Negros not welcomed at Boom Island for the 2009 Juneteenth Celebration – IBNN Exclusive
In breaking news IBNN sources close to the Twin Cities 2009 Juneteenth Celebration say the organization has been rejected from having its event at Boom Island this year as planned. After careful planning by the Twin Cities Juneteenth committee, the City of Minneapolis has rejected the events 2009 planned location.
On Monday, May 4, 2009 a meeting was held with the Minneapolis Park Police, 3rd and 4th Minneapolis Police Precincts and members of the Minneapolis Park Board to inform Juneteenth organizers that this year’s event had been rejected from the inner city location of Boom Island.
Mary Pargo, Executive Director of the Twin Cities Juneteenth Celebration said in an exclusive interview, “We were the last to find out about the decision to not let this celebration take place at Boom Island. We had planned this down to the wire and spent dollars to insure we sent the right message to the Twin Cities community. Now we have to start all over.”
Ms. Pargo says the Juneteenth Celebration will move back to Wirth Park.
Again the City of Minneapolis and political pundits deal the Black community a bad hand by obstructing open community engagement. This is further evidence of Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak’s “Massa-Plan” to dismantle the Black community by strategically blocking community events and reducing funding for these engagements that come too close to the White mainstream in downtown Minneapolis.
If you recall, page 36 of the Minneapolis Mayor’s 2009 Supplemental Budget it states the following: Read more
Andre Showell to Obama: What are you going to do to help Black America? A Report from the AFROCONSERVATIVE
"I didn't take the kinks out of my hair, I took them out of my brain...Afroconservative"
By the AFROCONSERVATIVE. Reprinted with permission by author.
Andre Showell from Black Entertainment Television (BET) wants to know what Obama will do to help Black America, specifically those in NYC where the Black unemployment rate is close to 50%. I’m not an expert. I am just another soul who freed myself from the Democrat’s shackles.
Maybe the unemployment rate is high in these areas because Blacks refuse to part ways from their unfounded allegiance to Liberal policies. We’ve been told for the past 40+ years that we don’t need faith, strong families (specifically Black FATHERS), and educational choice to fix the economic disparities in our communities. Read more
Black History Month Does Not End With Black President
"Black America displaying its whipped back!"
The idea advocated by some that Black History Month should now cease because America has an African American president does not make much sense. One is actually not sure what one has to do with the other. Obama’s victory and presidency is undoubtedly historic but the teaching of the trials and tribulations of people of African descent in America should not end due to one’s election. As the teaching of the British Empire and European centered civilization did not cease with Bush’s presidency.
It is a different argument to say that Black History should be taught alongside American History, or World History. Of course it should. Similarly, the role of women in American history and world history too should be taught and equally recognized. It is often the times that students of color do not relate or see themselves in what is being taught. Black History is at a minimum necessary for these students to take a second look at where they’ve come from and where they can go. An opportunity they should get to see more than the 28 days allotted.
As the founder of Black History Month Carter G. Woodson noted and other scholars promoting an African centered or a global centered curriculum, the current education system also serves as miss-education for white students who get to see themselves as the center of the world, when in reality they are like everyone else a part of the global community. Why not teach European history along with a history of the West African Empires (black history did not begin with Slavery, See the Great Mali Empire) and Egyptian kingdoms, Aztec and Inca Kingdoms, and Chinese Dynasties. It’s time for a global educational perspective for a now interconnected world.
Read more on www.BlackState.com
Rich, Black, Flunking
“Cal Professor John Ogbu thinks he knows why rich black kids are failing in school. Nobody wants to hear it.”
By Susan Goldsmith (Re-printed with permission of East Bay Express News by Nate Seltenrich, Clubs Editor/Editorial Coordinator East Bay Express, 1335 Stanford Ave., Suite 100 / Emeryville, CA 94608 – 510.879.3773 (02/2009). Visit East Bay Express News at www.eastbayexpress.com for more fine articles.
The black parents wanted an explanation. Doctors, lawyers, judges, and insurance brokers, many had come to the upscale Cleveland suburb of Shaker Heights specifically because of its stellar school district. They expected their children to succeed academically, but most were performing poorly. African-American students were lagging far behind their white classmates in every measure of academic success: grade-point average, standardized test scores, and enrollment in advanced-placement courses. On average, black students earned a 1.9 GPA while their white counterparts held down an average of 3.45. Other indicators were equally dismal. It made no sense.
