Florida Courier, July 6, 2012, #27

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Decades of struggle for Wilmington Ten B1

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COMPILED FROM STAFF REPORTS

Gov. Rick Scott says to hell with implementing ‘Obamacare’ in Florida, thus hurting thousands of Black Floridians who would immediately benefit from the legislation.

COURTESY OF THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

On June 28, Gov. Rick Scott reacted to the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision upholding the Affordable Health Care Act, President Obama’s signature health care law.

Blacks helping Mormon Church to grow

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JULY 6 - JULY 12, 2012

VOLUME 20 NO. 27

n the most watched U.S. Supreme Court case since Bush v. Gore in 2000, the justices upheld the landmark Affordable Health Care Act that requires all Americans except those objecting on religious grounds or facing financial hardship to obtain health insurance by 2014 or pay a financial penalty.

The ruling grew out of three cases challenging the constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act that were appealed to the Supreme Court – including a lawsuit filed by the state of Florida, instituted by former Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum, continued by his successor Pam Bondi, and supported

by Gov. Rick Scott.

President Obama signed the legislation into law in 2010.

Most of its provisions will be phased in over the next two years.

Among other things, the law prohibits insurance companies from denying coverage

based on a pre-existing condition, allows children to remain on their parents’ insurance plan until age 26, expands access to insurance to 30 million Americans, eliminates annual and lifetime coverage caps, creates insurance exchanges at the state level for individuals and small businesses, expands eligibility for Medicaid and requires insurance companies to cover certain preventive services without co-pays or deductibles.

Impact on Blacks According to an analysis by the Urban Institute, the number of uninsured AfricanAmericans under the age of 65 will drop from 7.4 million to 3.4 million as a result of the health care law, a decrease of 54.6 percent. Black Floridians are about 7.1 percent of America’s total Black population, which means that an additional 684,000 Black Floridians would be insured under Obamacare.

But some problem areas remain. Health Affairs magazine

concluded, “Of the estimated 26.4 million individuals projected to be uninsured after the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, those eligible for Medicaid and CHIP (the Children’s Health Insurance Program) but who remain unenrolled, constitute the single largest group, at 35.7 percent.

This eligible-but-unenrolled group includes 58.8 percent of the Blacks who we estimate will remain uninsured under the Affordable Care Act, which is a higher proportion than found in the other racial and ethnic groups examined.”

For the law to have impact, effective outreach programs must be used to reach those less likely to enroll in Medicaid, a state and federal partnership that provides medical coverage for needy families, pregnant women, children, the blind and the elderly, and CHIP, also a federal matching fund for states to provide health coverage to nearly 8 million children in families with incomes too high to qualSee SCOTT, Page A2

XXX OLYMPIAD / LONDON, ENGLAND

On her way to the 2012 Olympics

Standardization, equality attracts diversity

BY JAMES D. DAVIS SUN SENTINEL / MCT

FORT LAUDERDALE – It’s an old question, but Fred Bethel says he still gets asked: How can an African-American like himself be part of the Mormon Church, a religious group that waited until 1978 to allow Blacks to become leaders?

His response comes easily because of what the church is today.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is growing dramatically, and it is increasingly diversifying in South Florida, with a mix of Hispanic and Caribbean members.

“I don’t dwell on what the church has done,” says Bethel, a member of the Fort Lauderdale Ward, or congregation. “I look at what the church is now, and what it can become. The church is saying, we’re having a party and everyone’s invited.”

NHAT V. MEYER/SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS/MCT

Gabrielle Douglas, age 16, performs on the balance beam for the final round of the 2012 U.S. Olympic gymnastics team trial in San Jose, Calif. on July 1. Douglas will lead the five-member women’s gymnastics team to London.

See MORMON, Page A2

SNAPSHOTS OBITUARY | A2

Remembering Dr. Calvin Shirley FLORIDA | A6

New board chairman for Bethune-Cookman

FLORIDA | A3

Bill to deal with juvenile sentences

FINEST | B5

Meet Finest Cruisers

Activists call for federal voter registration act

BY MICHAEL PELTIER THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

Hundreds of thousands of Florida exfelons who have completed their sentences still can’t vote, a prohibition that is hindering their re-entry into society, a group of voting rights advocates said Tuesday as they urged Congress to step in.

Changes made last year in Florida have stopped restoration efforts for ex-felons who have served their prison sentences or completed probation.

Politically charged In 2007, former Gov. Charlie Crist and the Cabinet voted to end a 140-year-old practice and agreed to immediately re-

store the rights of nonviolent offenders who had completed their sentences. The action also allowed most of those who committed violent offenses to immediately apply for board approval to regain their rights instead of having to wait five years.

In March 2011, Gov. Rick Scott and an all-Republican Cabinet overturned the previous vote. In place of automatic restoration, ex-felons would have to wait at least five years from the time of their release before seeking the ability to vote.

Further, the request must be approved by the Executive Clemency Board, which is made up of the governor and Cabinet.

African-Americans have complained the move reduces voting in the Black community and lessens the community’s voice – because so many ex-felons are Af-

rican-American.

Florida now has one of the most restrictive processes for ex-felons to restore their right to vote. It is one of only a handful of states, most in the Deep South, that do not allow felons to automatically regain their civil rights when they are released from prison.

During the latest clemency meeting in late June, the panel restored the rights of 20 of 80 applicants. Last year the board restored rights to 78 individuals.

Feds must step in Hampered in efforts to change state law, Mark Schlakman, a Democratic candidate for Congress and Walter McNeil, former

ALSO COMMENTARY: CHARLES W. CHERRY II: RANDOM THOUGHTS OF A FREE BLACK MIND | A4 INSIDE COMMENTARY: MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN: LIFE OF HELL FOR JUVENILE IN ADULT PRISON | A5

See VOTER, Page A2

FOCUS

A2

JULY 6 - JULY 12, 2012

Pioneering Florida doctor Dr. Calvin Shirley dies at age 91 FROM STAFF REPORTS

Dr. Calvin Hylton Shirley, one of South Florida’s first Black doctors, died of natural causes on June 23 at Broward Health Medical Center. He was 91.

Dr. Shirley was one of the first four Black physicians admitted to the staff of then-Broward General Hospital (now Broward Health Broward General Medical Center).

The move paved the way for the acceptance of Black physicians.

Funeral services were held June 30 in Fort Lauderdale for Dr. ShirDr. Calvin ley, who was born Shirley Jan. 28, 1921 in Tallahassee to the late Rev. Edwin S. Shirley and Mrs. Stella Gertrude (Young) Shirley of Jamaica, West Indies. He was the oldest of four brothers and three sisters.

After graduating from Booker

T. Washington High School at age 16 in Pensacola, Dr. Shirley matriculated at Florida A&M University, where he obtained his pre-medical education majoring in biology and a double minor in chemistry and education.

From Boston to Broward After college, he was drafted into the Navy during World War II. He then enrolled in the Boston College of Physicians & Surgeons in Boston, graduating summa cum laude.

After finishing his internship and residency in obstetrics and gynecology at Boston City Hospital, he returned to Florida in 1949 to commence his medical practice.

He joined three Black medical doctors – James F. Sistrunk, Von D. Mizell, and R. L. Brown – who were already established in Fort Lauderdale at Provident Hospital, the only major health care facility in Broward County at the

time that would treat Blacks.

According to historical records, Provident was a general hospital, owned and operated by Broward County’s Black community through a non-profit corporation. It cared for Black patients anywhere in South Florida, was operated by an all-Black administrative staff and offered medical and surgical care under the standards set by the American Hospital Association.

Dr. Shirley became a staff physician there, eventually delivering more than 6,000 babies during his professional career. He later opened medical practices in Fort Lauderdale and Delray Beach.

Many firsts Dr. Shirley and his late wife, registered nurse Jeanette E. Shirley, implemented the first curriculum and operations for the Broward County Licensed Practical Nurse training program. He later became the county’s first

MORMON Substantial increase

SCOTT FISHER/SUN SENTINEL/MCT

Milsaint Valcin and his wife, Rose Nora, stand in front of their Mormon church in Boynton Beach. turally diverse Coconut Creek Ward, which includes Jamaican, Haitian, Brazilian, Mexican, Filipino, Polynesian, African-American even Canadian members.

More interest As the presidential candidacy of Republican Mitt Romney has ramped up, so has public interest in his religion.

Congregants take any questions as an opportunity to spread the faith. Polygamy? Long outlawed. No tobacco, alcohol or caffeine? Don’t do anything that

harms the body. Romney? Good man, but the church doesn’t endorse candidates.

What is drawing more and more people? Family values, for one. Many cultures are attracted to the Mormon teaching that they can stay together not just now, but for eternity.

Haiti-born Milsaint Valcin and his wife, Rose Nora Saint-Hilaire, recently drove to the Mormon temple near Orlando for a Sealing Ceremony.

“You can marry at a chapel, but that’s just temporal,” says Valcin,

from A1 ify for Medicaid, but can’t afford private coverage.

An important limit

FLORIDA COURIER FILES

from A1 Department of Corrections secretary, on Tuesday urged Florida’s congressional delegation to push for federal law changes to require automatic restoration of civil rights for federal elections.

The practical result, said Leon County Supervisor of Elections Ion Sancho, would be that state election officials would follow suit because a dual registration system for state and federal elections would not work.

The group pointed to a 2011 study by the Florida

“Dr. Calvin Shirley spent decades helping his patients and transforming health care in Bro-

Foreign missions critical

SCOTT

VOTER

‘Amazing man’

who attends the Boynton Beach Ward. “When you marry in a temple, it’s eternal.”

Mormons take care of each other on this side of eternity as well. Valcin was converted in Haiti, then came to the United States in 2002. Church members helped him fill out a résumé and looked up job postings in their companies.

A strong work ethic is another aspect immigrants like about the Mormon faith, says Nathan Katz, professor of religious studies at Florida International University.

“They also stand for abstinence, patriotism, respect for authority and church-centered life. And that has an appeal across ethnic boundaries.”

from A1 From 2000 to 2010, Mormons increased by 45.5 percent from 4.2 million to 6.1 million, according to the latest U.S. Religion Census, compiled by statisticians every decade. In Southeast Florida’s three stakes, or local districts, officials count about 12,150 members in 27 wards.

The Miami Lakes Stake, covering south Broward and MiamiDade counties, is about 60 percent Hispanic, according to stake president Albert Benzion. The village of El Portal has a Spanishspeaking ward mostly from Central America: Nicaragua, Honduras and Guatemala.

More than 35 percent of new members in the Pompano Beach Stake, from north Broward County to West Palm Beach, are Latino, according to its president, William Current. Coconut Creek to West Palm Beach has concentrations of Creole-speaking Haitians.

“The further we go in South Florida, the more diverse the congregations become,” says Donald Anderson, president of the LDS Fort Lauderdale Mission, which takes in the five stakes from Sebastian to the Keys. “They’ve made the church a wonderful melting pot.”

One of the newest Mormon chapels is a small white building in Lauderdale-by-the-Sea. Formed in December, the chapel houses the Cypress Creek Branch, a subdivision of the cul-

medical advisor to the Sickle Cell Foundation.

Dr. Shirley was also instrumental in getting a Broward Health Department building erected in a predominately Black community, thereby affording more accessibility to available county health facilities and public health services. He also was the first Black doctor to serve on the executive board of the Florida State Health Planning Council.

Nationally, Dr. Shirley served 15 years as the grand clinical director and assistant grand medical director of the Improved Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks of the World. This service is rendered during annual Grand Lodge Conventions held in various large cities throughout the United States.

He retired in 2004.

Parole Commission that indicated the recidivism rate for felons who had their rights restored in 2009 and 2010 was about 11 percent. That compared with an overall three-year recidivism rate of more than 33 percent between 2001 and 2008.

Between 4,000 and 5,000 Florida felons are released from prison or complete their probation every month.

“By saying you have to wait five years, what you’re saying is that person is going to have to crawl and scratch their way back into society,” McNeil said.

“The research tells us...the more years you push that out, the less likely they are to succeed.”

Under Obamacare, Medicaid was expected to extend coverage to about 17 million Americans by covering everyone below 133 percent of the federal poverty line – approximately $14,500 for individuals.

The administration had said that states that refused to go along with the change would lose their federal match.

The ruling now allows states to opt out of expansion without losing their federal funds. Now, Florida will opt out of spending about $2 billion more to expand Medicaid, and won’t build insurance exchanges, another optional part of the federal health care law, Scott’s office said.

Scott also noted that Obamacare doesn’t take effect until 2014 and nothing in it is required of states before the 2012 general election, when Republicans hope to unseat President Obama. Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has pledged to repeal the act.

Billions turned down Turning down the expansion of Medicaid means turning away most of the money to pay for it.

Washington would have

Another secret to Mormon growth: constant missionizing.

Nearly 55,000 youths volunteer their time – two years for men, one year for women – to spread the message in nations as farflung as Ghana, Russia, India and Mongolia. The Fort Lauderdale Mission has 140 of them.

The majority of converts likely are former Catholics, given the religious makeup of Haiti and Hispanic nations. But local Mormons also come from nearly every other group: Jews, Muslims, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Baptists, mainline Protestants.

Jamaica-born Valda Giambri was attending a Pentecostal church 10 years ago when her sister first showed an interest in a local Mormon church. “I said, ‘I’ll take you there and go to my church,’ “ she recalls. “But I stayed and listened, and I never left.”

picked up 90 percent of the cost, and all of it in the first couple years. But even that small state portion of new spending would be too much, Scott concluded.

(Florida now pays about 45 percent of the cost of Medicaid.)

Scott also noted that some families already are covered in Florida at the 133 percent of poverty level that the new law calls on states to do – and Florida has a children’s health insurance program, KidCare, which prevents children whose families sign up from going without health coverage.

