July 11th, 2019 Edition

St. LouiS AmericAn

Grand jury dismissed in Gardner case

Gardner’s attorney questions roles of special prosecutor, judge

By Rebecca Rivas

Of The St. Louis American

The gag order over the William Tisaby case expired on Monday, July 8 — at the end of the grand jury’s term.

And on July 10, St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner’s attorney came out with a heated statement.

“In my almost 20 years as a civil rights attorney, there are few matters I’ve worked on as troubling as the sham investigation into St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner,” attorney Roy Austin, who is based in Washington, D.C., said in a statement.

“From start to finish, this process has been a thinly veiled attempt by St. Louis’s old boys network to manipulate the law in order to exact political revenge for Circuit Attorney Gardner’s efforts to reform the criminal justice system, conduct full and fair investigations of police misconduct, and hold former Governor Eric Greitens accountable for his personal actions.”

On June 14, Tisaby — the circuit attorney’s private investigator during Greitens’ felonious invasion of privacy trial — was indicted on six counts of felonious perjury charges and one count of tampering with evidence.

While the indictment was for Tisaby, Gardner’s actions were highlighted just as much in the 30-page document. The indictment states that Gardner was present during Tisaby’s deposition and knew what he said was wrong but didn’t correct the record.

The Tisaby deposition ultimately led to Gardner dropping the case. Greitens later resigned as governor.

Gardner has not been able to comment on the charges because of the

‘If we weren’t going to do it for our children, who would?’

ACLU wins appeal over Ashcroft

Will proceed with referendum process on abortion ban

By Sandra Jordan Of The St. Louis American

Secretary of State John (Jay) Ashcroft appeals the case to the Missouri Supreme Court and prevails, Missouri voters will have a chance to reject the abortion ban after eight weeks (with no exceptions for incest or other forms of rape) signed into law by Missouri

Governor Mike Parson.

A three judge panel in the Western District Court of

n “Blocking the ballot box was a cowardly move designed to silence the people’s voice.”

– Tony Rothert, ACLU of Missouri

Appeals upheld the constitutional right of Missourians to a voter referendum on Monday, July 8, in a suit filed by the ACLU of Missouri. The panel ruled that Ashcroft acted illegally in his

Learning to swim for safety’s sake

Historic black neighborhood honored with statue

By Francene Bethune

For The St. Louis American

Mia Daugherty lives in a neighborhood where poverty is nothing new and school is often an afterthought, but from the moment her daughter was born she was determined to forge a bright future here for her daughter. Daugherty serves as one of the organizers of the Village of Moms. She, along with other moms, came together early last year to think of problems within the black community that they can address. They started with literacy.

“When you look at it, black children in our community read at least two grade levels lower than the other children in different neighborhoods,” said Daugherty. “So something needed to be done about it.” The organization hosted its second annual Reading Village at the

See MOMS, A6 Village of Moms promotes literacy in the black community

Barbre Park in Webster Groves hosts sculpture by Preston Jackson depicting scenes from history

oldest AfricanAmerican communities in the St. Louis region. Longtime resident Kathryn Dehart remembers when black grocery stores and businesses flourished in the community.

“We had everything in North Webster,” said Dehart, who is part of the North Webster Neighborhood Coalition. “I have lived here all my life. There are some of you out there who have experienced the same thing I have. We have hoped this day would come.” Dehart spoke at the June 1 commemoration of a sculpture in Barbre Park that is meant to honor

See STATUE, A7

St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner Mica Chambers instructed Cyrus Reed, 8, how to float on his back during a

safety class at Boys & Girls Clubs of Greater St. Louis’ Herbert Hoover campus on Monday, July 8.

the 5th year in a row, the

Photo by Bill Greenblatt / UPI

By Rebecca Rivas Of

Photo by Wiley Price

Webster Groves dedicated a sculpture in tribute to its African-American community of North Webster in Barbre Park on Saturday, June 1.