John Ogbu has been compared to Clarence Thomas, denounced by the Urban League, and criticized in The New York Times.
When these depressing statistics were published in a high school newspaper in mid-1997, black parents were troubled by the news and upset that the newspaper had exposed the problem in such a public way. Seeking guidance, one parent called a prominent authority on minority academic achievement.
UC Berkeley Anthropology Professor John Ogbu had spent decades studying how the members of different ethnic groups perform academically. He’d studied student coping strategies at inner-city schools in Washington, DC. He’d looked at African Americans and Latinos in Oakland and Stockton and examined how they compare to racial and ethnic minorities in India, Israel, Japan, New Zealand, and Britain. His research often focused on why some groups are more successful than others.
But Ogbu couldn’t help his caller. He explained that he was a researcher — not an educator — and that he had no ideas about how to increase the academic performance of students in a district he hadn’t yet studied. A few weeks later, he got his chance. A group of parents hungry for solutions convinced the school district to join with them and formally invite the black anthropologist to visit Shaker Heights. Their discussions prompted Ogbu to propose a research project to figure out just what was happening. The district agreed to finance the study, and parents offered him unlimited access to their children and their homes.
Read the full story at HERE.
Back on Uncle Sam’s Plantation
By Star Parker, Guest Contributor
The story of Star Parker is a stunning chronicle of how she left the seductive life of drugs, crime, abortions and welfare abuse through the power of the Gospel to become a leading advocate for the family. She is at the forefront of the Christian conservative movement to motivate and lead others away from the lies of the culture to a life full of grace and truth.
Star Parker is the founder and president of CURE, the Coalition on Urban Renewal & Education, a 501c3 non-profit think tank that provides a national voice of reason on issues of race and poverty – in the media, inner city neighborhoods, and public policy.
In addition to heading CURE, and its network of inner city clergy nationwide, Star is a syndicated columnist for Scripps Howard News Service, offering weekly op-eds to more than 400 newspapers worldwide.
As a social policy consultant, Star Parker gives regular testimony before the United States Congress, and is a national expert on major television and radio shows across the country. Currently, Star is a regular commentator on C-Span, MSNBC, and FOX News. She has debated Jesse Jackson on BET; fought for school choice on Larry King Live; and defended welfare reform on the Oprah Winfrey Show.
Her story begins….Six years ago I wrote a book called “Uncle Sam’s Plantation.” I wrote the book to tell my own story of what I saw living inside the welfare state and my own transformation out of it.
I said in that book that indeed there are two Americas. A poor America on socialism and a wealthy America on capitalism.
I talked about government programs like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Job Opportunities and Basic Skills Training (JOBS), Emergency Assistance to Needy Families with Children (EANF), Section 8 Housing, and Food Stamps.
A vast sea of perhaps well intentioned government programs, all initially set into motion in the 1960’s, that were going to lift the nation’s poor out of poverty.
A benevolent Uncle Sam welcomed mostly poor black Americans onto the government plantation. Those who accepted the invitation switched mindsets from “How do I take care of myself?” to “What do I have to do to stay on the plantation?”
Instead of solving economic problems, government welfare socialism created monstrous moral and spiritual problems. The kind of problems that are inevitable when individuals turn responsibility for their lives over to others.
The legacy of American socialism is our blighted inner cities, dysfunctional inner city schools, and broken black families.
Through God’s grace, I found my way out. It was then that I understood what freedom meant and how great this country is.
I had the privilege of working on welfare reform in 1996, passed by a Republican congress and signed into law by a Democrat president. A few years after enactment, welfare roles were down fifty percent.
I thought we were on the road to moving socialism out of our poor black communities and replacing it with wealth producing American capitalism.
But, incredibly, we are going in the opposite direction.
Instead of poor America on socialism becoming more like rich American on capitalism, rich America on capitalism is becoming like poor America on socialism.
Uncle Sam has welcomed our banks onto the plantation and they have said, “Thank you, Suh.”
Now, instead of thinking about what creative things need to be done to serve customers, they are thinking about what they have to tell Massah in order to get their cash.
There is some kind of irony that this is all happening under our first black president on the 200th anniversary of the birthday of Abraham Lincoln.
Worse, socialism seems to be the element of our new young president. And maybe even more troubling, our corporate executives seem happy to move onto the plantation.
In an op-ed on the opinion page of the Washington Post, Mr. Obama is clear that the goal of his trillion dollar spending plan is much more than short term economic stimulus.
