Baltimore Afro-American Newspaper May 3 2014

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Volume 122 No. 39

MAY 3, 2014 - MAY 9, 2014

Backlash

By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent

Displaying an unprecedented unified front

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LeBron James was very vocal on the Sterling matter.

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against racism, NBA players, past and present, are leading the charge against Los Angeles Clippers’ owner Donald Sterling in light of his alleged anti-Black statements that were caught on tape and released by TMZ on April 25.

“This is a very serious issue which we will address aggressively,” said Chris Paul, president of the National Basketball Players Association and, incidentally, the Clippers’ point guard.

The Association is calling on the NBA to bar Sterling from all playoff games this season. They also want a full reckoning of the past accusations of discrimination against Sterling, an explanation of whatever disciplinary measures are decided upon, close involvement in the process and a swift resolution.

Paul and his Clippers teammates held a silent but emphatic protest at their April 27 game against the Golden State Warriors, piling their warm-up uniforms at centercourt and wearing their shirts inside-out to hide the team’s

Continued on A6

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Tekeya Mayfield stares in disbelief at her brother, Michael Mayfield, another victim of urban violence.

Fellow cadets, Xavier and Adrian

Baltimore Community Leaders Address Youth Violence and Potential Solutions

By Roberto Alejandro Special to the AFRO

Remembrances and vigils in the wake of the murder of Michael Mayfield two weeks ago are beginning to fade into memory. In the aftermath, leaders in the Baltimore community are calling for a more community-based and sustained effort to address the issues that drive violence.

David Miller, chief visionary officer and a co-founder of the Dare to Be King Project, an organization that supports groups providing services to boys of color, stressed the need for early intervention – identifying aggressive and problem behavior at the elementary-school age level and getting parents and other professionals involved. He is also calling for improved access

May 17th.

to mental healthcare services in Baltimore city.

Miller would like more resources funneled to groups and organizations already operating within communities affected by violence and that possess credibility with area residents. Too often, he lamented, outside groups, though well intentioned, are limited in their effectiveness by a lack of history with the communities they seek to serve.

Adam Jackson, CEO and co-founder of Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle, a policy think tank engaged in advocacy and educational efforts in Baltimore, pointed out that too often violence is thought of in a vacuum rather than within the context of the social conditions that underlie violent behavior.

“We don’t really think about the way we can arrange our Continued on A5

When Integration Hit Baltimore

I was in school with children who looked like me and spoke a different language. Together we learned to eat Spam. Therefore, I could not imagine why these women did not want their children to go to school with me.

A memory from a Baltimore woman whose life was changed radically by To be perfectly honest I was more interested in the events of Baltimore the landmark Brown v. Board decision of 1954. than going to school. In the fall of 1953 Baltimore came alive. The electricity in the air was palpable.

May 17, 1954 marked a defining moment in the history of the United The Baltimore Colts had moved to town. Everyone, Black and white, States. The Supreme Court declared the doctrine of welcomed the Colts with open arms. Baltimore was “separate but equal” unconstitutional and handed The the Colts and the Colts were Baltimore.

NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund the most celebrated The great Buddy Young became my neighbor. victory in its storied history. Reversing the 1896 the Imagine, I could babysit for his family. One of Supreme Court’s decision that separate but equal the first Blacks to play pro football (after the educational facilities for Negroes were legal. “unofficial” ban from 1934 to 1945) Buddy Young I’m sure you’ve seen the film and pictures of all #22, experienced the humiliations of prejudice. of the White women upset about their children going But Buddy Young always insisted that the worst MarshaRose Joyner shares her to school with Black children. On that evening in prejudice he encountered was against his size being memories of Brown v.

BOE. May, like everyone in America who had a TV, I was the shortest NLF player. He said his size was not watching the 10 inch black and white television; a disadvantage and delighted in outsmarting larger witnessing the drama being played out. opponents who attempted to tackle him. ‘’They hate In New York I had gone to Catholic School with a little redhead boy to miss the little man, who can make them look foolish, so they hesitate,’’ he named Greenberg. At Holy Providence for Negros and Indians in Cornwells once said. ‘’That’s beautiful.’’ With Buddy Young being only a few inches Heights, Pa., the convent where I was a boarding student; we were taught taller than me, I learned to love my short genes. the Great Books and nothing about being a Negro or an Indian. In Saipan Continued on A5

By MarshaRose Joyner Special to the AFRO

26th Street Collapse

HBCU Town Hall Meeting Planned for Coppin State

By Sean Yoes Special to the AFRO

Photo by James Bentley

Join the AFRO on Twitter and Facebook

Photos by J.D. Howard

Police officers struggled to hold back passersby who couldn’t believe their eyes at the sight of much of the first block of E. 26th Street and the cars formerly parked there now resting in the belly of the train tracks. At approximately 3:45 p.m., workers in the 2500 block of N. Charles Street, including those in the AFRO office heard a sound that mimicked loud thunder with the jolting effect of an earthquake. Not knowing what it was, many went to investigate and found the collapse.

Lawyers for the Coalition for Excellence and Equity in Higher Education, which represent Morgan State University, Coppin State University, the University of Maryland Eastern Shore and Bowie State University have been engaged in a legal battle alleging unlawful duplication of their programs by traditionally White Institutions since October 2006.

The legal wrangling has reached the mediation phase between the two sides, and still very little is known by the general public in reference to what’s really at stake for the state’s historically Black colleges and universities.

A town hall style meeting on the plight of the state’s HBCU is planned for 6 to 8:30 p.m., May 13 on the campus of Coppin Continued on A6

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The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

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NATION & WORLD

Lupita Nyong’o Named ‘World’s Most Beautiful Person’ by People

Lupita Nyong’o was named People magazine’s “World’s Most Beautiful Person” 2014—but the choice was hardly a surprise.

The Mexicoborn Kenyan beauty has been riding a wave of critical acclaim from her role as the slave Patsey in director Steve McQueen’s 12 Years a Slave— for which she won a best supporting actress Oscar.

During the awards season, she also became the gold standard for a Hollywood fashion star for her aweinspiring style and aplomb, landing on countless best-dressed lists and magazine colors.

“In this moment, in this time, she can’t be denied,” said cultural critic Jimi Izrael, adding, “It was a natural choice.”

And the actress’ beauty goes beyond her radiant ebony skin, Izrael added.

“Beauty comes from within [and] when she smiles you know…. It’s just that simple,” he said.

The coveted magazine spot comes a few weeks after Lancôme, the French makeup and skincare giant, named Nyong’o its first Black ambassador for its product line.

“There was really no contest this year. She seemed like the only choice,” People editor Jess Cagle told NBC’s “Today” show at the reveal on April 23. “She’s obviously talented, obviously beautiful.

She is incredibly stylish,” he said. “The way she carries herself, with such grace and such humility, is what I think really put her over the top.”

Detroit Student Agrees to Debate Affirmative Action Foe

Brooke Kimbrough’s rejection by the University of Michigan (U-M) for a slot in next year’s freshman class has brought out the fight in the 17-year-old Detroit student.

She has accepted a challenge to publicly debate race-based college admissions with a seasoned veteran of the matter, Jennifer Gratz, the founder and CEO of the anti-affirmative-action XIV Foundation.

Brooke Kimbrough Details of the encounter between the Black high school senior and Gratz, the White victor in a landmark 2003 U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning U-M’s pro-minority affirmative action policy, have not been set. But, following an April 21 ruling by the high court upholding a Michigan law banning race-based admissions, Kimbrough said that she is ready for a verbal rumble.

“It’s important to talk about this,” said Kimbrough, according to The Detroit News.

“This woman has challenged me, and I want to talk about it. It’s important to talk about. And I am interested in hearing what she has to say.”

The challenge was issued after Kimbrough held a news conference and led a rally April 15 at U-M’s Ann Arbor, Mich. campus to protest the policies that led to her rejection, as well as others of her application.

Kimbrough is a part of a pro-affirmative action organization called BAMN, which stands for “By Any Means Necessary.”

Gratz said she wants to confront the teen’s belief that race matters in college admissions and to underscore that Michigan voters in 2006 endorsed a ban on affirmative action in higher education.

Kimbrough, a senior at University Preparatory Academy in Detroit, is currently president of her school’s National Honor Society and a member of the debate team, which recently won the Urban Debate National Championship.

Kimbrough also noted that her U-M application includes an academic record that features a 3.6 grade-point average and a score of 23 out of a possible 36 on the ACT, a widely used college prep test.

Gay and Lesbian Couples Challenge Oregon’s Same-Sex Marriage Ban

Attorneys for four gay and lesbian couples challenged Oregon’s voter-approved prohibition on gay marriage on April 23, arguing that the ban was unconstitutional because it serves no legitimate government interest.

The plaintiffs include a Black male couple.

Even the state declined to defend the ban, including Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum (D) who has said that the ban is legally indefensible and has refused to offer arguments before the judge.

“We’re all together in this and we’re representing the body of LGBT in the state of Oregon, so the more people we have on our side, the better,” said Paul Rummel to KOIN 6 television news reporters, who is a partner in one of the couples challenging the law. “I think we have a strong case that Oregon’s current law is in direct conflict with U.S. constitutional law, which has a precedent.”

According to the Associated Press, Oregon law has long prohibited same-sex marriage, and voters added the ban to the state constitution in 2004. The decision, approved by 57 percent of voters, came months after Multnomah County, which is the state’s largest county and includes Portland, briefly issued marriage licenses to same-sex couples. About 3,000 gay couples were allowed to marry before a judge halted the practice. The marriages were later invalidated by the Oregon Supreme Court.

The judge said that he will not make a decision until at least May 14 after he’s had a chance to hear the National Organization for Marriage’s arguments in defense of the state law.

The National Organization for Marriage is a nonprofit

organization with a mission to protect marriage and faith communities that sustain it.

According to 2010 U.S. Census, 11,773 same-sex couples live in Oregon. Of those couples, the report estimated that 50 percent (5,887 couples) would choose to marry in the first three years.

If the judge rules to strike down the ban, same-sex marriage could begin immediately in Oregon.

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

Counseling, Literacy Services Needed to Prevent Foreclosures

By Roz Hamlett Special to the AFRO

The cascading effects of the ongoing foreclosure crisis on Maryland’s economy, especially in Baltimore City and Prince George’s County communities, continue. However, housing counseling and financial literacy services are essential footholds for distressed homeowners seeking to avoid foreclosure and create successful outcomes. “If a foreclosure goes all the way through the process, then a vacant house in a strong neighborhood is just as damaging as a vacant house in a weak neighborhood,� said Mel Freeman, executive director of the Citizens Planning and Housing Association. The agency trains community leaders, and works with housing counseling nonprofits to stabilize neighborhoods and educate residents about available resources to avoid foreclosure.

According to RBI Business housing metric trends, home sales in the Baltimore Metro Region, have increased by 5.9 percent compared to the same time last year, and is at the highest level since 2008. “The housing market is rebounding. As the market improves, mortgage companies and banks are foreclosing faster because the last thing they want to do is extend the process when they have a chance to get the property back on the market,� said Roy Miller, senior housing counselor, BelairEdison Neighborhood Inc. Miller said the initial fallout from predatory lenders and subprime loans is over, and after the moratorium on foreclosures and the National Mortgage Servicing Settlement of 2012, mortgage lenders and banks are working to clear their pipelines of non-performing mortgages. Depending on the neighborhood, most housing counselors agree that the number of people coming in for housing counseling is on the rise. “Now foreclosures are occurring in situations where there has been a loss or reduction of income, separation and divorce, medical issues, retirement, and weak homeowner budgeting skills,� said Miller He believes that clients who are willing to do the hard work to secure a work-out plan can create successful financial

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recoveries once they master budgeting and other basic financial literacy skills through training classes and workshops offered at his and other housing counseling organizations.

