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They have called for more research, but also noted the many ways in which the pandemic wreaked havoc on African Americans. The study found that SIDS deaths increased by 15%, from 33.3 deaths per 100,000 babies born in 2019 to 38.2 per 100,000 babies born in 2020.
In data collection, both SIDS and incidents of accidental suffocation or strangulation fall under the umbrella term SUID, or sudden unexplained infant death. Unlike SIDS, the rates of SUIDs are categorized by race and ethnicity, and researchers found an increase in unexplained deaths in Black infants. They didn’t fnd an increase among any other group. The study’s author, Sharyn Parks Brown, said that the finding was absolutely a surprise. She is a senior epidemiologist for the
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Diego gave her awards of recognition; members of Congress and City Council members gave her the Gold Star Award for community involvement, as well as awards from the Business Development Center of San Diego County, Zeta Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., and the Finer Womanhood for Outstanding Christian Women organization, to name a few.
This phenomenal mother of three, grandmother of four, and great grandmother of one returned to her own education after becoming a mother. She earned an AA Degree in Child Development with honors, a B.A. and a Masters Degree in Business Administration and went on to earn a Phd Degree (Doctor of Business Administration.) If you saw her during the week, she was probably in old clothes working on some real estate project, as just everyday people. But if you saw her on Sunday, you saw the eloquent Dr. Kitty Reed in her Excalibur car, almost one of a kind here in San Diego.
Race:
Continued from cover ethnic and racial identities, both in the census and in gathering demographic information between head counts, have fueled editorials and think-tank essays as well as thousands of written comments by individuals in what is almost a Rorschach test for how Americans identify themselves.
The White House’s Office of Management and Budget is set to decide on new classifications next year and is hosting three virtual town halls on the subject this week.
Some conservatives question the process itself, saying the overarching premise that Americans need more ethnic categories will only accelerate Balkanization.
“By creating and deepening sub-national identities, the government further contributes to the decline of one national American identity,” wrote Mike Gonzalez, a senior fellow at The Heritage Foundation, in his personal comment posted on the OMB web page seeking public input.
That view contrasts sharply with those who say previous categories have overlooked nuances.
“This is certainly a singular moment and opportunity to greatly improve and enhance the accuracy and completeness of the data,’’ Mario Beovides, director of policy and legislative affairs for the NALEO Educational Fund, said during a recent forum.
The process also would combine the race and ethnic origin questions into a single query, because some
CDC’s Perinatal and Infant Health Team. “The racial and ethnic breakdowns of such deaths had been consistent for decades,” she said.
Reasons for the jump are reportedly unknown. The authors said that the increase could be a statistical anomaly. They said they would check the data for several more years to see if the increase was real or not. It could also reflect adjustments the National Association of Medical Examiners made in 2019 to how sudden infant deaths are classified on death certificates.
The guidance said finding babies on or near soft bedding was not enough to say the deaths were caused by suffocation, because there was no evidence the airways had been blocked. Those cases, according to the recommendations, should be classified as SIDS. “If the new guidance was followed, this could have led to increased reporting of SIDS,” the study authors wrote.
As a businesswoman, Dr. Reed held an active Real Estate license, was a licensed Tour Guide and Debt Consultant, and was honored by Women, Inc. She served as an Eastern Star Worthy Matron of Ruth Chapter #11 five times, for more than 60 years. But perhaps her greatest love was that of service to the Greater Life Baptist Church. She served on the church’s Board of Trustees for more than 10 years, and was Chairperson for distribution of food baskets for the needy for more than 15 years, purchasing most of the food with her own money as long as health allowed her to do so. The church has named its Greater Life center after her.
She served as a Sunday School teacher for more than 15 years. She was also a life member of the Ladies Auxiliary, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Post 5179 and a life member of Gold Star Wives of America, Inc. Her life was one well lived and her time well spent. She will be missed by all those who knew her or whose lives were touched by her efforts of service. Dr. Kitty Reed was 98 years old.
FEDS:
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County Metro Government and Louisville Metro Police Department “engage in a pattern or practice of conduct that deprives people of their rights under the Constitution and federal law.”
The report said the Louisville police department “discriminates against Black people in its enforcement activities,” uses excessive force and conducts searches based on invalid warrants. It also said the department violates the rights of people engaged in protected speech, like the street protests in the city in the summer of 2020 after Taylor’s death. Garland said some officers have assaulted people with disabilities and called Black people disparaging names.
“This conduct is unacceptable, it is heartbreaking,” Garland said. “It erodes the community trust necessary for effective policing and it is an affront to the vast majority of officers who put their lives on the line every day to serve Louisville with honor.”
The sweeping probe announced in April 2021 is known as a “pattern or practice” investigation – examining whether there is a pattern of unconstitutional or unlawful policing inside the department. The city will sign a negotiated agreement with the Justice Department and a federal officer will monitor the progress.
Louisville Mayor Craig Greenberg said the city “has wounds that are not yet healed.” grants, or even white individuals born in Africa, as well as reflecting their ancestors’ history in the U.S. Way, who is president of United Sons & Daughters of Freedmen, which describes itself as dedicated to restoring the broken promises from Reconstruction, also recommended substituting the word “population group” for “race.”
“We have to come to terms with where we’ve been, so we can get to where we want to be,” Greenberg said. Taylor, a 26-year-old Black woman, was roused from her bed by police who came through the door using a battering ram after midnight on March 13, 2020. Three officers fired shots after Taylor’s boyfriend, fearing an intruder, shot an officer in the leg. Taylor was struck several times and died at the scene.
