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About The skanner. (Portland, Or.) 1975-2014 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 15, 2017)
November 15, 2017 The Skanner Page 3 News communication at Mult- nomah County Library, told The Skanner. “We have staff that can help with taxes, financial lit- eracy, or getting people on a path to citizenship. We provide all kinds of resources across the spectrum of our work, so connecting them to healthcare is very much in line with that.” “ uninsured. This year, experts are encouraging people to enroll in due time, as the Trump administration has shortened the en- rollment period and will shut down the health- care.gov website near- ly every Sunday for 12 hours at a time. “It’s disappointing that people out there are sow- With the financial assis- tance available through the exchange, many Americans will be able to find afford- able, quality coverage The library’s enroll- ment information is also available in Spanish, Russian, Chinese and Vietnamese. Interpret- ers are available upon request. During this open en- rollment period, Ore- gonians – along with Americans across the nation – can sign up for health coverage through the Affordable Care Act marketplace by visiting healthcare.gov or local- help.healthcare.gov for assistance. “It’s critical that ev- eryone in our commu- nities know that this is the window to sign up through the ACA mar- ketplace,” said Oregon’s U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley in a press release. “With the financial assistance available through the exchange, many Ameri- cans will be able to find affordable, quality cover- age.” Millions of Americans qualify for tax credits that make health plans affordable, ranging from $50 to 100 per month. Already, roughly 10 million Americans have coverage through the ACA marketplace, but millions more remain Alexander ing confusion and trying to dissuade fellow Amer- icans from getting health coverage,” Merkley con- tinued. “It’s incumbent on all of us to make sure that Oregonians and all Americans know they have the opportunity to sign up for life-saving health coverage.” The Oregon Depart- ment of Consumer & Business Services has shared several tips to get- ting covered: 1. Get free, local help en- rolling. You can sign up for health insur- ance on your own at healthcare.gov, but if you face any difficul- ties, have questions, or need advice to choose a plan, trained experts are available. Certified community groups (community partners) and licensed insurance agents will help you free of charge. They are listed at OregonHealthCare. gov/gethelp. 2. If you already have coverage, log in to Healthcare.gov to up- date the application. Read more at TheSkanner.com At the start of the month, Maxine Fitzpatrick, executive director of Portland Community Reinvestment Initiatives (PCRI), presented the Pathway 1000 Implementation Plan before Mayor Ted Wheeler, Commissioners Amanda Fritz and Chloe Eudaly, community members, and a host of PCRI staff and board members. Fitzpatrick’s purpose of implementing the Pathway 1000 initiative is to restore involuntary displacement by building 80 homes per year over the next ten years, totaling 800 homes for purchase and 200 rentals in North and Northeast Portland. During the presentation, Fitzpatrick proposed that the city adopt the plan as a model replicable for future projects around Portland to “mitigate and rectify the damage done to our most vulnerable community members, elderly African Americans, and African Americans displaced from their homes due to Portland’s ongoing gentrification crisis.” Nan Stark, Northeast district liaison of the Bureau of Planning and Sustainability explains, “The Pathway 1000’s holistic approach to individual and community wealth building includes the development of affordable housing for home ownership. The community benefits from the creation of long-term jobs, affordable commercial spaces, and related positive economic impacts.” Coates cont’d from pg 1 famous for. As fans began queuing early in the morning for the highly an- ticipated discussion between the National Book Award-winner and New York Times Magazine writer Jenna Wortham, the line outside the 2,700-plus capacity venue snaked around city blocks in Southwest Portland. Entering the stage in jeans and a hoodie, Coates maintained his casual and approachable persona while joking that he was tired of donning a suit for public appear- ances. “I think about not embarrassing Black people a lot -- maybe more than is healthy,” Coates joked within minutes of taking a seat. After his second book, “Be- tween the World and Me,” was published in 2015 — written as a letter to his son that mixes per- sonal experiences alongside the symbolism and often bleak real- ities of being Black in the United States — Coates became the quint- essential voice on race relations and what some