www . thesKaNNer . COm
O CtOBer 19, 2011
s eattle , w ashiNgtON
V Olume XXXiii, N O . 51
25
CeNts
i nSiDe
Dr. King’s Charge
page 4
Jessie Jackson Jr.
page 5
Kwei Quartey
C hallenging P eoPle to S haPe a B etter F uture n ow
page 2
The big guys
Kings
Call for
Fairness
Bernice King says her
father sought to
Occupy Washington
PhOtO BY Julie Keefe
Brett Zongker
the Associated Press
Pee wee football player Nasyr Cornett 6 and his Kent Cobra teammates took on the rainier eagles in the 6th game
of the season Oct. 15 at at rainier Playfield. the eagles prevailed 18 to 6.
seattle seniors Fight Foreclosure
National campaign brings last-minute hope of saving family home
By the Skanner news
L
ike thousands of other
homeowners across the
country, Dixie Mitchell
found herself in danger of losing
her family home in Seattle’s
Central District, Her mortgage
holder Ocwen Financial refused
a loan modification and the
home was scheduled for auc-
tion. But neighbors, family and
friends came together to help
the 71-year-old cancer survivor.
“I’m just one of the thousands
of families whose lives have
been turned upside down by the
banks,” said Ms. Mitchell.
“They got bailed out, but
nobody’s around to help us
when we fall on hard times.”
Now a national campaign has
brought last-minute hope to the
family and, Issaquah- based
lawyer John Long has volun-
teered his services on a pro bono
(no fee) basis. And what seemed
like a lost cause, could well
become a victory.
Ms. Mitchell and her husband,
Luster, have owned their home
for 44 years. The couple raised
inDex
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Bids/Classifieds.........6-7
nine biological children and
cared for 50 foster children in
this home. The house was paid
off in full in the mid-1980s, but
when they needed money for
repairs and to help one of their
foster children, they went to a
bank for advice, and refinanced
with a sub-prime loan.
The loan repayment jumped to
$2,052. But after Luster
Mitchell suffered a stroke and
became unable to work, the
Mitchell’s monthly income fell
to $2,200. The couple fell
behind on payments and the
lender began foreclosure pro-
ceedings. Their home was
scheduled for auction Oct. 28.
Dixie Mitchell has done
everything she can to keep the
home: filing for bankruptcy, vis-
iting assistance agencies, offer-
ing to rent out rooms to cover
costs, and more. She tried to get
a simple loan modification but
Ocwen Financial, who hold the
title to her mortgage refused to
modify the loan. She tried to
find the people who had initial-
ly told her how the loan would
See Dixie on page 3
WAShingtOn — For many who
helped dedicate the new Martin Luther King
Jr. Memorial on Sunday, the towering gran-
ite monument is a stark reminder that the
civil rights leader’s dream of social and eco-
nomic justice has yet to be realized.
In many ways, the ceremony was a pass-
ing of the torch to a younger generation with
speeches marked by fierce rhetoric over the
nation’s economic disparities.
Thousands gathered at the memorial site,
some as early as 5 a.m., to hear President
Barack Obama, King’s children and other
civil rights leaders. Speaker after speaker
invoked King’s “I Have a Dream” speech
from 1963 to challenge others to carry on
his fight.
“Yes, my father had a dream. It was a
dream, he said, that was deeply embedded
in the American dream,” said King’s son
Martin Luther King III. “The problem is the
American dream of 50 years ago ... has
turned into a nightmare for millions” who
have lost their jobs and homes.
The nation has “lost its soul,” he said,
when it tolerates such vast economic dispar-
ities, teen bullying, and having more people
of color in prison than in college.
His sister, the Rev. Bernice King, remind-
ed the crowd that just before her father’s
assassination in 1968, he was mobilizing a
poor people’s campaign to occupy the
nation’s capital until the economic system
changed.
She said the postponement of an earlier
dedication because of Hurricane Irene that
was planned on Aug. 28, the 48th anniver-
sary of her father’s “Dream” speech, may
have been an act of God.
“Perhaps the postponement was a divine
interruption to remind us of a King that
moved us beyond the dream of racial justice
to the action and work of economic justice,”
she said. “Perhaps God wanted us to move
See KingS on page 3
why is Occupy movement so white?
Minorities suffer most from wealth gap but few attend the protests
By errin haines
the Associated Press
AtlAntA (AP) — Jason Woody imme-
diately recognized a shared struggle with
many of the Occupy Wall Street demonstra-
tors: The 2007 college graduate has been
out of work for two years, and it’s been
longer since he’s seen a doctor. He also
noticed something else - the lack of brown
faces on the front lines of the Occupy move-
ment.
“When I started out here ... I realized there
was not a lot of diversity out here,” said
Woody, who is black and graduated from
Morehouse College and has camped in a
downtown Atlanta park with other protest-
ers for more than a week. “It’s changed in
the course of the past week. I’d like to see
that grow.”
The outcry against the nation’s financial
institutions that has swept the country in
recent weeks has crossed many boundaries,
including class, gender and age. But a stub-
born hurdle in many cities has been a lack of
racial inclusion, something noted by organ-
izers and participants alike.
“We, the 99 percent, have to be reaching
See White on page 3