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JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

VOLUME 27 NO. 27

ALCEE UNPLUGGED An unexpected emergency room ordeal reminds a thoughtful Congressman Alcee Hastings that pancreatic cancer won’t stop him from waging battles for people who can’t fight for themselves.

BY DAPHNE TAYLOR A FLORIDA COURIER EXCLUSIVE

Earlier in the year when I heard about Congressman Alcee Hastings facing pancreatic cancer, I was extremely concerned. I wondered if he would survive it.

I know he’s always been a fierce fighter his entire life. But two years ago, as a co-worker faced the same illness, I happened to glimpse a television special on the disease. It was devastating.

Low long-term survival Very sadly, few too many people just don’t survive pancreatic cancer, unlike other cancers, for years at a time. I was heartbroken, because while I prayed and prayed for my friend, she didn’t survive it. So when the news of

DAPHNE TAYLOR FLORIDA COURIER EXCLUSIVE

CONCLUSION the congressman hit the media, my heart sank.

My faith knows, without a doubt, that with God all things are possible! But still, the news gave me a moment of reflection over the life of this political giant.

As mentioned in the first installment of this series, he helped launch me into my role as host of a live call-in talk show which became quite popular in South Florida, “The Voice of the Peo-

ple” on WRBD-AM in Fort Lauderdale.

Because he was a giant even then in the 1980s, as my first guest on the show, we broke all kinds of barriers and got all sorts of buzz and media coverage such that it skyrocketed my career to a whole new level.

So I had lots to reflect upon.

What about him?

With this news of a serious health condition, is he reflective of the fullness and totality of a life well-lived? Though he paused to take inventory of where this news has brought him in life, it seems the resilient Alcee Hastings is nonetheless ready to plow right through this latest challenge.

A clue? He didn’t resign from Congress.

PHOTO BY ALAN LUBY FOR THE FLORIDA COURIER

Congressman Alcee L. Hastings shared a hearty laugh as he received the Father of the Year Award from Palm Beach County’s Pleasant City Family Reunion Committee, Inc., last month.

“Now that I have begun treatment, I feel hopeful about survival and about my ability to continue serving my constituents of Florida’s 20th Congressional District and the nation,” he indicated in a press statement announcing the illness.

In other words, this will not

stop him from serving the people.

“Should it become clear that this cancer, which has invaded my body, cannot be defeated I will tell you so,” he stated. But until then, he’s still here doing what See ALCEE, Page A2

Restitution or poll tax?

THE CHAMPIONSHIPS, WIMBLEDON / 2019

Still in shock

State sued over Amendment 4

BY DARA KAM NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

COURTESY OF WIMBLEDON.COM

Cori ‘Coco’ Gauff reacts after her first-round Ladies’ Singles victory over her professional tennis idol and fellow Florida resident Venus Williams. Gauff, the youngest player – at 15 years and 122 days old – to make it through the Wimbledon qualifying tournament and into the main draw since the Open Era began in 1968, lives with her family in Delray Beach. Williams lives in Palm Beach Gardens.

TALLAHASSEE – Civil rights groups are hoping a federal judge will strike down a new Florida law that they say does not properly carry out a constitutional amendment restoring voting rights to felons who have completed their sentences.

Lawyers representing voting-rights and civil-rights groups, as well as more than a dozen Floridians who’ve been convicted of felonies, filed three lawsuits in federal court Friday, immediately after Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law an omnibus elections measure (SB 7066) that included the implementation of Amendment 4. The Southern Poverty Law Center filed a fourth lawsuit on Monday.

Under the new law, Floridians convicted of felonies will have to pay financial obligations related to their crimes before they are eligible to have voting rights restored.

The legal challenges, combined into one case by U.S. District Judge Mark Walker, allege the legislation unconstitutionally “creates two classes of citizens,” depending on their ability to pay financial obligations that many don’t even know about.

Jim Crow throwback The law, which went into effect Monday, is a throwback to Jim Crow-era policies aimed at preventing Black FloSee LAW, Page A2

Trump drops census citizenship question FROM THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

The Trump administration said Tuesday it will start printing the 2020 U.S. Census without a question asking every household about the citizenship status of residents.

The decision came less than a week after the U.S. Supreme Court said the administration

ALSO INSIDE

needed to come up with a better explanation for why it wanted the question, which experts said would discourage immigrant communities from taking part in the census, a move that could help Republicans politically.

“The Census Bureau has started the process of printing the decennial questionnaires without the question,” Ross said. “My focus, and that of the bureau and the entire department is to conduct a complete and accurate census.”

Asked about delay

Serious impact

Reacting to the court ruling, President Donald Trump said last week he had asked his lawyers if they could delay the census, “no matter how long” until more information could be given to the Supreme Court.

However, U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said that while he “strongly” disagreed with the court’s ruling, the U.S. Census Bureau will move forward with the 2020 Census without a citizenship question.

The possibility of a citizenship question had worried Florida Democrats, who said it would likely lead to an undercount of the state’s population, which is home to roughly 250,000 undocumented immigrants and has a dense population of immigrants. An undercount would have affected distribution of political power and federal funds during the next decade.

Concern about an under-

count was brushed off by some Florida Republicans, who argued the country should know how many citizens it has.

SNAPSHOTS BOOKS | B1

‘The Accident of Color’ review

Nothing to say Also in the middle of the debate was one of Gov. Ron DeSantis’ top attorneys, Deputy General Counsel James Uthmeier, who refused to answer questions in a congressional interview about the “key role” he played in adding the citizenship question while working in the Trump administration.

DeSantis’ office said it had nothing to do with that decision. It also never said whether the governor supported the proposed citizenship question.

FLORIDA: OUSTED BROWARD COUNTY SHERIFF WILL SEEK SEAT AGAIN | A3 COMMENTARY: GLEN FORD: WE ARE LATE TO THE REPARATIONS DEBATE | A4

FLORIDA | A3

State seeks solutions for algae woes NATION | A6

Pharmacists going ‘above and beyond’

FOCUS

A2

JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

STOJ

Do you want to be three-fifths of a devil?

Many of my friends in America believe the best way to secure equal rights and justice is to pray, to march and to assimilate.

From my point of view, Black people are headed down the wrong road!

I have no problem with praying, but I don’t encourage any person of African descent to march to the state capitol, city hall, or to the county commission locked arm-in-arm with separatists, supremacists and closet racists year after year and incident after incident singing, “We Shall Overcome”!

What to pray for If you pray, as I do, pray for knowledge. Pray for wisdom. Pray for courage. Pray for strength to fight modern-day pharaohs and the wicked nationalists that hate and despise you!

Back in the day, African American individuals were considered to be three-fifths of a person, that is, three-fifths of a U.S. citizen.

The three-fifths clause (Article I, Section 2, of the U.S. Constitu-

LUCIUS GANTT THE GANTT REPORT

tion of 1787) in fact declared that for purposes of representation in Congress, enslaved Blacks in a state would be counted as threefifths of the number of White inhabitants of that state.

You are still “three-fifths of a man” today by most of your nonBlack friends, coworkers, employers and classmates of ALL ethnic backgrounds. In 2019, the next worse thing to being a slave is being an ex-slave!

Putting ourselves last In nearly every aspect of life, we put other people and other racial groups first and put each other last. In too many minds, the White way is the right way.

We don’t like African names, we don’t like African style, we don’t embrace African religions,

we don’t enjoy dancing to African music and we don’t like the taste of African foods.

We believe that the White man’s ice is colder than the Black man’s ice, that the White newspaper is better than the Black newspaper, and the IQ of the White scholar is higher and better than the Black scholar’s.

Nothing new Don’t get mad if President Donald Trump disrespects Black people and Black contributions to the stability, prosperity and sanctity of the United States of America and in all other countries in the world. Donald Trump grew up thinking Black people were inferior.

In a Ku Klux Klan household headed up by a father who openly participated in Klan rallies, Trump didn’t start hating Barack Obama and other Blacks when he became president. He has had a demeaning attitude about Blacks since he was a child.

Your problem is that you think Trump’s behavior and govern-

mental actions are coincidences rather than rules.

You say, “He’s not a bigot because he likes Kanye West!” or, “He’s not a racist because he played golf with Tiger Woods!”

I say there are far more ethnic haters in far more houses than the White House!

selves more. We have to honor and celebrate the men and women that stand up and speak out for us. We must shun politicians, bloggers, internet sites and other entities that continue to express the beliefs that we are less than we truly are!

Don’t get it twisted

Whatever amount of justice, peace and prosperity we believe we deserve must be created by us or taken from others. The black sheep will never be loved, accepted, or taken care of by the white wolves!

We have to believe Black men and women are just as smart, just as strong and just as good as any other man or woman!

No angel should want to be considered three-fifths of a devil!

I graduated from a predominately White high school. I’ve worked in many media companies where, at the time, I was the only Black employee. When I suffered multiple house fires, most of the people that came to assist me physically and financially were White people. In fact, some of my very best friends and supporters are Caucasians.

I love my friends, but I depend on myself.

Another perspective We as a people must take a more Pan-Africanist view of our present situations and out future.

We have to believe in our exploiters less and believe in our-

Fight for our freedom

Buy Gantt’s latest book, “Beast Too: Dead Man Writing,” on Amazon.com and from bookstores everywhere.