Miller puts it this way: “Financial literacy is the best foreclosure prevention. Do you want to buy someone a fish dinner or teach them to fish?�

Scott Satchell is the Program Manager at The cascading effects of the ongoing foreclosure the Go Northwest Housing Resource Center, a crisis on Maryland’s economy continue. community services non-profit agency serving the communities of Garwyn Oaks, Hanlon, and A broad range of remedies available, including payment Howard Park. Like Miller, he works directly plans and loan modifications to help people stay in their with homebuyers and distressed homeowners to purchase, homes, and short sales, deed-in-lieu of foreclosures, cash for preserve, and retain their home through pre- and post-purchase keys, hardship assumptions, and renting back from the bank in homeownership education, counseling, and technical assistance. circumstances where the person must transition from the home. “Sometimes cutting losses and transitioning out of the home Satchell advises that the most important first step in getting back is the best thing a person can do, “said Satchell. He points to on the road to financial health is making the decision to seek recent studies on the negative effects on health that chronic help. “The most important word to look for is ‘non-profit,’ which financial distress can exact on vulnerable populations, including is free. If you’re currently paying someone to help, then it’s a hypertension. scam.�

One such study published in the American Journal of Reaching out for help is extremely difficult and embarrassing Public Health. The study found that a rise in neighborhoodfor many people experiencing financial hardship. “For an aging level foreclosures was a risk factor for depression in older parent, it is very hard to go to your children and ask them for adults. Depressive symptoms were associated with increases help,� said Satchell. “In most circumstances, there is nothing in mortgage default notices, with homes coming under the that anyone besides a housing counselor or a lending institution ownership of banks and with increases in properties going to can do anyway. auction. “The stress that the threat of foreclosure can cause “At Go North, we have a 98 percent success rate. We define on the developmental and emotional health of children and success as the avoidance of foreclosure. In six out of eight cases, families is equal to divorce,� said Satchell, who is not certified families own their houses right now.� as a family or marriage counselor, but says his role as a housing counselor routinely touches upon these areas.

For more information: “We’re blessed in Maryland to have a housing counselor * Maryland HOPE Hotline Referral services 1-877-462network that is the envy of many different states.� Through the 7555, TTY 410-685-2159 well-developed Maryland Housing Counselors Network Inc, * CCCS of Maryland and Delaware 1-866-731-8486 counselors like Miller and Satchell meet regularly with dozens * United Way of Central Maryland Referral Services 410of others to share best practices, connections to lenders, and 895-1453, aka 211, 800-492-0618 special training.

Baltimore Community Leaders Continued from A1

communities in such a way where people a viable option for many young people. “It’s a won’t engage in violent behavior,� said fatalism that comes from seeing so many of your Jackson. “If we increase their quality of life, friends die,� said Conway. people, generally speaking, will be less likely Through Friend of a Friend, an organization to engage in violent behavior.� he founded, Conway addresses youth audiences Like Miller, Jackson would like to see and noted that “somebody needs to bond with more anti-violence efforts undertaken by them that cares, that they can see that these organizations founded and operated from people care, that they can understand that there within the community. is a possibility of transitioning beyond that age The Rev. Ronald Covington, pastor with that they see as a block, a glass ceiling to them.�

New Victory Ministries, works with young Conway, in his efforts with youth, stresses people and their families. He feels one of the the importance of knowing one’s history, biggest problems is the lack of a concerted believing that it is difficult to envision an effort to address violence in the city. “It’s a expansive future when one cannot appreciate sustainability issue,� said Covington. “We that they are also part of a current that stretches can’t have a great program this summer and far into the past. “If you don’t know who you the violence stems, and we don’t follow up are, you don’t know your history, you don’t with something positive in the fall, spring, and know where you came from, then you can’t in the coming years and months.� make a determination of where you want to go,�

For Covington, ensuring that anti-violence said Conway. efforts do not see their effectiveness limited While a sense of hopelessness may often Photo by J.D. Howard by gaps in initiatives requires that both contribute to the violence that continues to community-based organizations as well as afflict Baltimore city, everyone who spoke to the Classmates hold hands during the closing prayer. outside groups be involved. “We need people AFRO focused on solutions, betraying no sense from outside who have resources, we need that they viewed the problem as intractable. people inside who know.� “We got to intensify our work with young black Marshall “Eddie� Conway, a former leader in the Baltimore chapter of the Black Panther males who are most at risk for violence,� said Miller. “We can turn this thing around but we got Party and a life-long political activist, spoke about the lack of hope that often makes violence to do things differently.�

HBCU Town Hall

Continued from A1

State University. Veteran award-winning journalist George Curry is set to moderate the discussion at the school’s James Weldon Johnson Auditorium to shed light on the historic lawsuit. “I think the goal is to educate the public, the broader community as to what this case is all about and what its implications are for the future of historically Black colleges and more generally of Maryland higher education,� said Dr. Earl Richardson, former president of Morgan State University, one of the participants in Coppin’s town hall event.

Richardson was president of Morgan when the Coalition lawsuit was filed against MHEC in 2006. He says the Black community needs to be stirred to action over the plight of HBCU during this primary election year. “Now is the time to force the hand of the candidates force the hand of the elected officials,� Richardson said. “It’s within your (politicians) power to resolve this issue now. It’s been in the

courtroom simply because of your refusal to address what is obviously a major example of discrimination and segregation,� he added.

Veteran defense attorney A. Dwight Petit, a former member of the University System of Maryland Board of Regents will also participate in the town hall meeting. “We need to continue to put pressure on the state,�

Petit said. “The governor’s office has called the shots the attorney general’s office is carrying out those shots and the Board of Regents as well as the Secretary of Higher Education‌(We need) to

â€œâ€Śvery little is known by the general public in reference to what’s really at stake for the state’s historically Black colleges and universities.â€? bring this matter to a complete and just result without it having being returned back to the federal courts,â€? Petit added.

State Senator Joan Carter Conway – a vocal advocate for HBCU – who has attempted to pass antiduplication laws through the legislature for nearly a decade

will also participate in the meeting at Coppin.

Michael Jones, from Kirkland and Ellis, one of the law firms representing the Coalition is also scheduled to attend the town hall meeting.

Prince George’s County

Delegate Aisha Braveboy, chair of the state’s legislative Black Caucus and a candidate for Maryland Attorney General has also been invited to participate in the event at Coppin.

But, perhaps the invitee

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with the highest profile is former Maryland Lt. Governor and former chairman of the Republican National Committee Michael Steele.

Steele, who has been a staunch supporter of HBCU wrote in a commentary on The Grio website last October: “With so many of the civil rights battles behind us, and the satisfaction that comes from the success of African-Americans in business, politics, sports and entertainment, it is no surprise that the assault upon the integrity and historic purpose

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The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

HEALTH

Heroes of R. Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center Celebrate Life

By Alexis Taylor Special to the AFRO Roughly 1,600 people gathered inside the Baltimore Convention Center April 26 to honor the heroes of Baltimore’s internationally renowned R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center. In a night of the highest pomp and circumstance, city and state legislators heralded the work of the country’s only center solely dedicated to handling the pressures of trauma patients in need of urgent care.

“Every year they treat about 8,000 people ...,” Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown told the AFRO, shortly before the gala began. “They have a 97 percent success rate and they save lives every day. It’s one of the best investments we can make into the health delivery system.”

This year’s festivities highlighted the stories of four who work inside the Shock Trauma Center every day – but in a twist of fate, found themselves in need of the critical care of their peers. “I work at tragedy central,” said Dr. Thomas M. Scalea, physician-in-chief of the Shock Trauma Center. “The hardest part is when the patient is one of us.”

Harold Hardinger, a 43-year-old veteran of the Shock Trauma nursing staff, never imagined he would land on Scalea’s operating table. That is exactly where he found himself after his Jeep was hit at an intersection late one night as he headed home from work.

Severely injured, the registered nurse crawled out of his flipped truck, gasping for each breath of air with a collapsed lung. With his hospital badge still on, Baltimore City Mayor Stephanie Rawlings- emergency Blake addresses those gathered to honor workers picked the heroes of the R Adams Cowley Shock Hardinger up, put him Trauma Center in downtown Baltimore.

in the back of an ambulance, and told him they were taking him right back to Shock Trauma. “There’s a small window in which you can save a life and only Shock Trauma Lt. Gov. Anthony G. Brown attends the can do it,” said Sen. Cathy Pugh, 2014 R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma referencing the Gala with wife, Karmen Bailey Brown. “golden hour” theory coined by Dr. R Adams Cowley.

According to information provided by the University of Maryland Medical Center, Cowley was contracted by the U.S. Army in the late 1950s to research the effects of shock to the human body, and the critical care needed within 60 minutes to offset traumatic injuries.

The Shock Trauma Center has maintained close ties with the U.S. military. It is where medical staff of the U.S. Air Force pick up crucial training in the Center for Sustainment of Trauma and Readiness Skills program.

When asked what makes Baltimore’s Shock Trauma Center different from other emergency rooms and hospitals around the world, Dr. Sharon Henry said teamwork and dedication.

“Most places are in the middle of taking care of every other injury – it’s the only free standing trauma center in the world,” she said. “We have everything a patient would need: general surgeons, neurosurgeons, maxillofacial surgeons, critical care, and Jeff Rivest, left, president and CEO of anesthesiologists the Maryland Medical Center, enjoys dedicated to cocktail hour with Gloria Mayfield trauma.”

Henry, like all Banks, and newly appointed Shock doctors working Trauma board member, Ken Banks.

inside the learning environment of the Shock Trauma Center, doubles as a professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. “One of the most important things we do is train those who will follow us,” said Scalea, who emphasized the importance of teaching nurses, technicians, residents, and staff how to use the cutting edge equipment available at the teaching hospital.

“It is a technological marvel. It has revolutionized our ability to care for patients,” he said of the Center and its Critical Care Tower, which broke ground in 2010 and was dedicated in November of last year. “It has been a game changer for us.”

The Critical Care Tower of the Shock Trauma Center came with a price tag of roughly $160 million, complete with 64 private intensive care unity beds, and 10 brand new operating rooms.

John Spearman, former vice president of the Shock Trauma Center and current president and chief operating officer of Laurel Regional Hospital in Laurel, Md. said, “Baltimore’s Shock Trauma has helped set up systems around the world, including in Africa, India, and China.”

Newly appointed Shock Trauma board member Ken Banks said the night was necessary because the work done inside is “critically important. You don’t know the impact it has until you need it,” Banks said. “When I recognized the dedication of the doctors and the nurses I was totally impressed. Though I hope I never have to be a patient of their services, I think it’s a marvelous opportunity for Baltimore.”

Aside from honoring the four heroic stories, 57 members of the staff from nurses to surgeons also received special recognition for their healing touch and use of leading technology to save lives.