have called the “totality of Blackness” in America today. Through her endorsement of his work, prolific novelist Toni Morrison tasked Coates with filling “the intellectual void” of James Baldwin since his death in 1987. Yet while Coates, now 42, doesn’t reject the praise, he does “ the guest chairs of prestigious speaking engagements, “it be- came like you have to have an an- swer on everything.” But fans of Coates — who is a national correspondent for The Atlantic — want to hear those an- Toni Morrison tasked Coates with filling “the intellectual void” of James Baldwin since his death in 1987 make a point to tread carefully around it. Coates said he’s always been a writer, and the act of writing it- self is what he calls his best form of “self care.” Given that, picking up where Baldwin left off means carrying an image he’s not necessarily pre- pared to take on. In conversation with Wortham, Coates was forthright about be- ing roped into what he called “the cult of smart.” “Before ‘Between the World and Me,’ I felt like a writer,” said Coates, who Wortham also re- ferred to as a “custodian of his- tory.” Yet after its widely positive reception which flung him into swers, in whatever form or opin- ion they may come. As Coates said, “I think a lot of writers feel their credibility is seeded in being right. I don’t think that’s what people expect of me. I think they except me to be honest... When you’re pursuing your curiosity, you’re going to be wrong sometimes.” Over the course of an hour at the Arlene Schnitzer, Wortham and Coates discussed topics of so- cial media (“You can’t be in a con- stant conversation on Twitter”), fame (“I have a stable life with a wife and a kid and I almost went crazy”), and public adulation. Read more at TheSkanner.com cont’d from pg 1 standing fac- ulty member whose exper- tise was often used when difficult situ- ations arose at the univer- sity,” wrote Marilyn M. Buck, Ball State’s inter- im provost and interim Charlene Alexander executive vice president for academic affairs, in a statement emailed to The Skanner. “She was always an advocate for under- served populations and was highly re- spected across the campus. She worked with departments to increase the diver- sity of applicant pools and our contin- ued rise in employee diversity levels is due to some of her work. We believe that we are a more sensitive campus to PHOTO BY Fitzpatrick Presents on Pathway 1000 cont’d from pg 1 PHOTO BY SOMMER MARTIN COURTESY OF PCRI Insurance the needs of all faculty, staff, and stu- dents because of Charlene’s work on our campus.” Alexander holds an undergraduate degree in psychology and a master’s in counseling and guidance from Iowa’s Creighton University; she holds a PhD in counseling psychology from the Uni- versity of Nebraska-Lincoln. In addition to meeting with stakehold- ers, Alexander said she’s reconfigured a couple of leadership committees and created training opportunities for fac- ulty and staff. Faculty are also engaging in a “crosswalk of the curriculum,” re- viewing gaps in the school’s diversity curricula. The president’s task force on diversity is also reviewing recruitment and retention practices and how the school reports bias incidents. Alexander said she was contacted by a consulting firm last December on OSU’s behalf, and spent significant time researching the position before deciding to make the leap. One of the clinchers, she said, was her conver- sation with OSU President Ed Ray, to whom she reports directly. “I have never met someone who was so passionate about these issues. Someone who understands that he is a White male and what that means here, and what it also means that he doesn’t “ We believe that we are a more sensi- tive campus to the needs of all faculty, staff, and students because of Char- lene’s work know — that he knows what he doesn’t know. With that level of awareness and passion, at the end of that meeting, I thought this is absolutely somebody I want to work for,” Alexander said. The Skanner was not able to reach Ray, nor representatives from OSU’s Black Student Union or the Lonnie B. Harris Black Cultural Center, for com- ment. Ray created the vice president and chief of diversity role in 2016; Al- exander succeeds Angela Batista, who was appointed as the university’s in- terim chief diversity officer and vice president in February 2016. Alexander started her academic ca- reer wanting to be a dentist. The com- bination of a particularly bad physics class and a particularly good psycholo- gy class – which she took the same aca- demic term – changed her mind. “The fact that you could study and predict human behavior just seemed to be this amazing thing to me as a disci- pline,” Alexander said. Before shifting to administrative work, she worked as a counselor and as a professor of psychology. She wants to help students understand the “power and worth” of who they are.