“Like” The Gantt Report page on Facebook. Contact Lucius at www.allworldconsultants. net.

LAW from A1 ridians from voting, argued lawyers for the Brennan Center for Justice at the New York University School of Law, the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida and the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

“Florida has a long, troubling history with voter suppression tactics, many explicitly motivated by racial discrimination – including the very felony disenfranchisement provision revised

by Amendment 4,” they wrote in a 74-page complaint filed last week.

The amendment, approved by more than 64 percent of Florida voters in November, granted restoration of voting rights to felons “who have completed all terms of their sentence, including parole or probation.” The amendment excluded people “convicted of murder or a felony sexual offense.”

The meaning of “all terms of sentence” became a flashpoint during this spring’s legislative session, sparking an emotionally charged, partisan schism over whether the amendment required payment of court-ordered fees, fines and restitution when the financial obligations are part of a sentence, as is almost always the case.

Have money, will vote Black Democrats were particularly incensed about the linkage between finances and voting, which the lawsuit refers to as an unconstitutional “poll tax.”

And the statute also will “prevent or at least chill voter registration and voting” because the state lacks a unified system tracking the amount of money owed by people convicted of felonies, the lawsuit alleges.

“It is really, really difficult to get the information that you need to be confident that you’re up to

ALCEE from A1 he does best – representing the people.

Unexpected ordeal A recent visit to the emergency room made him even more resolved to fight. It was over the Memorial Day holiday that his doctor, after a regular visit, said he needed to go immediately to the hospital emergency room.

He ended up being hospitalized for six days. But he learned a lesson firsthand about the crisis facing emergency rooms across the nation.

“They didn’t care at all about (my) being a congressman,” he said. “They gave me no special treatment. I had to wait like everybody else.”

He ended up waiting in an emergency room for 48 hours.

He said it was an experience he’ll never forget.

“I went in the emergency room and came out a different person.

The things I underwent there were unbelievable. I left there realizing that this is a real crisis.

Now I understood what people

LANNIS WATERS / PALMBEACHPOST.COM

Palm Beach County Supervisor of Elections Susan Bucher congratulates Anthony Ray Hoskins of Boynton Beach as ex-felons registered to vote Jan. 8, the day Amendment 4 took effect. Also registering were David Matos of West Palm Beach and Caren Ragan of Lauderdale by the Sea. date with your legal financial obligations,” Myrna Peréz, director of the Brennan Center’s Voting Rights and Elections Program, said in a telephone interview.

“The databases don’t speak with each other. They’re incomplete. They’re inaccurate. They’re out of date.

Registration risky Many people “who have been working so hard to get their lives back online don’t want to take a risk,” of registering to vote if they are uncertain about their eligibility, she added.

“They don’t want to be wrong, because the consequences are so very high. I believe that that is by design. I believe that the folks

are experiencing, because I got no special treatment. I was like everybody else.”

Take action He urged everyone to put fire under their representatives and to hold them accountable. “Your representatives need to be interested in the real lives of all people,” he urged.

Through his own personal crisis, he’s still learning, growing and seeking to help everyone else. His emergency room ordeal helped him to see life through a different lens even after more than five decades of community service. His illness is giving him fuel to fight for the betterment of the downtrodden and disenfranchised.

Patrick Franklin, president and CEO of the Urban League of Palm Beach County, says that’s exactly what Hastings’ emergency room experience was all about– helping the common man.

‘Just imagine’ “If that is the treatment he received, and he has the best health insurance in the world, then imagine the treatment of someone who has nothing; no health insurance at all,” Franklin

who passed these laws knew exactly what they were doing,” Peréz said.

Supreme Courtapproved But state House Speaker Jose Oliva, R-Miami Lakes, and other supporters of the law say it properly carries out the constitutional amendment, which was reviewed by the Florida Supreme Court before it went on the November ballot.

“Voters voted to give felons a second chance, but they didn’t vote to give them a free pass from accountability and payment of debt to society,” Oliva said in a text Monday. “We are confident the court will see the depths

pointed out.

“He was clearly put there for a reason and to fight that fight for those who have nothing. He felt what the common man felt firsthand. And now, being a man of his stature, he can raise that torch even higher. His voice would be even clearer and louder now that he’s experienced this. There’s no one better than Alcee to lead that fight,” said Franklin.

“We have a long way to go.

Imagine the person who has no health care.”

So as Alcee Hastings fights for his own life and reflects on the difference he’s made for such a long time, clearly his work is not finished.

Still necessary Florida State Senator Bobby Powell said the nation needs the congressman.

“We need him for continued guidance in all communities. He has walked roads that many have not. He’s a pioneer and a trendsetter and he’s shown us what can be done, because he’s fought the fight.

“He’s shown us politically and in the legal community that groundbreaking works are possible. He is one of the great lead-

to which the Florida Supreme Court went to firmly establish that things like paying fines are a large part of completing your sentence.”

Eighty percent uncollectable?

Many people who have been released from jail or prison are indigent and will be permanently unable to pay the fees, the lawsuit argues. According to a report compiled from data gathered by Florida clerks of courts cited in the lawsuit, county clerks collected about 20 percent of court-imposed fees and fines in 2018.

The law, however, includes provisions allowing third parties to waive outstanding debts, and

ers of the world who has paved the way for many other African Americans, both men and women, and I have no doubt he’ll be successful in this personal battle,” said Senator Powell in a telephone interview. “So many have learned from him and his example.”

‘Tireless advocate’ The newly elected mayor of West Palm Beach, Keith James, made history this year by becoming that city’s first African American ‘strong’ mayor.

“He (Hastings) is a tireless advocate, a dedicated public servant and a long-time leader in our community. From West Palm Beach to Washington, D.C., Congressman Hastings has really fought for his constituents. I am proud to call him a friend and mentor. He has been a true pioneer and trailblazer throughout his life. I stand on his shoulders as I continue my career in public service,” stated James.

And as Hastings forges ahead with great resolve, he realizes the cancer is a fight he must acknowledge. And he does.

‘Another battle’ “I’m fighting another battle

felons who are unable to pay can ask judges to convert their financial obligations to community service.

But those avenues are also problematic, the lawsuit alleges. For example, financial obligations resulting from federal or out-of-state cases can’t be resolved through Florida courts.

And third-party payment recipients – including collection agencies, insurance companies and private individuals – “have absolute discretion to grant or deny a person’s request” to have their financial obligations terminated “for any reason, no reason, or based on personal whims,” the plaintiffs’ lawyers argued.

now and that battle is cancer,” he told a Palm Beach audience. And people like Mayor James and many others know that Congressman Hastings will give it all he’s got, like he’s done with everything else.

“We are praying for him and believing he will fight this horrible illness with the same strength and determination that he has demonstrated in his decades of public service,” stated James.

Franklin, of the Urban League, put Hastings’ works and life in perspective.

“He is one of the last barrierbreakers. He opened up the door for us and said, ‘Come on in.’”

Indeed he did.

Thousands in his corner Congressman Hastings, as you put this time in your life into perspective, be reminded that you have thousands praying for you and silently supporting you.

Just as your presence years ago helped my broadcast journalism career, so too have you helped others around the world.

Fight on, sir. We stand in battle with you. And we thank you for your dedicated service. The nation wouldn’t be the same without you.

JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

STOJ

FLORIDA

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A3

State seeks solutions for algae woes for potential state grant funding.

All ideas welcome Frazer said officials are open to “all different kinds of potential solutions,” which could mean chemical, biological, mechanical ideas or any combination of those methods.

As part of a request for information, more than 35 questions are asked, from potential environmental impacts to the size of water bodies that could be effectively treated.

“With regard to cleanup, specifically, we want to make sure the technology provides nearterm ecological and human health relief,” Frazer said.

Some people making proposals could be asked to appear before the task force to answer questions about their proposals.

Frazer said additional people may even be needed to review the viability of proposals.

Specific focus

GREG LOVETT/THE PALM BEACH POST/TNS

Boats docked at Central Marine in Stuart in 2016 are surrounded by blue green algae. When the blooms begin to die and disintegrate, the pigment may color the water a distinctive bluish color hence the name blue-green algae.

Officials are open to ‘all different kinds of potential solutions,’ which could mean chemical, biological, mechanical ideas or any combination of those methods.

BY JIM TURNER NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

TALLAHASSEE – Experts looking into toxic algae outbreaks that have exploded in state waterways want to know if anyone has a proven, innovative cleanup strategy that can be used.

And they want to know quickly.

The Florida Department of En-

vironmental Protection is formally accepting information through July 15 on ways to prevent, combat or clean up harmful algal blooms in freshwater bodies and estuaries.

Thomas Frazer, Florida’s chief science officer, said Monday during a state Blue-Green Algae Task Force meeting in Fort Myers that he and other officials at the state department have already been

fielding calls from people with ideas about fighting the algae.

“I wouldn’t want to limit the people who have expressed interest,” Frazer said. “There are times that people may not have a ton of preliminary data … but sometimes there are really good ideas.”

The better ideas will go before the task force at its Aug. 1 meeting, Frazer said.

