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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 11, 2006)
5(ty years of •/community service M artin L uther K ing J r . and R osa P arks s p e d a i edition ‘City of Roses’ Volume XXXVI, N um ber 2 Students Oppose Jeff Plans Je ffe rso n stu d e n ts a tten d in g school board m eeting M onday op posed plans calling for school uni form s and separate program s for boys and girls, saying they dis crim inate and are unequal because they treat them differently from other kids in the school district. See story page A5. 40 years after civil rights, focus stays the same by S arah B lount and K hava D akko T hu P ortland O bserver Portland resident Kay Toran, the chief executive officer o f V olunteers o f Am erica O regon, is a living exam ple o f som eone Music Icon Remembered continuing Rev. M artin Luther King Jr.'s F u n eral s e r struggle for econom ic and social justice. v ic e s are She has accom plished a life's work o f s c h e d u le d addressing the needs o f fam ilies and chil Friday in Los dren. A n g e le s fo r Her deeds in public service follow the L o u R a w ls, extraordinary strides for equality that were th e v e lv e t m ade by black A m ericans nearly a half cen voiced sin-ger tury ago. w h o s ta rte d Rosa Parks galvanized Am ericans in a as a c h u rc h fight for justice by refusing to give up her choir boy and w ent on to record such classic tunes seat to a w hite man on a bus. K ing professed, as “Y o u ’ 11 Never Find Another Love in his fam ous speech at the M arch on W ash Like Mine’’and "Lady Love.” Rawls ington, that A frican A m ericans w ere not yet free 100 years after the abolition o f slavery. 72, died Friday o f cancer. See story T oday, like King and Parks before her, p age A2 Toran do esn ’t feel progress has developed Alito Questioned on Abortion quickly enough, and unapologetically calls S u p r e m e for social change. She said the long legacy C ourt nomi o f racism against African A m ericans co n nee Samuel tributes greatly to poverty. A lito sa id "T here’s still racial discrimination," Toran T uesday he said, “but it’s in different and in subtle w ould deal form s, and th e re 's institutional racism. We with the is have to acknow ledge that this still exists. sue o f abor Until then, people will be frustrated that they tion with an aren’t able to live up to their potential. W e're o p e n m ind not there yet because o f the denial and as a justice unfortunate practices that are hurtful and though he defended his 1991 judi cial vote saying w om en seeking abortions m ust notify their hus bands. In the second day o f Senate hearings, A lito also said no presi dent o r court is above the law - even in tim e o f war. Iraqi police were searching T ues day for an A m erican journalist who was kidnapped over the w eekend when gunm en am bushed her car and killed her translator in western Baghdad. M eanwhile, the death toll o f U.S. troops has risen to 2,201 Obesity Hurts Heart N o rth w e s te r n U n iv e r s ity r e search e rs. trac k in g 17,643 pa tien ts fo r three d ec ad e s, found that being o v erw eig h t in m id-life su b stan tia lly in c re ase d the risk o f d ying o f h eart d ise a se later in life - even in peo p le w ho began th e stu d y w ith h e a lth y b lo o d p ressu re and c h o lestero l levels. Committed to Cultural Diversity Wednesday • lanuary II. 2006 C h ild re n & l-amilivN photo by M ark W ashington /T he P ortland O bserver Volunteers of America Oregon Chief Executive Officer Kay Toran says the struggle for social and economic justice, celebrated in the lives of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks, will continue until we fully acknowl edge discrimination in all forms. hateful." Toran looks back to the men and w omen who helped raise aw areness o f these issues during her own life growing up in the 1960s. People like King, Malcolm X, President John F. K ennedy and his brother Robert F. K ennedy, each met their death through political martyrdom. Though their legacy is forever burned into our collective memory; the nation hasn’t seen such dynam ic lead ership since. “People will not take a stand like Dr. M artin Luther King Jr. did," she noted. “Perhaps people value longevity over stand ing up for what they believe.” T o ran , w ho has fash io n ed a ca reer through working with children and families, believes the absence o f role models has also contributed to social injustice. O ur leaders need to be nurtured and sought out, she said, especially for single parent homes. "W om en are raising boys that are ex pected to someday be heads o f households, yet there are very few male role m odels,” she said, citing church, schools, fam ily and