Members of the Morgan State University Choir perform Michael Jackson’s “Heal the World” for the guests of the 2014 R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Gala.

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May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

A5

May 17th

Continued from A1

April 15, 1954, one month before the Brown v. BOE, big-league baseball came to town when the St. Louis Browns arrived with the new name The Baltimore Orioles for the 1954 season.

The 1954 Opening Day Parade made its way through downtown. I love a parade.

At the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Camden Station, the Orioles - having traveled from Detroit, stepped off the train and into Baltimore’s version of wonderland.

Other than the traditional “Animal Walk” Circus Parade coming to town with the a herd of 18 elephants, trunk to tail in chain gang style, leading the way from the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus trains pulling the tents and the roustabouts dressed up as clowns, offered a dose of magic not obtainable anywhere else. The 1954 Opening Day Parade was the biggest parade I could remember.

Baltimore had no Beltway, no Harbor Tunnel, and no Jones Falls Expressway. Working farms prospered inside the city; Howard Street was rows of beautiful bustling segregated department stores. Banana boats offloaded their bushels onto wharves where the Inner Harbor now stands. I loved the sight of the ships in the harbor, the sounds of streetcar trolleys on the cobblestone streets, the taste of the juicy red plug from the watermelon man (A-rabbers) with his horsedrawn cart. People took such pride in their white marble steps, and oh, how I hated polishing the brass railing lining those white steps.

Mrs. Johnson, our next-door neighbor, was out to see that I did it right. The character of each neighborhood was on display. The descendants from Eastern European neighborhoods painted beautiful religious scenes on the front window screen.

Anyway, that 17th day in May, when the decision was handed down, in that same TV news broadcast with the White women screaming and yelling, there was the very gracious, calm Mrs. Mildred Coughlin the principal of Western High School, beautifully styled white hair and dressed in a soft pink suit. I was taken aback by her comment, and I quote, “I will never see a colored girl graduate from my school.”

Her school, Western High School, was one of the high class schools in Baltimore.

At that time, some schools in Baltimore were not only

segregated by race and they were also segregated by gender. The top schools in Baltimore were all that way, male and female. Western High School was the best, of all girl schools.

Baltimore became the first City in the United States to integrate public schools.

Baltimore Polytechnic Institute (BPI) had an unusually advanced and difficult college engineering “A” preparatory curriculum.

After a law suit by the Baltimore Urban League and the NAACP on behalf of 16 Black male students, a settlement was reached.

In the fall of 1952, Elmer (Buddy) W. German Jr. and his lifelong friend Victor Dates were among the first Black males to attend BPI. One cold day in winter of 1954 Buddy walked away.

His mother was stunned, she was so proud of her oldest son. “Mom, yes my grades are good, yes I can keep up and no I cannot not tolerate the harassment any longer.

He transferred to Douglass High School to graduate in 1956.

In complete candor Buddy German was my best friend’s brother and my “starter husband.”

May 1954, Walter Sondheim Jr. became president of the Board of School Commissioners of Baltimore City immediately after the Brown vs. Board decision and instantaneously implemented desegregation throughout the city.

The NAACP, along with CORE, the Urban League, other civil rights organizations and the AFRO had actively pushed Maryland into being the first state south of the Mason-Dixon Line to accept the Brown decision. As the gateway to the south, Maryland and especially Baltimore needed to be seen by the world as being able to implement civil rights objectives before the south would even give it a try.

Gov. Theodore McKeldin, on May 17, refused an invitation by Southern governors to consider plans for circumventing the Supreme Court’s decision.

June 1954, Dr. John H. Fisher, superintendent of schools for Baltimore, detailed a four point program of integration for all public schools. The Board of Education approved unanimously.

By the end of August, I was told we would go to “her school,” Western High School. There were five of us and we were hand-picked to

start September 7, 1954, in the 11th grade, which was the junior year. Western High School was on Center Street a half block away from the AFRO building on Eutaw Street where my, Elizabeth Murphy Oliver, was firmly ensconced; this made perfect sense to pick me.

However, on the other side of town, things did not go so smoothly. Oct. 4, 1954, near City Hall, a group of white students from Baltimore schools demonstrated against integration. Police held back white students at Southern High. Three days earlier, many students, led by their parents, boycotted classes in protest.

Mayor Thomas D’Alesandro, who had the city build 87 new schools, providing new facilities for Black students who had been relegated to inferior segregated buildings, prior to Brown v. BOE, appealed for “cool heads” to prevail. The administration of Baltimore held to their commitment of school integration.

At Western High School students and teachers were very nice; at least no one was ugly. No one was overt, it was covert racism. No one spoke to me. I suppose their parents had taught them if you cannot say something nice, do not say anything at all.

The five of us were in different classes, different curriculums, so we weren’t together. No shared class notes, no social activities, none of the things that go along with high school. The entire time in school was spent very quiet. I guess in retrospect that was good because I learned a lot. I didn’t have anything else to do. And even if I had told my mother no one would speak to me, her first comment would have been, “You’re not supposed to be talking in school, and you’re supposed to be learning.” As you may suspect, I love to talk.

Anyway we got through.

May of 1956, just before graduation, we had done all we were supposed to do.

Mrs. Coughlin, the principal, had been courteous to us; she had never been unkind or anything like that. However, just before graduation, Mrs. Coughlin turned her face to the wall and died. She never saw a colored girl graduate from her school. Now, I took it very personal, and as you can see it’s been 58 years and I will get over it- just not today.

“Although the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown

was ultimately unanimous, it occurred only after a hardfought, multi-year campaign to persuade all nine justices to overturn the “separate but equal” doctrine that their predecessors had endorsed in the Court’s infamous 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision,” explains the NAACP’s Legal Defense profile of the historic ruling that redefined the history of the United States. “This campaign was conceived in the 1930s by

Charles Hamilton Houston, then Dean of Howard Law School, and brilliantly executed in a series of cases over the next two decades by his star pupil, Thurgood Marshall, who became LDF’s first Director-Counsel.”

The drama took place in the towns and cities across

the South, to the greater woe of the white bigots, but it will pass into history as something that has happened to us all, children of this age, and it will remain in our lives forever.

Read more on Afro.com and the AFRO’s Facebook page.

Next week read about the unsung (s)heroes of the Brown v Board of Education decision.

Morgan University Hosts BGE CEO

Dr. David Wilson, center, president of Morgan State University, shares a laugh at a reception Morgan hosted for Calvin G. Butler Jr., right, who on March 1 became CEO of Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. Before that he served as BGE’s senior vice president, regulatory and external affairs and senior vice president of corporate affairs within Exelon and BGE’s sister utility, ComEd. On the left is NFL Hall of Famer Willie Lanier.

Courtesy photos

Family members with Butler, center, are Thelma Crawford, mother in law, left; Blake Butler, Sharon Butler, wife; Rainey Crawford, father in law and Raini Butler, daughter.

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The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

2014 Maryland Gubernatorial Primary: Congressional Races

By Sean Yoes Special to the AFRO Maryland’s congressional representatives from Baltimore City, Baltimore County and Prince George’s County are all heavily favored to hold onto their seats in the U.S. House of Representatives despite challenges in some of the districts.

In District 2 of Baltimore County U.S. Rep. C.A. “Dutch” Ruppersberger, ranking member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence has held his seat since 2003.

The former Baltimore County executive, who tantalized some political observers with the possibility that he might run for governor has one primary opponent, Blaine Taylor. In 2012,

Taylor sought the senate seat of Ben Cardin, garnering a little more than 4,300 votes.

In District 3, which encompasses Annapolis, parts of Baltimore City and Baltimore County, Howard, Anne Arundel and Montgomery counties, Rep. John Sarbanes is running unopposed in the democratic primary.

In District 4, incumbent Rep. Donna Edward captured her seat after winning a special election in 2008, defeating 15-year incumbent Albert Wynn making her the first Black woman to represent Maryland in the U.S. Congress.

She is being challenged by Christopher Warren, a retired Army Lt. Colonel originally from Holy Trinity, Ala. In Maryland’s venerable 7th Congressional District, Rep.

Elijah Cummings, who won the seat previously held by Kweisi Mfume and Parren J. Mitchell in 1996, is one of the highest profile Black members of Congress. As ranking minority member of the House Oversight Committee, Cummings battles with Republican Chairman Darryl Issa have been much publicized. Cummings will face two challengers in the democratic primary on June 24.

In 2012, Bryant Alexander – one of the candidates for Cummings’ seat – ran as an independent for Maryland’s U.S. Senate seat but, ultimately failed to submit the required nomination petition.

The other democratic primary candidate for the Seventh District is Howard County resident Fred Donald Dickson Jr.

N.C. Suppression

State Efforts Trump Citizens’ Rights

By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent Part III in an ongoing series on efforts to reverse voting rights in this country.

In the Republican-led movement to reverse the democratic gains of minorities and other targeted communities across the United States, North Carolina is ground zero.

After 150 years of taking a back seat in the Tar Heel state, the GOP gained veto-proof majorities in both chambers of the state house as well as the governorship, and quickly moved to secure their position by passing the most severe voter suppression laws in the nation—citizens’ rights be damned.

Those lawmakers were empowered by the Supreme Court’s Shelby v. Holder decision that gutted Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act—the provision that required states with a history of discrimination, like North Carolina, to obtain federal approval before making changes to election law.

“We’re seeing an avalanche of suppressive laws from states all over the country but mostly from states that were covered

by Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act,” said Julie Ebenstein, attorney, ACLU Voting Rights Project.

Fifteen of those previously covered states have passed repressive laws since the Supreme Court’s June 2013 decision, Ebenstein said. But, North Carolina’s Voter Information Verification Act, which was hurriedly rammed through the General Assembly, ranks as “one of the more comprehensively suppressive laws.”

Republicans seemingly piled on every vote-suppressing tactic they could think of into the 56-page HB 589: it includes a restrictive photo ID law, which excludes college IDs and goes into effect in 2016; cuts early voting period to 10 days; eliminates Sunday voting; eliminates same-day registration; discards pre-registration for 16- and 17-year-olds, who currently can register to vote before they turn 18; outlaws paid registration drives; jettisons provisional ballots cast in the wrong precinct; abolishes straight-ticket voting; prohibits counties from extending voting hours on Election Day, due to extraordinary circumstances, such as long lines; changes the procedure for obtaining absentee ballots; allows more people, including partisan poll observers, to challenge a voter’s right to

vote; and much more.

Almost immediately, the law was challenged by the Department of Justice, the ACLU, the NAACP and their partners, who lodged complaints alleging the law discriminated against African Americans and abrogated their constitutional rights—more than one-third of North Carolinians who lack an approved photo ID are Black; more than 70 percent of Black voters in the state took advantage of early voting opportunities; 34 percent of same-day registrants were Black voters, and the list of disproportionate effects goes on. The ACLU’s Ebenstein said they have filed a request for an emergency injunction to halt the implementation of the law before the 2014 General Elections.

“We had the option to be arrested or just sit back while things happened, and I chose to be a voice [that] let legislators know how we felt.”

—Rev. Linda Parker As usual, Republicans trotted out the old excuse about combatting voter fraud and increasing elections integrity— though experts showed that of the more than 21 million votes cast in the state in the past 12 years, only one case of voter impersonation was found.