Killer toxins Gov. Ron DeSantis issued an executive order in January to create the task force in response to outbreaks of toxic algae and red

tide across the state last year.

The source of outbreaks in Florida and the Gulf of Mexico is blooms of a single-celled organism called Karenia brevis algae, which produces toxins that kill fish, birds, sea turtles, manatees and dolphins and can cause shellfish poisoning in humans.

The problems particularly drew attention in Southeast and Southwest Florida, as algae plagued water bodies such as the St. Lucie and Caloosahatchee rivers and red tide caused fish kills.

Frazer said the task force won’t be asked to pick proposals or vendors but to determine if projects have merit to move forward

Part of the grant-making process will be determining who is behind proposals because some information could come from more than one person.

The focus of the task force is Lake Okeechobee and waters on both sides of the lake, but the state is also looking at possible algae impacts as far north as the St. Johns River.

As part of the $90.98 billion budget for the fiscal year that began on Monday, $4 million is slated to go to expanding “statewide water quality analytics for the nutrient over-enrichment analytics assessment and water quality public information portal.”

Red tide research Separately, a new law (SB 1552) provides $3 million a year for the next five years to the Florida Red Tide Mitigation and Technology Development Initiative to research the causes and impacts of red tide.

The initiative was created between the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Fish and Wildlife Research Institute and Sarasota-based Mote Marine Laboratory.

Israel running again for Broward sheriff’s job He likely will face DeSantis appointee who is dealing with accreditation issue

BY DAVID SMILEY MIAMI HERALD/TNS

MIAMI — Ousted Broward Sheriff Scott Israel took another step on his comeback campaign Monday when he filed the paperwork to launch a reelection bid.

Israel, first elected in 2012 and again in 2016, lost his job as Broward’s top cop in January when newly elected Gov. Ron DeSantis suspended him from office and blamed him for the Broward Sheriff’s Office’s botched response to the Feb. 14, 2018, shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School.

Israel, 63, is challenging his removal.

Filed paperwork But regardless of whether he’s reinstated by the Florida Senate

— which under Florida law has the power to overturn a governor’s suspension — Israel would need to be elected in 2020 in order to run the agency going forward.

He began that process Monday when he walked into the Broward Supervisor of Election’s office and submitted paperwork to open a campaign account.

Israel did not respond immediately to a text message seeking comment.

Accreditation revoked Last week, a state panel voted unanimously to revoke BSO’s accreditation, citing the agency’s mishandling of the response to shootings in Parkland and the Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood InternaGregory tional Airport as Tony the grounds for its decision.

Israel will presumably run

Governor reports dip in net worth

BY JIM TURNER NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

TALLAHASSEE – Gov. Ron DeSantis’ net worth dropped nearly 9 percent in 2018 as he left Congress and made a successful run for governor.

DeSantis reported a net worth of $283,605 as of Dec. 31, down from $310,971 at the end of 2017, according to a new financial disclosure posted Monday on the Florida Commission on Ethics website.

State officials faced a Monday deadline to file updated disclo-

sures, which typically detail their finances as of the end of 2018.

Sold home DeSantis’ new report included a Ponte Vedra Beach home he sold in March for $460,000, according to St. Johns County property records.

DeSantis listed the Ponte Vedra Beach home as worth $450,000 at the end of 2018, up from a $400,000 price-tag he placed on the property a year earlier.

DeSantis, who resigned his congressional seat in September after his primary-election victory, reported $116,000 in income

CARLINE JEAN/SUN SENTINEL/TNS

Suspended Broward Sheriff Scott Israel leaves a Broward County courtroom after a lawsuit hearing against Gov. Ron DeSantis earlier this year. against Gregory Tony, the former Coral Springs sergeant DeSantis appointed to run BSO upon Israel’s suspension.

Tony, who owns a firm specializing in mass casualty incidents,

has not yet filed paperwork but has said he will run to keep his job in 2020.

Israel, a Democrat, joins a crowded field. H. Wayne Clark, Willie Jones, Al Pollock, Da-

vid Rosenthal, Andrew Maurice Smalling, and Santiago C. Vazquez Jr. have already opened campaigns, though none of the candidates has raised much money to date.

last year from the U.S. House, a position that paid him $174,000 in 2017.

DeSantis also picked up $15,297 from the state last year while governor-elect in the transition period.

al income in 2018 and $27,500 the year earlier.

When listing his assets at the end of 2017, DeSantis reported a $275,000 home in Palm Coast.

AccordGov. Ron ing to the Flagler DeSantis County Property Appraiser’s office, the Palm Coast home was sold for $275,000 on May 15, 2018.

Both DeSantis properties had mortgages, including $263,100 on the Ponte Vedra Beach property as 2018 ended.

ernor, reported to the state a net worth of $91.75 million as of the end of 2018.

Scott, who made a fortune in the health-care industry and other businesses before entering politics, had started 2018 with a reported net worth of $232.6 million. Scott spent an estimated $64 million of his own money for his successful U.S. Senate run against Democrat Bill Nelson.

State records don’t require candidates and elected officials to include investments by spouses.

As part of Scott’s federal filing last year, he disclosed former First Lady Ann Scott was worth between $171 million and $208 million.

$3,500 in stock As he took office in January, DeSantis followed now-U.S. Sen. Rick Scott, who was the wealthiest governor in Florida history.

Unlike Scott, who has widespread financial holdings, DeSantis listed just over $3,500 in stock in Scottrade accounts in U.S. Steel and SiriusXM. The sale of the Ponte Vedra Beach home will also cost DeSantis some rental income, as the first family made $5,500 rent-

Scott’s net worth Meanwhile, Scott, who served the first week of this year as gov-

EDITORIAL

TOJ

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JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

STOJ

We are late to the reparations debate The following essay was prepared for the 30th annual convention of NCOBRA, the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America, held June 20-23 in Detroit.

The year 2017 is when reparations definitively became a “mainstream” issue – meaning serious candidates for president have been compelled to discuss the need to repair the historical and ongoing damage inflicted on Black people with the complicity of the United States government.

Solid majorities of African Americans support reparations in principle: 64 percent, according to a Business Insider poll taken in March of this year, a statistically significant increase over Black pro-reparations sentiment measured in 2014 (59 percent, according to a YouGov survey), 2015 (52 percent, CNN) and 2016 (58 percent, Marist Poll).

Democratic support The Business Insider poll shows that 25 percent of Whites, 37 percent of Asian Americans and 42 percent of Hispanics favor reparations – not enough to sway a national referendum on reparations, but almost certainly constituting a majority of the Democratic Party base, 25 percent of which is Black.

These numbers are extremely encouraging, in that they give national political legitimacy to the principle of reparations, which political scientist Michael Dawson writes “has been a central theme of Black political life,” and now seems destined to become a staple of the Democratic half of the U.S. electoral duopoly.

With a companion bill in the Senate introduced by New Jersey’s Cory Booker in April, the H.R. 40 reparations study measure is now a “real” piece of legislation that can be lobbied in both chambers of Congress.

In addition to Booker, presidential candidates Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, Tulsi Gabbard and Julian Castro claim to favor reparations, although

GLEN FORD BLACK AGENDA REPORT

none of their proposals measure up to even a narrow semantic definition of the word. It is enough, for now, that these politicians acknowledge that a debt is owed to Black people.

‘What does it mean?’

Sen. Bernie Sanders, who has a real chance of becoming president, says he will sign a reparations study bill if it comes across his desk. But he resists endorsing reparations, asking CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: “What does that mean? What do they mean? I don’t think anyone’s been very clear.”

It’s an honest and sincere question – and one that can only be answered by Black people in the process of a Great Black Reparations Debate. Only Black people can put meat on the bare bones principle of reparations in America. As Frederick Douglass said, “the man who has suffered the wrong is the man to demand redress – the man STRUCK is the man to CRY OUT.” Reparations – repair – must mean measures that are transformative, that lift Black people up from the bottom of the socioeconomic-political barrel that the United States government and White society have methodically placed us in through centuries of criminal acts.

The runaway slave who joined the Union Army and was part of the unit that captured his former master’s plantation was clear on what reparations meant to him. “Bottom rail on top this time, Massah.”

At the bottom The United States was built on the foundation of Black people as the bottom rail – and keeping them there. In an endemically racist society, we are the

Meharry’s Juul grant is good news Should Meharry Medical College, a Historically Black College (HBCU) established in 1876 in Nashville, have accepted $7.5 million from Juul Labs, the controversial e-cigarette company that provides an alternative to smoking tobacco?

Meharry says it will use the grant, the second-largest it has ever received, to study public health issues and African Americans, including the health effects of tobacco products. They will establish a Center for the Study of Social Determinants of Health and according to its president, Dr. James Hildreth, “begin conducting fully-independent research into the health conditions and issues related to tobacco and nicotine-delivery products.”

Should have passed?

Critics say that Meharry has made a deal with the devil since African American people smoke more and have a higher death rate from tobacco-related illnesses than other racial and ethnic groups. They think Meharry should have passed on the Juul donation because they don’t believe that the historically Black Meharry can’t take Juul’s money

JULIANNE MALVEAUX TRICE EDNEY NEWS WIRE

and continue to make a difference in Black lives.