Freeform fires back at racist Halle Bailey haters

While the studio has yet to respond to the bigoted backlash over last week’s announcement of the casting of Halle Bailey as Ariel in the upcoming live action production of “The Little Mermaid,” Freeform, a Disney-owned TV network, issued a scathing statement on Sunday defending the decision. The African-American singer/actress, who is also half of the sibling R&B duo Chloe x Halle stars on the network’s series “Grown-ish.”

adding, “Black Danish people, and thus mer-folk, can also genetically (!!!) have red hair.”

In an Instagram post entitled, “An open letter to the Poor, Unfortunate Souls,” Freeform wrote that while Hans Christian Andersen, the original author of the fairy tale, was Danish, “Ariel... is a mermaid” and a fictional character. And even if Ariel is Danish, the network wrote, “Danish mermaids can be black because Danish *people* can be black,”

The fiery post continued: “So after all this is said and done, and you still cannot get past the idea that choosing the incredible, sensational, highlytalented, gorgeous Halle Bailey is anything other than the INSPIRED casting that it is because she ‘doesn’t look like the cartoon one’, oh boy, do I have some news for you...about you.”

A$AP Rocky remains locked up in Sweden after denied appeal

Last week, Harlem rapper A$AP Rocky was detained in Stockholm, Sweden after getting into a fist fight with a pair of overly aggressive fans. French news outlet France 24 reported that his appeal for release until his first hearing

has been denied. “On Friday, a Swedish district court decided the 30-year-old artist, whose real name is Rakim Mayers, should be kept in custody while prosecutors investigate a June

30 street brawl,” France 24 said. Mayers’ lawyer, Henrik Olsson Lilja, immediately appealed the decision, but was denied by the court of appeals. He told AFP on Monday

that his client had therefore chosen to appeal the decision to Sweden’s Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court will decide later this week on whether to look at the case, but it only accepts a fraction of cases submitted, accepting those it thinks will provide guidance for the lower courts in future cases.

Meanwhile, fellow A$AP crew member A$AP Ferg said that the rapper is being held in inhumane conditions.

Stevie Wonder confirms kidney transplant rumors

“He’s in Sweden locked up in solitary confinement with no visit or phone call privilege,” Ferg said via Instagram. “They are trying to keep him there for two weeks and if convicted, he will be looking at six years for just defending himself in a fight. He was in no way or form the aggressor in this ordeal.”

Over the past few weeks, there have been rumors that R&B icon Stevie Wonder was suffering from kidney failure. The music star confirmed the news at a Hyde Park concert and gave fans an update on his health.

“So, what’s gonna happen is this: I’m going to have surgery,” Wonder told his fans during the performance. “I’m going to have a kidney transplant in September of this year. I’m all good. I have a donor, it’s all good. I want you to know that I came here to give you my love – and to thank you for your love. You don’t have to hear no rumors about nothing, I’ve told you what’s up – and it’s going to be all good.”

Sources: People.com, France 24, Instagram.com

THE STUFF THAT HAS PEOPLE TALKING

Halle Bailey

Stevie Wonder

A$AP Rocky

One year after IHOP police incident with black Wash U students

St. Louis teenager Teddy Washington reflects on racial profiling experience

By Chad Davis Of St. Louis Public Radio

The series is produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center.

On July 7, 2018, when Teddy Washington was walking with nine other black incoming Washington University students from the IHOP in Clayton back to campus, the last thing he expected was for the night to end in a confrontation with police officers.

“The emotions I think was mostly shock, but it’s that initial adrenaline rush that you just kind of freeze,” Washington, now 18, said. That shock came when Clayton police officers saw Washington and the other students walking on Brentwood Boulevard and confronted the group. The officers were responding to a report from IHOP employees about a recent “dine-and-dash” incident at the restaurant. Washington and his fellow students had just finished eating at the IHOP and were then walking from the nearby CVS.

employees told the officers these customers were not the ones who left without paying.

“There were no MetroLinks at that time of the morning anymore, so we walked back to Wash U and everything kind of sunk in on the walk back,” Washington said. It was after midnight. A weekend outing to a concert had ended on a sour note. The incident made local and national headlines after many in the community accused Clayton police of racial profiling. As a result, the department eventually apologized for its response and met with the Wash U students, their families and faculty. But a year later, the incident still lingers on the family’s minds.