But, the truth will out, and Don Yelton, former precinct chairman of the Buncombe County Republican Party, revealed the legislation’s true intentions in an Oct. 24 appearance on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart.”

“The law is going to kick the Democrats in the butt,” Yelton said. “If it hurts a bunch of college kids that are too lazy to get up off of their [behinds] and get a photo ID, so be it. If it hurts the Whites, so be it. If it hurts a bunch of lazy Blacks that want to have the government give them everything, so be it.”

Such blatant disregard for the disenfranchisement of African Americans, the young, the poor and other targeted groups has been met by a groundswell of community-led protest, in

addition to litigation.

“Of all the horrors that have come from the Shelby decision, one positive outcome is the level of concern and awareness among activists, but also among everyday people who realize it should not be made more difficult to vote,” Ebenstein said.

Ellie Kinnaird decided to resign as a state senator after a 17-year tenure to launch a grassroots project, NC Voter, to fight against the laws that were whittling away voters’ rights and undoing many of the progressive measures she has fought to enact.

“To watch 17 years of my work just being destroyed was very disturbing to me,” the former lawmaker told the AFRO. “I was so discouraged and weary of fighting a losing battle.”

Kinnaird joined forces with the Forward Together Moral Movement, a broad, multiracial coalition movement led by the North Carolina NAACP, which has dedicated itself to fighting the suppressive election laws and other harmful legislation through nonviolent protest, litigation, voter engagement and education and other means. One of those tools is the Moral Monday movement, a series of protests that began when a few activists were arrested outside the North Carolina General Assembly for civil disobedience.

The Rev. Linda Parker, rector of the North Carolina Central University Presbyterian Campus Ministry, was one of the early participants and was arrested—for the first time in her life— while protesting before the state capitol last May. “We had the option to be arrested or just sit back while things happened, and I chose to be a voice [that] let legislators know how we felt,” the 65-year-old minister said.

Now the Moral Monday movement has exploded with an estimated 80,000 to 100,000 people rallying in Raleigh this past February, and spinoffs taking flight in Georgia and South Carolina.

Rev. Parker said exposing the truth of North Carolina’s unfair policies is “worth anything that I personally suffered.”

And, speaking in a genteel voice underlaid with steel, she vowed to keep on speaking truth to power on behalf of her students and others whose lives are being used as fodder in political gamesmanship, and expressed confidence that righteousness would prevail.

“The God of justice that I serve will have the last word,” she said.

Backlash

Continued from A1 logo.

Other protests were much more vocal, as was Sterling— if it is indeed his voice heard on the 9-minute tape railing at his girlfriend V. Stiviano for associating with African Americans after she posted a photo on Instagram posing with Magic Johnson.

“It bothers me a lot that you want to…broadcast that you’re associating with Black people. Do you have to?”

Sterling allegedly complains.

“You can sleep with them.

You can bring them in, you can do whatever you want.

The little I ask you is not to promote it on that and not to bring them to my games.”

The voice continues, “...

Don’t put him [Magic] on an Instagram for the world to

have to see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games.”

In an extended version of the recording acquired by the website Deadspin, Sterling allegedly continues the racist rant.

This time, when Stiviano, who is part-Black and Mexican, questions his prejudice and asks him if he is aware that his entire team is Black, Sterling responds: “You just, do I know? I support them and give them food, and clothes, and cars, and houses. Who gives it to them? Does someone else give it to them? Do I know that I have—Who makes the game? Do I make the game, or do they make the game? Is there 30 owners that created

the league?”

The leaked tape set off an atomic bomb within the sports world with Sterling at the epicenter.

Many basketball players took to social networks to voice their opinions.

“Sterling basically articulated Plantation Politics...Make money off the

have to do something, do something very fast, quickly, before this gets out of hand.

Like I said, there’s no room for Donald Sterling in our league.”

NBA Commissioner Adam Silver, at a press conference April 26, called the statements attributed to Sterling “offensive and

“…When you’re in a position of power, and you can take jobs and economic opportunities from people, that’s what crosses the line.”

— Charles Barkley

Bucks/Lay with the Women/ No Association in Public good or bad,” Indiana Pacers forward David West said on Twitter.

Los Angeles Lakers star Kobe Bryant opined, “I couldn’t play for him.”

The Miami Heat’s LeBron “King” James was even more outspoken, telling reporters Sterling’s supposed statements were “unacceptable in our league.”

“It doesn’t matter if you’re White, Black, Hispanic, whatever, all across the races.

It’s unacceptable,” he said.

“And for an owner to come out and say the things that he said, it’s very disrespectful, and very appalling…. I believe in the NBA. And they

disturbing” and vowed to get some answers as “quickly as possible.” But he stopped short of offering immediate judgment, saying Sterling, who owned the franchise for three decades, deserves due process.

Many were not as magnanimous, saying the NBA should bring down the hammer against Sterling, who has a long history of racist behavior, or that Sterling, himself, should resign.

NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who was a Clippers special assistant coach in 2000, told CNN: “I know him. I know his voice. I am not surprised by this very much.”

He added in a statement

quoted by MSNBC, “Donald Sterling’s recent comments confirm that he is guilty of the systematic racism that he’s been accused of for the past 14 years. The best possible outcome would be for him to voluntarily give up his franchise so a new owner who reflects the values of America can take over.”

Charles Barkley, speaking at the half-time of Game 4 between the Indiana Pacers and Atlanta Hawks on TNT called this situation the “first test of Adam Silver.”

“You can’t have this guy making statements like that.

[Silver] has to suspend him and fine him immediately,” Barkley said. “…When you’re in a position of power, and you can take jobs and economic opportunities from people, that’s what crosses the line. We can’t have an NBA owner discriminating against a league — we’re a Black league.”

Magic Johnson, who became an unwitting star in the drama, expressed hurt over Sterling’s alleged sentiments about him and other African Americans and over the incident’s impact on the Clippers’ players during an already tense playoff season.

“I had a friendship with him. So for him to then make these comments, or alleged comments, about myself and other African-Americans and minorities – there is no place in our society for it and

there’s no place in our league because we all get along,” Johnson said April 27 on ABC’s “Nba Countdown.”

He later added, “I’m going to say what I’ve been saying all along – he’s got to give up the team. If he doesn’t like African-Americans – he’s in a league that’s over 70 percent African-American. When you have the president of the United States saying that this is bad and you have all the fans all around the country of different races saying its bad, it’s time for him to exit.”

Basketball legend Michael Jordan, a five-time NBA MVP as a player and the current owner of the Charlotte Bobcats, offered a unique perspective on the racist comments.

“As an owner, I’m obviously disgusted that a fellow team owner could hold such sickening and offensive views,” Jordan said in a statement April 27.

“As a former player, I’m completely outraged. There is no room in the NBA – or anywhere else – for the kind of racism and hatred that Mr. Sterling allegedly expressed.

I am appalled that this type of ignorance still exists within our country and at the highest levels of our sport. In a league where the majority of players are African-American, we cannot and must not tolerate discrimination at any level.”

Read more on NBA Backlash on AFRO Sports B4.

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

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COMMUNITY CONNECTION ‘Dreamers and Achievers’ and Links Host STEM Expo at Dunbar High School Dunbar’s “Dreamers & Achievers” and the Harbor City Chapter of The Links are hosting the second annual Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) Expo at Paul Laurence Dunbar High School for Health Professionals, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., May 10 at Dunbar High School, 1400 Orleans St. in Baltimore.

The theme of the expo is “STEMConnector -Preparing and Linking the Next Generation to Careers in STEM fields.”

The STEM Expo is the culminating activity for students at Dunbar High School who have participated in the “Dreamers & Achievers - Stem-ulation Right Brain and Left Brain” program. This program is funded, in part, by a grant awarded to the Links Foundation, Inc. by Chevron Corporation.

As part of the Expo there will be a career panel session in which students can hear from individuals in various STEM professions or those who use their STEM background in many different careers.

Over the course of the past year, the Harbor City Chapter of The Links has continued its program to educate Dunbar students on STEM disciplines through curriculum application content from NASA, hands-on experiential opportunities in their classrooms, and field trips involving interaction with professionals in STEM fields. The STEM Expo will provide an opportunity to expose members of the greater Dunbar High School community to STEM Education and to help them gain an appreciation for the critical need to prepare the next generation to enter into the increasing number of career opportunities in the STEM disciplines.

Healing for Women Brings Healing to Nations Heal a Woman Heal a Nation (HWHN), the creation of Mothyna James-Brightful and her visionary team, recently celebrated its 11th annual conference weekend welcoming women leaders into a space of support for their businesses, Courtesy photos

causes and personal lives.

“The Heal A Woman to Heal A Nation Unlimited You Conference was phenomenal!

The people I connected with and those I was reconnected with were so awesome and awe inspiring that I didn’t want the conference to end,” said Tanefa Wallace.

“All the speakers were geniuses at their craft and experts in their fields. I walked away with so much knowledge being poured into me; I have been feeling more blessed and highly favored than ever before.”

Another attendee described it this way.

“Last night…we laughed, we cried, we danced, we celebrated and honored incredibly inspiring women/queens!

It was a beautiful experience,” said Carla Blackwell. “I’m looking forward to new knowledge, connections, and inspiration to be the Unlimited Me I was born to be as I attend day 2 of the HWHN conference.

Conference sponsors included BET Networks and the Rap. it. Up campaign, Constant Contact and COVERGIRL. Orioles’ Adam Jones Kicks Off Y of Central Maryland 2014 Give Every Child A Chance Campaign In his first official duty as honorary chair of the Y of Central Maryland’s 2014 Give Every Child a Chance campaign, Baltimore Orioles All-Star Center Fielder Adam Jones acted as host and Y ambassador at a kickoff Adam Jones event, April 15, at Oriole Park at Camden Yards. Jones addressed the group of board members and other volunteers who fundraise for the Y’s charitable cause.

The Give Every Child a Chance campaign raises criticallyneeded funds to help children from low-income families participate in Y educational and enrichment programs including camp, preschool and before and after school programs, which help them succeed in school and in life.

Jones explained to the crowd that he believes in the Y because he believes all children deserve the same fair chance to succeed, regardless of their family’s financial circumstances.

Jones’ chairmanship of the 2014 Give Every Child a Chance campaign follows his successful chairmanship in 2013, which

enabled 663 kids in Central Maryland to attend Y camp who otherwise would not have been able to do so. With Jones’ efforts, the 2014 campaign is expected to raise $1.5 million for kids in need in Central Maryland.

Silver Spring Airman Finishes Basic Training Air Force Airman Kellen N. Cargill graduated from basic military training at Joint Base San Antonio-Lackland, San Antonio, Texas.

The airman completed an intensive, eight-week program that included training in military discipline and studies, Air Force core values, physical fitness, and basic warfare principles and skills.

Airmen who complete basic Airman Kellen N. Cargill training earn four credits toward an associate in applied science degree through the Community College of the Air Force.

Cargill is the son of Mary and Lonnie Cargill of Silver Spring.

He is a 2011 graduate of Springbrook High School, Silver Spring.