o r ganizations like the Boys and G irls Clubs as im portant m odels for our youth. Toran believes these issues o f econom ic justice and poverty belongs in the front pages o f new spapers everyday. Recent headlines brought poverty and discrim ina tion issues to the forefronts o f our minds when H urricane Katrina exposed an ugly reality to an unsuspecting public. “An interesting thing happened right after Katrina,” Toran said. “Rosa Parks died. It takes a national event to start a movement. It seems to me >ur highest priority in Aippricn ought to be our citizens.” W hen asked if the exposure o f abject c o n tin u e d ’3 ^ ' on p a g e A 5 A Decade of Change on Alberta Heating Help Falls Short Journalist Kidnapped www.portiandobserver.com Following in the Footsteps T,Week¡n TheReview O regon receives em ergency heat ing and energy funds from the Bush A dm inistration, but local officials say the additional federal aid isn’t enough to keep many low -incom e fam ilies warm. T housands o f O r egon fam ilies still face, quite liter ally, being left out in the cold. See sto ry , p ag e AS Established in 1970 Political power comes with King, but displacement comes with gentrification B obby B urk F or T he P ortland O bserver Looking less like the “Soul o f the C ity” and m ore like the suburbs, it’s easy to see that northeast Portland is undergoing a radical transform ation. The changes com e with a population that is less black and with more money. And now here is all o f this more evident than in the A lberta Arts District. T he cozy streets o f A lberta show a vi brancy and vigor that com es with people w anting to live, com m une and flourish, not ju st reside. A variety o f local coffee shops, art galleries, restaurants and other unique businesses have blossom ed and m ultiplied, causing one to realize that A lberta is a destination for the city at large. T he neighborhood has shed its "bullet zone" image from years o f gang problem s with the “rat-a-ta,-tat"ofdrive-by shootings. Beka A m blin, m other and small business ow ner, was lured to A lberta in 1992 by real estate prices she could afford w hile working as a bar maid. She faced a tough decision; either purchase a tiny house in the already trendy and expensive area o f Laurelhurs, or have a choice o f a larger home i n an econom i - cally-challenged neighborhixxl. Her north east Portland castle turned out to be four stories and five bedroom s worth o f cheap ness. “W hen we first moved here they w ouldn’t deliver pizza to our house,” said Amblin, “we had to meet them at the Safew ay be cause the pizza guy said we were a liability issue to com e the extra 14 blocks." Thirteen years later, Amblin ow ns a sec ond hom e as well as a business in the heart o f N ortheast, her journey to prosperity par alleling that o f the area. bv photo by B obby B i rk /F or T he P ortland O bserver Robert Williams adapts to changes in his neighborhood off Alberta Street. For many though, and especially for the black com m unity, the story o f progress has not com e w ithout disruptions. M any people o f color are left scratching their heads, troubled that a black com m unity with deep roots in the Northeast is shrinking “W e are w itnessing what is essentially the d eco n stru ctio n o f w hat used to be P ortland's black com m unity," said Darrell M illner, P rofessor o f Black History at Port land State U niversity, w ho believes that a generational backlog o f econom ic and racial factors have caused many to relocate to areas like G resham , H illsboro and W ashing ton County. T o understand how Alberta lost its dis tinction as a mostly black com m unity, one has to Im k back to a tim e when the true soul o f the northeast was established am idst turmoil and strife. As Am erica moved into W orld W ar II, a w artim e m anufacturing industry blossom ed in Portland and fell alm ost entirely into the hands o f w hites-only labor unions. These wartime laborers left many manual labor jobs vacant, and so black people w ere welcom ed into Oregon from areas like Louisiana, G eor gia and other areas in the South to fill these gaps in the labor market. The jobs were physically debilitating and paid very little. making it difficult to achieve econom ic pros perity. A prime example o f the challenges people o f color were facing at the tim e can be seen in arenas like housing, w here, according to M illner, decisions about where blacks could buy hom es, what kind o f hom es they could live in and how they could pay for and finance those hom es w ere made by politi cians and financial institutions. Local African A m ericans w ere often turned dow n for m ortgages simply because they w ere black. L andless and near penni- c o n tin u e d on p a g e A l l