I say nonsense! Juul will not be dictating the topics or terms of research with Meharry. Dr. Hildreth, who has been determined to increase the amount of research that Meharry students are doing, says the college approached Juul, not the other way around – and they did it with their eyes wide open.

He says he is confident that the new research center Meharry will establish will be independent of Juul. They won’t have input to the research topics that Meharry tackles, nor will they determine the course or direction of research.

A pause Most medical colleges, including Meharry, turn down contributions from tobacco companies. As Meharry and Juul were exploring the possibility of

institutional definition of the bottom. The mission of genuine reparations must be to eliminate the “bottom” altogether – otherwise, a hostile White society will push Black people back into our “place,” once again.

Resources are important, and any reparations scheme that does not have a price tag in the many trillions is an insult to the living and the dead. According to one estimate, the Federal Reserve bank bailout amounted to $29 trillion to save the criminals that caused the economic collapse!

Redressing crimes against the Black people whose unpaid labor created America’s wealth is at least as large a project.

But reparations is more than material resources; it is the power to use those resources for the betterment of one’s people, and to be secure in not being victimized again by the historical oppressor. It means Black self-determination, without which “democracy” is a sham and a farce.

It’s up to us The Great Black Reparations Debate must reach into every nook and cranny of Black America, examining every aspect of Black life in this country – as well as debating Black Americans’ relationship with the rest of the African Diaspora and the world. It is up to Black people – the ones who have been struck! – to propose the programs and structures that not only emancipate us from the bottom, but that effectively abolish such substrata.

Folks need to be instructed to stop asking White or Black politicians to come up with a reparations plan – that’s a task reserved collectively for African Americans, after long and exhaustive debate.

The United States was built on stolen land and stolen labor.

Those are the crimes that must be redressed. Any reparations proposal that leaves current U.S. social, economic and political structures intact only perpetuates the crime and guarantees a relapse into the abyss.

the donation, Altria, a tobacco company, acquired 35 percent of Juul. Should that have killed the deal?

It caused Meharry to pause.

But eventually, they decided to accept the money because they believe they can use it for the greater good. I agree.

President Hildreth has been a biomedical researcher for more than 36 years. In a letter to the Meharry community, he reminded them that “The bodies of Black Americans have historically been the subject of scientific experimentation with no control on our part. If it takes an unorthodox partnership to change that dynamic, then let the research begin.”

Government approval I can’t read that part of Hildreth’s letter without thinking of the Tuskegee syphilis experiments, where the federal government funded research on the effects of untreated syphilis on Black men. Medicine to cure syphilis was withheld from the men in the experiment. The federal government did this!

The commercial use of Black bodies included the harvesting (and reproduction) of the cells of Henrietta Lacks, a Black woman whose DNA is still being used today for medical research. And, when we think of experiments on Black bodies, one must think of the odious J. Marion Sims, who was called the “father of

VISUAL VIEWPOINT: KIM JONG UN AND DONALD TRUMP

DALE CUMMINGS, CANADA, POLITICALCARTOONS.COM

The Great Black Reparations Debate must begin before passage of H.R. 40. Ideally, the Black debate should inform those delegated by Congress to study the reparations question. More likely, a Black community that is energized and aroused by the debate will wind up rebuking the politicians, including most of the Black ones, for treating the reparations issue as a chance to declare a symbolic victory for Black people, like the Dr. King holiday.

for Black people to re-imagine themselves and their place in the nation and the world, and to act collectively to build a new society – one that is fit for our people’s habitation.

Once such a mobilization is underway, it really doesn’t much matter what the corporate servants on Capitol Hill think reparations should look like – because Black people will have our own vision and plan.

We are late

In his book “Black Visions,” Dr. Michael Dawson analyzes the results of an exhaustive political survey of African Americans that he oversaw in 1994.

The survey showed that a majority of Black people, while not in favor of politically separating from the United States, nevertheless see Black America as a “nation within a nation.”

A Great Black Reparations Debate – actually, a mass discussion of our collective future – is a chance for Black America to start acting like that “nation within a nation.”

But that’s the most African Americans can expect if we fail to organize a Black-wide debate that involves, literally, millions of our people. We’re already late.

Black opponents of reparations like political scientist Adolph Reed argue that reparations may be appealing, but isn’t worth investing lots of political capital because the non-Black majority of the U.S. will never support truly transformative repair. That’s certainly true, if we assume that today’s pitiful level of independent Black political mobilization is permanent.

Forty million Black people can’t change a damn thing unless they argue collectively about what is to be done, and then organize to do it. The Great Black Reparations Debate can be the extended, independent forum

modern gynecology.” He earned his fame by conducting painful experiments on enslaved women. Thank goodness New York City removed his statue from Central Park!

Meharry doesn’t aim to hurt the six million African Americans who are smokers or to profit from them. They aim to have a seat at the research table, a place from which Black researchers, and Black research institutions, have often been excluded.

Juul’s contribution allows Meharry to pull up a chair to the research table and participate in the scientific inquiry about the health effects of cigarettes and other tobacco products – critical investigation given the fact that African Americans are more likely to die from tobacco-related illnesses than others.

Some questions Dr. Hildreth’s letter to the Meharry community outlines several research questions. What is the long-term impact of ecigarettes? Does vaping cause developmental health issues?

Are vaping devices effective as smoking reduction or cessation devices?

Will laws prohibiting tobacco sales for those under 21 improve health outcomes? San Francisco recently passed legislation outlawing the sale of vaping devices. How effective are such laws?

These are questions worth answering through research.

Charles W. Cherry II, Esq., Publisher

Opinions expressed on this editorial page are those of the writers, and do not necessarily reflect the editorial stance of the newspaper or the publisher.

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Click on this commentary at www.flcourier.com to write your own response.

From where I sit, Meharry should have negotiated for a much more substantial contribution from Juul, and perhaps they will. After all, according to Dr. Hildreth, the tobacco industry “has taken our money and delivered sickness and death in return.

“We at Meharry intend to advance the fight for better health and longer life by turning that insidious relationship on its head.”

The right thing Bravo, Dr. Hildreth. If Meharry’s research can help us learn more about addiction, and if the research can be used for tobacco use prevention, then Meharry is doing the right thing. I don’t see others lining up to fund Meharry’s research, and fundraising for HBCUs is extremely challenging.

I look forward to the work that the Center for the Study of Social Determinants of Health will produce.

Julianne Malveaux is a Washington, D.C.-based economist and writer. Her latest book, “Are We Better Off? Race, Obama and Public Policy,” is available at www.juliannemalveaux.com. Click on this commentary at www.flcourier.com to write your own response.

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JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

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EDITORIAL

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‘What to the slave is the Fourth of July?’

Editor’s note: On July 5, 1852, anti-slavery crusader Frederick Douglass spoke at an event commemorating the signing of the Declaration of Independence in Rochester, N.Y. Excerpts appear below. To read the entire text, go to www.flcourier.com.

(T)he Fourth of July... marks the beginning of another year of your national life…Nations number their years by thousands. You are…still lingering in the period of childhood. Were the nation older, the patriot’s heart might be sadder, and the reformer’s brow heavier.

Our eyes are met with demonstrations of joyous enthusiasm.

Banners and pennants wave exultingly on the breeze…The earpiercing fife and the stirring drum unite their accents with the ascending peal of a thousand church bells.

Prayers are made, hymns are sung, and sermons are preached in honor of this day; while the quick martial tramp of a great and multitudinous nation, echoed back by all the hills, valleys and mountains of a vast continent, bespeak the occasion one of thrilling and universal interests nation’s jubilee.

Why am I here? …(W)hy am I called upon to speak here today? What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? And am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?

I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us, I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me.

The sunlight that brought life and healing to you has brought stripes and death to me.

This Fourth [of] July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak today?

By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down. Yea! We wept when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. For there, they that carried us away captive, required of us a song; and they who wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

How can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.

Fellow-citizens; above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, today, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully remember those bleeding children of sorrow this day, “may my right hand forget her cunning, and may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!”

To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world.

From the slave’s perspective I shall see, this day, and its popular characteristics, from the slave’s point of view. Standing, there, identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine, I do not hesitate to declare, with all my soul, that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this Fourth of July! Whether we turn to the declarations of the past, or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting.

America is false to the past,

Frederick Douglass, 1818-1895 false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, in the name of the Constitution and the Bible, which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery-the great sin and shame of America!

I will not equivocate; I will not excuse; I will use the severest language I can command; and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice, or who is not at heart a slaveholder, shall not confess to be right and just.

No persuasion needed But I fancy I hear some one of my audience say, it is just in this circumstance that you and your brother abolitionists fail to make a favorable impression on the public mind. Would you argue more, and denounce less, would you persuade more, and rebuke less, your cause would be much more likely to succeed.

But, I submit, where all is plain there is nothing to be argued. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? On what branch of the subject do the people of this country need light?

Must I undertake to prove that the slave is a man? That point is conceded already. Nobody doubts it.

The slaveholders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave.

There are seventy-two crimes in the state of Virginia, which, if committed by a Black man, (no matter how ignorant he be), subject him to the punishment of death, while only two of the same crimes will subject a White man to the like punishment. What is this but the acknowledgement that the slave is a moral, intellectual and responsible being?