Another part of the health care law gives Florida the flexibility to opt out of building insurance “exchanges” that Washington billed as a way of helping residents find health coverage. Scott said it would cost too much.

Critics object Karen Woodall, an advocate at the Florida Center for Fiscal and Economic Policy, said expanding Medicaid would create 65,000 Florida jobs over five years.

“Medicaid expenditures go to hire people,” Woodall said. “They go to pay physicians, nurses, health care workers, CNAs, pharmacists...It defies logic to state that it’s a job killer.

“We still have groups of children that don’t receive coverage,” Woodall said, but if Medicaid were expanded, that would be ended.

Florida still has half a

ward County. He was an amazing man who not only brought thousands of lives into this world but worked to change the world, into which they were born, said Frank Nask, CEO and president of Broward Health. “...I’ve come to understand his character and commitment through his daughter Jasmin Shirley, our vice president of community health services. A dedication to healing and public service are his legacy and those qualities continue in his children.”

Dr. Shirley was a member of Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc. He was preceded in death by his wife Jeanette, a brother and two sisters.

He is survived by his daughters Jasmin Shirley and Dr. Carmen Shirley Mack; sons Calvin Hylton Shirley Jr., John Walbridge Shirley and Cedric Hylton Shirley; five grandchildren; and a host of other relatives.

Nowadays, whenever someone asks her about LDS beliefs, she always invites them to church at the Palm Springs Ward, which includes Pembroke Pines and part of north Miami-Dade County. “I tell people, don’t take my word for it. Find out. Come. Investigate. Get the truth about it.”

‘Same service’ Yet all this growth has come with few of the adjustments other churches try, like ethnic foods or music. And members seem to like it that way.

“If I go to Hawaii and drop into a Mormon church, I’ll see the same service,” says Natalia Camargo, 23, leader of the young single adults group at the Cypress Creek Branch. “That’s the beauty of it. All the wards are the same around the world.”

In the Fort Lauderdale Ward, the 600 members include Haitians, Brazilians, Jamaicans and others. But their racial stance is spelled out on varicolored bracelets some of them wear: “One Heart, One Mind, Be One.” “It’s hard to define what the cultural majority is,” remarks Bethel, of the Fort Lauderdale Ward and whose wife is from Japan. “We’re all the same, just different shades of brown.”

Says Terron, of the Cypress Creek Branch: “If Mitt Romney wins the presidency, then sits next to me in a temple, we’ll still be equal.”

million uninsured children, ranking it third nationally in that regard. And the state currently faces a class-action lawsuit on the grounds that Medicaid children don’t get adequate care.

Actions ‘irresponsible’ Democratic Leader-designate Perry Thurston (DPlantation) issued a scathing statement accusing Scott of “foot-dragging” and calling his actions “fiscally and morally irresponsible.”

“I believe it is a colossal abdication of Governor Scott’s responsibility to prematurely reject provisions of the Affordable Care Act...His recent repugnant and divisive remarks on the topic truly displays a lack of compassion, a lack of leadership and strikes me as a sickening political stunt at the expense of our state’s most vulnerable residents,” Thurston said. “...The status quo only continues a costly reliance on hospital emergency rooms for treatment to the poor, which wastes resources and drives up costs for other consumers and businesses...Governor Scott’s defiance renders him incapable of recognizing that health insurance exchanges...embrace free market principles and promote personal responsibility by allowing consumers to comparison-shop in purchasing health coverage. “...I call on Governor Scott to show leader-

ship and end the political gamesmanship. It is time for Governor Scott to get to work and implement health care reform for Florida.”

Republicans cautious While the Florida Legislature may not be ready to sign off on Scott’s decision, it’s not clear whether they’d have any choice. Scott has line item veto power over the budget, and controls the state health care agency that runs Medicaid.

House Speaker-designate Will Weatherford said the House would take a “rational, deliberative” approach to deciding whether to expand coverage.

Time to debate State Sen. Joe Negron, RStuart and his chamber’s budget chief for health and human services, said he hopes Congress will “repeal Obamacare and start over from scratch with a better plan...

“But on the exchanges, in the event that Obamacare isn’t overturned, the state would have two options,” Negron said.

States have the choice of establishing and running the exchanges themselves or deferring to the feds to do so. The deadline is January 2013.

George E. Curry of the NNPA News Service and David Royse and Margie Menzel of the News Service of Florida contributed to this report.

JULY 6 - JULY 12, 2012

FLORIDA

A3

Bill to deal with sentences for juveniles Jacksonville lawmaker seeks measure in wake of ruling by Supreme Court about life terms

gun is fired in the commission of a crime, the minimum sentence is 20 years, and if a shot hits someone who is hurt or killed, the sentence goes up to life.

Bondi responds

BY MARGIE MENZEL THE NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

TALLAHASSEE – Florida’s criminal justice system is scrambling to close what could be a massive gap between judicial discretion and the state’s mandatory minimum sentence laws in cases involving juveniles in the wake of a recent court decision.

In two cases, Miller v. Alabama and Jackson v. Arkansas, the U.S. Supreme Court earlier this week said laws in 28 states – including Florida – that require mandatory life sentences for juveniles convicted of homicide were unconstitutional.

That opens up a can of worms, said state Rep. Mike Rep. Mike Weinstein, R-Jacksonville, Weinstein and a prosecutor.

No automatic term “The [Florida] judges are in a box,” he said, “because if they sentence the way our statutes require them to, the Supreme Court has said that’s unconstitutional. If they sentence the way the Supreme Court wants them to, it violates the statutes.”

Weinstein said he’ll sponsor legislation next year to try to allow judicial discretion for juvenile killers, but acknowledged it may be hard to pass.

The court ruling, handed down last week, still allows judges to give juvenile murderers life sentences without parole.

But they must now consider a juvenile’s age and the nature of the crime before deciding on such a sentence. That means, it can’t just be given automatically. In Florida, however, murders involving guns require a minimum life term.

Many questions “It’s clear that the judges are required to do individualized assessment” of the circumstances before handing down a sentence to a juvenile, said Paolo Annino, a Florida State University law professor specializing in children’s legal issues.

“Is this a 14-year-old or a 17-year-old?

Is this a kid with a learning disability? Is

Terrance Graham is shown at age 15 in 2002. He was sentenced to life in prison at 17 for a home invasion robbery. In his case, Graham v. Florida, the Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that life without parole for juveniles who did not commit murder amounted to cruel and unusual punishment. this kid mature for his age or immature?

Was he with a group of kids when the crime occurred and he was the follower, or was he the leader? Was he the trigger person, or just a wrong-place-wrongtime kid?”

And that individual approach, Annino said, means the ruling will unshackle Florida judges, who will recover their discretion in cases involving juveniles who commit murder.

‘Self-imposed blinders “What was happening before [the ruling] was the judges had blinders on,” he said. “And these were not self-imposed blinders. Judges around the state, from the most conservative to the most liberal, were all in agreement that they wanted to judge. They wanted to make an assessment whether the person before them deserves the most severe penalty or the most lenient penalty.”

Florida’s judiciary is bound by the state’s 10-20-Life law, passed in 1999, which mandates that possessing a gun while committing some felonies brings a 10-year minimum sentence, that when a

Attorney General Pam Bondi, a prosecutor for 18 years, said the high court’s decision reopens the wounds of those whose loved ones have been killed by juveniles.

“I think it will have a tremendous impact on our criminal justice system,” Bondi said. “I think it’s going to be very difficult for victims’ families who have to relive this again… I’ve seen firsthand juveniles commit some of the most egregious, gruesome crimes imaginable.”

Most observers put the total number of state prisoners affected by the Supreme Court ruling at about 250, but the data are not all in.

Florida case Students at FSU’s Public Interest Law Center and Barry University’s Juvenile Life Without Parole Defense Resource Center are working to calculate how many prisoners qualify for resentencing.

The Orlando-based Juvenile Life Without Parole Defense Resource Center was created after another U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2010, brought by Terrance Graham of Jacksonville, who was sentenced to probation for a robbery but then arrested for another robbery and sentenced to life in prison.

In his case, Graham v. Florida, the justices ruled that life without parole for juveniles who did not commit murder amounted to cruel and unusual punishment. The Alabama and Arkansas cases expand that to murderers who were sentenced under automatic minimum sentence laws that didn’t allow the judge any discretion.

According to a 2009 Florida State University study, 77 out of 109 juveniles in the country facing life without parole for nonhomicidal crimes were from Florida. The study found that Florida’s laws were “out of step with the nation,” but state officials argued that Florida has the right to set its own criminal penalties.

“The states have sovereign responsibility over their own criminal justice systems, and their legislatures decide the appropriate mix of punishment, deterrence, incapacitation, and rehabilitation in determining appropriate prison sentences,” Florida officials wrote at the time.

Bill died in Senate The Graham decision prompted Weinstein, now running for the state Senate, to sponsor a bill to allow juveniles convicted of non-homicides and sentenced to life to be re-sentenced after serving 25 years. He sponsored it two years running, and last year it passed the House but died in the Senate.

He said he’ll bring the measure back in the 2013 session, along with a second bill addressing juveniles who kill.

“It’s going to be a little harder, but we don’t have a choice,” Weinstein said.

According to State Attorney Bill Eddins of the First Judicial Circuit, president of the Florida Prosecuting Attorneys Association, the state has several options in the wake of the Miller ruling.

Exploring options One is for the prisoner to have a resentencing hearing before a judge.

“The second option is to pass legislation that grants the right to parole to these juvenile homicides that are serving mandatory life,” Eddins said. “When the Graham case came down, our association encouraged the Legislature to do that.”

Eddins said he personally supports Weinstein’s past proposals, as do some other prosecutors, but that the Florida Prosecuting Attorneys Association hasn’t taken a position. Weinstein said his first attempt at passing his bill failed because it gave a role to the Parole Commission, which some in the Legislature want to phase out.

Several prosecutors want the state’s clemency board to consider those cases, Eddins said.

Bondi, too, said she plans to review each of the cases affected by the ruling.

“We will be looking at it closely,” she said. “It’s a personal issue to me as a prosecutor for many, many years. But hopefully, the right thing will happen and the juveniles who deserve to stay in prison for life will stay in prison. You have to remember, some of these juveniles committed very, very adult crimes in a very, very gruesome manner, and they could be out of prison when they’re younger than all of us standing here.”

EDITORIAL

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JULY 6 - JULY 12, 2012

Time to leave traditional political plantations The Democratic and Republican parties dominate the modern political party system in the United States.

Black Americans should recognize that neither of these parties has helped us to gain political equity.Over the years, Blacks and their political participation have been far more symbolic than substantive.

Blacks’ political highlights date back to February 1989, when Ronald Harmon Brown was elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee.As president, Barack Obama is the titular head of the Democratic Party. Michael Stephen Steele served from January 2009 until January 2011 as the first African-American chairman of the Republican National Committee.

WILLIAM REED BUSINESS EXCHANGE

But in the final analysis, neither of these political office holders did anything distinctive other than being “The First Black” in their position.

Distancing themselves Isn’t it time Black Americans of all political stripes recognize that we’re never treated equally, and that politicians spend their time and resources on attracting White swing voters by distancing themselves from Blacks?

So when will we distance

ourselves from America’s traditional political plantations? Does the answer for Blacks’ political empowerment lie with the Republicans or the Democrats?

When will significant numbers of us move off the political plantation system that is prevalent in America in order to make the political policies and platforms necessary for elevating ourselves and the passage of our own issues?

The venerable Malcolm X offers substantive political advice. “We need a Black political party so we can have our own voting bloc and can go to either party and cut deals that you will only receive our votes if we receive what we demand... when we have a voting bloc, we are no longer asking or

VISUAL VIEWPOINT: ‘OBAMACARE’ IN FLORIDA

JEFF PARKER, FLORIDA TODAY

Random thoughts of a free Black mind, v. 143 Missing in action! Greetings again to all my faithful readers, especially those who let me know my few words in this space have been missed. I’ve made my fourth trip to Ghana, West Africa in the past year, and we’ve honed in on some opportunities to do good, have fun, and make money. (Does it get any better than that?) More on my latest adventures in Africa in the weeks to come...

‘Football’ (soccer) in Africa – It’s serious business there. While riding in a taxi in Accra, Ghana’s largest city, I saw a sticker with this motto: “Never say die until the bones are rotten.” I did some research and found out it belongs to Accra’s Hearts of Oak Football Club, founded in 1911. Their archrival: Kumasi’s Asante Kotoko Football Club, founded in 1935 and known as the “Porcupine Warriors” (motto: “Kill 1,000 and 1,000 more will return”). Kumasi is Ghana’s second-largest city. On a pro sports level, it’s like Major League Baseball’s New York Yankees vs. the Boston Red Sox. In Florida, it’s like FAMU vs. BethuneCookman, except the rivalry is much older and is deeper over multiple levels, including tribal/ethnic. That’s where the “dying” and “killing” comes in...

Bro. Prez’s ‘Betting on America’ bus tour – The Obama campaign sent the fol-

QUICK TAKES FROM #2: STRAIGHT, NO CHASER

CHARLES W. CHERRY II, ESQ. PUBLISHER

lowing: “Throughout Ohio and Pennsylvania, President Obama will talk about his efforts over the last three years to get our economy back on track, doubling down on American workers by saving the auto industry, investing in manufacturing and bringing jobs back to America.” Bro. Prez was scheduled to stop in Maumee, Sandusky, and Parma, Ohio on Thursday and then go to Pittsburgh, Penn. on Friday.

He bypasses Cleveland and Youngstown, Ohio, as well as Philadelphia, Penn., cities with high-density Black populations and disproportionately high Black unemployment. Are you betting on them too, Bro. Prez?

