ho for the year 2000 C ensus. This is w here the ' feds’ w ere at the m iddle o f this de cade and they have been tinkering w ith the process ever since (at stake are a lot o f jobs, votes, loans, m ort gages, childcare, food stam ps, health care, seniors aid). The ent i i i v U.S. O ffice O f M anagem o and Budget (O M B ) is review ing the racial and ethnic categories used by federal agencies for governm ent- wide recordkeeping and statistical data collection. T he review is the result o f increasing criticism that the standards no longer truly reflect the U.S population’s diversity since they w ere first issued 17 years ago. W hile the m ost com m only know n use o f racial and ethnic categories is census reporting, the categories are also used for evaluating public and private sector affirmative action plans, monitoring minorities' access to home m ortgage loans, enforcing the Equal C redit O pportunity A ct and assist ing firms under m inority business developm ent program s. Proposed changes include: ♦Adding a "M ulti-racial” category so that respondents w ould not be forced to deny part o f their heritage by having to choose a single cat egory; ♦Adding an “other” category for v services through local “one-step” sys tems overseen by local work force in vestment boards. Oregon has 18months to submit a plan o f implementation to the U.S. Secretary o f Labor. Contact: Steve Tegger(503)947-1478. November Unemployment Claims Up: Oregon Employment Department officials report the effects o f the state’s economy slowing is now being felt in the local employmentoffices. In November the department filed 16,928 new unem ployment insuranceclaims.up 13% from November 1997. Contact: Frank Richey (503)947-1691 Department Obtains Fraud Convic tions: TheOregon Employment Depart ment successfully prosecuted three in dividuals fbrunemployment fraud in the month ofDecember illegally collecting unemployment benefits LsaclassC felony punishable by up to five years in prison anda$100,000fine.Courts ordered those convicted to pay $ 13,659 in restitution to the department. The convictions came from Douglas, Linn, and Multnomah counties. In Douglas County, Carla Renee Starnes ofRoseburg received 24 months probation and 20 days on a county work crew for illegally claiming those individuals with multiracial backgrounds and those who want the option o f specifically stating a unique identification; ♦Providing and open-ended ques tion to solicit inform ation on race and ethnicity, or com bining concepts o f race, ethnicity and ancestry; ♦Changing the category for Black to A frican A m erican; ♦ C h an g in g the ca te g o rie s for A m erican Indian or A laskan Native to N ative A m erican; ♦Including native H awaiians as a separate category or as part ofN ati ve A m erican rather than as part o f the A sian or Pacific Islander categories; ♦Including H ispanic as a racial designation rather than a separate ethnic category; and ♦A dding a “ M iddle Easterner” category to the list o f ethnic designa tions. Be sure to save this federal blue print for your future to com pare to next w eek ’s startling revelations. Oregon Employment Department Department Steps-UpEvaluationOf Employment Service Quality: The O r egon Employment Department has in stalled a process for evaluating the ac curacy and completeness o f informa tion received from employers and job seekers that is needed to provide quality employment services. The Employment ServiceQualityAssuranee(ESQA)Pro- gram will take an intense look at the quality ofjob seeker enrollments andjob orders on a quarterly basis. Department officials say ESQA is designed in re sponse to federal guidelines and in volves self-appraisals by local field of fice management and staff. Contact: Rod Simmons(503)947-1661. Workforce Investment Act O f 1998 Goes Into Effect: the Workforce Invest ment Act o f 1998 went into effect Janu ary 1 The act calls forjobplacementand training, and other employment-related $3,939 in unemployment benefits. In Linn County, Derek Dearment o f Al bany received 18 months probation and 1 Odayscommumty service fbrclaiming $3,512 in benefits. And in Multnomah County, Daniel Frank O ’Brien o f Portland received 24 months probation and 16 hours ofcom- munity service fortaking $6,208 in ben efits. In 1998, the Employment Depart ment successfully prosecuted 88 indi viduals resulting in $396,215 to be re turned to the unemployment insurance trust fund. Contact: Craig Spivey (503) 947-1303. IAM CARES OREGON T hank Y ou F or R eaping W ire ÿaim rtA A 'B <fh»»TEKWt* Cordially Invites You Scare Tactics B y M arian W right E delman In a recent column, I reported the good news that the arrest rate for juveniles involved in violent crim es fell 23 percent from 1994 to 1997, and in cluded a drop of more than 40 percent in the juvenile murder arrest rate. But how does that jibe with the words o f U.S. Rep resentative Bill McCollum, who predicted before a House Com m ittee on Early C hildhood, Youth, and Families in 1996 that a “coming storm ” of youth vio lence was on the