It is admitted in the fact that Southern statute books are covered with enactments forbidding, under severe fines and penalties, the teaching of the slave to read or to write. When you can point to any such laws, in reference to the beasts of the field, then I may consent to argue the manhood of the slave.

Is it not astonishing that, while we are plowing, planting and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver and gold; that, while we are reading, writing and ciphering, acting as clerks, merchants and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators and teachers; that, while we are engaged in all manner of enterprises common to other men, digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hill-side, living, moving, acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives and children, and, above all, confessing and worshipping the Christian’s God, and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave, we are called upon to

prove that we are men!

Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? That he is the rightful owner of his own body? You have already declared it. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation, as a matter beset with great difficulty, involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to be understood?

How should I look today, in the presence of Americans, dividing, and subdividing a discourse, to show that men have a natural right to freedom? There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven that does not know that slavery is wrong for him.

What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters?

Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? No! I will not. I have better employments for my time and strength than such arguments would imply.

Fire and thunder O! Had I the ability, and could I reach the nation’s ear, I would, today, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder.

We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be proclaimed and denounced.

What, to the American slave, is your Fourth of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelly to which he is the constant victim.

To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy – a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages.

There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of these United States at this very hour.

Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for

revolting barbarity and shameless rose in rebellion to oppose,” a sevhypocrisy, America reigns without enth part of the inhabitants of your country. a rival.

I will not enlarge further on your national inconsistencies. The exDefiled Christianity (T)he church of this country… istence of slavery in this countakes sides with the oppressors. try brands your republicanism as It has made itself the bulwark of a sham, your humanity as a base American slavery, and the shield pretence, and your Christianity as a lie. It destroys your moral power of American slave-hunters.

Many of its most eloquent Di- abroad; it corrupts your politicians vines who stand as the very lights at home. It saps the foundation of the church, have shamelessly of religion; it makes your name a given the sanction of religion and hissing, and a byword to a mockthe Bible to the whole slave sys- ing earth.

It is the antagonistic force in tem. your government, the only thing They have taught that man may, properly, be a slave; that the re- that seriously disturbs and enlation of master and slave is or- dangers your Union. It fetters your dained of God; that to send back progress; it is the enemy of iman escaped bondman to his mas- provement, the deadly foe of eduter is clearly the duty of all the fol- cation; it fosters pride; it breeds inlowers of the Lord Jesus Christ; solence; it promotes vice; it sheland this horrible blasphemy is ters crime; it is a curse to the earth palmed off upon the world for that supports it; and yet, you cling to it, as if it were the sheet anchor Christianity.

For my part, I would say, wel- of all your hopes.

Oh! Be warned! Be warned! A come infidelity! Welcome atheism!

Welcome anything in preference horrible reptile is coiled up in your to the gospel as preached by those nation’s bosom; the venomous creature is nursing at the tender Divines!

These ministers make religion a breast of your youthful republic; cold and flinty-hearted thing, hav- for the love of God, tear away, and ing neither principles of right ac- fling from you the hideous montion, nor bowels of compassion. ster, and let the weight of twenty They strip the love of God of its millions crush and destroy it forbeauty, and leave the throng of re- ever! ligion a huge, horrible, repulsive form.

I still have hope It is a religion for oppressors, tyAllow me to say, in conclusion, rants, man-stealers, and thugs. It notwithstanding the dark picture is not that “pure and undefiled re- I have this day presented of the ligion” which is from above, and state of the nation, I do not despair which is “first pure, then peaceof this country. There are forces in able, easy to be entreated, full of operation, which must inevitably mercy and good fruits, without work the downfall of slavery. “The partiality, and without hypocrisy.” arm of the Lord is not shortened”…

But a religion which favors the I, therefore, leave off where I began rich against the poor; which exalts the proud above the humble; – with hope.

No nation can now shut itself up which divides mankind into two from the surrounding world, and classes, tyrants and slaves; which says to the man in chains, stay trot round in the same old path of there; and to the oppressor, op- its fathers without interference.

The time was when such could press on; it is a religion which may be done. Long established cusbe professed and enjoyed by all the robbers and enslavers of man- toms of hurtful character could kind; it makes God a respecter of formerly fence themselves in, and persons, denies His fatherhood of do their evil work with social imthe race, and tramples in the dust punity. Knowledge was then conthe great truth of the brotherhood fined and enjoyed by the privileged few, and the multitude of man.

All this we affirm to be true of walked on in mental darkness.

But a change has now come the popular church, and the popular worship of our land and nation over the affairs of mankind. Walled – a religion, a church, and a wor- cities and empires have become ship, which, on the authority of in- unfashionable. The arm of comspired wisdom, we pronounce to merce has borne away the gates of be an abomination in the sight of the strong city. Intelligence is penetrating the darkest corners of the God. globe. It makes its pathway over Inconsistency, hypocrisy and under the sea, as well as on the earth.

Americans! Your republican Oceans no longer divide, but politics, not less than your repub- link nations together. From Boston lican religion, are flagrantly incon- to London is now a holiday excursistent. sion. Space is comparatively anYou boast of your love of liber- nihilated. Thoughts expressed on ty, your superior civilization, and one side of the Atlantic are distinctyour pure Christianity, while the ly heard on the other. No abuse, no whole political power of the nation outrage whether in taste, sport or (as embodied in the two great poavarice, can now hide itself from litical parties), is solemnly pledged the all-pervading light. to support and perpetuate the enIn the fervent aspirations of Wilslavement of three millions of your liam Lloyd Garrison, I say, and let countrymen.

You invite to your shores fugi- every heart join in saying it: God speed the year of jubilee/ tives of oppression from abroad, honor them with banquets, greet The wide world o’er them with ovations, cheer them, When from their galling chains set toast them, salute them, protect free,/Th’ oppress’d shall vilely bend them, and pour out your money to the knee, them like water; but the fugitives And wear the yoke of tyranny/Like from your own land you advertise, brutes no more.

That year will come, and freedom’s hunt, arrest, shoot and kill.

You are all on fire at the mention reign,/To man his plundered fights of liberty for France or for Ireland; again but are as cold as an iceberg at the Restore.

God speed the day when human thought of liberty for the enslaved blood/Shall cease to flow! of America.

You can bare your bosom to the In every clime be understood,/The storm of British artillery to throw claims of human brotherhood, off a three-penny tax on tea; and And each return for evil, good/Not yet wring the last hard-earned far- blow for blow; thing from the grasp of the Black That day will come all feuds to end./And change into a faithful laborers of your country.

You profess to believe “that, of friend one blood, God made all nations Each foe.

God speed the hour, the glorious of men to dwell on the face of all the earth,” and hath commanded hour,/When none on earth all men, everywhere to love one Shall exercise a lordly power,/Nor another; yet you notoriously hate, in a tyrant’s presence cower; (and glory in your hatred), all men But all to manhood’s stature towwhose skins are not colored like er,/By equal birth!

That hour will come, to each, to your own.

You declare, before the world, all,/And from his prison-house, the and are understood by the world thrall to declare, that you “hold these Go forth.

Until that year, day, hour, artruths to be self evident, that all men are created equal; and are en- rive,/With head, and heart, and dowed by their Creator with cer- hand I’ll strive, tain inalienable rights; and that, To break the rod, and rend the among these are, life, liberty, and gyve,/The spoiler of his prey dethe pursuit of happiness;” and priveyet, you hold securely, in a bond- So witness Heaven! /And never age which, according to your own from my chosen post, Thomas Jefferson, “is worse than Whate’er the peril or the cost,/Be ages of that which your fathers driven.

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NATION

JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

STOJ

Black pharmacists going ‘above and beyond’ I’m practicing in a clinic setting and an African American patient sees me,” Butler said. “It’s a pure joy that comes over their face, a sigh of relief. It’s like ‘OK, I’m glad that you’re here because I can be honest with you and I know you will be honest with me.’”

She often finds herself educating her Black patients about diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and other common conditions.

“Unfortunately, there’s still a lack of knowledge in those areas,” Butler said. “That’s why those conditions can be so prevalent.”

Bad experience

MICHAEL B. THOMAS/KAISER HEALTH NEWS/TNS

Customer Bernard Macon (center) is shown with Vincent and Lekeisha Williams, owners of LV Health and Wellness Pharmacy in Shiloh, Illinois.

African Americans get support, education from health advocates at drugstores nationwide

BY CARA ANTHONY KAISER HEALTH NEWS/TNS

SHILOH, Ill. — After a health insurance change forced Bernard Macon to cut ties with his Black doctor, he struggled to find another African American physician online. Then he realized two health advocates were hiding in plain sight.

At a nearby drugstore in the suburbs outside of St. Louis, a pair of pharmacists became the unexpected allies of Macon and his wife, Brandy. Much like the Macons, the pharmacists were energetic young parents who were married — and unapologetically Black.

Vincent and Lekeisha Williams, owners of LV Health and Wellness Pharmacy, didn’t hesitate to help when Brandy had a hard time getting the medicine she needed before and after sinus surgery last year.

The Williamses made calls when Brandy, a physician assistant who has worked in the medical field for 15 years, didn’t feel heard by her doctor’s office.