Contact me at ccherry2@gmail.com; holler at me at www.facebook.com/ ccherry2; follow me on Twitter @ccherry2.

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.

THE CREDO OF THE BLACK PRESS The Black Press believes that Americans can best lead the world away from racism and national antagonism when it accords to every person, regardless of race, color or creed, full human and legal rights. Hating no person, fearing no person. The Black Press strives to help every person in the firm belief...that all are hurt as long as anyone is held back.

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begging for things.”

Post-racial illusion The lack of a Black political movement also feeds into the mindset that we live in a post-racial society. That’s an illusion. Racial inequality remains a brutal fact of life in America. The interracial political unity that is supposed to herald a truly postracial society does not exist.

Blacks and Whites remain bitterly divided in their political beliefs.

As “The First Black President” makes unflinching commitments to gay and Jewish groups, are you satisfied with his administration and its lack of commitment to Black issues and legislation?We need to make it our business to reconstruct Black politics and

build political structures and alliances based on our concerns. We need to move away from “mainstream policies” that only mean us harm and fragment our interests.

In our hands More of us need to understand that the quests for racial and economic justice are intertwined with uncompromising spirit and building a better society. It’s in our own hands – “Black politics” – and the ability to influence policy, demand accountability, participate in American political discourse, and offer alternatives to the status quo is in each of our control.

There is a major disconnect between Blacks’ politics and economic empow-

erment. The Black society that supported activism in the past is weaker today than at any other time during the 20th century.Will Blacks stop accepting what “mainstream society” doles out to us, and instead take necessary steps to put our issues at the top of the nation’s agenda? Why can’t our economic woes and potential solutions be right up there with aid to and Israel and same-sex marriage policies?

William Reed is publisher of “Who’s Who in Black Corporate America” and is available for speaking/ seminar projects via BaileyGroup.org. Click on this story at www.flcourier. com to write your own response.

Black press and journalists full of ‘Obama-Love’ President Obama has “Big Love” for Black America. We know this because Valerie Jarrett, the senior Black person at the White House and his good friend from Chicago, said so at the New Orleans convention of the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) last month.

The president “has a genuine love for the Black community,” said Jarrett – and that was quite sufficient for many of the assembled Black journalists. At an interview session, one asked if the White House sometimes felt that there was “no pleasing” Black folks.

Jarrett replied that, no, she didn’t feel that way. And why should she, when so many Blacks in the corporate media and what’s left of the Black-owned press generally acts as public relations agents for The First Black President?

‘Doesn’t hide it’ Another NABJ member could think of nothing more probing to ask than whether Obama occasionally longed for a chance to just kick back and act “unabashedly Black.” “He IS Black,” said Jarrett. “He’s the Black president. He doesn’t hide it.”

This is what often passes for journalism in Black America: an infantile obsession with the inner world of the Obamas that is wholly disconnected from the real world of economic policy, and of war and peace. Such reporters become indistinguishable from the antics of Steve Harvey, the profes-

GLEN FORD BLACK AGENDA REPORT

sional media ignoramus, and the schoolyard politics of syndicated disc jockey Tom Joyner.

There were some at the NABJ convention who thought Valerie Jarrett had violated some sort of protocol by making too much of a campaign-style speech – although that, of course, is her job. It is the reporters’ job to tear that speech to shreds – with journalistic vigor – when it veers from the truth. To fail to do so is much worse than a violation of protocol: it is a betrayal of one’s profession and solemn obligation to the public – in this case, most especially, the Black public.

No adversarial relationship But NABJ executive director Maurice Foster was eager to characterize Ms. Jarrett as someone who has been, in his words, “a good supporter of NABJ.” He said, “She’s always lent herself to project the image of NABJ in a positive light and the good things that we do.”

Not a hint of the adversarial relationship that must exist between real journalists and the State.

the president’s closest advisor and longtime friend is a friend of the NABJ, representing thousands of Black journalists. Of course, there could be no such political friendship if Black journalists were doing their job –aggressively examining the president’s actual policies rather than behaving like boosters and fans.

There is a kind of logic to this corruption of Black journalism. As I learned 37 years ago while helping to organize the Association of Black Journalists in Washington, D.C., the NABJ is more concerned with Black jobs in journalism than with how journalism can be made to serve the Black public. For NABJ, it’s all about diversity in the newsroom. Black journalistic faces are role models – even if they’re broadcasting racist trash on FOX News or collaborating in lies about Black people in the local paper.

Barack Obama is the biggest Black role model of them all and, therefore, can count on the lesser role models of Black journalism.

So to hell with the profession – and to hell with the people. All Power to the Role Models!

Glen Ford is executive editor of BlackAgendaReport.com. E-mail him at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com. Click on this story at www.flcouriNot doing their job er.com to write your own Mr. Foster is proud that response.

Eric Holder, White males and ‘uppity’ Black men There are few people more detested and feared by many White males that what they consider an “uppity Black man” – “uppity” being any Black man who looks them straight in the eyes when speaking to them, who does not smile unless hearing something to smile about, who does not shuffle his feet when around them.

In other words, a Black man whom they can’t intimidate with bluster and ranting.

In the old days, from the era of enslavement through the 1960s, many Black men were assaulted and in numerous instances killed for coming off as being uppity, especially by White males in the former Confederate States of America. The most extreme yet far-fromuncommon reflection of that White male attitude is a quote attributed to Sen. Ben Tillman of South Carolina in 1906 in response to President Teddy Roosevelt inviting Booker T. Washington to dine with him in the White House.

Tillman declared bombastically, “The action of President Roosevelt in entertaining that nigger will necessitate our killing a

A. PETER BAILEY TRICE EDNEY WIRE

thousand niggers in the South before they will learn their place again,” as quoted in the book “Up from History, The Life of Booker T. Washington” by Robert J. Norrell (2009).

Holder ‘uppity’?

I thought about that history when watching Rep. Darrell Issa, chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and his cohorts go after Attorney General Eric Holder around the flawed “Fast and Furious” gunrunning operation. During the congressional hearings, it was clearly evident that Issa and his crew consider Holder an uppity Black man who had the nerve to not be intimidated by their name-calling and threats.

Of course they were not as vicious as Tillman was.

Times and circumstances have changed. They had no desire to kill Holder; what

they wanted to do was to totally destroy his reputation and ability to remain attorney general.

As they arrogantly questioned his integrity, his competence, his honesty, his right to be in that Cabinet position, Holder’s eyes and body language made it plain that Issa and his boys were right about one thing – Holder held them in contempt. Total contempt. And they knew he felt that way, which made them even more determined to goad him into saying something they could use politically against him and President Obama.

Holder remained cool and resolute, treating them with the scorn they so richly deserved. He and we should be proud that he is the first sitting Cabinet member to ever have been held in contempt of Congress. And we should also be proud that he is an uppity Black man.

Contact A. Peter Bailey at apeterb@verizon.net, or 202-716-4560. Click on this story at www.flcourier.com to write your own response.

JULY 6 - JULY 12, 2012

A life of hell for juvenile sentenced to adult prison On June 25, the U.S. Supreme Court in Miller v. Alabama banned mandatory sentences of life in prison without parole for juveniles. This is a major victory for children and for America.

Until then, America was the only country in the world to routinely condemn children as young as 13 and 14 to die in prison. Now about 2,000 people who were sentenced to die in prison as juveniles have hope for a new hearing and a new sentence.

While we are disappointed the court did not ban the practice outright, we must keep working toward justice for children and end the devastating Cradle to Prison Pipeline™ crisis that leads to marginalized lives, imprisonment, and premature death.

Why become involved?

Bryan Stevenson, the brilliant founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Ala. argued this case and the companion case, Jackson v. Hobbs, before the Supreme Court. Last month, he told participants at the Children’s Defense Fund Freedom Schools® national training session how he first became devoted to helping children in our adult justice system: “I was working on a case when a grandmother called me, and this young boy had been arrested. This boy was living in a house where his mother had repeatedly been the victim of a lot of sexual assault, a lot of physical assault and domestic violence. And one day this boy’s stepfather came home, and he just punched this boy’s mother in the face. She fell on the floor unconscious, and the little boy tried to revive his mom and he couldn’t do it, and she was bleeding. And we think he thought his mom was dead.”

MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN NNPA COLUMNIST

The Supreme Court’s historic decision to abolish mandatory life in prison without parole sentences for children reinforces the importance of never giving up hope as we all keep speaking out and fighting for justice for children.

Killed instantly Bryan Stevenson continued with his harrowing true crime story: “And the man went into the bedroom and fell asleep, and after he did that, this little boy got up. He was about five feet tall, 14 years of age, under 100 pounds, and he waited until the man went into the bedroom and fell asleep...and he went over to the man’s dresser, and he pulled out this man’s handgun. And while the man was sleeping, this little boy walked over to him, and he pointed the gun at his head, and

tragically at point-blank range, he pulled the trigger. The man was killed instantly.

“Now, this child had no prior criminal history. He had never been in trouble before. He was actually a good student, no juvenile adjudications, and probably would have been tried as a juvenile but for the fact that this man was a deputy sheriff. And because he was a deputy sheriff, the prosecutor insisted that this child be tried as an adult, and the judge certified him to stand trial as an adult and put him in the adult jail.

“The grandmother called me three days later, and I went to the jail to see this little boy. I started asking him questions, and no matter what I asked him, this little boy just sat there. I tried to ask him some more questions; he just sat there. He wasn’t responding to anything I said, and finally after 20 minutes, I said, ‘Look, you got to talk to me. I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.’

“I got up and I walked around the table, and I got my chair close to him...I started leaning on him a little bit and leaning on him, and finally, he leaned back. And when he leaned back into me, I put my arm around him and said, ‘Come on, tell me what’s going on.’ This boy started crying, and through his tears, he began talking to me not about what happened at his house with his mom or his stepdad, but he began talking to me about what had happened at the jail.

“He told me on the first night, he had been assaulted by several men. Then he told me on the next night, he had been sexually assaulted by several men, and then he told me on the night before I had gotten there, there were so many people who had assaulted him, he actually couldn’t remember how many there had been.

EDITORIAL

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VISUAL VIEWPOINT: SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS ‘OBAMACARE’

LUOJIE, CHINA DAILY, CHINA

Couldn’t be silent “I held this little boy while he cried hysterically for over an hour, and I left that jail thinking this is our system – our system – and so it became necessary for me to say something.”

So now, Bryan Stevenson said, “I represent these young people who have many times been horribly abused. We put them in adult prisons. There are 27 states that put children in adult facilities where they are 10 times more likely to be the victims of sexual assault, 25 times more likely to commit suicide, and there is this silence.”

Once Stevenson saw the truth, he knew he could never be among those who stay silent. He also said: “Of all the problems that I’m talking about [with the treatment of juveniles in the adult justice system] – and I’m talking about race and I’m talking about poverty and I’m talking about abuse of power and I’m talking about misconduct – the problem that we have got to confront is hopelessness, the profound absence of hope that is represented by the death penalty, by life imprisonment without parole for children, by mass incarcera-

tion, by the way in which we are dealing with people...

“I’ll tell you something about hope. Where there is hopelessness, there is always injustice, and you can never achieve justice without hopefulness.”

There’s hope The Supreme Court’s historic decision to abolish mandatory life in prison without parole sentences for children reinforces the importance of never giving up hope as we all keep speaking out and fighting for justice for children.

We still have so much work left to do to solve the crisis of children in adult prisons – but we now have a huge victory to spur us on and give us more hope.

Bryan Stevenson helped changed the nation’s course by saying something and doing something, and so must we.

Marian Wright Edelman is president and founder of the Children’s Defense Fund (www. childrensdefense.org). Click on this story at www.flcourier.com to write your own response.

So many choices, so many screens We are spoiled rotten.

Reviewing Nielsen’s latest cross-platform report, “How We Watch from Screen to Screen,” I smile and remember the earlier days of “watching television” – the one screen, the only option we had – before flatscreens, HD, satellite, DVR, cable, hundreds of “channels” and the Internet, plus a growing number of devices to watch “TV.” We had one, maybe two (if you were lucky) TV “sets” in the house.

Before we had all of these fancy remotes, people actually got up to manually turn a dial to change stations, adjust the volume and turn the set on or off. Back then, not that long ago, there were the three major networks – ABC, CBS and NBC – along with PBS and maybe an independent station or two that required a tweak of your TV antenna to achieve a clear picture. (You know the secret tool was that aluminum foil.)

CHERYL PEARSONMCNEIL SPECIAL TO NNPA

ever and however we want – on actual televisions that are connected to either cable, telephone company or satellite subscriptions, game consoles or timeshifted viewing (DVR, on-demand and cloud-based DVRs); or on our computers, tablets or mobile phones through online streaming with Netflix, Hulu and other video apps. We’re talking everything here – from new movie releases, to our oldie-but-goodie TV shows and everything in between.

However, even with all of these cool technological choices, the latest cross-platform report revealed that television remains the platform of choice for watching content. Television has certainly Whenever, wherever gone through a few facelifts, but it Today, we can watch video or is still one of the main sources we media content whenever, wher- use. The number of people who

have HDTV sets grew by more than 8 million over the past year.

Live and time-shifted TV reigns supreme, accounting for more than 33 hours of viewing per week on average among Americans. Our community, however, is not average as we continue to top those numbers. The study shows that African-Americans still overindex in traditional TV viewing, clocking more than 57 hours a week in front of our televisions. The average AfricanAmerican household also owns four or more televisions. Yes, this is great for darting from room to room without missing a beat of your favorite show; but I personally stay super-glued to my comfy couch and only watch one of the four TVs in the house.