“This plan is more than a prescription for short-term spending-it’s a strategy for America’s long-term growth and opportunity in areas such as renewable energy, health care, and education.”
Perhaps more incredibly, Obama seems to think that government taking over an economy is a new idea. Or that massive growth in government can take place “with unprecedented transparency and accountability.” Yes, sir, we heard it from Jimmy Carter when he created the Department of Energy, the Synfuels Corporation, and the Department of Education.
Or how about the Economic Opportunity Act of 1964 — The War on Poverty — which President Johnson said “…does not merely expand old programs or improve what is already being done. It charts a new course. It strikes at the causes, not just the consequences of poverty.”
Trillions of dollars later, black poverty is the same. But black families are not, with triple the incidence of single parent homes and out of wedlock births.
It’s not complicated. Americans can accept Barack Obama’s invitation to move onto the plantation. Or they can choose personal responsibility and freedom.
Does anyone really need to think about what the choice should be?
Read more articles by Star Parker by visiting www.townhall.com or click HERE to go directly to her other submissions.
“Lift Every Voice and Sing…Where is the Outcry from our self-appointed African-American leaders?”
Part 4 in a 4-part series titled, “$103,770.00 – Without a Trace”
HEADLINES: A 15-year-old pregnant girl is found dead in north Minneapolis garage; Brooklyn Park Police beat man while children and fiancée lay in the snow… in their underwear; Minneapolis Urban League Fails Community; NorthPoint and the University of Minnesota (Let the “U” take it over, at least we’d have an “end game.”)
"Let the U of M take over NorthPoint, then you won't have to stand guard!"
As the toll on human life mounts in north Minneapolis, I am shocked that no action or verbal commentary has been offered by our “self-appointed” African-American leaders. The only time these leaders respond is when money is involved. These self-appointed leaders are poverty pimps, in my opinion. The dictionary defines “poverty pimp” as any self-appointed leader, usually of a racial or ethnic heritage, who extols the perpetual poorness of his/her ethnicity, yet is quite financially well-off as a result of his/her efforts. Such a “poverty pimp” is usually a reverend of a well-known church, a non-profit organization leader, or a man who sells out the community to the White man and then is seen standing before the TV cameras. Poverty pimps are also people who rely on the White man’s guilt to gain credibility, money and influence, and are usually racists themselves. But beware, poverty pimps are the same people who always show up for development projects in north Minneapolis – you’ve heard the names, they’re at the “table” now (2009).
This apathy, this indifference to the concerns of our community is a serious problem that is rampant on the North side. For example, a pregnant 15-year-old girl was found dead in an abandoned north Minneapolis garage, and no one has expressed outrage or concern. No one in the community has uttered a word about her death. The only communication about her death has been the reports that appeared on the teenager’s high school website, TV and in a suburban newspaper, The Lake Minnetonka Liberty.
The suburban paper featured the story: “Turns out the body found in the garage of some boarded-up property in North Minneapolis earlier this month was that of a pregnant 15-year-old girl who police now say was murdered. The girl has been identified as Annshalike Hamilton of Minneapolis. The property owner found her body inside the garage at 22-22 North Fourth Street on December 15th. The medical examiner says both Hamilton, and the fetus she was carrying, died as a result of blunt force injuries. Police are treating the case as a double-homicide”.
This story was also reported on AM radio WCCO 830. But so far, the long-time north Minneapolis newspaper, Insight News, has not reported or commented on the teen’s death.
On Saturday, January 10, 2009 young Ms. Annshalike Hamilton was laid to rest at funeral services held at St. Philips church in north Minneapolis. (Our condolences go out to her family and her fellow Patrick Henry High School students).
Isn’t it time the community to come together and express our outrage about the toll these heinous crimes and misdeeds take on human lives? Isn’t this teen’s death newsworthy information the community should be informed about?
If Insight News is the “go-to” paper for the African-American community, why has the African-American community been so ill-informed about this teen’s death and other important issues? Instead of telling the story of this teen’s life and unfortunate death, Insight News chose to re-publish a story about the Minnesota Department of Transportation’s (MNDoT) failure to sufficiently hire women and minority contractors. Was it really timely and newsworthy to re-publish this story about MNDot’s hiring practices, which was featured in mainstream media, including Minnesota Public Radio’s (MPR) website? In my opinion, there is never a slow news day in north Minneapolis. Therefore, I question whether news is really the focus of the Insight News “paper.”
No assistance from the Minneapolis Urban League…again!