For Washington, the experience was something new. He said this was the first time he had been through what he describes as racial profiling. It made him examine what he identifies as his own “privilege” as a middleclass African American who attended St. Louis University High School and now attends Wash U.

one, I guess if you want to call it a ‘privilege’ I had in high school, is the fact that my uncle was chief of police. So it was like I took comfort in that.”

Washington said several of the students showed the officers their receipts. Then they all walked back to the restaurant to prove they had paid. That’s when IHOP

“It’s interesting because Teddy talked about feeling privileged, which is amazing to me really, and it’s a blessing,” said Denise Washington, Teddy Washington’s mother. “The

Both Theo and Denise Washington grew up in different environments than their son Teddy and their daughter, Caroline. Theo Washington attended Parkway West High School through the desegregation program and lived in 22 different addresses

in his first 22 years. Denise Washington grew up in North St. Louis and also participated in the desegregation program to Parkway West. For them, racial profiling experiences are not new.

“Did I think things like that could happen? Absolutely. But what we’ve always tried to teach the kids, you behave in different ways in certain environments,” Denise Washington said.

Some of those lessons include making it clear to the world that Teddy Washington’s car is in fact his vehicle. Denise Washington said she has told him to make sure bumper stickers from SLUH and Wash U are prominently displayed as an extra precaution.

“We immediately put his SLUH sticker in the window and the SLUH license plate around St. Louis University High,” Denise Washington

said. “We were like, ‘It’s important that you especially make it clear to people what community you belong to, and in saying that, I know that it’s not necessarily fair, but it is what it is.’”

The incident sparked several changes for the Clayton Police Department, including the introduction of more regular sensitivity training sessions. The Washington family says the discussions with the police department were effective but they want to see dialogue on race-related issues and stereotypes continue.

Teddy Washington hopes having those discussions about the incident will spark more reforms.

“I think it brought reality to those situations,” Teddy Washington said. “It made me keenly aware that there are things that we need to fix as far as relationships with black people and police, and there’s a responsibility with having those interactions and doing something to change them.” Clayton officials, including the city manager, said last year that they mishandled the situation and that the meeting with the students, family members and Wash U faculty was “emotionally powerful.” Follow Chad on Twitter @ iamcdavis.

You can learn more about Teddy and the Washington family at http:// beforefergusonbeyondferguson. com/.

Reprinted with permission from news.stlpublicradio.org.

Photo by Chad Davis / St. Louis Public Radio

Theo Washington, 46, and Denise Washington, 46, heard about the racial profiling incident through an email from Washington University faculty days after the event.

Teddy Washington

Crime Commission president playing dangerous game with circuit attorney

The St. Louis Crime Commission sounds like a government body but is not; it’s a private non-profit organization. Its president is Edward L. Dowd Jr., a litigator and partner at Dowd Bennett, as well as a member of a local legal dynasty. Dowd appeared in positive news coverage on Monday, July 8, handing the nonprofit’s $200,000 donation to Better Family Life for its commendable work, frequently reported and discussed in these pages, preventing and deescalating violence.

“So many people are doing so much to help save lives in St. Louis,” Dowd stated in his media opportunity. “The citizens of St. Louis, the Attorney General, the U.S. Attorney, the Mayor, our Chief of Police and the Crime Commission working with citizens like James Clark and organizations like Better Family Life, the Regional Business Council and Civic Progress are making real progress.” Notably absent from the city’s professional crime-fighting team that Dowd credited with saving lives in St. Louis is Circuit Attorney Kimberly Gardner. It is easy to see why. And it explains why some of attorney Dowd’s recent actions are more likely to spur unrest in St. Louis than prevent violence or save lives.

Dowd was part of then-governor Eric Greitens’ high-powered legal defense team when Gardner charged Greitens with felonious invasion of privacy; a women claimed Greitens took a semi-nude photo of her without her consent and then transferred it in a way that it could be accessed by a computer. After Gardner dropped her charges, Greitens’ defense team went into offense against the elected St. Louis prosecutor, pursuing perjury charges against an investigator, William Tisaby, hired by Gardner in the Greitens case when she found the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department unresponsive. However, the police were very responsive when Greitens’ legal team pursued Tisaby, as was City Counselor Julian Bush.