Leveling off Even though all Americans watch more traditional television than any other platform, the cross-platform report shows that traditional TV viewing actually declined one-half of one percent (or about 46 minutes per month)

after consistent year-over-year growth. This is attributed to simply leveling off after a period of sustained growth; weather; economic factors; or the plethora of other viewing options available to us we’ve already named. Of our total monthly viewing time, all TV homes (including those with cable provider-enabled time-shifting and homes with DVRs) report watching 13 hours of timeshifted TV. In homes with DVRs only, that number jumps to 27 hours and 30 minutes per month. In the African-American community, those numbers are nearly 9 hours and just over 22 hours, respectively.

Americans also watch video on our mobile devices, which are increasingly becoming mini-handheld TVs. I mentioned that 54.4 percent of Blacks owned smartphones and 50.4 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers owned smartphones. Of all American smartphone owners, 33.5 million people now watch video on their phones, an increase of 35.7 percent since last year. Blacks, Hispanics and Asians all average four hours and

20 minutes a month of viewing on our smartphones. White Americans average three hours and 37 minutes a month watching video on their mobile devices.

What does all of this mean? For one thing, it means the media industry may one day have to redefine the terms “TV household” and “TV viewer.” And as I repeatedly remind us all, our choices mean that marketers are going to have to pay closer attention to our community and the significant combined buying power our choices represent. The operative word: POWER.

Cheryl Pearson-McNeil is the senior vice president of public affairs and government relations for The Nielsen Company, a global information and measurement company. For more information and studies, go to www.nielsenwire.com. Click on this story at www.flcourier.com to write your own response.

There’s newfound interest in Africa Have you noticed all the current efforts to promote business opportunities in Africa? Have you wondered how now, all of a sudden, politicians are placing so much emphasis on Africa?

Have you seen and heard about conferences and initiatives taking place across this nation that stress the importance of business connections with the Motherland?

Why is this happening now?

Why is Africa so vital to our economic interests now?

Everything we need

JAMES CLINGMAN NNPA COLUMNIST

During that same period, nearly 1 million Africans had been slaughtered in Rwanda, and the United States under the leadership of Bill Clinton, refused to intercede because “we have no interests there.” I am sure they were talking about economic interests rather than human interests.

Africa, the place where civilization began, the first place God put man and gave him everything he would ever need, the place where diamonds and gold are in abundance, the place where other natural resources flourish, and the place where so much commerce and trade were established, is now being put forth publicly as an “opportunity” by our government officials.

In 1997, I wrote a book entitled “Economic Empowerment or Economic Enslavement – We Have a Choice,” in which I cited an April 1996 article in Black Enterprise magazine that featured African-American business opportunities and relationships in Africa. After reading the article, I thought of the irony of a continent, rich with diamonds, minerals, and vast natural resources, populated and owned by Black people, our ancestors, just sitting ‘Economic frontier’ In Cincinnati recently, a U.S.there waiting for us to come back and take care of business.

Africa business conference was

held to “showcase U.S. business expertise to African clients and to highlight trade and investment opportunities in Africa to U.S. exporters and investors.” Johnnie Carson, the assistant secretary of state for African affairs, was there to talk about those opportunities. In an interview, Carson stated, “For American companies, Africa provides a fast-growing consumer market, and forecasts anticipate Africa will be home to seven of the 10 fastestgrowing economies over the next five years.”

Hillary Clinton also chimed in on the African economic opportunity issue at the African Growth and Opportunity Act Forum by calling Africa the “land of opportunity.” In a Cincinnati Enquirer article, Africa is called the “last economic frontier.”

Ironically – or sadly – Africa, having been there all the time and having contained all the riches and opportunities imaginable, was not very important to our national interests when hundreds of thousands were being murdered. Now, however, it’s deemed the last economic bastion of the world. One correc-

tion: It was the “first” economic bastion of the world.

Notwithstanding King Leopold’s veiled attempt through his International African Society to “civilize” the continent, and the Berlin conference in February 1885, in which European countries cast lots for various countries in Africa, with the exception of Ethiopia who fought against them and won, it is now being held in high esteem by the U.S. powers-that-be.

America is coming Although China, Lebanon, and other countries have been investing in Africa for quite some time, believe me, the U.S. will now be in the fast lane trying to catch up and even surpass them in their efforts to cast more lots for Africa’s resources.

But what about Black Americans? For many years, Black people have known about the opportunities that are now being paraded before us. Black leaders such as Booker T. Washington and Marcus Garvey advocated for African-African-American business relationships, but we

failed to take them seriously and follow through. Now we face being left behind and last to the table again.

In my book, I quoted Morris Jeff who said, in reference to this question, “Maybe we were sent here.” He went on to posit that maybe African-Americans are the ones who, after gaining all of the knowledge we have today, are supposed to return to Africa and help develop that continent.

While others are trying to make an African connection, we have had one for centuries. What will we finally do with it?

James E. Clingman, founder of the Greater Cincinnati African-American Chamber of Commerce, is the nation’s most prolific writer on economic empowerment for Black people.

Contact him via www.blackonomics.com. Click on this story at www.flcourier.com to write your own response.

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FLORIDA

JULY 6 – JULY 12, 2012

B-CU’s Handfield welcomes new chairman Major donor will continue to serve on trustee board

cult to fill Handfield’s shoes.

“You can see the changes he has done, sacrifices he made to preserve the legacy of MMB,” Harrington concluded.

BY JAMES HARPER FLORIDA COURIER

President addresses issues

Attorney Larry Handfield, outgoing chairman of the BethuneCookman University’s Board of Trustees told more than 200 alumni at the school’s 44th Annual National Alumni Association Convention last month that “the best is yet to come.’’

Handfield, the largest single alumnus donor in the school’s history, was dumped as chairman earlier this year as the board began the process to replace retiring Bethune-Cookman University (B-CU) President Dr. Trudie Kibbe Reed.

Following the board’s spring meeting, Handfield was reinstated as chairman. Handfield had temporarily yielded leadership to fellow alumnus and first vice chairman Dr. Lee Rhyant in January.

Handfield, a South Floridabased attorney who has served as chairman since 2009, has been instrumental in the selection of Dr. Edison Jackson as the interim president of B-CU.

Dr. Larry Handfield, left, is shown with his successor, the Rev. John Harrington.

All about attitude

New chairman

“He has a track record of coming in and turning things around.

He believes he is the right person, right moment, at the right time. In less than a month, he has transformed the university and is making his blueprint. Students coming back will see B-CU like they have never seen it before,” Handfield said about Jackson.

“He believes it is all about the student. Everything we do is about students. If you don’t have right attitude, you need to find another place of employment,” Handfield said to B-CU staff attending an alumni convention luncheon on June 21 in Daytona Beach.

“It’s a privilege to be amongst my family – my extended family,” added Handfield, who also introduced his successor, the Rev. John Harrington, during the luncheon. Handfield’s last day as chairman was June 30, but he will remain a board member for three more years.

“You all stood by me at my darkest times and gave me light.

You stood up. I owe you all a debt of gratitude and love,” Handfield said to the alumni and supporters who served on the board with him.

“Trustees are the glue that keeps this institution together,” he continued.

PHOTO COURTESY OF JOHN REEVES/B-CU

Reporter to write about International AIDS Conference for NNPA FROM STAFF REPORTS

James Harper, who primarily writes for the Daytona Times, the sister newspaper of the Florida Courier, has been selected by the National Newspapers Publishers Association (NNPA) to cover the XIX International AIDS Conference from July 22-27 in Washington D.C. Harper is one of five reporters who will report on the conference for NNPA. The conference is the premier gathering for those working in the field of HIV, as well as policy makers, persons living with HIV and other individuals committed to ending the pandemic. More than 20,000 participants from over 200 countries are expected to attend. This will be the first time in 20 years the conference has been held in the United States.

“It is only natural we would cover the conference,” NNPA News Service EditorJames in-Chief George Curry said, noting that Harper the NNPA Foundation was awarded a grant from the Center for Disease Control. The grant will be used to inform the public about issues such as HIV/AIDS. “AIDS has ravaged our community more than any other community,” Curry told the Florida Courier.

Harper said he has been following the AIDS issue since it was first discovered in the early ’80s in this country.

“I am even more proud of our country, especially under a Black president, now that it has done away with the restrictions involving people with AIDS coming to this country who can now attend the conference. I am so happy I will be a part of history as I continue to report on this disease,” he remarked.

Curry said Harper was chosen from 24 finalists.

Experience covering topic Stories written by Harper from the conference will be posted on the NNPA website for use by member newspapers.

Last year, Harper wrote several stories in the Daytona Times pertaining to HIV/AIDS, including a visit by Naomi Tutu, the daughter of Desmond Tutu, who spoke in Daytona Beach about HIV/AIDS. Harper also wrote a comprehensive piece about a mother living with AIDS and has written stories on HIV/ AIDS cases in Volusia and Flagler counties. He also reported on World AIDS Day events.

“The opportunity to report on an issue at this level would be a pinnacle moment in my career as a journalist,” said Harper.

Harper, who is from Daytona Beach, started writing while in junior high school. A journalist for 30 years, he received a degree in Journalism/Broadcasting from the University of Florida in 1984. He has worked at various media outlets, including print, radio and television.

For more information on the conference, visit aids2012. org.

Handfield says Harrington has “love and commitment, the same as if he were a (B-CU) graduate.”

White chairman Harrington is the senior pastor at Morrison United Methodist Church in Leesburg. A native of Richmond, Va., he is a graduate of Florida State University and the Candler School of Theology of Emory University. His pastoral appointments have ranged from Jacksonville to Miami to Tallahassee to Tampa.

Harrington also served on the Board of Ordained Ministries and the Board of Pension and Health Benefits. He is a member of the North-Central District Leader-

ship Council, a member of his local Salvation Army board, and a volunteer chaplain to the Leesburg Police Department. Harrington and his wife, Betsy, have four children.

Harrington also had glowing remarks about Handfield as he came to the podium after being introduced by Handfield.

“I pale in comparison to my predecessor,” Harrington, who is White, said to laughter to the majority Black audience.

“Not because of the color of my skin. No one will do as much for B-CU as he (Handfield) has done in the last three years,” said Harrington.

He added that it will be diffi-

Ray Brinson, president of the B-CU National Alumni Association, also praised Handfield for his accomplishments as chairman.

“We get compliments about our campus. It started with Larry Handfield. We could not have had a better advocate for our students. His blood is maroon and gold. He was willing to put gloves on and go to work,” Brinson said.

Also during the convention, new interim president Jackson called the current structure at BCU a “recipe for hell” and plans to stop what he calls a disjointedness that exists.

His goal is to improve the environment on the campus so staff “can be all that they have been called to be.

“Deans are fabulous, but they have been shackled. I’m removing the shackles,” he said.

Jackson also noted there are people working for the university who have retired mentally but are still on the job.

“Execute your paperwork for full retirement,’’ he urged, adding that the students are what is most important at the university.

“This is serious business. No time to be playing games. It’s about transforming lives,” Jackson continued.

Jackson says his goal is to add certificate programs and more degrees.

“We are going to become a powerhouse. We have got to become more than we have been,” he continued.

Testing experts play critical role in future of state’s students, teachers Lake County school psychometrician Heather Wright is leading a statewide effort to create assessments in subjects beyond the FCAT to help meet the state’s merit-pay mandate.

BY ERICA RODRIQUEZ THE ORLANDO SENTINEL (MCT)

Heather Wright often meets people who are confused about exactly what she does for a living.

That’s not surprising. After all, how many psychometricians have you ever met?

Wright, an energetic former English teacher, is a leader in a littleknown realm of education. Psychometrics is the intricate science behind measuring what people know.

Experts such as Wright work closely with teachers to help devise new standardized tests in niche subjects such as web design, creative writing and psychology.

It’s an incredibly complex process that school districts are diving into as they rush to fulfill an unfunded state mandate tied to the merit-pay plan for teachers.

Grading the teachers The merit-pay rule calls for half of a teacher’s evaluation to be based on students’ standardized-test scores. Districts have used mostly FCAT scores for that purpose, even for teachers who don’t teach FCATrelated subjects.

Because of the rule, districts are banding together and scrambling to create dozens of assessments to help grade teachers in subjects where no standardized test exists.

“You want to be evaluated on what you taught — not on whole school scores or on assessments that measure what students learned maybe a year or two before they were in your classroom,” said Wright, a psychometrician with the Lake County school district.

Expensive undertaking Wright is leading a group of teachers and other psychometricians who will be creating dozens of tests.

But the process isn’t easy — or cheap. Wright estimates the project will produce about 82 tests and cost as much as $603,000, which is paid for on the school district’s dime.

The costs are in addition to the $52 million the state is already spending on plans for testing in subjects beyond the FCAT and end-of-course exams.

The state Department of Education is spending $20 million of federal Race to the Top money to pay for four districts to make tests for subjects such as art, music or physical education.

ERICA RODRIQUEZ/ ORLANDO SENTINEL/MCT

Developing test bank The state also recently awarded Pearson, a national testing company, a $32 million contract to develop a test bank and software program that districts can use.

“Either way, whether you’re developing it yourself or buying it from another district, there is a considerable price tag,” said Ruth Melton, legislative director for the Florida School Boards Association.

The group recently adopted a resolution that calls for the state to fully fund its accountability system and criticizes the state’s “over-reliance” on “high-stakes” testing.

Teachers involved But teachers familiar with the process say being involved in test-making is helping them understand their subjects better and they’re happy to have a hand in making the tests that will eventually be a part of their personal rating.

“It’s giving teachers the opportunity to be a significant part of the assessments that are being created,” said Angel Teron, a teacher who is helping make rules for a creativewriting test. “And it’s not something that’s being delivered telling them, ‘This is what you have to teach.’’’