The warrant used to enter her home is now part of a separate federal criminal investigation, and one former Louisville officer has already pleaded guilty to helping falsify information on the warrant. No drugs were found in Taylor’s home.
Two more officers are charged in the warrant probe, and a third, Brett Hankison, is charged with endangering Taylor and her neighbors with his shots into her apartment.
One of the attorneys for Taylor’s family, Ben Crump, said the family was encouraged by the Justice Department’s results.
“These findings, and LMPD’s expected cooperation with the DOJ’s recommended remedial measures, will help protect the citizens of Louisville and shape its culture of policing,” Crump said in a news release.
The report said Black motorists were more likely to be searched during traffic stops, and officers used neck restraints, police dogs and Tasers against people who posed no imminent threat. Garland cited one incident where two officers threw drinks at pedestrians and recorded the encounters. Those incidents happened in 2018 and 2019. Both officers are facing federal charges.
Louisville police have undergone five leadership changes since the Taylor shooting, and new Mayor Craig Greenberg is interviewing candidates for the next chief. The city has settled a number of lawsuits related to the incident, including a $12 million payment to Taylor’s family that ended a wrongful death lawsuit.
Garland also mentioned some reforms the city has undergone since Taylor’s death, including a city law banning the use of “no-knock” warrants in 2020. The warrants are typically used in surprise drug raids. The city also started a pilot program that aims to send behavioral health professionals to some 911 calls, expanded community violence prevention efforts and sought to support health and wellness for officers, the report said.
Conflating “African American” with “Black” has ‘’blurred what it means to be an African American in this country,” Way, who works for a pharmaceutical company in Athens, Georgia, said in a telephone interview.
Haskins, a retired government worker from Lansing, Michigan, suggested eliminating race categories like ‘’white’’ and “Black” since they perpetuate “deeply rooted unjust socio-political constructs.”
Xernona:
Continued from cover of rapper T.I., and Mary Tucker, mother of comedian Chris Tucker. Clayton was also a consistent supporter of the Black Press across the country.
Martin Luther King III reflected on his memories of Clayton growing up. “There is no greater honor than what is being done here today,” said King III.
At the unveiling, Clayton recalled arranging logistics for a meeting between Dr. King and supporters of the SCLC in the heart of Atlanta. “I pride myself in getting everything right before I start out, and I knew I had all my details in order for this special luncheon hosted by Dr. King, but everything went wrong,” Clayton said. The motel, which supposedly had an “open door policy,” expressly told Dr. King to leave. “I Xernona Clayton was thrown out of a hotel. Now, you are standing backed by a street named Xernona Clayton Way.”
“The idea for a monument to Xernona Clayton was born from a 4 a.m. meeting with her in 2020. Our kids didn’t know who she was, and we felt that such an inspiring figure deserved recognition,” s aid Project Co-Founder Mariela Romero, a Latina journalist, originally from Venezuela, who co-presented the idea for the statue and has been one of the forces helping to make the monument a reality. Romero said when she learned about Clayton’s contributions to the Civil Rights movement and all her personal accomplishments, she was surprised that more Americans of all races did not know about her life story and legacy.
Clayton became involved in the civil rights movement working for the National Urban League in Chicago. She went undercover to investigate employment discrimination against African Americans at Marshall Fields, a major Chicago
See XERNONA page 14 together, one loses a lot of important granularity that can help differentiate issues that are specific to one group and not another,” Parekh said. The MENA community appears to be having a related problem, based on several comments to OMB. Without its own category, the group’s political power is diluted. People could benefit from cohesive representation, especially if identities were taken into account in drawing political districts, advocates said. advocates say the current method of asking about race and separately about ethnic origin often confuses Hispanic respondents. With the revisions, the government would try to get more detailed answers on race and ethnicity by asking about country of origin.
It comes down to something even more personal for Houda Meroueh, who described herself to the Biden administration as a 73-year-old Arab American woman.
Another proposal recommends striking from federal government forms the words “Negro” and “Far East,” now widely regarded as pejorative. The terms “majority” and
“minority” would also be dropped because some officials say they fail to reflect the nation’s complex racial and ethnic diversity.
Several Black Americans, like Way, whose ancestors were enslaved, said in public comments to the OMB that they would like to be identified in a category such as American Freedmen, Foundational Black Americans or American Descendants of Slavery to distinguish themselves from Black immi-
Instead, he said people should be able to self-identify as they wish. When his sociologist daughter points out the difficulty of aggregating such data into something useful to address inequalities in housing or voting, or tailoring health or education programs to the needs of communities, he tells her, “Go crazy at it. That’s what you’re being paid for.”
“You need to search for the truth and not just stay with the old categories because someone decided, ‘That is what we decided,’” Haskins said.
Parekh is asking the government to distinguish South Asians from East Asians.
“When these groups are assessed
‘’When I go to the doctor’s office I do not feel they have the information necessary to understand my medical history or my culture,’’ she said. ‘’For all these reasons I want to be counted as who I am. Not as white.’’
Jordan Steiner said ethnic categories should be expanded to include not only MENA, but other groups like Jews who often regard themselves not only as members of a religious group but an ethnic one too.
Jessica Aksoy commended the proposals to expand the categories, saying she often felt limited about which boxes to check as someone of Turkish, European and Jewish heritage.
“Recognizing our differences is honoring and celebrating the rich melting pot of America,” Aksoy said. “The face of America is changing, and this initiative is for progress in recognizing that.”