Despite the fact that Public Safety Director Jimmie Edwards, a former judge who officially oversees the police department, does not think charges should have been pursued regarding Tisaby’s testimony made in a deposition to defense lawyers, rather than before the bench in open court. However, Edwards’ former colleague Circuit Judge Michael K. Mullen appointed a special prosecutor to pursue Tisaby, and that special prosecutor was none other than Gerard Carmody, another private attorney, a principal

James Clark of Better Family Life accepts a check from Edward L. Dowd Jr., president of the private non-profit St. Louis Crime Commission, to support violence de-escalation efforts on Monday, July 8.

at Carmody MacDonald and friend of Dowd’s dating back to high school. Carmody got a grand jury to indict Tisaby for multiple charges of perjury (in a deposition) and tampering with evidence, though Gardner’s attorney believes that Gardner was the real target of the investigation, which we believe to be undeniable.

When the grand jury was dismissed without indicting Gardner, the St. Louis region likely dodged a bullet. Jerryl Christmas, a private attorney helping to organize community support for Gardner, expressed shock that this legal circus against the city’s first black prosecutor – perpetrated by a group of unelected white attorneys, the police and a compliant mayor – is playing out as the clock ticks toward the fiveyear anniversary of Michael Brown’s police killing in Ferguson. We wish we could say we are shocked, but the white establishment’s estrangement from the black community makes anything possible here. We think it is good that the non-profit Dowd leads gave Better Family Life some money. But we think Dowd was wrong to exclude Gardner from the list of crimefighting lifesavers in the city. And we believe that the brazen game he and others are playing with Gardner is a dangerous game that could cost us dearly if it continues.

AS I SEE IT – A Forum for community Issues

Independence Day belongs to the people, not Trump

By Eugene Robinson For The St. Louis American

President Trump chose the wrong backdrop for his attempt to make Independence Day all about himself. Standing beneath the majestic statue of Abraham Lincoln, occupying a space where great orators have stood, Trump looked and sounded quite small. He gave a triumphalist speech, of course. “Our nation is stronger today than it ever was. It is its strongest now,” Trump claimed. He went on to give extended salutes to each of the nation’s armed services, punctuated by flyovers by Coast Guard, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Army aircraft and the singing of the corresponding anthems. Anyone who came to see an elaborate military pageant did not go home disappointed.

Trump declared that “we are one people chasing one dream and one magnificent destiny,” but that misses the point. We are, in fact, a nation, bound together not by blood but by our creeds, our institutions and our laws. Trump treats the law like an inconvenience, an annoyance. Missing, as Trump spoke in Lincoln’s shadow, was any sense of humility as a vital aspect of American greatness. But you might have guessed that.

Since he visited French President Emmanuel Macron two years ago and witnessed the Bastille Day parade in Paris, Trump has wanted a big military extravaganza of his own. On July 4, he got one – and, predictably, he put himself smack at the center of it.

All week, reporters and citizen-journalists spotted heavy-duty Defense Department hardware being trucked into town for Trump’s martial-themed celebration of “your favorite president, me” – Bradley Fighting Vehicles, M1A2 Abrams tanks, an M88A2 Hercules recovery vehicle. The flyovers included a B-2 stealth bomber, two F-22 Raptors, two V-22 Ospreys, two F/A-18 Super Hornets, two F-35s, one of the planes used as Air Force One, the famed Blue Angels and various other military aircraft. All that was missing was a reviewing stand, like the one on Red Square where grimfaced Soviet leaders used to watch the tanks roll past. Oh, wait, there was a reviewing stand of sorts – a closed-off VIP section near the Lincoln Memorial where Republican Party donors and bigwigs could sit up front, basking in the glow of their maximum leader. Democratic Party luminaries were not invited.

That is outrageous, of course, but not surprising. It was clear from the beginning that Independence Day meant nothing more to Trump than an opportunity to choreograph a made-for-television reelection event and give himself an obscenely expensive ego massage.