Line Up and Line Dance for Lupus In recognition of May Lupus Awareness Month, Marva’s Grand Hands of Love, Inc. will host “A Line Dance for Lupus Party” to raise funds to fight lupus and to help amplify the voice of the lupus community, 3 p.m. to 7 p.m., May 18, at Diamondz Events Hall, 9980 Liberty Road in Randallstown, Md. Local radio personality and line dance instructor Randy Dennis will teach supporters new line dance moves and call out traditional line dances. “Not only will supporters benefit a wonderful cause, but they also benefit themselves because line dancing is a healthy and fun way to get in some exercise,” said Marva Williams, event organizer.

Proceeds support the Lupus Foundation of America (LFA) DC-Maryland-Virginia Chapter. A LFA representative will be present to accept the donation. LFA estimates that at least 1.5 million Americans have the autoimmune disease.

“I recently lost a 27 year old cousin to complications from lupus and my best friend has it. I’m determined to help the women, men and children living with lupus,” Williams said.

Catering will be provided by Chef Mookie Hicks. Tanya’s Bling Tees has created a custom lupus awareness t-shirt for the event. Informational materials will be available. Tickets are $30 in advance. For more information, contact Marva Williams at 410-599-9159.

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The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

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COMMENTARY

Rancher Cliven Bundy and ‘The Negro’

chiseler.

On Saturday, April 19, Bundy, speaking to a small group of his supporters – and, fortunately for the rest of us, a New York Times reporter and photographer – went off message to hold forth on a number of topics, including race.

According to the Times, Bundy said: “I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro,” as he recalled driving past a Las Vegas public housing project, “and in front of that government house the door was usually open and the older people and the kids – and there is always at least a half dozen people sitting on the porch – they didn’t have nothing to do. They didn’t have nothing for their kids to do. They didn’t have nothing for their young girls to do.”

Bundy didn’t stop there: “And because they were basically on government subsidy, so now what do they do? They abort their young children, they put their young men in jail, because they never learned how to pick cotton. And I’ve often wondered, are they better off as slaves, picking cotton and having a family life and doing things, or are they better off under government subsidy? They didn’t get no more freedom. They got less freedom.”

Did Cliven Bundy form those views just from driving past – once? twice? – a federally subsidized housing project where Black Americans live? Or did they come from the stew of racist notions that still have wide circulation in the political ideology – conservatism – Bundy claims to be an adherent.

Some of his well-known enablers among the conservative echo

chamber of politicians, talk-show jockeys and pundits quickly distanced themselves from Bundy as soon as the Times story appeared. Others, doubling-down, claimed his racist views were irrelevant to what they asserted were his proper resistance to federal government overreach.

But it’s too late for that flimflam. Beyond the laughable hypocrisy of Cliven Bundy, chiseler, asserting that “the Negro” is too dependent on government largesse, his words underscore that American conservatism’s central motivating force from the long-ago past to the present has always been the oppression of ‘the Negro.”

For one thing, consider that Bundy brought up the topic himself – and not only made it clear he thinks Blacks were better off when the vast majority were enslaved but would be better off now if reduced to something approximating slavery. Bundy’s views aren’t at all unique among American conservatives. Especially since President Obama took office, conservatives, high and low, have shown an obsession with twisting the truth about Negro slavery.

If it’s not the Tea Party fanatics contending that President Obama’s intent is to “enslave” Whites; it’s White conservatives – and their Black front-men such as Ben Carson, Herman Cain and Allen West – asserting that Blacks who vote Democratic are unthinkingly content to laze about on the Democratic “plantation.” If it’s not the Family Leader, an Iowa-based conservative group, proclaiming that Blacks were better off during the Slave era because the slave-owners kept their families intact – a brazen lie – it’s former U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, now head of the powerful, conservative Heritage Foundation, declaring on a right-wing Christian talk show earlier this month that the slaves were not emancipated by “big government” but by “a growing movement among the people, particularly people of faith that

NBA Commissioner Alan Silver, who replaced David Stern just two months ago, did what we’ve all been waiting for – he showed Los Angeles Clippers bigoted owner Donald Sterling the nearest exit and told him not to look back.

On Tuesday, Silver banned Sterling from the NBA for life and fined him $2.5 million, the maximum allowed under the NBA constitution and bylaws.

Of course, that’s only shoe shine money for someone worth $1.9 billion. Still, it sends a powerful George E. Curry message not only to Sterling, but to others that at least one sector of America is willing to confront brazen racism. Now, the NBA Board of Governors needs to complete what Silver started by forcing Sterling to give up ownership of the Clippers.

Unless you’ve been under a rock or just landed from mars, you should know by now that Sterling, who has a long and acrimonious history with people of color, exposed his true feelings about African Americans in a conversation with his mistress, Vanessa Stiviano, who is almost 50 years his junior. The conversation was apparently taped surreptitiously in Sterling’s home by Stiviano, who describes herself as part Mexican and part Black. A 9-mintute segment of the conversation was posted Saturday to celebrity website TMZ. A 15-minute excerpt was later posted by Deadspin.

There was this exchange in one segment: V: I don’t understand, I don’t see your views. I wasn’t raised the way you were raised.

DS: Well then, if you don’t feel—don’t come to my games. Don’t bring black people, and don’t come.

V: Do you know that you have a whole team that’s black, that plays for you?

DS: You just, do I know? I support them and give them food, and clothes, and cars, and houses. Who gives it to them? Does someone else give it to them? Do I know that I have—Who makes the game?

Do I make the game, or do they make the game? Is there 30 owners, that created the league?

At one point, Sterling said: “It bothers me a lot that you want to broadcast that you’re associating with black people. Do you have to?…”

“You can sleep with [black people]. You can bring them in, you can do whatever you want. The little I ask you is not to promote it on that … and not to bring them to my games…”

“I’m just saying, in your lousy f******* Instagrams, you don’t have to have yourself with, walking with black people.”

“Don’t put him (Magic Johnson) on an Instagram for the world to have to see so they have to call me. And don’t bring him to my games.”

Finally, there was the following exchange: DS: You think I’m a racist, and wouldn’t— V: I don’t think you’re a racist.

DS: Yes you do. Yes you do.

V: I think you, you— DS: Evil heart.

DS: It’s the world! You go to Israel, the blacks are just treated like dogs.

V: So do you have to treat them like that too?

DS: The white Jews, there’s white Jews and black Jews, do you understand?

V: And are the black Jews less than the white Jews?

DS: A hundred percent, fifty, a hundred percent.

V: And is that right?

DS: It isn’t a question—we don’t evaluate what’s right and wrong, we live in a society. We live in a culture. We have to live within that culture.

V: But shouldn’t we take a stand for what’s wrong? And be the change and the difference?

DS: I don’t want to change the culture, because I can’t. It’s too big and too [unknown].

V: But you can change yourself.

DS: I don’t want to change. If my girl can’t do what I want, I don’t want the girl. I’ll find a girl that will do what I want! Believe me. I thought you were that girl—because I tried to do what you want. But you’re not that girl.

Sterling, 81, has a long history of antagonizing Blacks.

In 2009, he paid $2.7 million to settle a suit accusing him of discriminating against Blacks, Latinos and families with children at an apartment building he owned in Los Angeles.

In addition, NBA Hall of Famer Elgin Baylor, who spent 22 years with the Clippers, filed a suit against Sterling in 2009 for wrongful termination. According to the Los Angeles Times, “In his deposition, Baylor spoke about what he called Sterling’s ’plantation mentality,’ alleging the owner in the late 1990s rejected a coaching candidate, Jim Brewer, because of race. Baylor quoted Sterling as saying: ‘Personally, I would like to have a white Southern coach coaching poor black players.’ Baylor said he was shocked. ‘And he [Sterling] looked at me and said, ‘Do you think that’s a racist statement?’ I said, ‘Absolutely.

That’s plantation mentality.’ ” Donald Sterling is the Paula Deen of professional basketball.

Accordingly, the NBA stuck a fork in him and told him he’s done.

Earlier this month Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette charged an organization known as Freedom by Faith Ministries with defrauding over 100 consumers in Southeast Michigan. The alleged crime: foreclosure rescue scams.

Unfortunately the circumstances that led to the Michigan lawsuit represent a continuation of a disturbing trend of profiteers seeking to financially exploit the Charlene Crowell misfortunes of troubled homeowners. The U.S. Government Accountability Office in 2013 found over 40,000 complaints of foreclosure fraud occurred nationwide and together totaled losses to homeowners of over $90 million.

Foreclosure scammers typically demand large, upfront cash payments from troubled homeowners and advise homeowners to stop making mortgage payments. They also dupe their victims into sharing important personal information such as Social Security and bank account numbers. After payment is received, the scammers do little or no work to obtain a loan modification for the homeowners. In the process, homeowners fall deeper into delinquency and also lose valuable time that could have yielded better results.

Free services of a HUD-certified housing counselor are available nationwide to help negotiate with mortgage servicers. Many times these housing counselors facilitate securing options to avoid

foreclosure such as home modifications, refinance, forbearance, short sales, and more.

A new research report, Foreclosure Rescue Inc. by the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under the Law finds that foreclosure scams are beginning to take new forms while still fraudulently taking money from distressed homeowners. Some scammers falsely claim government affiliation while others include improper involvement of legal and real estate professionals For example, in West Palm Beach, Fla., foreclosure rescue “consultants” held seminars to teach people how to make money off of distressed homeowners. In Atlanta, attorneys were reported to have been randomly solicited to sign up as “partners” or “affiliates” of foreclosure rescue operations. And in Long Island, NY, legitimate housing counselors unknowingly gave fraud actors powers of attorney to presumably talk to banks on behalf of homeowners.

“African-American and Latino homeowners, already victimized by targeted predatory lending, have been victimized by scams at disproportionate rates compared to their percentage of the population”, said Yolanda McGill, manager of the Loan Modification Scam Prevention Network for the Lawyers’ Committee.

When a troubled homeowner’s race is taken into account, stark racial differences emerge. White homeowners represent 78 percent of the nation’s homeowners and together account for less than half – 47 percent – of complaints filed. By contrast, both Black and Latino homeowners combined represent 16 percent of the nation’s homeowners, their combined fraud complaints are nearly the same number as those filed by Whites: 44 percent.

“Senior homeowners also are victimized at high rates and their average loss is higher than other groups”, continued McGill. “The Lawyers’ Committee and our federal, state, and community partners

continue to fight back and put these scammers out of business, including through litigation.”

The Lawyers’ Committee litigation includes 14 lawsuits against loan scam operators whose collective efforts affected over 400 troubled homeowners. The lawsuits sought both monetary and injunctive relief. So far, 50 scam operations have been shut down and over $500,000 has been recovered on behalf of homeowners.

Additionally, those found guilty have been banned from future participation in mortgage assistance relief services.

As the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau continues its complaint resolution and the Lawyers’ Committee continues its litigation, Foreclosure Rescue Inc. recommendations call for more policy reforms: * Allowing homeowners to pursue private rights of actions; * Enacting state laws that broaden fraud definitions to include any stage of the scam process; and * Incorporating explicit government warnings to consumers regarding potential scammers and how to avoid fraud.

Created in the summer of 1963 by President John F. Kennedy after an initial meeting of 244 lawyers, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law is a nonpartisan, nonprofit providing legal services to address racial discrimination. Anyone desiring more information on state and national resources for foreclosure fraud should visit www. preventloanscams.org.

To file an online mortgage complaint with CFPB, visit www. consumerfinance.gov.

Charlene Crowell is a communications manager with the Center for Responsible Lending. She can be reached at Charlene.crowell@ responsiblelending.org.