At 6:30 a.m. on Friday, December 19, 2008, Brooklyn Park police knocked on the door at 6300 82nd Place. As the residents inside the home slept, the police broke a patio-door window and the front door to gain access into the home of Victor Took and his fiancée Courtney Totten and their six children. The children and Took’s fiancée where ordered outside the home and were forced to lay in the snow for nearly 20 minutes with no shoes, shirts or socks while the police beat Took and ransacked his home. After beating Took and destroying his home, the Brooklyn Park police learned that this was a miss-directed tip. The couple’s two-week-old baby was later rushed to the hospital suffering from a respiratory infection. Took’s fiancée telephoned the Minneapolis Urban League to talk to someone about the traumatic event and its affect on her children, and to possibly file charges against the police officers for human rights violations. Ms. Totten said regarding her phone call to the Minneapolis Urban League: “When I call them, they just take your number and never call back. What’s the problem?”
NorthPoint and the University of Minnesota:
A savvy business strategy for the University of Minnesota in 2009 would be to implement a takeover of NorthPoint Health and Wellness Centers (The City of Minneapolis and Hennepin County might go for this). The U, which initially proposed $60 million to partner with NorthPoint to develop a new facility, could give the City of Minneapolis/Hennepin County $10 million for the sale of NorthPoint, which would help ease the City’s deficit. The remaining $50 million could be used to develop the proposed new, innovative center offering resources and access to jobs – a facility never before imagined in north Minneapolis. (Personally, I would love to have a Dairy Queen or Jamba Juice on the North side!)
These are just a few of the examples of how people, organizations and systems have failed north Minneapolis and the African-American community. If our self-appointed African-American leaders continue to be apathetic regarding issues of dire importance to our community, then how will we as a community become socially and economically self-sufficient? In some respects, we residents must blame ourselves for our failure as a community. If we continue to appoint the same people to sit at the table and then demand nothing of them regarding access to jobs, the reinvestment and redevelopment of our community, and improved health care, then we are just as culpable, maybe more culpable than those we appoint to the table. In essence, we’re getting back exactly what we expect of ourselves and our community – nothing!
_________________________________________________
In 2008, the Minneapolis Urban League, Northway Community Trust, the Stairstep Foundation, Jordan Area Community Council, and the African American Men Project did not step up to the plate to address issues or to coordinate efforts to add value for the life’s of the north Minneapolis residents. We need new people with fresh ideas that believe in action. As of January 2009, we don’t own any Banks, Hotels, Airlines or Car Dealerships.
Do the Minneapolis Urban League and other agencies have a contingency plan for 2009?
Study: Ad Agencies Exhibit ‘Pervasive Racial Discrimination’
Article from Advertising Age (http://adage.com)
Blacks Make 20% Less than Whites; Groundwork Laid for Class-Action Suit.
“According to the NAACP’s Ms. Ciccolo, black workers “have a better chance of being struck by lightning” than being employed at some agencies.”
This is why BOYCOTTS are good!
By Marissa Miley and Ken Wheaton
(Published: January 08, 2009 Cyrus Mehri, partner in the firm Mehri & Skalet, specializes in civil rights litigation.)
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — The ad industry doesn’t simply have a diversity problem. According to Cyrus Mehri’s Madison Avenue Project, it is guilty of “pervasive racial discrimination” that not only under hires and segregates African-Americans but pays them 80 cents for every dollar it pays comparable white employees. With current efforts to bridge the gap doing little more than “blaming the victims,” Mr. Mehri and the NAACP are laying the groundwork for a possible class-action suit against the industry.
“The NAACP and my firm are joining forces to take on the advertising industry to end the long era of purposeful discrimination,” Mr. Mehri said in New York today, where he, NAACP Interim General Counsel Angela Ciccolo, activist Sanford Moore and economists Marc Bendick and Mary Lou Egan held a press conference. The industry, Mr. Mehri continued, “has robbed the African-American community of equal opportunity, good positions and, most important, their dignity.”
Mr. Mehri’s civil-rights firm, Mehri & Skalet, specializes in class-action cases, including successful discrimination cases against Coca-Cola Co., Ford Motor Co. and Texaco. He said the Madison Avenue Project, though, is best compared to his Women on Wall Street project, which focuses on gender discrimination in financial institutions. He said he would release a clearer timeline for the Madison Avenue Project by the end of the month.