“They completely went above and beyond,” said Bernard Macon, 36, a computer programmer and father of two. “They turned what could have been a bad experience into a good experience.”

Black doctors, dentist Now more than ever, the Macons are betting on Black med-

ical professionals to give their family better care. The Macon children see a Black pediatrician.

A Black dentist takes care of their teeth. Brandy Macon relies on a Black gynecologist.

And now the two Black pharmacists fill the gap for Bernard Macon while he searches for a primary care doctor in his network, giving him trusted confidants that chain pharmacies likely wouldn’t.

Trust, understanding Black Americans continue to face persistent health care disparities.

Compared with their White counterparts, Black men and women are more likely to die of heart disease, stroke, cancer, asthma, influenza, pneumonia, diabetes and AIDS, according to the Office of Minority Health.

But medical providers who give patients culturally competent care — the act of acknowledging a patient’s heritage, beliefs and values during treatment — often see improved patient outcomes, according to multiple studies.

Part of it is trust and understanding, and part of it can be more nuanced knowledge of the medical conditions that may be more prevalent in those populations.

Creative support For patients, finding a way to identify with their pharmacist can pay off big time.

Cutting pills in half, skipping doses or not taking medication altogether can be damaging to one’s health — even deadly. And many patients see their pharmacists monthly, far more often

than annual visits to their medical doctors, creating more opportunities for supportive care.

That’s why some Black pharmacists are finding ways to connect with customers in and outside of their stores.

Inspirational music, counseling, accessibility and transparency have turned some minorityowned pharmacies into hubs for culturally competent care.

“We understand the community because we are a part of the community,” Lekeisha Williams said. “We are visible in our area doing outreach, attending events and promoting health and wellness.”

History of mistrust To be sure, such care is not just relevant to African Americans.

But mistrust of the medical profession is especially a hurdle to overcome when treating Black Americans.

Many are still shaken by the history of Henrietta Lacks, whose cells were used in research worldwide without her family’s knowledge; the Tuskegee Project, which failed to treat Black men with syphilis; and other projects that used African Americans unethically for research.

At Black-owned Premier Pharmacy and Wellness Center near Grier Heights, a historically Black neighborhood in Charlotte, N.C., the playlist is almost as important as the acute care clinic attached to the drugstore.

Owner Martez Prince watches his customers shimmy down the aisles as they make their way through the store listening to JayZ, Beyoncé, Kirk Franklin, Whitney Houston and other Black artists.

Prince said the music helps him in his goal of making health care more accessible and providing medical advice patients can trust.

More than dispense In rural Georgia, Teresa Mitchell, a Black woman with 25 years of pharmacy experience, connects her customers with home health aides, shows them how to access insurance services online and even makes house calls.

Her Total Care Pharmacy is the only health care provider in Baconton, where roughly half the town’s 900 residents are Black.

“We do more than just dispense,” Mitchell said.

Iradean Bradley, 72, became a customer soon after Total Care Pharmacy opened in 2016. She struggled to pick up prescriptions before Mitchell came to town.

“It was so hectic because I didn’t have transportation of my own,” Bradley said. “It’s so convenient for us older people, who have to pay someone to go out of town and get our medicine.”

Educating patients Lakesha M. Butler, president of the National Pharmaceutical Association, advocates for such culturally competent care through the professional organization representing minorities in the pharmacy industry and studies it in her academic work at the Edwardsville campus of Southern Illinois University.

She also feels its impact directly, she said, when she sees patients at clinics two days a week in St. Charles, Mo., and East St. Louis, Ill. “It’s just amazing to me when

For Macon, his experiences with medical professionals of backgrounds different from his own left him repeatedly disappointed and hesitant to open up.

After his wife had a miscarriage, Macon said, the couple didn’t receive the compassion they longed for while grieving the loss. A few years later, a bad experience with their children’s pediatrician when their oldest child had a painful ear infection sparked a move to a different provider.

“My daughter needed attention right away, but we couldn’t get through to anybody,” Macon recalled. “That’s when my wife said, ‘We aren’t doing this anymore!’”

Today, Macon’s idea of good health care isn’t colorblind. If a doctor can’t provide empathetic and expert treatment, he’s ready to move, even if a replacement is hard to find.

HUED app Kimberly Wilson, 31, will soon launch an app for consumers like Macon who are seeking culturally competent care. Therapists, doulas, dentists, specialists and even pharmacists of color will be invited to list their services on HUED. Beta testing is expected to start this summer in New York City and Washington, D.C., and the app will be free for consumers.

“Black Americans are more conscious of their health from a lot of different perspectives,” Wilson said. “We’ve begun to put ourselves forward.”

But even after the introduction of HUED, such health care could be hard to find.

While about 13% of the U.S. population is Black, only about 6% of the country’s doctors and surgeons are Black, according to Data USA. Black pharmacists make up about 7% of the professionals in their field, and, though the demand is high, Black students accounted for about 9% of all students enrolled in pharmacy school in 2018.

‘Barbershop feel’ For Macon, though, the Williamses’ LV Health and Wellness Pharmacy in Shiloh provides some of the support he has been seeking.

“I still remember the very first day I went there. It was almost like a barbershop feel,” Macon said, likening it to the community hubs where customers can chitchat about sports, family and faith while getting their hair cut.

“I could relate to who was behind the counter.”

CDC issues warning about ‘crypto’ in pools, water parks

BY STEPHANIE SIGAFOOS THE MORNING CALL/TNS

Outbreaks of “crypto,” a parasite found in swimming pools that causes long-term diarrhea, are on the rise, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

The CDC says outbreaks of the summertime parasite increased an average of 13% each year from 2009-17.

Cryptosporidium is spread through the infected fecal matter of humans or animals. The CDC says people have been getting sick after swallowing the parasite in contaminated water or food or after coming in contact with infected people or animals.

It is said to be the leading cause of disease outbreaks in the United States linked to water, specifically outbreaks linked to public pools or water playgrounds.

Kids susceptible

Tough to kill

According to the report: 35% of outbreaks were linked to treated swimming water in places like pools or water playgrounds 13% were linked to contact with infected people in child care settings 15% were linked to contact with cattle, and 3% to drinking raw milk or apple cider Young children are particularly susceptible to spreading the disease and experiencing severe symptoms, said registered nurse Michele Hlavsa, chief of CDC’s Healthy Swimming Program.

“They don’t know how to use the toilet and wash their hands, or are just learning how,” she said. “But we as parents can take steps to help keep our kids healthy in the water, around animals, and in childcare.”

The concern with crypto, according to the CDC, is that it’s tough to kill.

It can survive for days in chlorinated water in pools and water playgrounds, and even on surfaces disinfected with chlorine bleach.

Someone sick with crypto can have diarrhea for up to three weeks.

Outbreaks of crypto are most common in the summer, the report says, and anyone with diarrhea should not swim or enter public pools or playgrounds.

Children sick with diarrhea should stay at home and away from child care facilities.

The Morning Call is in Allentown, Pennsylvania.

DREAMSTIME/TNS

The fecal parasite can survive for days in chlorinated water in pools and water playgrounds.

HEALTH | FOOD | TRAVEL | SCIENCE | BOOKS | MOVIES | TV | AUTOS COURIER Meet some

IFE/FAITH of Florida’s Finest See page B2

JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

SHARING BLACK LIFE, STATEWIDE

Summer sweets from strawberry pie to ice cream See pages B3 & B4

SOUTH FLORIDA / TREASURE COAST AREA

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Black & Browns New book examines the failure of Reconstruction

BY DR. GLENN C. ALTSCHULER SPECIAL TO THE FLORIDA COURIER

After he was refused a drink in a posh coffeehouse and bar in January 1871, New Orleans Parish Sheriff Charles St. Albin Sauvinet filed a suit “for the purpose of vindicating his civil rights.”

Sauvinet cited Louisiana’s new public accommodations law, which required that all businesses be “open to the accommodation and patronage of all persons without distinction or discrimination on account of race or color.

Nonetheless, the trial turned on a determination of the race of Sauvinet, a freeborn Creole, with a French immigrant father and a mother of Haitian descent.

Colored or not?

Contrary to defense assertions that the plaintiff had claimed to be White until he ran for office and began courting African-American voters, Sauvinet explained that his “general reputation in the community” was as a person of color, even though “whether I am a Daniel Brook colored man or not is a matter that I do not know myself.”

In “The Accident of Color,’’ journalist Daniel Brook focuses on New Orleans and Charleston, South Carolina, cosmopolitan metropolises with large mixedrace populations, to explore the chang-

BOOK REVIEW “The Accident of Color: A Story of Race in Reconstruction’’ by Daniel Brook. W.W. Norton & Company. 344 pages. $27.95.

ing nature of racial distinctions in 19thcentury America.

Before the Civil War, Brook reminds us, a clear distinction was made between slaves and free persons. A child of a free mother was free, no matter who the father was, no matter how dark his or her complexion; the son or daughter of an enslaved mother was a slave.

Re-segregation era During Reconstruction (from about 1865-1877), racial distinctions were less

applicable (under the law) because Constitutional amendments (reinforced by Congressional legislation) deemed all citizens equal regardless of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

But with the “redemption” of the South in the last quarter of the century, a new, ostensibly biological definition of race took hold, with Jim Crow re-segregation laws defining a person of color as anyone with at least one African-American great-grandparent, and, in time, hewing close to a “one-drop” rule.