Lee A. Daniels

As is typical of blowhards, Cliven Bundy, the conservative movement’s most recently defrocked hero/criminal, opened his mouth once too often. In doing so, the Nevada rancher revealed who he really is behind all the Stars-and-Stripes flagwaving and man-of-the-West rhetoric. The man who has grazed his cattle on federal land for more than two decades but has refused to pay the minimal grazing fees the government charges all ranchers (Bundy now owes about $1 million) is an arch-racist as well as a

Racist NBA Owner Has Fouled Out

[slavery] was wrong.”

I’ve no doubt that the ignorance on display in the conservative movement’s obsession with American slavery is largely a deliberate gambit to obscure how evil – and widely accepted among Whites – slavery and its successor, legalized racism, were. But I also think that, as with Cliven Bundy, some of it stems from the deep-rooted fear of what “freedom” for Black Americans means for those Whites who need the crutch of White supremacy to feel good about themselves. If Blacks were “free,” you could get Black Americans contributing a full measure of their talent to American society. Why, you might get a Paul Robeson, or an Althea Gibson, or a Leontyne Price, or even a president of the United States.

And then, what would America be?

Lee A. Daniels is a longtime journalist based in New York City.

His latest book is Last Chance: The Political Threat to Black America.

George E. Curry, former editor-in-chief of Emerge magazine, is editor-in-chief of the National Newspaper Publishers Association News Service (NNPA) and can be reached on www.georgecurry.com and on Facebook.

Over $90M Lost to Foreclosure Rescue Scams

A10

The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

Belle

ARTS & CULTURE

18th Century Biopic Revisits Life of Ex-Slave Raised as Aristocrat

Gugu Mbatha-Raw stars as Dido Belle in "Belle."

Film Review

By Kam Williams Born in the West Indies in 1761, Dido Belle (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) was the product of the taboo union of Mary Belle, an African slave, and John Lindsay (Matthew Goode), a British ship captain. Upon Mary’s death, the concerned father brought his 8 year-old daughter to England to see whether his well-heeled aunt and uncle might be willing to take her in.

After all, Lady (Emily Watson) and Lord Mansfield (Tom Wilkinson). had just adopted another niece whose own mom had passed away. Plus, since Dido and Elizabeth (Sarah Gadon) were about the same age, the orphaned girls could conceivably keep

Kam’s Kapsules

each other company.

Captain Lindsay further argued that his daughter was entitled to live on the family estate by virtue of her noble birthright. This prompted a skeptical Lady Mansfield to speculate about whether skin color ranked above or below bloodline in polite society.

Ultimately, she did agree to raise Dido, and the young cousins proceeded to forge a close friendship that would last a lifetime. In fact, proof of their enduring bond would be preserved for posterity in a striking portrait of the pair commissioned in 1779.

That famous painting apparently served as the source of inspiration for Belle, a mesmerizing biopic based on a speculative script by Misan Sagay. Directed by Amma Assante, the riveting historical drama continues the recent cinematic trend of reexamining race from the black perspective, ala Django Unchained, The Retrieval and Oscar-winner 12 Years a Slave.

Here, the picture focuses primarily on Dido and Elizabeth’s coming-of-age against the backdrop of a country increasingly uneasy about its involvement in the slave trade. After being fairly protected during childhood, racism rears its ugly head when the boy-crazy girls start entertaining the overtures of appropriate suitors outside the safe confines of the family manse.

Meanwhile, tension builds around a legal decision set to be handed down by their uncle in his capacity as Chief Justice of England’s Supreme Court. The case revolved around a trading company that was seeking compensation from its insurance company for the loss of over a hundred Africans who had been deliberately drowned.

The question Judge Mansfield was being asked to settle was whether or not slaves should be considered human or mere cargo that could be thrown overboard for financial gain at the whim of the owner. The longer he agonizes over the ruling, the more pressure he feels to issue a farreaching, landmark opinion likely to signal the death knell of an odious institution.

An 18th C. tale of race and romance told in a sophisticated fashion reminiscent of the best of Jane Austen.

Excellent (4 stars) Rated PG for smoking, mature themes and ethnic insensitivity.

Running time: 104 minutes Distributor: Fox Searchlight Pictures To see a trailer for Belle, visit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTz5VjBscGk

Weekly Previews That Make Choosing a Film Fun

By Kam Williams Special to the AFRO

Big Budget Films

The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (PG-13 for action and sci-fi violence) Second installment in re-booted Marvel Comics franchise finds your friendly neighborhood superhero (Andrew Garfield) wooing Gwen (Emma Stone) while protecting New York from a few, formidable new foes (Jamie Foxx, Dane DeHaan and Paul Giamatti). With Sally Field, Chris Cooper, Denis Leary, Colm Feore and Embeth Davidtz.

Belle (PG for mature themes, mild epithets and brief smoking) Gugu Mbatha-Raw stars in this biopic about the life of Dido Elizabeth Belle (1761-1804), the illegitimate offspring of an African slave and a British ship captain (Matthew Goode) who sent his daughter to England to be raised in polite society by his aristocratic aunt (Emily Watson) and uncle (Tom Wilkinson). Cast includes Penelope Wilton, Sarah Gadon, Miranda Richardson, Tom Felton and Bethan Mary-James.

Independent & Foreign Films

Altered States of Plaine (Unrated) Sci-fi thriller revolving around a young fugitive (George Gallagher) on the run from the government who is desperate for a cure from a mysterious affliction that has him waking up in a different place whenever he falls asleep. (In English and French with subtitles) With Kether Donohue, Michael P. Mathis and Donald Pritt.

The Bachelor Weekend (Unrated) Buddy comedy, set in Dublin, about a bride-to-be (Amy Huberman) who recruits her ex (Andrew Scott) to plan her fiance’s bachelor party, an overnight camping trip to the Irish countryside (Hugh O’Conor) with his friends and her obnoxious brother (Peter McDonald). Featuring Brian Gleeson, Michael Legge and Andrew Bennett.

Bad Johnson (Unrated) Battle-of-the-sexes comedy about a charming womanizer (Cam Gigandet) who finally gets what’s coming when his penis leaves his body and takes human form. Cast includes Jamie Chung, Nick Thune and Katherine Cunningham.

Decoding Annie Parker (R for profanity and sexuality) Samantha Morton handles the title role in this fact-based drama about a woman’s fight against the same hereditary form of breast cancer that claimed the life of her mother and sister. With Helen Hunt, Rashida Jones, Marley Shelton, Maggie Grace and Alice Eve. Farmland (Unrated) Generation Next documentary taking a look at the lives of some farmers and ranchers who have assumed the reins of the family business while still in their twenties.

For a Woman (Unrated) Romance drama, exploring the mystery of undying love from the perspective of a daughter (Sylvie Testud) deconstructing her parents’ (Benoit Magimel and Melanie Thierry) enduring marriage. Cast includes Nicolas Duvauchelle, Julie Ferrier and Denis Podalydes. (In French with subtitles) Friended to Death (R for profanity and crude sexual references) Dark comedy revolving around a social media junkie (Ryan Hansen) who fakes his own death online just to see whether any of his supposed friends come to the funeral.

With James Immekus, Zach McGowan, Pancho Moler and Angela Bullock.

Ida (PG-13 for mature themes, sexuality and smoking) Skeleton-out-of-the-closet drama, set in Poland in 1962, about an orphan (Agata Trzebuchowska) raised in a Catholic convent who learns that she was born Jewish just as she’s set to take her vows as a nun. Co-starring Jerzy Trela, Halina Skoczynska and Agata Kulesza. In Polish with subtitles) Jobriath A.D. (Unrated) “It’s better to flame out than to fade away” biopic recounting the brief career of Bruce Wayne Campbell (1946-1983), aka Jobriath, the first openly-gay rock star, and the first to die of AIDS. The M Word (R for profanity and sexual references) Ensemble comedy, written and directed by the legendary Henry Jaglom, following three middle-aged sisters (Frances Fisher, Mary Crosby and Eliza Roberts) as they make the awkward adjustment to the onset of menopause. Co-starring Corey Feldman, Tanna Frederick and Gregory Harrison.

More than the Rainbow (Unrated) Shutterbug retrospective highlighting the eclectic portfolio of eccentric cabbie-turned-NYC street photographer Matt Weber.

Mr. Jones (PG-13 for terror, frightening images, sexuality and brief profanity) Harrowing horror flick about an aspiring filmmaker (Jon Foster) who moves to the country with his girlfriend (Sarah Jones) where they get more than they bargain for when they sneak into the home of their new next-door neighbor (Mark Steger), a reclusive sculptor with a weird agenda. With Faran Tahir, Stanley B. Herman, Jordan Byrne and Ethan Sawyer.

The Protector 2 (R for profanity and violence) Tony Jaa reprises the title role in this martial arts sequel, set in Thailand, as a retired Royal Guard now enlisted to crack a terrorist conspiracy to disrupt peace talks in Bangkok. With RZA, Marreese Crump and JeeJa Yanin. (InThai with subtitles)

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

B1

The fellowship hall at Whitestone Baptist Church was packed with excited friends and relatives who were buzzing around in preparation for Elizabeth J. Goins who would soon be entering the banquet hall.

The crowd applauded as Mrs. Goins was escorted in by her grandson, Darryl Davis, as grandson, Reginald Love played Donnie McClurkin’s “We Fall Down, But We Get Up” on the keyboard.

The mother of four, grandmother of 34, and great grand mother of 12, Elizabeth Josephine Rice Goins never sat down as she greeted her guests who came to celebrate her 90th birthday.

The Hon. Kweisi Mfume, who lived across the street from the Goins family, reminisced about his “Neighborhood Mom” from the Sandtown area of Baltimore.

Mrs. Goins summarized her birthday with a grateful heart of wisdom.

“I thank God first of all,” she said as she recalled suffering a massive heart attack while in Atlanta with her daughter Jackie.

“God has been very good to me,” Mrs. Goins continued. “The Springfield Church members in Atlanta made me their ‘Honorary Usher Mom.’ People love me, and God knows I love people.”

The native of Spartenburg, S.C. fills her time with booking bus trips and cruises all over the world and working in Whitestone Baptist, the church she has belonged to for 66 years.

Elizabeth J. Goins, celebrating her 90th birthday, is escorted into the church fellowship hall by her grandson, Darryl Davis

Lillian Colbey, close friend sang a favorite selection, “I Know Who Holds my Hand”

Arnetta Stock, Marjorie Jeffers, Dale Knight, Leona Holly, close friends

The grand children and great grand gathered around Nana as they sang Happy Birthday

Kurt Richardson, great great grandson welcomed the family and guests to his Nana’s birthday celebration

Evangelist Debra Stokes read Psalm 46, a scripture chosen by the honoree.