‘Tried to get people to listen’
The Madison Avenue Project follows decades of prior attempts to break down racial discrimination in the $31 billion advertising industry. “For over 30 years, I’ve tried to get people to listen,” Mr. Moore said, comparing “the streets of Madison Avenue” to the “segregated graveyards of the past.”
Read the full story at http://adage.com/article?article_id=133638.
The Current State of North Minneapolis heading into 2009 – “Shall we Overcome?”
Mr. Lennie Chism addresses the Minneapolis City Council, who has decided to “exclude” the Black community from dollars.
In view of the catastrophic failure of Minneapolis Urban League in 2008 as it pertains to service to people, programs, community engagement and bad internal decision making to include cutbacks and layoffs, does the Black social service agency have a contingency plan for 2009? With the layoff of the MUL’s marketing/communications director (A U of M triple major with a Masters Degree – probably the smartest person in the building), it seems that bad choices will continue to be the flavor for 2009. An old poet wrote, “To fear someone with education and a strong will moves forward the clock of your stupidity.”
Furthermore, the exit this summer of the MUL’s Chief Development Officer and the agency opting to hire another grant writer versus someone with a solid direction, (which was the issue in the first place), put the once flagship Black social service agency in a tight competition for funds and the lack of procedure on how to fundraise in the private sector – a piece that’s been missing for a long time. It’s been reported that in 2009 local and national philanthropic agencies will meet to announce cuts in funding to Twin City agencies to include the MUL. These (White) philanthropic agencies have been conditioned to see Black agencies on television, radio and newspaper talking about successful measurable outcomes and current programs that reflect dollars given to local non-profits for programs to enact those programs. “Question: When was the last time you saw FOX 9 News or WCCO at the Minneapolis Urban League to promote a successful outcome that was purely Black focused and driven?”
The fact is; it has not happened. Now, with no fear of being called racists or unfair for not giving the usual dollars to the Black agencies in light of the current political atmosphere, the White philanthropic agencies are asking the question, “What are you doing with the money and what have you done.” With questions still unanswered regarding the $50,000.00 given away freely by Northway Community Trust to a firm outside of the community/state for a survey on Broadway Avenue businesses that was never done; to the alleged miss-dealings of the Jordan Area Community Council; and our favorite, Northside Residents Redevelopment Council (NRRC) lack of “development” makes us wonder if “change” is the operative word for 2009, local Black social service agencies must “step up to the plate” and play in the league of sound business practices; understanding policy, making policy and working with people from outside of their circle (but within the community) who might know more without being afraid of “change.” For example, if the Minneapolis Urban League gets money (again) to address the housing foreclosure issue within the community, we cannot let them “go outside the community and hire people that don’t look like us or don’t live in the community to address this very serious issue. That has always been the “easy-out.” There are knowledgeable people in the community that have technically solved the foreclosure crisis in their heads but have not been given the opportunity to step forward and apply the logics needed to create education, wealth and independence for North Minneapolis. If the African American Men Project needs a marketing plan or a website developed – they will not give a White firm $100,000.00 to complete a task and turn into a referral agency. Year-to-date, we have not seen a solid plan or website for AAMP. Part of this situation evolves from Black people that can make decisions, feel more comfortable doing business with White folks. (That’s another story…soon.)
Rather than just cutting the agencies off, meetings are being set up to announce a start from scratch approach with programs and plans that local agencies have to re-apply for funding – if they meet the requirements. Also reported today, NorthPoint Health and Wellness Clinic goes into 2009 with a half-million dollar deficit. Contacts for IBNN allege that a meeting was called between the NP board chair and a NP program director that had to answer some very “pointed” questions about his “process” or failure of. (It’s understandable why the U of M backed out of that deal.)
In University of Minnesota/Northside Partnership News…A concerned North Minneapolis community wise man received this email from the University of Minnesota’s Community Liaison, stationed at the Minneapolis Urban League. It reads, “The Urban Research and Outreach/ Engagement Center is working to create a time line of people who have been important or instrumental in the Northside and well as Minneapolis and in Minnesota – people who have had an effect in a positive or negative way. This will be used during the Future’s conference. Some examples include Jesse Ventura – Governor from 1999 – 2003, Sharon Sayles-Belton as the first African American and woman Mayor, Marcea Bland Staten Lloyd – Political strategist or Sister Jean of Ascension these are names to jog your memory. Names should cover the 1970s, 1980s,1990s, and 2000s up until now. Can you send your responses by the end of this week, Friday, January 2nd at 3:00? Please list names and year. Feel free to pass this on to others. Thanks for your help.”