Others hope it can help teachers be more consistent from school to school, but critics say it’s just another flawed way of trying to measure teacher performance.

“They are being forced to create yet another yardstick to measure adults,” said Kathleen Oropeza, who heads the advocacy group Fund Education Now. “Our children are being used as test-taking minions to prove that adults are doing their job.”

Daunting task Educators agree that the task of creating assessments for every subject a district offers by 2014 is daunt-

ing. Districts can have up to 1,000 courses that don’t currently have standardized tests, but some are hopeful these new assessments will help teachers diagnose students’ problems before it’s too late.

“The hope is that teachers and students will use this to determine where students are at over time — not just at the end of the course,” said Tod Clark, director of Race to the Top assessments.

It can easily take three years to make a test that’s valid and proven, a process that involves high-level statistics, the guidance of expert teachers and a psychometrician or two.

Teachers with special training have to break apart the state’s standards for, say, anatomy. Then they must decide what can actually be measured on a standardized test and what would better be measured in, perhaps, a small group.

Rules for writers Teachers then come up with rules for test writers that explain how complex to make questions or what not to ask students. Then teachers, with the help of experts such as Wright, make a test blueprint.

After more review by another team, students will take the test, but the results must be statistically analyzed before educators deem it scientifically sound. The results from those tests will then be used as a base to determine teacher effectiveness, which is where the controversy in education circles thrives.

As the testing push in Florida continues to be fueled by state and federal laws, Wright thinks school districts and parents will pay more attention to the science behind what she does.

“If your student is in one teacher’s class, you would hope your student is measured in the same way as in another teacher’s class,” Wright said.

“You would want that equity.”

LIFE | FAITH | HEALTH | MONEY | EVENTS | CLASSIFIEDS | ENTERTAINMENT | SPORTS | FOOD July 6 - July 12, 2012

Poor African woman shares journey to home and security See page B4

Cruise ships docking in more exotic places in Caribbean See page B5

SOUTH FLORIDA / TREASURE COAST AREA WWW.FLCOURIER.COM

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This 1978 file photo shows Ben Chavis, right, speaking at a news conference the day after Gov. Jim Hunt’s decision to reduce the sentences of the Wilmington Ten. Hunt refused to pardon the group.

RALEIGH NEWS & OBSERVER/MCT

Still trying to clear their names Members of the Wilmington Ten have lived for 40 years with a cloud over their heads.

What they want now is an official pardon from North Carolina’s governor.

BY CASH MICHAELS NNPA NEWS SERVICE

M

ost of the defendants were young, some barely in their 20s when they were convicted in 1972 of crimes they didn’t commit. Some were still in high school, and living with their parents. At least one, Anne Shepard, was rearing three young children.

Most of them had dreams of a bright, hope-filled future. Some wanted to practice law. Some wanted to play professional sports. And some were already musicians, looking for their big break.

Their only “crime,” they say, was their willingness to openly and peacefully, challenge the New Hanover County Public School System in Wilmington, N.C., in the early 1970s when it declined to provide an equal, quality education to Black students.

Great personal hardships Because of their individual courage

and commitment to equality, the Wilmington Ten suffered false prosecution, years of imprisonment and great personal hardships for themselves and their families.

The impact for all of them has extended decades beyond their release from prison, and well after a federal appellate court overturned their convictions.

Stained names, reputations Today, 40 years later, three members of the Wilmington Ten – Jerry Jacobs, William Joseph Wright and Anne Shepard – have died, their dreams unfulfilled.

One member, Reginald Epps, has worked so hard to protect his privacy and rebuild his life that he rarely speaks of his Wilmington Ten experience anymore.

Another member, the Rev. Benjamin Chavis, the leader of the group, has evolved into one of the most accomplished civil rights leaders of our time, but he, too, has paid a dear personal price along the way.

So has Wayne Moore, who left Wilmington after his release from prison, leaving family and friends behind, because he was unable to find work in his hometown, in large part, because of his past.

Willie Earl Vereen, Connie Tindall, James McKoy and Marvin Patrick, are now elderly men facing health challenges; each feel robbed of his youth and ambitions. They have lost faith in government because it was government prosecutors, after all, who stained their names and reputations.

Here are their stories.

Race-riot case received attention around the world The Wilmington Ten filed a petition in May requesting pardons from North Carolina’s governor, nearly 40 years after their trials.

The nine young Black men and one White woman were convicted and given long prison sentences in 1972. A Wilmington grocery store, Mike’s Grocery, was firebombed during days of racial anger the previous year and firefighters and police officers responding to the blaze were fired on.

Seated left to right in an old photo of the Wilmington Ten are the Rev. Ben Chavis, William “Joe” Wright and Connie Tindall. Standing are Wayne Moore, Anne Shepard, James “Bun” McKoy and Willie Earl Vereen.

JERRY JACOBS

According to his mother, Margaret Jacobs, Jerry, age 19 at the time of his arrest was a happy, “real lovable” person who got along with everyone, and never got into trouble. He was a good student at Williston High – the all-Black school whose closing helped sparked the protests – and had dreams of becoming a professional tennis player, and a doctor.

When Williston was closed, Jerry was, as were many other Black students, “very upset,” his mother recalls. He joined the protests. Jerry never got into trouble and didn’t believe in violence.

“The police came and got him out of bed,” Mrs. Jacobs recalls about her son’s arrest in front of her.

29-year sentence Mrs. Jacobs was increasingly upset when she attended the trial, saw the mostly White jury, and heard the testimony of Allan Hall and other state’s witnesses. The whole experience was very troubling, she said not only for herself, but for Jerry’s siblings as well. “It affected them real bad.”

Jerry Jacobs was sentenced to 29 years in prison.

‘A hurt man’ After Jerry was released from prison and went back home to Wilmington, he

Supporters said the youths were railroaded by the prosecutor and trial judge. The governments of several foreign nations, including the Soviet Union, called the case an example of human rights violations.

A federal appeals court said the testimony of the prosecution’s three key witnesses was perjured and prosecutors knew or should have known that. Prosecutors also offered key witnesses leniency and vacation getaways for their damning testimony, the appeals court said. The witnesses later recanted their testimony.

The appeals court overturned the convictions of Wilmington Ten leader the Rev. Benjamin Chavis and nine others in 1980. Though Black newspapers have supported efforts to win pardons for the Wilmington Ten for more than a year, the group’s pardon request comes less than eight months before Gov. Beverly Perdue, a Democrat who is not seeking re-election this year, leaves office.

couldn’t find a job, and was shunned by the community. So much so that Jerry felt his life was in danger, prompting him to move to New York City. But Jerry didn’t stay long, his mother says.

He got mixed up with the wrong crowd and began taking drugs. He returned to Wilmington in bad shape, arm swollen and strung out. Mrs. Jacobs said Jerry later had a stroke.

Doctors told his mother he also had contracted the AIDS virus because of a bad needle. “That’s what killed him,” she says about Jerry’s death in 1989. “That’s what destroyed him.”

If Margaret Jacobs could speak to North Carolina Gov. Beverly Perdue face-to-face, she would tell the governor of the hardships her son went through and that when he died, he was a “hurt man, never the same.’’ She said the false prosecution by the state changed Jerry’s life forever.

“Yes it did,” Mrs. Jacobs laments. “Yes it did. He probably would have been living today.”

WILLIAM ‘JOE’ WRIGHT JR.

William Gibbs remembers his late brother, Joe Wright as a “very, very congenial fellow who brought people to common understanding, and very much See WILMINGTON TEN, Page B3

Pardon rejected in 1978 A previous pardon request from the group was rejected in 1978 by then-Gov. Jim Hunt. But Hunt cut the prison sentences of the nine men from up to 25 years, making all but Chavis eligible for parole that year.

Perdue spokeswoman Christine Mackey said the pardon requests would be given full and fair consideration.

The group’s seven surviving members and relatives of the three who have died asked Perdue for a pardon of innocence for those wrongly convicted and imprisoned. If granted, each person would qualify for state compensation of $50,000 for each year behind bars.

The Wilmington Ten group was caught up in the racial tensions that followed a court order requiring schools in and around the North Carolina port city to be desegregated. During days of shooting around the time of the firebombing, two people were shot to death.

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GOOD NEWS

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FLORIDA COMMUNITY CALENDAR Miami: Ice Cube, T.I., Young Jeezy, Wale, DJ Khaled, Fat Joe and Waka Flocka Flame will be at the Klipsch Amphitheater in Miami on July 7 for the Radio One Fest.

Fort Pierce: The St. Lucie County Library System announces its parenting program “Father & Child Connection” for July focusing on “Discipline: To Teach and Lead by Example.” Sessions will be held at the Morningside Branch Library July 10 at 6 p.m. and at the Fort Pierce Branch Library July 24 at 6 p.m. More information: 772579-3419 or seibenicke01@ elcslc.org.

State Rep. Perry Thurston, left, is shown with his wife, Dawn, and the Rev. Anthony Burrell. In the back row are Trey and Alison Thurston.

Thurstons celebrate graduations Florida State Rep. Perry Thurston and his wife, Dawn, recently celebrated the graduations of their daughter and son.

Daughter Alison just graduated from Princeton University in New Jersey while son Perry “Trey’’ Thurston III completed South Plantation High School. Alison has accepted a fellowship from Princeton in Africa and will be traveling to Ugan-

da to work for the next year.

Trey will be heading off to Morehouse College, as a business major and football player on Aug. 1. His father received his bachelor’s degree from Morehouse.

The two were among the graduates honored last month at their church, Mt. Calvary Baptist Church in Pompano Beach, where the Rev. Anthony Burrell is pastor.

A victory for HBCUs: Norfolk’s O’Quinn drafted by Magic

BY ANDREAS BUTLER FLORIDA COURIER

Throughout history, hundreds of players from historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUS) have made their mark in the NBA. That continued last month when the Orlando Magic drafted Norfolk State University center Kyle O’Quinn.

A standout at the HBCU, O’Quinn was the 49th Kyle overall pick in the second O’Quinn round of the NBA draft on June 28.

During a press conference on Monday, the team introduced O’Quinn and their first round pick, Andrew Nicholson.

“For me and my family, this is a tremendous opportunity and blessing. This is a great and respected franchise, which is well known,” said O’Quinn.

In O’Quinn, the Magic saw not only basketball skills but character traits they liked.

Character counts “Kyle is mature and has high character. We admire his toughness and will to win. He brings a hard-nose mentality. He wants to help his team anyway that he can.

Kyle, like Andrew, when we spoke to people about them no one had anything bad to say about them,” commented Orlando Magic General Manager Rob Hennigan.

Although the Magic look to trade their All-Star Center Dwight Howard, O’Quinn is excited about the possibility of playing with him.

“It’s exciting to be on a team with such a superstar. There is a lot that I can learn from him,” said O’Quinn.

Late bloomer O’Quinn is a 6-10, 240-pound athletic big man from Queens, New York, who took an unlikely road to the NBA. He didn’t play organized ball until his senior year of high school at Campus Magnet High.

“I made the JV team in ninth grade but ended up being the team manager,” recalled O’Quinn.

O’Quinn admits that he didn’t grow up with NBA dreams.

“Once my parents invested in me to play, I just wanted to have success. In high school, the goal was to get a scholarship, in college to win a championship and when the draft opportunity was proposed its like now fight for the dream,” O’Quinn stated.

“I also was helped by a great growth spurt in college. I went from 5’11’’ by my freshman year to 6’7’’ my junior year.”

Has what it takes Anthony Evans, head coach of Norfolk State, says that O’Quinn has the right qualities to make it as a pro.

Evans stated, “Kyle is a great person.

He is always upbeat. He jokes around, but when it comes to basketball he is serious and brings a business-like attitude. I think it will make him a good pro.”

Notoriety for HBCUs O’Quinn is the first Norfolk player to be drafted since Lee Johnson was taken by the Detroit Pistons in the third round in 1988 and the first Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC) player taken since

Florida A&M’s Jerome James was picked by the Sacramento Kings in the second round in 1998.

“This speaks volumes for our conference, our level of competition and the players that we have. He had a remarkable season and outstanding post season, which helped a team from our conference a No. 15 seed beat No. 2 seeded Missouri in the NCAA tournament,” commented Dr. Dennis Thomas, MEAC’s commissioner.

Gravelle Craig, head basketball coach at Bethune-Cookman University, added,” His selection is great for our conference and gives us notoriety. It shows kids that they can make it to the NBA from our schools. It also shows those overseas and in the NBA that we have talent too.”

Miami: The Dance Now! and Little Haiti Cultural Center is hosting a summer dance intensive training teens in ballet, modern, jazz, musical theater, hip-hop, Afro-Brazilian, West African and Haitian folklore dance styles. The Summer Intensive Show culminates with a performance by the students on July 7 at 7 p.m., 212 NE 59th Terrace.

Tickets: $10 at the door. More information: 305-960-2967 or www.dancenowmiami.org Fort Lauderdale: Live jazz, blues, pop and everything in between along Hollywood’s signature 2.5 mile Broadwalk is every Friday of every month. More information: 954-924-2980.

Fort Lauderdale: A threehour cooking class with professionally trained chefs is scheduled at City College Fort Lauderdale, 2000 W. Commercial Blvd. The class is 6 p.m. – 9 p.m. MondaySaturday. Cost: $39.99 per person per class. More

ISRAEL HOUGHTON

The King’s Men Tour with Kirk Franklin, Marvin Sapp, Donnie McClurkin and Israel Houghton is scheduled at the AmericanAirlines Arena in Miami on Sept. 30.

information: 954-703-6745 or www.chef954.com.