Birthday celebrant, Elizabeth Goins with her siblings, Shirley Cooper, left, and Dorothy Harvey

The Rev. Dr. Robbin Blackwell, Mrs. Goins' goddaughter, offers the prayer

The Hon. Kweisi Mfume, birthday celebrant and the Rev. Dr. E.E. Warren Jr. Linda Miles, Alma Rowlette and Alma Rollins Grandson Reginald Love plays “What a Mighty God We Serve”

Rev. Dr. E.E. Warren Jr., host pastor

Rhoda Jones served as mistress of ceremonies Grandchildren of Elizabeth Goins

Women’s Auxiliary of the United Baptist Missionary Convention of Md. include Elizabeth Able, Lucille Johnson, Joyce Middleton, Barbara Booth, Mary Jones

The 2014 John Mackay Award Gala was held, April 12, at the Baltimore Marriott Hotel, hosted by friends of John Mackey, those responsible for the administration of the John Mackey Award and the John Mackey Award Selection Committee. WBAL sports director and Baltimore Ravens broadcaster Gerry Sandusky presented the evening awards to: Ozzie Newsome, Ravens general manager, who received the John Mackay Leadership Award; Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless of ESPN First Take who received the Outstanding Journalism Award.

The highlight of the evening was the fourteenth annual presentation of the John Mackey Award to Austin Seferian-Jenkins of the University of Washington.

Nattie Comas, Mrs. Goins’ granddaughter, is all smiles

Seferian-Jenkins made an emotional thank you speech and participated in a live question and answer session. Proceeds from the event supported the Omega Baltimore Foundation.

The John Mackey Award is a member of the National College Football Awards Association (NCFAA) which encompasses the most prestigious awards in college football.

The 21 awards boast 678 years of tradition-selection excellence.

Great grandson twins Tyree and Tyrelle

Many guests attended the birthday celebration Photos by Dr. A. Lois De Laine

Jerry Mackey Sr., chairman and honorees Austin S. Jenkins, Ozzie Newsome, Stephen A. Smith

Photos by J.D. Howard

Gbolahan Lasaki, Tolu Lasaki, Mark Azevedo and Chad Alexander

Melissa B. sang the National Anthem

Mark Stevens and Jerry Mackey Jerry Mackey Sr., chairman; Ozzie Newsome, Austin S. Jenkins, Sylvia Mackey, Gerry Sandusky, MC and Stephen A. Smith Ozzie Newson, recipient of the John Mackey Leadership Award

Lawrence Boileau, Stephen A. Smith, Sylvia Mackey and Gerry Sandusky

Austin S. Jenkins, recipient of the John Mackey Award and family members

Gerry Sandusky interviewing Austin S. Jenkins

Beulah Pittman, Gerald Miles and Gloria Miles

TYPESET: Wed Apr 09 12:25:05 EDT 2014

BECOME A FOSTER PARENT

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Treatment Foster Parents work from home, receive a tax-free stipend and professional 24 hour on-call support for providing shelter for a young person who has suffered abuse or neglect. For more information, call the CHOSEN Treatment Foster Care Program at 1-800-621-8834.

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BUSINESS SERVICES Drive traffic to your business and reach 4.1 million readers with just one phone call & one bill. See your business ad in 104 newspapers in Maryland, Delaware and the District of Columbia for just $495.00 per ad placement. The value of newspapers advertising HAS NEVER BEEN STRONGER....call 1-855-721-6332 x 6 today to place your ad before 4.1 million readers. Email Wanda Smith @ wsmith@mddcpress. com or visit our website at www.mddcpress.com.

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TYPESET: Wed Apr 30 14:07:40 EDT 2014

LEGAL NOTICES

City of Baltimore Department of Finance Bureau of Purchases Sealed proposals addressed to the Board of Estimates of Baltimore, will be received until, but not later than 11:00 a.m. local time on the following date(s) for the stated requirements: MAY 14, 2014 *O.E.M. PARTS AND SERVICE FOR MACK TRUCKS B50003487 THE ENTIRE SOLICITATION DOCUMENT CAN BE VIEWED AND DOWN LOADED BY VISITING THE CITYS WEB SITE: www.baltimorecitibuy.org

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B2 The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

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Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) Contractual Administrative Officer III Neighborhood Revitalization Grants Manager Recruitment#: 14-999999-413 Filing Deadline: May 5, 2014, 11:59 pm Salary: $19.44 - $25.12/hour Work that matters. DHCD is a national leader in community development and affordable housing. The Division of Neighborhood Revitalization (NR) seeks a positive individual experienced with financial management in the public sector.

Serving as the Grants Manager in NR, this position will primarily maintain financial records and process requests for payment for the Division?s grant and loan programs. Incumbent will assist in the preparation of grant/loan agreements, oversee financial coding, maintain HUD’s federal financial assistance information, prepare monthly reports, verify and reconcile grant balances and oversee the Division?s purchases. Wed EOEApr 30 14:04:46 EDT 2014 TYPESET:

TYPESET: Wed Apr 30 14:07:18 EDT 2014 CITY OF BALTIMORE DEPARTMENT OF TRANSPORTATION NOTICE OF LETTING Sealed Bids or Proposals, in duplicate addressed to the Board of Estimates of the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore and marked for F.T.A.P No. MD-04-0021-00; BALTIMORE CITY NO. TR11320R; GREYHOUND INTERMODAL TERMINAL, 2110 HAINES STREET, BALTIMORE, MARYLAND will be received at the Office of the Comptroller, Room 204 City Hall, Baltimore, Maryland until 11:00 A.M JUNE 4, 2014. Positively no bids will be received after 11:00 A.M. Bids will be publicly opened by the Board of Estimates in Room 215, City Hall at Noon. The Contract Documents may be examined, without charge, at the Department of Public Works Service Center located on the first floor of the Abel Wolman Municipal Building, 200 N. Holliday Street, Baltimore, Maryland 21202 as of MAY 2, 2014 and copies may be purchased for a non-refundable cost of $200.00.

Conditions and requirements of the Bid are found in the bid package.

All contractors bidding on this Contract must first be prequalified by the City of Baltimore Contractors Qualification Committee. Interested parties should call (410) 396-6883 or contact the Committee at 3000 Druid Park Drive, Baltimore, Maryland 21215. If a bid is submitted by a joint venture (”JV”), then in that event, the document that established the JV shall be submitted with the bid for verification purposes. The Prequalification Category required for bidding on this project is (A02601 Bituminous Paving & D02620 Curbs, Gutters & Sidewalk). Cost Qualification Range for this work shall be $5,000,000.00 to $10,000,000.00.

A ”Pre-Bidding Information” session will be conducted at 10:00 AM. on MAY 15, 2014, at 417 E. Fayette Street, Charles L. Benton, Jr. Building, Richard L. Baker Conference Room, Baltimore, MD 21202. YOU MUST ATTEND THE MANDATORY PRE-BID MEETING IN ORDER TO BID ON THIS CONTRACT AS A PREQUALIFIED CONTRACTOR. Principal Items of work for this project are: Mobilization LS; Building Construction LS; and Fuel Storage Tank and Dispensing Units LS. The DBE goal is 25% APPROVED: Bernice H. Taylor, Clerk Board of Estimates

afro

Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development (DHCD) Loan/Insurance Underwriter Lead/Advanced, Multifamily MD-BRAC Rental Preservation Manager Recruitment#: 14-001734-002 Filing Deadline: May 6, 2014, 11:59 pm Salary: $48,920 - $78,507 Work that matters. DHCD is a national leader in the financing and development of affordable housing and community development lending. The individual in this position will be responsible primarily for managing the MD-BRAC Preservation Loan Fund, an $8M revolving loan fund funded with a program related investment. Three years underwriting experience for Multi-family or commercial projects REQUIRED. EOE TYPESET: Wed Apr 30 14:04:19 EDT 2014

NURSING NURSING FACULTY Carroll Community College seeks full-time, 10-month nursing faculty members.

Detailed information may be obtained at www.carrollcc.edu.

•Your History •Your Community •Your News

Pageants, Parlors & Pretty Women: Race and Beauty in the 20th Century South Book Review

By Kam Williams

“[This book] tells us how Jim Crow and civil rights were expressed in southern women’s bodies. Using female beauty as a lens, the book brings into focus an untold social and cultural history of southern women and of the South generally...

I argue that female beauty in the American South was, more so than in the rest of the country, deeply racialized…I also emphasize the complexity inherent in the pursuit of beauty… I approach beauty as an expansive category that encompasses ideals, practices, labor, and even spaces…

Underscoring almost every conversation about beauty in the region were worries about morality and sexuality… Pageants, Parlors & Pretty Women provides a fresh perspective on the anxieties that plagued southerners from the late 19th C. through the mid-20th C. Or, put another way, it reveals how the female body both informed and reflected the challenges of life during Jim Crow.”

-- Excerpted from the Introduction (pages 6 -10) America has a long, ugly legacy of promoting diametrically opposed images of black and white females. This can be traced all the way back to Founding Fathers like Thomas Jefferson, an adulterer who had a white wife, but fathered a half-dozen children with Sally Hemmings, one of his hundreds of slaves.

Yet, in his only book, “Notes on the State of Virginia,” the hypocritical third President of the U.S. frowned upon racemixing while denouncing black women as unattractive on account of their hair texture and skin color. He actually went so far as to pronounce sisters so promiscuous that they would just as soon mate with an ape as a human.

Sadly, such racist notions continued to shape popular attitudes about African-American femininity after Emancipation, especially in the South with its strictly-enforced color line. In the wake of the Civil War, Caucasian women “were transformed into symbols of white supremacy and, eventually, massive resistance,” to integration and equal rights.

That is the proposition put forth by Blain Roberts in Pageants, Parlors & Pretty Women: Race and Beauty in the 20th Century South. Roberts, a History Professor at California State University, Fresno, discusses at great length the role which beauty played in maintaining the racial divide.

For, the enduring plantation myth still propagated post slavery placing white women on pedestals as paragons of virtue in need of protection proved to be the ideal tool for justifying the persistence of white supremacy ad infinitum. And Jim Crow Era bigots found affirmation in the Miss America beauty pageant which would for many decades be not only lily-white but dominated by entrants from former Confederate States.

The opus also delineates the black female struggle to escape the stranglehold of their stereotype as “sexually licentious” and “innately depraved and dirty.” They fought back by turning to skin lighteners and straightening combs until finally being freed by the Sixties’ “Black is beautiful!” movement to embrace their natural hair and skin tones.

A far more sophisticated examination of black and white pulchritude than Gone with the Wind’s long unquestioned suggestion that it’s as simple as Mammy vs. Scarlett O’Hara.

To order a copy of Pageants, Parlors & Pretty Women, visit: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00JN8AQLS/ ref%3dnosim/thslfofire-20

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CITY OF BALTIMORE - COUNCIL BILL 12-0067

B4 The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

B5

CITY OF BALTIMORE - COUNCIL BILL 12-0067

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

CITY OF BALTIMORE - COUNCIL BILL 12-0067

B6 The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

B7

CITY OF BALTIMORE - COUNCIL BILL 12-0067

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

CITY OF BALTIMORE - COUNCIL BILL 12-0067

B8 The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

CITY OF BALTIMORE - COUNCIL BILL 12-0067

May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014, The Afro-American

B9

My Take

How The Army Ostracized Me For My Own Hair

By Kristie Mitchell, MD

“The Wear and Appearance of Army Uniforms and Insignia” covers every aspect of soldiers’ grooming and appearance – from fingernail length to tattoos.

Last month, the Army proposed updates to this regulation that scrutinize (Photos by Kristie Mitchell) African-American female hairstyles more than ever Kristie Mitchell today, (left) Kristie’s natural locs before. Previously AR 670- during her time in the Army, (right).