In outrage and the feeling of being patronized and disrespected, the community wise man responded with this email message, “You continue to insult the community with the 1950’s “Ceremonial Negroes” mind set. STOP. What was successful yesterday can it be carried forward today? The major concern I have is the continuing unprofessional, lack of knowledge and lack of full discourse. Anyone engaging in your process that disagrees with your plan or ideas of mindset is made unwelcomed. This question is another example of limited discourse prior to posing such a question. “Successful people live in the future; unsuccessful people live in the past.”
To add fuel to the fire, the University of Minnesota point person sent this email to us, which read, (unedited) – “What is your most pressing question around PAR? Each Foundations of Participatory Action Research (PAR) training session will include both University faculty, students, and staff, as well as Community participants. The opening of the training will place it in the context of partnership and university-community engagement, highlighting the value of research in forming and sustaining these collaboratives. Each session will then introduce the concept of research as a continuum, with ‘traditional’/bench research on one end and PAR on the other. After brief descriptions of the different degrees of collaboration in research on the continuum, the training will offer a basic definition of PAR, noting that it is a form of engaged research through which all members are co-inquirers. The training will then move into a more detailed exploration of PAR. Topics to be covered will include: historical basis and theoretical underpinnings; assumptions; core values and principles; benefits; challenges; process and phases; and ethics. In addition to a general Q&A exchange, attendees will be given the opportunity to participate in “table-top” dialogues with their colleagues.”
Our response was, Dear Community Liaison for the Urban Research Outreach and Engagement Center/ University Northside Partnership University of MN – After receiving you’re very badly written email about Participatory Action Research and being totally insulted by the text in the body of the email – it is clear that the University of Minnesota has no clue what they’re doing and who they’re doing it with. You folks presuppose that just because you have some melanin in your skin you identify with the Black folks of North Minneapolis. Secondly, you asked the question in your email, “What is your most pressing question around Participatory Action Research (PAR)?” Did you forget you did not write any background information or provide a link so we “Neanderthals” can look it up ourselves?
The fact is the “research” aspects of PAR attempt to avoid the traditional “extractive” research carried out by universities and governments where “experts” go to a community, study their subjects, and take away their data to write their papers, reports and theses. Research in PAR is ideally BY the local people and FOR the local people – (Like the lost tribe of “Booboo”) lol! Research is designed to address specific issues identified by local people, and the results are directly applied to the problems at hand.
PAR proceeds through repeated cycles, in which researchers and the community start with the identification of major issues, concerns and problems, initiate research, originate action, learn about this action and proceed to a new research and action cycle. This process is a continuous one. Participants in Action Research projects continuously reflect on their learning from the actions and proceed to initiate new actions on the spot. Outcomes are very difficult to predict from the outset, challenges are sizeable and achievements depend to a very large extent on researcher’s commitment, creativity and imagination of which you and the University of Minnesota have none. (The players from UROC and UMNP have failed to demonstrate the skill-sets, in my judgment, to complete the necessary tasks to complete the PAR).
If you want a significant participation from the community for the U of M/UROC-Northside Partnership please stop the central localization of message distribution that only attracts the same participants with no new ideas; no creative solutions; and finally no results. I’ve seen what the U of M is trying to do in North Minneapolis work better in other cities because the point-people “got-it!” Your database reflects the U’s lack of outreach to a broader community base; therefore your list has become folly, a sham!
In closing Makeda, this is not a personal attack against you but an attack against the process that leaves “sound business practices and the correct process of community engagement” in the trash. Happy New Year!
As the University of Minnesota/Northside Partnership and UROC forge ahead with its impending commitment to research, it has again scheduled a series of meeting in the community cleverly sung to the tune of, “We want to know what you think” while offering no immediate answers to North Minneapolis about economic stimuli, employment, business start-up, addressing the Minneapolis Public Schools; or the Foreclosure issue. One reason no answers have been given is because they haven’t a clue!
In our opinion, it looks like 2008 will carry into 2009 with the same Standard Operating Procedures and no results. What will it take for the community to stand up and demand a solid community benefits agreement with the University of Minnesota that will reflect a true partnership – “What I have; what you have and what we have together.” Starting over is not a failure but an opportunity to align yourself with the right groups to move the project forward.
Until then, there’s a lot to write about. Happy New Year!
Why voting NO on the Minneapolis School Referendum is a vote For Minneapolis School Children
No Administrator Left Behind!