horizon? Brace yourself for the coming generation o f super-preda tors’,” McCollum warned. Super-predators? When you looked at your children beside the Christmas tree, or gathered around the candles celebrating Hanukkah or Kwanzaa this year, did you see in their faces the viciousness o f a super-preda tor? Or did you see a child, con fused perhaps, too easily influ enced, angry, or just plain scared maybe, but most o f all, a child who needs love and guidance? I recently read an excellent book by Franklin E. Zimring, a law professor at the University C alifornia at Berkeley. His American Youth Violence does a great deal to debunk the myth that your youths are becoming irretrievably violent and beyond control. This is important be cause this kind o f wrong think ing and fear are behind a lot of half-baked policy proposals that keep surfacing at the federal, state, and local levels. In the last Congress, sanity prevailed, thank God, and S. 10, proposed juvenile crime legisla tion that would have turned the clock back 25 years on protec tions for children, did not pass. Had it become law, juveniles could have been jailed with adult criminals, yet the legislation did nothing to promote prevention programs we know work, like af ter-school and mentoring pro grams that keep children out of trouble. And it did not do anything to control the proliferation o f guns that have resulted in increased homicides. In his book, Zimring shows how easily statistics can be ma nipulated and distorted. For in stance, if aggravated assaults are up, is it because of more vio lence, or new and/or non-stan dard classifications of aggravated assault versus simple assault? And statistics showing increased teen violence seldom note the increase in the number of teens. Zimring writes that the “teen population increased rapidly dur ing the 1960s and e a rly 1970s...followed by fifteen years of decline [and the expectation now that] the number of teenag ers will grow 16 percent over the fifteen years ending in 2010, to a total o f 21.5 m illion.” Most o f all, I want to make the point that many scary pre dictions are based on the as sumption that all conditions will remain the same. But that is only one o f the choices we as a na tion can make. We can instead choose to do something about the factors that lead an inno cent, beautiful child created by God to turn to crime. C an’t we, individually and jointly, decide that it is no longer acceptable to condemn our children to poverty, sub-standard educa tion and health care, and unsu p erv ised , vio len ce-p lag u ed hom es, neighborhoods, and schools? Or we can continue to choose to put our money and our faith into cleaning up afterwards. We can continue to allow our chil dren to waste their precious lives in more and more prisons, attempt to find solace in drugs and guns, or fantasize about fu nerals instead of graduatings be cause they see many of their friends die so young. Zimring poses and interest ing question. “How does it hap pen,” he asks, “that a child-cen tered and optim istic culture embraces such a narrow and negative view of a future gen eration in prosperous times? Perhaps it is not because of what we see on the street but rather what we see in the m ir ror. What are we doing to make tomorrow a time o f success, safety, and satisfaction for our children? What are we not do- to our Annual Appreciation Luncheon January 27,1999 11:00 A.M. to 2:00 P.M. Keynote Speakers: Charles A. Moose, PhD, Chief of Police Stephanie Parrish Taylor, Branch Manager Vocational Rehabilitation Division PLEASE PLAN TO JOIN US AT THE OAME BUILDING/CASCADE PLAZA 4134 N. VANCOUVER AVE. PORTLAND, OREGON In recognition of our partnering agencies, community-based organizations, participating employers, elected officials, community leaders and residents. mg.' Refuse to be swayed by scare tactics and hopeless, nothing- works rhetoric and racism Stand for Children in your homes, neighborhoods, schoo districts, and with those who make public policy at all levels ‘Super-predators’ are not bom they are made; and the darkest clouds of a ‘coming storm ’ wil fade in the light o f love and care we can choose to give to all the children in our country. 1 am CARES is the human services arm of the International Association of Machinists. IA M CARES is a national, non-profit organization dedicated to helping people with special employment and training needs attain career progressive job opportunities. It is our privilege to provide an important link between orga nized labor, employment and training programs. Welfare to Work, rehabilitation, school to work, and youth and adults who need our services. We proudly serve the Portland Enterprise Community, dislocated work ers, disabled workers, underemployed and underrepresented Individuals. Our programs have made it possi- ble for over 27,000 youth and adults (nationwide) to return to work and become productive members of the labor force participating fully in enterprise. Industry and commerce. RSVPtQM-ML 'z M e t a » * . • ’S - , ’ ' -♦* s w"? ' Z.'ît m -