Miami: The Funkshion Fashion Week Miami Beach will be held from July 17- July 22 at various locations throughout Miami and Miami Beach.

More information: www. fashionweekmiami.com or 305-673-2756.

Boca Raton: An open mic night for 18 and up featuring comedy, poetry and music is held every Monday at the Funky Biscuit in the back of Royal Palm Plaza, 303 SE Mizner Blvd. Signup is at 8 p.m.; show time begins at 8:30 p.m. More information: Richy Lala 561-512-8472.

Miami: Fantasia, Keith Sweat, Guy, K-Ci & Jo-Jo will be at the American Airline Arena for the Fresh Music Festival July 12 for an 8 p.m. show.

Miami: Miami-Dade County hosts a Downtown Harvest Market every Friday from 11 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Residents and visitors have the opportunity to purchase seasonal produce directly from Miami-

Dade growers at the Stephen P. Clark Center’s Courtyard, 111 NW 1st St. More information: www.earth-learning.org.

Miami: Nicki Minaj will be at the James L. Knight Center on July 24 for an 8 p.m. show.

Miami: Tickets are on sale for a show featuring Enrique Iglesias and Jennifer Lopez at the American Airlines Arena on Aug. 31.

Miramar: Jeffrey Osborne, Millie Jackson, Ken Boothe and more will be at the Miramar Regional Park in Miramar July 8 for a 3 p.m. show.

Vero Beach: The Riverside Children’s Theatre presents the Riverside Dance Festival Performance on July 6 at 7:30 p.m. and July 7 at 1:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m., at 3250 Riverside Park Drive. Members of professional dance companies will showcase their work in collaboration with dance students. Tickets are $12 for adults and $8 for students.

More information: 772-2316990 or www.riversidetheatre.com.

Worked hard O’Quinn is the 14th Norfolk University Spartan to be drafted and the first during the school’s Division I era.

“Our program always takes kids who need to develop and Kyle took advantage.

He worked extremely hard. Kyle being drafted is a credit to his work ethic. HBCUs have talented players but are overlooked because we don’t get the exposure that the major and mid-major programs get,” added Evans.

O’Quinn was the only HBCU player taken in this year’s draft and the first since North Carolina Central’s David Young was selected by the Seattle Supersonics with the 41st overall pick in the second round back in 2004.

Great season at Norfolk O’Quinn had a stellar senior season at Norfolk State, where he averaged 15.9 points, 10.3 rebounds and 2.7 blocks per game.

He led Norfolk to a 26-10 record, firstever MEAC tournament title and an 84-82 upset win over No. 2 seeded Missouri in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

Against Missouri, he had a dominating performance where he tallied 26 points and grabbed 14 boards.

“That game did wonders for my career.

It was a big game and it was on TV. It put me out there and really helped me out with my draft stock,” O’Quinn said.

‘Heart and soul’ of Norfolk team O’Quinn was named the MEAC Player of the Year and MEAC Defensive Player of the Year, becoming the first player to receive both honors in the same season.

He also was the Lou Henson Award winner for the best Mid-Major Player and was named All MEAC First team and MEAC tournament MVP. “He was the heart and soul of our team and he did everything. He was our low post threat on offense and he anchored our defense,” said Evans.

Great career at Norfolk O’Quinn is Norfolk State’s all-time leader in blocks (283). He ranks sixth in rebounds (1,092) and 16th in scoring (1,607) at the school.

During his junior season in 2010-11, he averaged 16.4 points, 11.1 rebounds and 3.4 blocks per game, garnering MEAC Defensive Player of the Year honors.

During his sophomore campaign in 2009-10, he averaged 11.5 points and 8.7 rebounds per contest.

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WILMINGTON TEN from B1 a young leader.” Gibbs says the conspiracy charges against the Wilmington Ten were “totally out of character” for them. “Joe and a lot of those guys wouldn’t hurt a fly,” Gibbs said.

The 17 year-old Wright wanted to grow up to become a lawyer, and was willing to put in the hard work to make that happen.

Gregory Congregational Church was right in the neighborhood, so it was nothing for him, his friends and family to frequent there from time to time.

And when it became the center of Black student activism against the heavyhanded ways of the New Hanover Board of Education and the city of Wilmington, he was right there, learning how to protest and demonstrate forcefully, but peacefully.

He had nothing to do with the events of Feb. 6, 1971, but a year later, when authorities began arresting people and charging them with the firebombing of Mike’s Grocery, he was added to the list and eventually sentenced to 29 years.

Productive in prison When Wright got to prison in Northhampton County, Gibbs is amazed that he was able to survive. He used his time wisely, taking classes to prepare for the day when he would leave.

He was looking forward to earning a law degree.

“You never heard him cry,” Gibbs says. When Joe Wright was finally released early in 1978, unlike several other members of the Wilmington Ten, he was fully integrated back into the community.

He was able to return to school, find work, and even get a job with a United States congressman in Washington, D.C. He was planning to go to law school, when he became ill. He had contracted a debilitating disease that attached itself to his lungs while he was in prison. He died in 1991. A week before his death, he was accepted to Campbell Law School.

WILLIE EARL VEREEN

Willie Vereen was a young 17-year-old musician playing in a rhythm and blues band. He told his family he wanted to be lawyer or a doctor. His older sister, Wanda, was the political one, not him.

He grew up in Jervay Projects, which meant Willie hung out with the guys late, “drank a little wine,” and basically just had fun.

A Hoggard High student, Vereen found himself in the midst of a Black student boycott one day. That boycott led to him joining other students at Gregory Church.

Willie understood what the boycott was about, but he was mainly there “because of the girls.’’

Stunned by arrest Indeed, when the authorities came looking for a “W. Vereen,” Willie believed they were looking for Wanda. So he was shocked when authorities arrested him a year after the Mike’s Grocery fire, and charged him as a conspirator.

Vereen’s father was stunned by his arrest. His mother couldn’t understand what was going on.

Both were very hurt, but believed Willie when he told them he was innocent of the charges.

Watching the trial, while Vereen could see the deck was being stacked against him by the prosecutors, he still held out hope that all he had been taught about trusting authority figures, and trusting government, would save him and James McKoy in the end.

Why McKoy? Because on the night that Mike’s Grocery was firebombed, both teens were at the same club, at the same time, outside of Wilmington, performing in a band.

Joined Nation of Islam Vereen was sentenced to 29 years in prison. In prison, Vereen survived by joining the Nation of Islam and converting to Islam.

“It took a lot of anger away from me,” he states. Vereen spent five years in prison before his sentence was overturned.

Being a member of the Wilmington Ten, Vereen was not received very well back home. When it came to applying for jobs, Vereen would get the work, only to have someone recognize him, and get him fired.

Old friends wanted nothing to do with him. Even many members of the church he attended felt that Vereen was guilty.

Vereen did go to school for journalism, and was able to do well in that environment, but it was a rare oasis amid everything else he faced.

JAMES “BUN” McKOY

What has happened to his life because of the Wilmington Ten episode brings tears to the eyes of James McKoy, now 59.

At 18, McKoy played bass guitar in bands, particularly on Carolina Beach, where he played with Whites at supper clubs. He wanted to play professionally. “I just wanted to be the entertainer.”

The youngest of four, McKoy graduated from Hoggard High School in 1971, amid the strife and Black student protests.

McKoy joined the protests, but says, unlike many of the others, he “didn’t think much” of their new leader, the Rev. Ben Chavis, primarily because he was preoccupied with music, not activism.

So in 1972 when young McKoy was arrested and charged with conspiracy in connection with the Mike’s Grocery bombing, McKoy said he didn’t know why.

Sustained by family’s faith McKoy figured the only reason why he was being arrested was because he lived in the neighborhood of Gregory Church.

“Why they (prosecutors) picked us out is the question,” says McKoy, who also was sentenced to 29 years.

He was sent to Odom prison. Several Wilmington Ten defendants were sent to the same prison and they stuck together.

After McKoy left prison, he didn‘t have too many problems finding work as a musician. In the interceding years, McKoy has suffered two strokes.

CONNIE TINDALL

Young Connie Tindall was an all-star high school football player who dreamed of growing up to play in the NFL. But at age 20, the Wilmington Ten episode eliminated that possibility.

Tindall, whose father was a longshoreman, was looking for work while still attending school. Upset at the way Black students were being treated in 1971, he decided to be a spokesman for their cause.

He shaped their message and became their face in the press, Even after the Rev. Ben Chavis arrived in February of that year, Tindall remained in the forefront of the struggle.

Apparently, the authorities took note. A year after the destruction of Mike’s Grocery, Tindall was yanked out of bed late at night in his parents’ home, arrested and charged with conspiracy in connection with the grocery store firebombing.

At party during fire Tindall knew that he had a perfect alibi: The night of the fire, he was across town in a club called the Ponderosa, celebrating his birth-

CASH MICHAELS/WILMINGTON JOURNAL

Seated from left to right are Wilmington Ten surviving members Marvin Patrick, Margaret Jacobs and Connie Tindall. Standing are the Rev. Ben Chavis, Wayne Moore, Willie Earl Vereen and James McKoy.

day with several friends.

The first trial in June 1972 was declared a mistrial. The initial jury was made up of 10 Blacks and two Whites.

When the case began again on Sept. 11, 1972, the jury was reversed – 10 Whites and two Blacks.

Tindall was convicted and sentenced to prison to 31 years in prison.

“Prison was just another way of life,” he recalls.

“Same things went on in the streets, went on there.”

Tindall kept the faith that even if it took 10 or 20 years, the truth would eventually come out.

‘Vindicate me!’

When Tindall finally left prison on early release after almost five years, there was no easy re-entry into his community. It was hard getting a job and when he did land one, it rarely lasted past a week. Because Tindall’s father was a longshoreman, he was able to find work for his son.

To this day, Tindall contends he “would have been a beast” as an NFL defensive back.

His message to the governor: “If you want to do something for me, then pay me for those 4 ½ to five years I sat up in that penitentiary for nothing. Vindicate me!”

MARVIN PATRICK

Marvin Patrick is 60 years old, has suffered a stroke and struggles to get around on a cane. He says being arrested as part of the Wilmington Ten cost him the opportunity to become a unionized longshoremen like his father.

At age 20, Patrick already had worked on the docks and served a short stint in the Army.

In 1971, Patrick got involved in the Black student movement because he deeply believed in a quality education, and that included African-Americans learning about their history and culture.

A year after the firebombing of Mike’s Grocery, word circulated that the authorities had arrested various students who were at Gregory Church. When Patrick paid Chavis a visit, he too was arrested and charged with conspiracy.

‘Black folks acted funny’ Patrick urged his mother not to attend the trial. “I didn’t want to put no pressure on her,” he says. “She knew in her heart that her son was innocent.” So did his father. Patrick was convicted and sentenced to prison 29 years. He credits the Lord with helping him to survive Odom Farms Prison in Northhampton County.

Because of the distance from Wilmington, the visits from family were fewer than Patrick had hoped for, but when they did come, they lifted his spirits. After Patrick was released, “even Black folks acted funny.”

After a while, he started telling a lie to get a job.

He said that like his fellow defendants, even church members turned against him.

ANNE SHEPARD

Judy Mack remembers those days when her mother, Anne Shepard, stood

strong against discrimination of any kind, including race, gender or size, Shepard believed that all were equal in God’s sight, and she brought up her three children to believe the same.

That belief made life harder for Shepard, a 34-year-old White woman who, in 1971, stood foursquare with Black students in Wilmington trying to remove the last vestiges of a rigidly segregated school system.

Shepard was a respected community worker known for her work on behalf of poor families in public housing. So working with students at Gregory Church came natural to her.

And when activists were arrested in 1972 in connection with the Mike’s Grocery firebombing, Shepard was not exempted. The authorities had hoped to turn Shepard against Chavis and the other activists but she refused.

Believed in mom Judy Mack, who was 11 years old at the time, said her mother told them that she was standing on principle was willing to accept the consequences of taking such a brave stand.

Although Mack was too young to fully comprehend the unfolding events, she and a sibling were in court constantly to support their mother; an older sister ran away.

“She truly believed in what she was doing,” Mack said, referring to her mother. “And she raised us, as young women [that we] could make a difference.”

After Shepard was convicted, she was sentenced to 15 years in prison, the lowest punishment given to the 10 defendants.

Fought for inmates’ rights Shepard also spent plenty of time in the prison law library and organized a boycott to protest what she felt were violations of inmates’ rights.

She was released early while the case was on appeal, allowing her to reunite with her daughters and moved to Raleigh. When her appeal failed at the state level, she had to return to prison, separating from her daughters yet again.

When a federal appeals court overturned the convictions of the Wilmington Ten, Shepard was released from prison for good, reunited with her daughters and moved to Durham, where he graduated from Durham Tech.

Mack said Shepard always was questioned by other Whites about why she would sacrifice herself for Blacks, which she didn’t appreciate.

She died in Durham in 2011.

REGINALD EPPS

If there’s a Wilmington Ten member who prefers to distance himself from those fateful events of 40 years ago, it is Reginald Epps. He does not attend anniversary programs and usually refuses to grant interviews.

“As you go through life, you’ve got this thing over you…this cloud over your mind,” he says in a rare interview. “You realize that you don’t have access to things that you ordinarily think you would be able to

get access to: jobs…being able to fill out a resume and present myself at an interview.

“I knew those things were probably closed off to me, or at least I felt that way. I had to backdoor my way into a normalcy or a life [after leaving prison], as opposed to the more traditional graduate high school, then go to college and get a job.”

Epps didn’t pass his high school courses or get a diploma until he was serving time in prison. And yet, Epps, one of nine children, credits the experience for changing his life. He readily admits being a young man who stayed in trouble, heading down a path in life that assured worse things to come. He was a hustler, with no dreams.