What happens if the Minneapolis school funding referendum fails this election? What happens is the voters will be asked to approve it next year in November 2009 (when we vote in Minneapolis City Council elections). The Minneapolis School Board and referendum supporters have stated that if the Referendum fails this year, nothing “bad” will happen. This Referendum will have no effect on school funding in Minneapolis, for this year (2008-2009 school year) or next year (2009-2010 school year). It only affects school funding starting in 2010-2011.
Why should people who support children and Minneapolis public schools vote NO on the Referendum this year? Because they believe that the children of Minneapolis deserve better than the current referendum proposal. The current referendum is flawed and incomplete. Working together the Minneapolis School Board, school administration and teachers union can do and should do much better for Minneapolis school children, than the current Referendum proposal. The District needs to be much more specific about the actions steps it will take to achieve its stated goals, which I agree with. Below are the things I want to know and I think all voters should know made before we support a referendum. Unfortunately, the only way to gets this information is for us to vote NO this year. By voting NO we send a message to Minneapolis School Board, school administration and teachers union that they can do much better than the current Referendum proposal for Minneapolis school children.
Enrollment Decline
Minneapolis parents are voting with their children, by taking their children out of the Minneapolis School District and sending them to suburban districts. This is a major cause of the decline in enrollment in the Minneapolis School District. This says 10 times more about the Minneapolis school district than all the speeches, reports, editorials, and commercials on TV & radio etc. combined. Shouldn’t voters know the specific steps the School District is planning on taking to reverse this trend, before not after approving a $60 million tax increase?
School Closings
The School Board and administration will announce which schools they plan to close in February or March 2009. I want an aggressive school closings plan because I want my tax dollars going to teacher salaries and not to pay for heat, lights and especially for repairing and maintaining buildings that are over 50 years old including several from the 1920s. Others may want to keep neighborhood schools open, especially neighborhood elementary schools. Some people might vote No on the referendum if they knew their neighborhood elementary, middle and/or high schools was going to be closed. We the voters and especially parents deserve to know which schools the District plans to close before we vote on this referendum not after. Unfortunately, that means voting NO this year so we will know the District’s school closing plan before we vote next year.
Black White Achievement Gap
The achieve gap between black students and white students in Minneapolis public schools is among the very worst in the entire United States – worse than schools in Alabama or Mississippi. The achievement gap has not really changed since it was first identified.
The Minneapolis school board, administration and teachers union say they want to close the achievement gap between black students and white students. Is the District committed to doing whatever takes to eliminate the black white achievement gap? Or is only planning to do what is easy and/or what is not controversial? If easy steps could reduce the gap, it would have been eliminated years ago. The only way to know the level of commitment is to know the specific action steps the School Board and Administration are committed to taking to close the black white student achievement gap. But the District has not shared with voters what specific steps it will take to close the achievement gap. I want know and I believe that all voters, parents and especially black parents deserve to know if the School Board and Administration are willing to “take the heat” for making the unpopular and/or controversial changes that will be necessary to close the black white student achievement gap, before approving a $60 million referendum not after approving the referendum.
Staff to Teacher ratio
Several years ago, a study of California schools revealed that California public school had one staff employee for every teacher. The California parochial schools had one staff employee for every six teachers. Obviously a much higher percentage of revenue went to hiring teachers in the parochial schools than in the public schools. What is the staff to teacher ratio in the Minneapolis public schools? Do you know, because I don’t know? Shouldn’t voters know the staff to teacher ratio before approving a $60 million tax increase not after approving a tax increase?
Union Contract
The current contract with the Minneapolis teachers union severely restricts School Board and Administration’s ability and flexibility to change teacher assignments to improve student performance. The current union contract is designed to protect the established seniority system. Teacher assignments (which grade they teach, subject and school location etc.) are based on seniority; not experience in a specific subject or grade, interest in specific the subject or grade etc.
In business if a company has problems with quality and/or low productivity at a particular manufacturing plant; do they send their least experienced mangers and/or poorest performing managers to that plant? NO!! The company sends its best, most experienced managers to “turn around” the poorly performing manufacturing plant. The current union contract forces the District to send its newest and least experienced teachers to the schools with the poorest performance. The current contract does not see having teachers high on the seniority list assigned to a poorly performing school as a badge of honor.
The union contract prevents the District from paying a bonus to the best teachers, whose students show the biggest improvement on test scores. Shouldn’t teachers, that are extraordinary, be paid more than poor teachers? The current contract does not allow merit-based pay.