Impact of historians Intended for a general audience, “The Accident of Color’’ draws on the work of several generations of professional historians, including W.E.B. Du Bois, C. Vann Woodward, John Blassingame, and Eric

In “The Accident of Color,’’ journalist Daniel Brook focuses on New Orleans and Charleston, South Carolina, cosmopolitan metropolises with large mixed-race populations, to explore the changing nature of racial distinctions in 19thcentury America.

See BOOK, Page B2

Dennis-Benn’s novel of Jamaican immigrant is magnetic, wrenching

BY CONNIE OGLE NEWSDAY/TNS

In America, anyone can be anything. That’s what the dream assures us, right?

We live in the land of opportunity for anyone willing to work hard. Unless of course you get here the wrong way. Then there’s little opportunity, few choices, constant unease, quick despair. You don’t belong.

In her new novel, Nicole DennisBenn contrasts the deep chasm between the American dream and immigrant reality, and the result is magnetic and wrenching.

The story is a perfect fit for the author: Her first novel, “Here Comes the Sun,” laid bare the poster image of Jamaica as a tropical paradise, revealing the ugly truths behind the promises of sun, sand and sex.

BOOK REVIEW “Patsy” by Nicole Dennis-Benn; Liveright (432 pages, $26.95)

Another mirage

Dennis-Benn was born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica. She holds a Master of Public Health from the University of Michigan and an MFA in Creative Writing from Sarah Lawrence College. She lives with her wife in Brooklyn, New York.

Now, in “Patsy,” she exposes another mirage, returning to themes she explored with insight and empathy — sexism, racism, colorism, homophobia, motherhood and poverty.

What must women sacrifice, Dennis-Benn asks, to become their true selves? It’s not just a question for the privileged. Patsy, a civil servant in Jamaica, knows her answer.

In a fair world, her affinity for math would lead her to a desirable job.

Accounting, maybe. But such work is impossible to find, because darkskinned, poor women like Patsy have little value in her town.

So Patsy has invested the little money she has saved and spent it on a visa application. She is going to America, she tells her 5-year-old daughter Tru, to “mek t’ings bettah fah you. Fall all ah we.”

A new life This is a lie. Patsy hopes to find a better job — after all, she has taken two courses at a community college and once solved 100 math problems in a row at school.

But she won’t return to Jamaica because Cicely is in America. Cicely, her beautiful friend who emigrated and married for a green card.

Patsy and Cicely loved each other once, and Cicely still writes hopeful letters to Patsy, encouraging her to come to New York. And so Patsy leaves Tru to build a new life. But America is less a paradise than a treacherous illusion.

Hard choices A mother who abandons her child is a monster in most cultures, but

Dennis-Benn’s deep compassion for Patsy — for all women facing unthinkable choices — forces you to reconsider your own preconceptions.

She urges you to think about this woman’s desperation, her fear, her past, her yearning for connection.

She never wanted to be a mother, and Tru’s father, a married police officer, can provide a stable home for the girl.

That rationalization doesn’t soothe Patsy’s guilt, nor does it comfort Tru, who clings to her mother’s promise to return for as long as she can.

Eventually, though, Tru has to grow up and make hard choices of her own.

Two views “Patsy” is told from both points of view, mother and daughter, the voices raw, honest and haunting.

Patsy faces the irony that the only options open to her are nanny jobs, caring for the children of others.

She hates being labeled “illegal” and “can’t understand why she’s deemed a criminal for wanting more.” She wonders: “What am I good at?” and simply doesn’t know.

As a teenager, Tru begins to reject the role her culture has carved out for her (Dennis-Benn has a lot to say about how girls are raised in her native Jamaica).

Both women suffer depression, a battle all the harder to win when you don’t have the means to fight it.

But reinvention and redemption are possible. The story ends on a note of hope, though it comes at a price. What are you good at, Patsy?

Loving. Learning. Living. The most human strengths of all.

ENTERTAINMENT & FINEST

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FLORIDA COMMUNITY CALENDAR

stops at the Broward Center on Aug. 1 and Jacksonville’s Florida Theatre on Aug. 2. Details: iyanlavanzantlive.com

Miami: Actor and activist Danny Glover will be the guest at the Universal Foundation for Better Living’s Panorama of Truth conference in Miami this month. Details: ufbl.org or call 305-624-4991

Hollywood: Lionel Richie performs July 27 at Hard Rock Live and July 28 at Tampa’s Amalie Arena.

Miami Gardens: Join Mayor Oliver Gilbert for a free handsonly CPR course from 10 a.m. to noon on July 26 at the Betty T. Ferguson Recreational Complex. Sign up at the complex.

Plantation: Judah Worship Word Ministries will host a pastoral appreciation service for Apostle Willett L. Mitchell on July 21 at 8:15 a.m. More info: 954791-2999 Orlando: Khalid performs at Amway Center on Aug. 16 and Aug. 17 at Miami’s AmericanAirlinesArena.

Fort Lauderdale: Iyanla Vanzant’s Acts of Faith Remix Tour

Jacksonville: Gospel star Kirk Franklin will be at the Florida Theatre Jacksonville on July 15.

JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

STOJ

LIL WAYNE

He will be in concert with blink-182 on July 25 in West Palm Beach, July 26 in Tampa and July 29 in Jacksonville.

BB KING BLUES BAND

The band will perform at Jannus Live in St. Petersburg July 12-13.

Jacksonville: Mary J. Blige will be at Daily’s Place on July 14.

West Palm Beach: Mary J. Blige and Nas will perform at the Coral Sky Amphitheater on July 11 and MidFlorida Credit Union Amphitheater in Tampa on July 13.

Ponte Vedra: Catch Leela James at the Ponte Vedra Concert Hall on July 5 and Plaza Live – Orlando on July 8.

BERES HAMMOND

Catch the reggae icon on Aug. 24 at Hard Rock Live Orlando and Fort Lauderdale’s Broward Center on Aug. 25.

Coconut Creek: Catch Kool & the Gang on Aug. 15 at Seminole Casino Coconut Creek.

Veteran journalist helping women overcome life’s diversities SPECIAL TO THE FLORIDA COURIER

July is Minority Mental Illness Awareness month and former Florida TV anchor Sicily Wilson is using her voice to bring attention to the issue through her nonprofit, WOW (Women Overcoming with Willpower) Legacy Group.

Expanding the program into Tampa Bay, its mission is to empower, support and encourage women transitioning through life’s adversities to reach their true potential.

According to the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services Secily Office of Minority Health, 40% of Wilson Puerto Ricans experience depression, followed by 20% of African Americans; while one-in-five women experience a mental health condition.

Stroke, depression Wilson knows first-hand how living with depression can ruin your life. After an on-air stroke in 2004, she lost her ability to speak clearly; and after intensive speech therapy, Wilson regained her broadcast quality voice.

From there, her unfortunate experiences con-

tinued. Her marriage to her college sweetheart ended in divorce; she was laid off from her broadcast job; she exhausted her savings and lost her home to foreclosure.

Wilson lived silently in a depressed state until a close friend – and Tampa native – Sartura Shuman-Smith, director of the Centre for Girls, came to her rescue.

“My life had fallen completely apart, at no fault of my own,” Wilson said. “Sartura helped to ignite a philanthropic spark, by encouraging me to give back to a group of women in transition.”

It was then Wilson founded the WOW Legacy Group and the Fall into Fabulous (FIF) Empowerment Program in Orlando. Now in its seventh year, the program is expanding into Tampa Bay with its FIF empowerment breakfast and fashion show, thanks to the Ford Motor Company and Macy’s.

Aug. 10 event Taking place on Saturday, Aug. 10 at 8:30 a.m. at Macy’s Westshore Plaza in Tampa, the event will address the important issues of mental health by energizing and engaging thought leaders, who will guide attendees on a journey to renew, refocus and reimagine the possibilities of their life.

As WOW Legacy Group aims to empower, educate, inspire and transform lives of women, the Ford Motor Company and Macy’s both have philanthropic mission to improve the lives of women.

“Ford is all about strengthening communities and empowering women,’’ said Theresa Campbell, Regional Marketing Specialist for Ford Motor Company. “We understand women drive a lot of the decisions and make a big impact in the community. It just made sense to partner with the WOW Legacy Group.”

For more information, visit www.wowlegacygroup.org or follow the organization on Facebook at Fall into Fabulous.

FLORIDA’S

finest

Jada says she never wanted to marry Will

BY KASSIDY VAVRA NEW YORK DAILY NEWS/TNS

Jada Pinkett Smith says that she never wanted to marry Will Smith — and that the couple still doesn’t label themselves “married” despite getting hitched more than two decades ago.

Pinkett Smith, 47, told People in a new interview that she “never wanted to get married” — but felt pressured into it by her family.

“I had never seen a happy marriage,” she told People, saying she “adored” her partner, but did not want to marry.

Her mother, known as Gammy, called Will crying — which Pinkett Smith said was “infuriating” — and the meddling mom said “You have to get married.”