‘I had no clue’ Epps was 17, and a student at Hoggard High when he found himself caught in the web of the Wilmington Ten. He visited the Gregory Church often because it was the only experience he had being with positive Black students seeking to build self-esteem, pride and knowledge of self.

That self-esteem was shattered when two school resource officers walked up to him and said, “Come with us.”

“I had no clue,” Epps says about why he was arrested.

He was charged as a conspirator in the firebombing of Mike’s Grocery.

His mother scolded Epps for becoming involved in the Black student movement at Gregory Church, fearing that it was radical and would only lead to trouble.

He was sentenced to 28 years in prison. His family did not attend the trial or the sentencing.

Epps survived Odoms Farm by sticking close to Willie Vereen and other Wilmington Ten members.

“You had those up days and down days,” he recalls.

He later moved to Raleigh to begin a new life.

WAYNE MOORE

After Wayne Moore was released from prison in 1979, he went back to Wilmington, hoping not only to be accepted into the community again but to get his young life on track. At 19, he was sentenced to 29 years in prison.

But it soon became clear, after losing job after job, and being shunned by many in the community, that there was no future for Moore in his hometown anymore. So he had to move to Michigan, where he learned a trade as an electrician, and remains gainfully employed.

A while back, Moore wrote the following about how he saw his struggles.

Determined to triumph “Although I can only imagine what it was like to be a slave chained to the bowels of a slave ship, my experience with the Wilmington 10 allowed me to somewhat sample physical bondage with no ability for self-reliance, or self-determination,” he wrote.

“Although I am determined to somehow triumph, I have struggled tremendously over the years to overcome the psychological and social effects of being imprisoned for crimes I never committed. My self-

confidence and self-esteem were shattered. After long separations from my family and friends, I found it difficult to deal effectively with the responsibilities of everyday life, including fatherhood.

“The State of North Carolina has never been held accountable for this tragic disruption in my life after allowing one of the most blatant miscarriages of justice in the history of America to take place. The city of Wilmington has already apologized for this injustice. It is now time for the state of North Carolina to do the same by granting The Wilmington Ten a full pardon of innocence.’’

REV. BENJAMIN F. CHAVIS

Without a doubt, the most famous member of the Wilmington Ten is its leader, the Rev. Benjamin F. Chavis. He was the convener of the 1995 Million Man March. He led the NAACP as its president/CEO. Today, Chavis heads the HipHop Action Network.

Almost as soon as Chavis was sent by the United Church of Christ to Wilmington to help lead the Black student protest in February 1971, he was branded an outsider by public officials, warned to leave town, and his life was threatened.

White supremacists were allowed by local police to open fire on Gregory Church, where Chavis, 24, was working with Black students, training them how to peacefully, but forcefully, demonstrate for justice in the public schools.

Shot numerous times Chavis tells of having a bullet fired at him, piercing his leather jacket.

“I was shot at a number of times,” he recalls, adding that people were wounded as a result. But police refused to investigate or call a curfew to prevent further violence.

“We were building a growing movement, and that was threatening to the power structure of Wilmington,” Chavis recalls.

When Mike’s Grocery was firebombed, Chavis was immediately blamed. He was tried and convicted of conspiracy to commit murder and conspiracy to firebomb the grocery. His sentence: 34 years in prison.

Life as freedom fighter Writing about his experience for the National Newspaper Publishers Association News Service, he said the following: “Life in the five different North Carolina maximum, medium and later minimum security prisons where I was imprisoned in 1972, 1976, 1977, 1978, and throughout 1979 were the years that I personally experienced what millions on prisoners in the United States are made to endure.

“I was not a ‘celebrity’ inmate. I got the same dehumanizing and degrading treatment that the average prisoner received. I learned to stay focus on not just my individual rights or to focus only on the Wilmington Ten case, but just as importantly, I spent most of my prison time advocating for the rights of prisoners in U.S. and in particular the rights of all U.S. political prisoners.

“The Wilmington Ten case, struggle and eventual victory had a tremendous impact in helping to shape who I am today. I was 23 years old when the incident in Wilmington happened, but by that age, I was already 11-year veteran of the Civil Rights Movement.

“We were imprisoned when I was 24 years old.

What I later accomplished in my 30s, 40s and 50s was certainly impacted and shaped by the Wilmington Ten chapter of my life. Today, I am still a “freedom fighter.”

This story is special to the NNPA News Service from the Wilmington Journal.

TOJ B4

CULTURE

STOJ

JULY 6 – JULY 12, 2012

Determined to have a better life in Zimbabwe Poor African woman shares journey to home and security

BY ROBYN DIXON LOS ANGELES TIMES (MCT)

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – It was more money than she had ever dreamed of, stuffed into stockings and concealed under her clothes like a python around her waist.

On the bus trip back to Zimbabwe, her homeland, Samkeliso Moyo was terrified that her secret money would be discovered or stolen, and she’d lose everything.

Born into the poorest family in her village, she grew up hungry, with no shoes and one thin cotton dress. She never once got a Christmas present. She ran away from exploitation and abuse at 11, and got her first job at 13, earning a few dollars a month.

Eight years later, she made the journey to what for her was a land of opportunity: South Africa.

Big dreams For years, she had worked there as a maid six days a week, built up a small trading business on evenings and weekends, rented out half of her room to a boarder, scrimped on phone calls to her children, whom she had sent to live in Zimbabwe. And somehow, she had squirreled away a miraculous $6,700.

The 32-year-old dreamed of buying something big, something that would make a difference to her children. She would never have to sleep in a park again. Or go to bed hungry.

Or beg relatives and strangers for help. Would she?

That money was going to change everything. It would be her ticket to the middle class — if only she could get home with it.

Better jobs, life All over Africa, people like Moyo are making their way out of poverty. A report last year by the African Development Bank said the continent’s middle class

had tripled in the last 30 years, encompassing onethird of the total population, or 313 million people.

Make no mistake, millions still live in dire poverty, about a quarter of the population of sub-Saharan Africa, where just 100,000 people hold 80 percent of the wealth, according to the report.

And the bank’s definition of “lower middle class” (anyone earning $4 to $10 a day) and “upper middle class” (anyone earning $10 to $20 a day) underscores how different they are from their Western counterparts.

But the growing middle class has a massive transformative effect on Africa and fuels future growth.

As people buy things they need beyond sustenance – clothing, phones, motorcycles, improved housing – they create jobs. By paying school fees, they provide their children with the education to find better jobs and consolidate the family gains.

The report found that “growth of the middle class is associated with better governance, economic growth and poverty reduction. It appears that as people gain middle-class status, they are likely to use their greater economic clout to demand more accountable governments.”

A hungry village For most of those 313 million Africans, the grinding haul out of poverty is a story of ordinary people doing extraordinary things.

Moyo grew up in Tsholotsho, a dry, hungry village in southern Zimbabwe, in a family so poor that her mother and granny sent her at age 9 to stay with a relative who could pay her school fees. Her father was not involved with the family.

There was no breakfast, no lunch, and school was a blur of sleepy hunger. Her relatives made her do many hours of chores, fetching water and pounding dried corn with a stick.

A predatory neighbor saw her helplessness and raped her.

She yearned for her gran-

ROBYN DIXON/LOS ANGELES TIMES/MCT

With her hard-earned savings from her work as a domestic worker in South Africa, Samkeliso Moyo was able to fulfill her dream of owning a home in her native Zimbabwe. ny and home. Yes, her family almost always went to bed hungry and had to beg from neighbors, carefully approaching one house one night, another the next and another the night after. But her grandmother always sang and cuddled the children, comforting them with hope that one day they’d have all the food they wanted.

Grandma’s faith “My granny said, ‘One day, it’s going to be fine.

One day, you are going to be number one.’ ” So one night, Moyo ran away and back to her granny, her feet bare, wearing a thin cotton dress and carrying a plastic bag with her few belongings.

“It was dark. I was scared.

I didn’t know what would come and grab me or eat me,” she said. “I walked the whole night. When I got home to my place, I screamed, this wailing scream. I don’t know where it came from. I just let my bag fall down.”

Two years later, she left home to work for a few dollars a month in Bulawayo in southern Zimbabwe.

And at 21, she left Zimbabwe to look for work in Johannesburg.

Street trader After she arrived, she struggled to get a job and a place to live. Once, she slept in a park all night.

Moyo’s aunt, a domestic worker, helped her find work as a maid for a welloff White family. She had no idea how to use a vacuum cleaner or fold a shirt.

“Those first few months were hard.”

In 2003, another employer fired her for being pregnant, but then she managed to get a job one day a

week as a domestic worker. Then she found another day’s work, then another, until she was working six days a week cleaning houses for different families, earning more than $410 a month.

She set herself up as a street trader, selling secondhand clothing that she bought in bales at a warehouse outside Johannesburg, a business she ran after work until late at night and on Sundays. She even employed jobless people to sell for her, and made as much as $200 extra a month.

Tough decision

By African Development Bank standards, she’d made that great leap to the middle class. But her childhood wounds, still raw and angry, left her hungry for more security. After the birth of her son, Ayanda, and then twins, Thendo and Mthendo, she grew afraid that they would be doomed to deprivations like those she had suffered.

So she made a sacrifice that she still questions.

Just over two years ago, she sent her children to live with a nanny in Bulawayo, with its cheaper rents and child care, to cut her costs in half and get further ahead. But doubt consumed her. Would her children think it meant she didn’t love them?

As a child she had nursed anger at her mother, who was ill and couldn’t give her food and schooling and who sent her to live with the relative who used her as a servant. She understands now that her mother couldn’t help their poverty, but the anger remains, driving her to better herself so that her children won’t suffer too.

“I don’t want my kids to be hurt, like I was hurt.”

The long trip home She budgeted $180 a month for her expenses, including just 80 cents a day for food. The rest, she saved, initially keeping it hidden in a box and then, warily, opening a bank account.

At the beginning of 2010, she had less than $200. A year later she’d saved more than $3,600, and by April this year she had $6,700.

She had a plan. She would buy a house.

On the long bus trip home, Moyo restlessly churned over the many catastrophes that could derail the dreams of a Black single mother.

She could be attacked and robbed. She could be hurt in an accident, knocked unconscious and hospitalized.

She could fall ill or faint.

“And they’ll open your clothes and of course they’ll take it,” she worried.

Just one careless word to a relative, or even her children, could send tsotsis, township gangsters, to kill her for the money. Or she could fall for a scam, be cheated into buying a house that belonged to someone else or paying someone for a fake title deed.

Her own land When she finally reached her children in their small rented house, she briefly hugged them, then crept into the bedroom, put the money into a cash box, locked it and hid it under the bed.

In the days that followed, she identified a parcel of land in a good location and went to the government land office to pay.

But even as her name was typed into the computer,

she couldn’t bring herself to hand over the $1,800 for the 2,150-square-foot block No. 18335.

She was still worried that somehow she could be scammed. Perhaps they would let her pay for the land after visiting the municipal council to pay for her sewerage connection.

There, she could doublecheck whether the land really had been transferred to her name.

The woman in the land office agreed, so Moyo went to the municipal council.

“I said, ‘I am coming to pay for No. 18335.’ The lady put the number into the computer. She said, ‘For Samkeliso Moyo?’

“I said, ‘That’s my name.’

I had tears of happiness.

That thing touched me.

Like, I did it. I did it. It was in my name. I was like, my kids can tell themselves, ‘This is my mother’s land.’

A reason to smile She spent the rest of the money on a builder and materials. A few years from now, she hopes to be able to move back home and live in her house, but for now she headed back to South Africa to earn more money for her children’s education.

In the middle of May, she got a call telling her that workers were putting on the roof. Her little four-room house was nearly done.

Somehow, it makes up for the hardships that a barefoot girl with one cotton dress endured.

“I didn’t know that one day, the little kid that suffered was going to find a house.”

As she told her story, Moyo had wept recalling her harsh childhood and the rape.

But now her eyes shone.

And she smiled.

Women make chic Muslim scarves to empower, foster dialogue of Religion Data Archives at Pennsylvania State University.

And they are providing a product that wasn’t always easy to find, said Elif Kavakci, who spoke at the fashion show. She designs high-end, one-of-a-kind outfits for powerful clients, such as the first lady of Turkey, through her company, Kavakci Couture.

BY SARAH MERVOSH DALLAS MORNING NEWS (MCT)

At a sleek venue in Dallas’ Design District, Ndaa Hassan burst through the curtain and rushed backstage. The fashion show was about to start. She was a flurry of nerves, wrapped in light pink from head to toe. “Ladies, it’s a full house!” she shouted.

The 30 or so models wore vibrant eye shadow, bejeweled dresses and high heels. But in this case, the stilettos didn’t lead up to bare, twiggy legs. In fact, they led no further than the hems of loose-fitting dresses that revealed almost no skin.

This was fashion, all right, but with a Muslim influence.

Hassan and her friend Zeena Alkurdi were presenting their first fashion show to about 150 people, spotlighting stylish but modest clothing — including some of their own designs. As entrepreneurs, Hassan and Alkurdi, both 22, design and sew hijabs

ALLISON SLOMOWITZ/DALLAS MORNING NEWS/MCT

Compassion for Fashion hosts Zeena Alkurdi, center, and Ndaa Hassan visit backstage during a fashion show in Dallas on June 15. whose chic styles range from tie-dye and sequins to cheetah print and vintage floral.

Expanding businesses Each has launched an online boutique to bridge the gap between the Middle Eastern traditions of their parents and the American culture they grew up in. A stylish hijab, they say, empowers Muslim girls to feel more confident and find

common ground with nonMuslim peers.