1 only briefly commented on uniquely African-American hairstyles. It banned “dreadlocks” for being “unkempt, twisted, matted ... hair,” while cornrows were authorized as long as “conservative.”

Now, greater numbers of African-American women are allowing their hair to remain natural and the proposed regulation microanalyses these hairstyles (braids, twists, cornrows, and locs) and effectively eliminates many of the natural styles African-American service women have been wearing for years.

I am an African-American woman, a psychiatrist, and a former U.S. Army Major, and I am dismayed by this.

When I read the regulation and endured words like “unkempt” and “matted” used to define my natural hair, I was reminded of the pain and humiliation I, too, endured before I voluntarily departed the Army five years ago. Since then I’ve enjoyed the simple dignity of wearing my natural hair to work in a neat and professional manner.

My Deployment The Army recruited me during medical school. They paid for all four years of my medical school training, and then gave me excellent residency training at the flagship military medical centers of the time: Walter Reed Army Medical Center and Bethesda National Naval Medical Center. All totaled, the military likely devoted close to a million dollars preparing me to provide expert medical care to its service members.

While I maintained my primary focus on my medical education, soldier training, and physical fitness, the nagging question that pulled at my attention day after day was ‘how do I keep my tightly curled hair within Caucasian-based hair standards?’

Though most African-American service women struggle silently, it is a daily battle for thousands of these women trying to stay on the right side of an increasingly convoluted hair regulation.

For years, like many African-American service women, I attempted a straight hairstyle, which required me to chemically and thermally straighten (i.e., relax) my curls on a regular basis. Other African-American women attached hair extensions to their scalps to attain longer straight hair or braids. In either case, we’ve dedicated time, financial, and emotional resources fostering an appearance we hope will escape scrutiny. Ultimately we’ve exposed ourselves to countless chemicals and techniques well known to cause scalp damage. Many of these chemicals are now suspected of disrupting the normal functioning of our hormones. After years of straightening my hair into submission, and watching it fall out in retaliation, it occurred to me that I could attain peace by cutting my hair off.

The “big chop” as it is known in the African-American community, allowed me the freedom to wear my hair in its natural state. But the compromise was that I could leave very little hair on my head. For years I wore my hair close to my scalp like my African-American male counterparts and my hair became a non-issue – a very important thing, as my busy schedule in the hospital left no excess energy to devote to this hair riddle. Over time, though, I discovered a style that would allow my hair the dignity of its natural state and permit the styling flexibility my Caucasian female counterparts took for granted.

This began my journey with locs.

In the loc’ed state, my hair met all the Army’s professionalism standards – it did not touch my collar, my Army headgear and masks fit properly, and my hair was as well groomed as any of my other female colleagues. I felt the riddle had been solved.

So effortlessly did my hair fall within the Army hair regulations that I finally had no greater hair-anxiety than my Caucasian colleagues. I went about my true business of doctoring and soldiering with confidence and freedom.

Then I deployed to Iraq. In the midst of war, while I was doctoring in a combat zone, a lower ranking soldier identified my locs as “dreadlocked” and therefore, by Army definition “unkempt and matted” hair. He notified my supervisor who gave me an official (though somewhat apologetic) reprimand for not meeting hygiene standards. The irony was not only did my hair fit all the required professionalism standards, but also it was very easy to keep clean and neat.

After the reprimand, I made one futile attempt to hide my locs by covering them with a wig (an authorized option). But this was too distracting, and with temperatures soaring to 140 degrees daily, one could imagine that option did not last long. So I conceded. I cut off my locs. I returned to the neutral state where no natural hair was acceptable natural hair. But the peace was uneasy, to say the least.

Coming Home When I returned from war, I filed official requests to change the regulation. I wrote letters appealing my case, I sent pictures showing my hair firmly within regulation, but my efforts were ignored. It was not until I beseeched my congressman, Ciro Rodriguez, that I finally got a response from the Army. It came two years after I was forced to cut my locs and two months after I chose to leave the Army. I received a simple letter from the Deputy of the Human Resources Policy Directorate stating that it appeared that my loc’ed hair was not in violation after all.

The concession came too late. I had already left, already realized that I did not have to continue to suffer these indignities to practice my profession. While I loved caring for soldiers, the personal toll of being a psychiatrist for the Army was too great a burden. So now I’m using my training to serve the civilian healthcare sector, where no one is analyzing the strands of my hair to see if they are twisted or loc’ed or braided.

I continue to maintain a high professional standard of appearance – as it is understood all professionals must. I spend my time honing my skill set and caring for my patients, with no complex and pejorative hair regulation weighing me down.

And I am not alone. I know of other female physicians who have left the Army for similar reasons.

I applaud the United State Army, for setting high standards for appearance and hygiene, and expecting all service members to achieve them. But, it must recognize that the Caucasian hairstyles these regulations are based upon are not the only ways to achieve this professional, hygienic appearance. The Army must embrace the ethnic diversity within its ranks and stop placing undue hardship on its African-American service women. It must understand the impossible choices it’s forcing upon its service women – either alter the structure of your hair with harmful chemicals, wear someone else’s straight hair, cut all your hair off, or endure harassment from officers measuring the size of your braids.

As a psychiatrist and African American woman I am all too aware of the toll this needless expenditure of time, money, and mental energy has on self-esteem. This is a toll no other group in the Army must pay.

And it ultimately detracts from meeting the goals of the mission. Why must African-American women fight these battles to serve this country? Whether purposely or not, the result of these pejorative regulations will be the loss of the very talent and skill the Army has spent so much time and money cultivating.

So, though I’m appalled at how far these proposed changes have gone, they have finally triggered the public outcry that may result in change. I am heartened to witness African-American service women finally finding their voice in defense of their hair and raising it loud and clear against this injustice.

Dr. Kristie Mitchell was previously a psychiatrist and major for the United States Army.

My Take is a social commentary feature that allows AFRO readers to share their insight on topics of their choosing. Please submit your 250-400 word entries, with My Take typed into the subject field, to editor@afro.com <mailto:editor @afro.com> . Include your name, age, occupation and daytime phone number. The AFRO reserves the right to edit or reject any entry.

B10

The Afro-American, May 3, 2014 - May 9, 2014

“MAY BRINGS SPRING FLOWERS & LOTS OF ENTERTAIMENT” Hello everyone! How was your week? I had a very busy week, doing book signings for my new book, which is a good thing. I did a little panel discussion at Reginald Lewis Museum on the subject of “Women in Music” along with my dear friend Camay Murphy and long-time musician, Kendra Holt. Then I was a judge at “Uplifting Minds Entertainment Event” at Security Mall, which was a lot of fun.

I thought I was on “American Idol” when the children came up on stage to audition and each judge had to give an opinion on each of the performances. I kept looking around for the cameras, puffing up my hair and looking for my make-up person to freshen up my make-up, but it didn’t happen. TERRIBLE SITUATION! Well enough about me. Let’s talk about what is going on in your community this week and what you are going to do or where to go for next week, which is Mother’s Day weekend.

Kicking it off this weekend is a “Pre-Mother’s Day Old-Fashioned Cabaret” being hosted by Bonnie, Brian, Bunny & Kay 9 p.m. to 1 a.m. May 2 at the Pikesville Community Hall, 40 Sudbrook Ln., Pikesville, Md. The music is provided by DJ Mike Jones. Remember

I did say cabaret, meaning you bring your own drinks and food. I am not sure how that is honoring your mother for Mother’s Day, but I guess she can get her groove on before the big day. For more information, call Brian at 443-615-9766.

Arlington-Lewis United Methodist Church and Angel Hands Mobile Phlebotomy Services are hosting their 1st Annual Community Health Fair 10 a.m. – 3 p.m. May 3. They are located 5268 Reisterstown Rd.,Baltimore. There will be screenings and booths for STDs, blood pressure, BMI calculations, Multiple Sclerosis Society, American Diabetes Association; Chesahna Kindred, M.D. & M.B.A. Dermatologist; Park West Medical Center, and Bon Secours Baltimore Health System, so you see, you are well covered, no matter what you think your health situation may be. Not only you can check out your health problems, but you can have fun while you do it. There will be music by DJs, face paintings for the kids, a lot of useful giveaways, dancing performance for Zumba, Yoga, there will be boot camp and demonstrations. But ladies and gentlemen, the icing on the cake is yours truly “Rambling Rose” will be their doing a book signing with my new book. So bring your cash, credit card, debit card, or check book.

For just $25.00 you can get an autographed book from me. I will see you there. If you have any questions, please contact, Angel Hands MPCS at 410-8648181.

Neptune Yacht Club presents “King Neptune’s Cabaret 8 p.m. May 3 at the Patapsco Arena, 3301 Annapolis Rd. Your tickets will include top shelf open bar, chips & pretzels, set-ups and music again provided by DJ Mike Jones. For ticket information, call Arthur Allen at 410-404-1773.

Okay, now check this out!

Here is another “Pre-Mother’s Day” event. This one is a Prayer Breakfast hosted by Freedom Baptist Missionary Church, 3455 Erdman Ave.,Baltimore where Bishop Calvin Monroe is the organizer; First Lady Carolyn Monroe, advisor; Reverend James A. Johnson, interim pastor; Lady Wanda Johnson, interim director; and Sister Wanda Scott, as chairlady.

The event is being held 8:30 am – noon May 3. For ticket information called 443-6806059.

MARK YOUR CALENDAR FYI: *MULBA & MD Beverage Association is hosting again the “LIQUOR EXPO” 3 – 8 pm May 10. It is a free beer, wine, and liquor tasting show at the

reliable

We go to great heights power. to deliver

John Milton Wesley, singer, songwriter, and recording artist returns 4 – 8 p.m. May 3 to Pennsylvania Avenue for the “Courtyard Summer Music Series and Historic Mural Unveiling” at the Avenue Bakery, 2229 Pennsylvania Ave.

James Hamlin & family and The Royal Theater & Community Heritage Corporation will host “A Taste of Contemporary” at The Avenue Bakery with the Courtyard Summer Music Series and Historic Mural Unveiling and Rosa Pryor book signing 4 – 8 p.m. May 3 at 2229 Pennsylvania Ave.,Baltimore. It is open to the public; donations will be accepted to help rebuild the Royal Theatre, “One Brick @ a Time.”

Maryland State Fair Grounds, 2200 York Rd., Timonium, MD. There also will be DJ music, vendors, games of chance, lots of food. Dr. Louise Jones Johnson, president of MULBA is doing it again, but bigger and better. For more information and tickets, call 410-925-4056.

*A Fabulous Forum Feast, they are calling it. The Forum Caters is hosting a “Soul Food Mother’s Day Dinner” 3-6 P.M. May 11 at the Forum, 4210 Primrose Ave. Now folks if you like good food, this is the place!

Dr. Walter G. Amprey Make reservation by calling passed away on April 22, 410-358-1101 or the quick way 2014. Service entrusted to is to go to their website: info@ March Funeral Home-West. forumcaterers.com.

Funeral service is 11 a.m.

Friday, May 2; wake at 10 I won’t be able to talk to a.m. at New Shiloh Baptist you next week, so I say now: Church, 2100 Wabash Ave., HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY! Baltimore.

Remember if you need me, call me at 410-833-9474 or email me at rosapryor/@aol.com. UNTIL THE NEXT TIME, I’M MUSICALLY YOURS.

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