www . tHEskaNNEr . COm
m ay 18, 2011
s EattlE , w asHiNgtON
V OlumE XXXiii, N O . 29
25
CENts
i nSide
Operation: Backpack
page 2
Editorial
page 3
Harbor Fest
C hallenging P eoPle to S haPe a B etter F uture n ow
page 2
Breathe easy
Coach’s
Death a
tragedy
Shooting death was
called avoidable;
may be self-defense
By gene Johnson
associated Press
rev. lennox yearwood Jr. will be speaking out about asthma rates in seattle Friday may 20, and saturday, may 21,
keynoting this year’s green Festival-seattle
High asthma rates among youth
Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr. speaks out on Seattle’s air pollution
R
ev. Lennox Yearwood Jr., President
and CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus,
will be in Seattle Friday May 20,
and Saturday, May 21, keynoting this
year’s Green Festival-Seattle. Linking the
issues of poverty and pollution, Rev
Yearwood will address rising asthma rates
and other health disparities from air pollu-
tion among youth and communities of
color in Seattle.
“The fact that people cannot breathe
clean air is un-American,” Rev. Yearwood
says. “Illness and death from dirty air
among our most vulnerable populations –
children and the elderly, particularly in
poor communities – is a direct assault on
American values of life, liberty and pur-
suit of happiness. Seattle, one of our great-
est American cities, deserves better.”
May is National Asthma Awareness
Month. The CDC recently released a
report which found that asthma rates are
rising sharply across the nation: 1 in 10
children and 1 in 12 adults have asthma;
for African American children, it is far
worse: 1 in 6 have asthma.
According to the Asthma and Allergy
Foundation of America, Seattle is one of
the top 100 asthma capitals of 2011. The
Seattle-Tacoma-Olympia metro area is the
18th most-polluted in the country for fine
particle pollution, according to a report
released by the American Lung
Association.
Yearwood is the subject of a current
Discovery Network feature documentary,
“Hip Hop Rev,” that premiered Earth Day
2011 on the Planet Green Channel. The
film captures Rev Yearwood’s activism
and community organizing on environ-
mental justice and climate issues in com-
munities of color across the nation.
The documentary highlights Rev
Yearwood launching environmental initia-
See aSthma on page 2
auBuRn, Wash. (AP) — The small
cul-de-sac of beige duplexes in this Seattle
suburb gave every illusion of tranquility
on a sunny Sunday afternoon.
Thankful for the reprieve from Pacific
Northwest rain, two women cleaned their
cars. Their young sons shot water guns in
the shaggy grass and dandelion thicket
between their driveways. A few houses
over, an Indian immigrant named Jaspal
Mangat sat on her stoop. Kids played bas-
ketball in the street.
Even so, strife-weary neighbors knew
the idyll was unlikely to last. The adjacent
public housing complex and nearby trailer
parks are filled with teenagers, and it
seems hardly a weekend goes by that some
aren’t brawling or getting into public, pro-
fane arguments with their parents — either
up the street, or outside the Boys and Girls
Club, or right here in the cul-de-sac.
So it was with a mixture of frustration
and alarm that residents called 911 that
May 1 afternoon to report that yet another
fight had broken out. But this one would
end much differently — with a popular
middle school coach dead; with his broth-
er staggering on a front lawn, clinging to
life; with a completely avoidable tragedy
that devastated two families.
“It’s a shame it did happen, but it had to
happen,” said Dave Maun, whose house
faces the cul-de-sac. “It’s been building up
to this. It is not a safe neighborhood.”
Shennon Shelton, 22, helped coach bas-
ketball and football at Cascade Middle
School. He came from a big Samoan fam-
ily with athletic brothers. One of his
younger brothers, Danny, 6-foot-3 and 300
pounds, is one of the University of
Washington’s most prized football recruits
this year. It was a point of pride that prom-
ised a new future for the family. He may
have escaped harm when the shooter’s gun
See Shooting on page 2
indeX
News ........................2-4
Calendar ....................2
Opinion .......................3
Bids/Classifieds............4
libya Ends College Funding for students
Those studying in Washington, U.S., have nothing for tuition, expenses
By nicholas K. geranios
associated Press
SPoKane, Wash. (AP) — About 2,000
Libyan students who attend college in the
U.S. will lose financial support after Libya
stopped funding a scholarship program
when the U.N. froze about $30 billion of
that country’s assets.
Among the students is Abdalhamid Alkar,
one of about 40 Libyan students at
Washington State University in Pullman
who will see their government support end
on May 31 unless the situation changes.
“This is a big problem for all of us,” Alkar
said Friday. “We don’t have any way to sup-
port our living here.”
Student visa requirements prohibit the stu-
dents from working, and lack of support
from their government means the students
will be left without money for tuition and
living expenses.
Alkar actually graduated in May in veteri-
nary medicine but still needs support from
the Libyan government while he waits sev-
eral months for permission to get a job.
“I have no funds for that,” Alkar said.
Various groups at Washington State
See StudentS on page 3