Using the Internet and social media, these entrepreneurs have expanded their businesses in ways that wouldn’t have been possible even a few years ago.

They have a growing Muslim population to cater to, with around 2.6 million living in the U.S., according to census data, and about 150,000 in North Texas, according to the Association

In high demand “There is a high demand,” Kavakci said. “In 2012, women have so many more options.”

Both Hassan’s and Alkurdi’s parents came from the Middle East. The friends grew up in North Texas and attended local universities. But neither has a background in fashion. Their mothers and grandmothers taught them how to sew, and they taught themselves the rest — finding time to make hijabs outside Alkurdi’s job at a Muslim school and Hassan’s part-time marketing work.

Their clients range from teens to women in their

30s. They each field orders from around the world — Malaysia, Canada, Brazil — and sell their scarves for $10 to $30. In the last year and a half, Alkurdi has sold about 350 hijabs. Hassan, who started six months ago, has sold between 150 and 200.

a pearl, she should be covered, too.

This story resonates with Muslim women. Wearing the hjiab as part of their faith makes them feel empowered, proud and beautiful. Alkurdi says the best compliment she can get is when she’s wearing a hijab.

Inspired by Muhammad Ali

A way of life

Hassan’s boutique, Écharpe á la Mode, offers classy scarves with a simple design, while Alkurdi prefers a bold style inspired

by Kim Kardashian.

“If I was going to a night out with my friends, I would wear Zeena’s hijab. If I was going to a wedding or a brunch, I would wear Ndaa’s,” said Hanan Qasem, 20, a college student and one of the models at the fashion show.

Alkurdi named her business Pearl Boutique, inspired by Muhammad Ali. As the story goes, the legendary boxer told his daughter that oysters cover pearls, and since she was even more precious than

For “hijabis,” the scarf is not just an item of clothing; it connects them with God and reminds them who they are. They wear the hijab every day. Only other women and male family members can see them without the scarf.

“It might be an accessory and clothing, but it is a way of life,” Hassan said. “With the hijab on, we’re always representing our religion, and it forces us to be on our best behavior.”

Ten years ago, after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Alkurdi’s father asked her if she wanted to take a break from wearing the hijab. She broke down in tears. “This is a part of me,” she said. “I can’t take it off.”

STOJ

JULY 6 - JULY 12, 2012

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FINEST & TRAVEL

B5

Think you’re one of Florida’s Finest?

E-mail your high-resolution 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.

Florida Courier photojournalists were onboard Royal Caribbean ships with thousands of “Tom Joyner Morning Show” fans on the Fantastic Voyage 2011 and 2012.

We’re featuring some of the “Finest” cruisers.

PHOTOS BY TONY LEAVELL/ FLORIDA COURIER AND DELROY COLE/ FLORIDA COURIER

Cruise ships docking in more exotic Caribbean ports of call

BY ELLEN CRAEGER DETROIT FREE (MCT)

CURAÇAO – There is absolutely nothing wrong with Cozumel or the Bahamas.

But once you’ve seen them, it’s time to branch out.

Cruise lines are experimenting with all kinds of interesting Caribbean itineraries that expose travelers to a broader swath of the region. Some feature islands that are hard to visit on your own. Some mix exotic with familiar, giving travelers a taste of wildly different cultures.

“The thing is, these islands represent different regions, and many are more European,” says Carnival Valor Capt. Luigi De Angelis, who has captained ships throughout the Caribbean. His favorite islands are Aruba and Roatan, Honduras.

Not super trendy By visiting more exotic islands with Dutch, French, English or Spanish roots, “you get a taste of all these different places on the other side of the ocean. That is why it seems to me it is more culturally interesting,” he says. “On Curaçao, the people speak five languages. It’s not often you go to an island where the people speak five languages.”

More sophisticated than your basic western Caribbean or Bahamas itinerary, cruises labeled “southern Caribbean” or “exotic Caribbean” usually are at least eight days long. Most leave from Miami, Fort Lauderdale or San Juan, Puerto Rico. And most cruise distances of 4,000 miles or more.

Admittedly, the exotic Caribbean isn’t super trendy. Right now, the in-the-know cruise folks are flocking to the Mediterranean.

The Caribbean cruise sector grew

BUSIEST CARIBBEAN CRUISE PORTS 1. Bahamas (4.2 million cruise visitors in 2011) 2. Cozumel (2.9 million) 3. U.S. Virgin Islands (2 million) 4. St. Maarten (1.7 million) 5. Cayman Islands (1.4 million)

less than 1 percent in 2011 because lines redeployed ships to Europe, especially in the summer, according to Caribbean Tourism Organization data.

Caribbean cruising overall this year is expected to rise 2 percent-3 percent, a figure that’s probably optimistic. Southern Caribbean islands have been especially vulnerable to the downturn.

But that’s all the more reason to go now. Exotic Caribbean cruise prices are as low as $600-$900 per person for a week or more.

It’s easy and cheap to get to departure ports like Miami. So seek your best deal.

6. Jamaica (1.1 million) 7. Puerto Rico (1 million) 8. Belize (700,000) 9. Barbados, Antigua, Aruba (600,000 each) 10. Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Curaçao, Haiti, St. Lucia (400,000 each) 11. Dominican Republic, Dominica, Grenada (300,000 each) 12. St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Martinique (less than 100, 000 each)

Smaller destinations Look for the unusual islands.

Do you know how hard it is to fly to Guadeloupe on your own? But you can get there on Brilliance of the Seas in December. And look for those bonus sea days, when the ship doesn’t stop, but just glides through the turquoise water like a floating cocoon.

Looking for an unusual Caribbean itinerary, I chose a Carnival Valor cruise out of Miami in late May because it visited four spots I’d never been — Turks and Caicos, the Dominican Republic, Aruba and Curaçao.

But it was hard to choose.

Some Royal Caribbean ships stop in cool places like Bonaire, St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

Celebrity Cruises stop at ports in St. Croix, St. Kitts, Dominica and Grenada. Silversea and Seabourn cruises call on sophisticated St. Barts.

Yes, most of the smaller destinations don’t have the tourist development of a St. Thomas or Grand Cayman. Some are poor. Not every island has dutyfree shopping. But that is their charm.

ELLEN CRAEGER/DETROIT FREE PRESS/MCT

Cruise ship passengers are greeted by local dancers at La Romana in the Dominican Republic.

Hip, hot spot Aboard Carnival Valor at the end of May, I was surprised to find that our ship was the only one in every port. In eight days, I never saw another cruise ship. It was weird, but nice.

While walking peacefully along the cruise piers, I happily imagined 8 zillion cruise ship passengers elbowing and swearing at each other at the Italian port of Civitavecchia.

It’s a good question. What makes one Caribbean island more exotic than another? Think of places other cruises generally do not visit. Places hard to get to on your own. Places you may never have heard of or couldn’t find on a map. Places without a Columbian Emeralds store (OK, this is hard). Places distant from tourist meccas.

For instance, our cruise stopped in Grand Turk. It delightfully turns out that while Turks and Caicos is a hip, hot destination, all of that trendy stuff is happening way over in Providenciales, about 65 miles away by sea, and definitely not in Grand Turk, where the most exciting event is watching the tide go out. Fantastic.

More fun islands I likewise was pleasantly surprised by the Dominican Republic. The DR is the most visited island in the Caribbean, but almost nobody arrives by cruise ship. Carnival Valor docked way down at La Romana, on the southern coast, hours from Punta Cana and other giant tourism hot spots. The dock was near the sugar cane fields and orchid farms. It was warm and relaxing

SOURCE: 2011 DATA FROM CARIBBEAN TOURISM ORGANIZATION

and real.

Down in Aruba and Curaçao, both islands with Dutch heritage, the pastel buildings seemed to shout a happy welcome to our lonesome ship. Off-season, these islands near Venezuela still were hot and friendly. Curaçao, with its swinging pedestrian bridge, is definitely different from any other Caribbean island. The citizens do speak four or five languages — Papiamentu, Dutch, English, Spanish and sometimes French.

And Aruba, with its divi divi trees bending to the wind, with its giant cacti spreading across the landscape like the old west, with its brand-new Ritz Carlton rising on the shore, and with the scenic Alto Vista Chapel a sturdy outpost on a seaside cliff, was just plain fun.

FOOD

TOJ B6

S

JULY 6 – JULY 12, 2012

ENTER YOUR BEST RECIPE FOR A CHANCE AT $10,000

Eggs have been the star ingredient in breakfast dishes for centuries, and Americans are becoming more interested in new uses for eggs that extend beyond the morning hours.

In fact, a recent survey, conducted by Harris Interactive on behalf of Eggland’s Best, found that 64 percent of Americans would follow a new food trend using eggs as a topping. In addition, more than one out of five indicated brunch or dinner as their favorite meal time to serve eggs.

“Eggs are so versatile and one of my favorite ingredients to cook with,” said Candice Kumai,

celebrity chef and cookbook author. “I always keep my fridge stocked with Eggland’s Best eggs to ensure my recipes come out consistent and tasting phenomenal.”

When it comes to cooking, Kumai also follows a “Foods with Benefits” philosophy, which is why Eggland’s Best can be found in many of her recipes. Compared to ordinary eggs, they contain twice the amount of omega3s and vitamin D, and 10 times more vitamin E. At-home chefs can get cracking in the kitchen with these egg dishes created by Kumai. Find additional egg recipes and tips from Candice Kumai at www. egglandsbest.com.

SKINNY 3-VEG SCRAMBLE The Harris Interactive survey found 34 percent of Americans prefer to prepare their eggs scrambled. This delicious and healthy scramble recipe is a go-to for Candice Kumai.

Makes 4 servings 6 large Eggland’s Best eggs 6 large Eggland’s Best egg whites 1/2 cup salsa 1teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon black pepper 1 cup roasted red peppers, drained and chopped 1 cup spinach, chopped 1 can black beans, rinsed and drained

1 cup zucchini, chopped 1 teaspoon ground cumin 4 toasted English muffin halves, whole wheat Whisk whole eggs, egg whites, salsa, salt and pepper in medium bowl.

Stir in roasted peppers, spinach, and beans. Set aside.

Heat medium nonstick skillet over medium heat. Lightly coat with cooking spray. Add zucchini and cumin, stirring, until softened, 2 minutes. Pour in egg mixture; gently stir until eggs are cooked to your liking.

Serve over English muffins.

Recipe by Candice Kumai, “Pretty Delicious,” Rodale Publishing 2011

FROM FAMILY FEATURES

Eggland’s Best (EB) is launching its first-ever Eggland’s Best “Your Best Recipe” Contest to see how fans use EB eggs in their best recipes.

One lucky at-home chef will have the chance to win a $10,000 grand prize, and three runners-up will have the chance to win a $1,000 category prize: Breakfast, Main Course, Appetizer and Dessert.

For official contest rules and to submit your original recipe, visit www. egglandsbest.com/yourbestrecipe, or the Facebook page at www.facebook. com/egglandsbesteggs between May 7 and Aug. 12.

SUNNYSIDE STUFFED BAKED POTATOES Loaded with some of Candice Kumai’s favorite “Foods with Benefits,” this recipe is ideal for the one out of six Americans who revealed in the Harris Interactive survey that they would top a potato with an egg first.

Makes 4 servings 4 large russet potatoes 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil 1 small yellow onion, finely chopped 1 cup baby bella mushrooms, thinly sliced 1 teaspoon sea salt 1 teaspoon pepper 2 cups spinach Non-stick cooking spray 4 large Eggland’s Best eggs 1 teaspoon fennel seed Scrub skin of potatoes, dry well. Poke 5 holes in each potato with fork and place in 400°F oven, approximately 1 hour.

In medium skillet over medium heat, add olive oil and onion; cook

for 8 minutes. Lower heat, add mushrooms, salt, and pepper; stir about 5 minutes. Toss in spinach; cook until wilted, 2 minutes.

Cook sunnyside eggs in a lightly coated medium non-stick skillet over medium heat. After 2 minutes sprinkle eggs with fennel seed; cook until yolk is medium.

Cut a horizontal slit into each potato. Stuff with spinach and mushroom mixture and gently top with an egg.

Recipe by Candice Kumai SUMMER SQUASH & MUSHROOM FRITTATA More than one-third of Americans stated vegetables as their favorite ingredient to pair with eggs, according to the Harris Interactive survey, which makes this recipe a crowd pleaser.

Makes 6 servings 1 tablespoon olive oil 1/2 cup onion, chopped 1/2 cup sliced button mushrooms 1/2 red bell pepper, thinly sliced 1 cup summer squash, thinly sliced

6 large Eggland’s Best eggs, beaten well 1 teaspoon basil 1 teaspoon tarragon 1 teaspoon sea salt 1 Roma tomato, thinly sliced 1/2 cup shredded Asiago cheese Coat non-stick, oven-proof skillet with olive oil; heat on stove over medium heat. Add onion and mushrooms; sauté 8 to10 minutes or until soft. Add bell pepper and squash; cook 3 to 4 minutes.

In mixing bowl, combine eggs, basil, tarragon and sea salt; mix well.

Pour egg mixture over mushrooms and onions in pan.

Reduce heat to medium-low. When eggs begin to set, gently run a heatproof spatula around edge of skillet.

Cook until eggs are firm. While eggs are cooking, pre-heat oven broiler to medium-high.

Remove skillet from heat; place tomato slices on top of frittata, and sprinkle cheese. Place under oven broiler for a few minutes, until cheese is melted.

Recipe by Candice Kumai

It’s Publix, and the savings are easy.

Every week we publish our hundreds of sales items in the newspaper insert and also online, so you can take advantage of all our special offers. Our easy–to–spot shelf signs point out the deals and your register receipt will tally up your savings for you. Go to publix.com/save right now to make plans to save this week.