‘I don’t own him’ The couple married on New Year’s Eve in 1997 when Pinkett Smith was in her first trimester of pregnancy with son Jaden, now 20. The pair also share daughter Willow, 18. And Will has a son, Trey, 26, from his first

WALLY SKALIJ/LOS ANGELES TIMES/TNS

Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith arrive at the Golden Globes \on Jan. 10, 2016. marriage to Sheree Zampino.

Pinkett Smith told People that she’s happy she did get married, but that she and Smith, 50, still do not label themselves as married.

“It’s more of a life partnership … I don’t own him. He doesn’t own me. He has to be his own person first, and vice versa …

Love is freedom,” Pinkett Smith told People.

Pinkett Smith is most known for her roles in “The Nutty Professor,” the “Matrix” series, and as a voice in the animated “Madagascar” series.

Think you’re one of Florida’s Finest?

E-mail your high-resolution (200 dpi) digital photo in casual wear or bathing suit taken in front of a plain background with few distractions, to news@flcourier.com with a short biography of yourself and your contact information. (No nude/glamour/ fashion photography, please!) In order to be considered, you must be at least 18 years of age. Acceptance of the photographs submitted is in the sole and absolute discretion of Florida Courier editors. We reserve the right to retain your photograph even if it is not published. If you are selected, you will be contacted by e-mail and further instructions will be given.

Thousands of Caribbean culture lovers converge on South Florida every year before and during the Columbus Day weekend to attend the annual Miami Broward Carnival, a series of concerts, pageants, parades, and competitions.

On Carnival Day, “mas” (masquerade) bands of thousands of revelers dance and march behind 18-wheel tractor-trailer trucks with booming sound systems from morning until nightfall while competing for honors.

Here are some of the “Finest” we’ve seen over the years. Click on www.flcourier to see hundreds of pictures from previous Carnivals.

Go to www. miamibrowardcarnival.com for more information on Carnival events in South Florida.

CHARLES W. CHERRY II / FLORIDA COURIER

JULY 5 – JULY 11, 2019

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Pique your culinary curiosity with these trends FROM FAMILY FEATURES

Forget the rules and restrictions. Today’s food trends are about enjoyment and simplicity, from decadent flavors your taste buds can’t wait to explore to convenient packaging that makes it incredibly easy to eat no matter where or when you make time to dine.

Whether you’re a foodie keeping tabs on the latest culinary trends or an everyday eater with a dose of culinary curiosity, these trends can give you something to chew on.

Unique herbs and spices Most often associated with salad dressings and hummus as a flavor additive, tahini has stepped beyond just savory foods and has found its way into many new dishes, including desserts and cocktails.

From ice cream and milkshakes to muffins, cookies and other baked goods, this toasted ground sesame seed spread used in Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cuisine can also be added as an alternative to nearly any dish that calls for peanut butter.

On the go For most people, a busy day is just part of the program. Even if you take your hectic lifestyle in stride, chances are it affects your eating habits to some extent. Fortu-

PHOTO COURTESY OF GETTY IMAGES/TNS

There are plenty of ways to add more flavor and excitement to everyday meals. nately, you’re not alone and conveniently packaged foods can make eating on the go tasty and enjoyable.

The options are even crossing into areas traditionally reserved for a sit-down meal, such as Aunt Jemima’s Pancake on the Go Cups, which offer a soft and fluffy texture like the typical pancake in Chocolate Chip or Buttermilk & Maple flavors.

They’re surprisingly simple to prepare; just add water, stir and microwave for a pancake in a cup that you can enjoy from anywhere. Learn more at auntjemima. com.

Ugly eats Save your judgment for someplace else; ugly produce is actually in vogue. A growing number of chefs and brands are promoting recipes made with ugly foods – usually produce that is perfectly useful and edible but likely to be overlooked at the store due to a physical imperfection.

Think oddly shaped tomatoes or a smaller melon than you might not normally choose. Often those options are of-

fered at a discount and it’s a savvy way to reduce food waste.

Hot and spicy Palettes are growing ever-adventurous, and that means flavors that pack a strong punch are gaining traction. If you’re not sure your taste buds are up to the challenge, try adding some spice to a familiar dish like rice or pasta.

For example, you can find a spicy take on Rice a Roni, Pasta Roni and Quaker Instant Grits with Jalapeno Cheddar varieties, which include cheddar cheese and real jalapeno bits that leave lingering heat.

Include these as the perfect side for your next taco night or try in place of mashed potatoes for an extra kick. Find more spicy ideas for dinner at ricearoni.com.

Move over, meat Opting for more plant-based foods in place of meat no longer means forgoing those flavors and textures.

While not a completely new trend,

plant-based and blended burgers and sliders have become more mainstream and found places on menus at restaurants nationwide with more people (even nonvegans) searching for a break from meat or ways to add flavors like mushrooms into meals and snacks.

Salty-sweet flavors Sweet-meets-salty combos are hardly new, but products featuring this blend are showing up in more and more places, including at the breakfast table. Sea salt is a perfect match for the sweetness of chocolate or caramel; it adds a rich depth of flavor that strikes a balance between too sweet or too salty.

Start the day off with an option like Quaker’s Cocoa & Sea Salt Instant Oatmeal, which contains 100% whole grains, no high-fructose corn syrup, no artificial preservatives, no artificial sweeteners, no artificial flavors and no added colors.

Explore additional ideas to sweeten your breakfast plans at quakeroats.com.

Some punched-up side ideas for backyard entertaining ‘UGLY’ SUMMER COLESLAW SALAD Recipe courtesy of Two Purple Figs ½ head white cabbage (about 4 cups) 2 scallions 1 carrot 1 apple 1 pear ½ bottle Bolthouse Farms Coleslaw dressing 1 cup pomegranate arils (optional) Using shredder disc in food processor, shred cabbage, scallions, carrot, apple and pear. Add dressing and pulse until smooth.

Sprinkle with pomegranate arils, if desired, and serve.

This content is courtesy of Bolthouse Farms.

Fresh strawberries make this pie a summer treat It wouldn’t be summer without a fresh fruit pie. Sink your teeth into sweetness with every bite of this Fresh Strawberry Pie. Find more summer recipes at Culinary.net.

FROM FAMILY FEATURES

Backyard barbecues and family picnics are plentiful during the summer months, so chances are good you’ll host (or attend) at least one event this season. While you’ll likely feast on a bevy of hamburgers, hot dogs and summer salads, a menu filled with fresh, delicious sides makes for a meal worth celebrating.

There’s certainly more than one way to create a menu for a casual backyard picnic, so it’s easy to plan dishes that everyone can enjoy. When organizing your menu, be sure to consider your guests and prepare a selection of side dishes that are both age-appropriate and satisfy a wide range of cravings.

Here are some creative ways to put a twist on classic side dishes to make your meal memorable.

Pasta medley When you’re serving a group with kids, a simple pasta salad is a must-have side that even picky eaters will enjoy. Simply prepare your favorite noodles (fun shapes like spirals or bowties if you’re thinking kidfriendly) then add an array of ingredients like cubed cheese, olives, cherry tomatoes and broccoli florets with some extra-virgin olive oil.

For a more grown-up flavor, combine feta cheese and bits of fresh basil with a drizzle of Bolthouse Farms Classic Balsamic Vinai-

grette dressing for an extra kick of flavor.

Naturally sweet treats Many traditional sweet dishes are simply impractical for a hot summer day. As an alternative, something lighter can help satisfy a sweet tooth without the bulk of a heavy cake or pie.

Try a mixed berry bowl with all your favorite seasonal fruits like fresh strawberries, raspberries, blackberries and blueberries.

It’s a cheerful presentation and an option all ages can enjoy. Add a few sprigs of mint for garnish for a little festive fun.

Crisp coleslaw salad A refreshing salad is almost always a crowd-pleaser. Instead of a traditional tossed garden salad, try adding some crunch with a zesty coleslaw salad. This recipe uses all chopped vegetables, allowing you to help reduce food waste by choosing veggies that are not the most beautiful on the shelf, but still taste delicious.

Try using an option like Bolthouse Farms Coleslaw dressing to make these veggies and coleslaw even more delicious by giving you the classic, tangy, creamy and sweet coleslaw taste you love with less fat and fewer calories than other refrigerated brands.

Just pour, mix in with cabbage and enjoy. Another tip: balance your crunchy veggies with some sweetness, like bits of apple, pear, persimmon or nectarine, for a truly flavorful salad.

FRESH STRAWBERRY PIE Recipe adapted from Pillsbury 1 pie crust 6 cups whole fresh strawberries 1 cup sugar 3 tablespoons cornstarch ¼ cup water Sliced strawberries 1 cup sweetened whipped cream Heat oven to 450 F. Press pie crust into 9-inch glass pie pan. Bake 9-11 minutes, or until lightly browned. Completely cool pie crust, approximately 30 minutes.

In blender, crush strawberries to make 1 cup.

In saucepan, combine sugar and cornstarch. Add crushed strawberries and water. Bring to boil, stirring constantly. Cool to room temperature.

Arrange sliced strawberries in cooled crust.

Pour cooked strawberry mixture evenly over strawberries. Refrigerate 3 hours.

Top with whipped cream and desired toppings.

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BAHAMIAN PROUD TO CELEBRATE BAHAMAS INDEPENDENCE DAY.