The current union contract also prevents the District from holding teachers accountable when their students perform poorly. If a teacher’s students perform poorly on standardized tests one year that is a matter of concern. If a teacher’s students perform poorly on standardized tests five years in a row, which is a problem. Teachers, that consistently underperform, cause problems for the teacher that gets those students the following year. Good teachers, that get students from poor performing teachers, have to do double work teach current grade work plus teach prior grade work that students did not learn because of the poor performing teacher. Good teachers have to double work because they care about getting the students back learning at grade level. Is this fair to students and good teachers? Teacher under performance needs to be addressed, perhaps by additional training, coaching from successful teachers etc. If a poor teacher does not improve after being a given reasonable time to improve, then that teacher needs to be terminated for the benefit of students and good teachers.
The vast majority of teachers high on seniority list, work hard to be good teachers. But there are a few bad apples that stop working or are just putting in their time until they retire. The slackers know that they will never ever be laid-off because of their seniority. The school district needs a union contract that allows them to lay off these few bad apples for the benefit of students and good teachers.
There are some senior teachers that have given up on black students. They feel no personal responsibility to go the extra mile to help black students who are behind catch up. They feel no personal responsibility if black students fail. The School District needs a union contract that allows it to lay off teachers that have given up on black students for the benefit of students and good teachers.
The Minneapolis School District needs the leverage of passage of the school referendum to negotiate a more flexible and student friendly contact with the teacher’s union. After the referendum what is the Union’s incentive to negotiate changes to the current contract? Voters deserve to know if the union will negotiate changes to the existing contract will allow performance-based pay, performance-based terminations and flexibility in teaching assignments before approving a $60 million referendum not after approving it.
These are the reasons I’m voting for Minneapolis school children by voting NO on the school referendum this year. Children, parents and voter deserve more information and a better proposal than the current referendum. I hope that Minneapolis School Board, Administration and Teachers Union will provide Minneapolis voters and parents with the information we need to make an informed decision about voting YES next year.
Several years ago, the Minneapolis school district decided on the number of teacher to layoff, before even considering reductions in administrative positions. To me this is backwards, decisions on the number of administrative positions are made first, before teacher layoffs are considered.
TO “EQUIVOCATE” (Meaning: To use vague or ambiguous language in order to deceive or to avoid telling the truth.)
The University of Minnesota is “Equivocating” as it pertains to their rationale for pulling out of the north Minneapolis project. But are they also “Equivocating” as to their rationale for the Mental Health project?
No “Equivocation” on this joint venture was proposed to address the mental health concerns, which has resulted in the large number out-of-home- placement of children in the North Minneapolis and surrounding community.
Now, the meeting, Dr. Robert Jones stated, due to the increase in cost U of M is unable to go forward, citing some figures of over $385.00 per square foot and the additional cost of certain additional equipment as the bases for being unable to continue with the project. However when asked by the 5th District Congressman, Rep. Keith Ellison, as to “what was projected as the original budget for the project and what are the present projections – (In essence what is the increase in cost) the EQUIVATION begins.
Further it is important to note community member who were present at the U of M Regent meeting when the go-ahead was given for the U of M involvement and questions were asked as to budget for the project, statement was made something to the effect “we’ll get to that later”. This raises additional question as to whether cost was a concern. (Given donation from the Gates foundation for money allegedly supplied by Warren Buffet, the dollars amount was of little concern)
When a board member ask the question, after one half hour of Equivocation by Dr. Jones quoting Marvin Gaye, “What Going On?” the NorthPoint representative Ms. Stella Whitney-West, CEO of NorthPoint Health and Wellness Center stated in the open meeting, the issue is “Board Involvement” , that is the board of this joint venture must remain as Federal Law requires, that is, board member must be individuals who has utilized NorthPoint Health Center in the last year. This response implies that the U of M would be unable to have a seat on the board and that the present control would remain the same. Congressman Ellison stated, “Let’s see if we can work of changing this requirement. The NorthPoint representative responded in the negative. Congressman Mr. Ellison then stated, “Why are we here, let’s shut down!”
Further, off the record, the NorthPoint representative Ms. Stella Whitney-West, CEO of NorthPoint Health and Wellness Center stated the real issue is that the U of M requested the lion share of revenue generate by the clients who utilize the joint Health Center and Board control. To subject citizens to approximately two hours of EQUIVOCATION IS A MAJOR REASON WHY MOST COMMUNITY MEMBERS REFUSE TO GET INVOLVED.
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