Presidents, as a rule, have treated the Fourth of July with special reverence because they understand that the day belongs to us, not to them. The few attempts by presidents to take partisan advantage of the holiday have not gone well.

In 1970, at the height of unrest over the Vietnam War, Independence Day was turned into something called “Honor America Day” – an extravaganza staged, like Trump’s, at the Lincoln Memorial. President Richard M. Nixon videotaped a speech to be played at the event; even

Reparations

he had the good sense not to attend in person, instead decamping to his home in California.

That event, billed as apolitical and nonpartisan, turned out to be anything but. Evangelist Billy Graham led off by blasting opponents of the war as “a relatively small extremist element.” Raucous, drum-beating protesters came out in force; some of them overturned a Good Humor truck, prompting riot police to move in. A few neo-Nazis showed up for good measure. The smell of tear gas hung in the air. Before going onstage, the program’s host, comedian Bob Hope, reportedly surveyed the scene and quipped: “It looks like Vietnam, doesn’t it?”

Actually, it looked like an America that didn’t care to be told how to think about Independence Day.

That’s what this July 4 looked like, too. Protesters were not allowed to fly the now-famous “Baby Trump” balloon, so they inflated it and sat it on the Mall. MAGA hats and Trump T-shirts abounded. There was some friction between pro- and anti-Trump revelers, including a brief clash near the White House at the scene of a flag-burning whose organizers had been granted an official permit.

This is the most collective of our holidays, in that it celebrates our common heritage and enterprise, but it is also the most individual. It commemorates not a battle but a document, and each of us gets to decide what the Declaration of Independence means -- what patriotism entails, what the flag represents, what the fireworks symbolize. Your view of what the Fourth of July means is every bit as valid as the president’s. Mine is, too, and it excludes fighters and bombers over the Lincoln Memorial.

for slavery are not about

By Mike Jones Of The St. Louis American

Reparation is making amends for a wrong one has done by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged. It’s this notion of financial compensation for the descendants of enslaved people of African descent that is usually the focus of the reparations debate.

Columnist

Mike Jones

The great moral failing of capitalism is that it can determine the price of anything but the value of almost nothing. Capitalism turns everything into a commodity. This commodification requires the objectification of the natural world, including human beings.

In 1860 there were 31 million people in the United States, and 4 million were classified as slaves. These enslaved people were the descendants of the estimated 400,000 Africans forcibly brought to Colonial America. They had their lives, their futures and their labor stolen from them. But they were also robbed of something more valuable, their humanity. America robbed them of their identity as human beings and defined them as property to be sold like any other commodity, all for the sake of profit.

My question for those demanding financial compensation for the 240 years of oppression and uncompensated labor is: what is the value of those lives and how do you calculate it?

One reason for not considering reparations in economic terms is that America is still a crooked game. Any professional gambler will tell you that you can’t beat a crooked game,

the money

unless it’s your crooked game. No matter how much money you bring, you’re going home broke. If your money holds, your luck won’t change.

America was designed to guarantee white success at the expense of everyone not white. The token nonwhite success story is a function of allowing suckers to believe everyone has a fair chance of winning.

If America wrote a check to Black America for reparations for slavery without changing this crooked game, African Americans would have as much a chance of changing the trajectory of our collective lives as the clueless amateur has in a poker game with professional gamblers.

When we frame the discussion of reparations in economic terms, we fall into the same moral rabbit hole as the perpetrators.

Asserting a claim for monetary compensation presumes there is a dollar amount that is the moral equivalent of the stolen lives of millions of enslaved African Americans. It says that America could write a check that says, “They’re good, and we’re straight.” The value of what America has stolen from the descendants of the African Diaspora cannot be calculated. To put a price on their exploitation is to insult their memory and dishonor their sacrifice.

All people, all societies and cultures have a creation myth. The creation myth tells the story of how a culture or a people came to be and, more importantly, who they are and what’s their place in the universe. A creation myth is not to be confused with history, which is the study of the past as described in documents and testimony.

While all creation myths are made up, they’re usually made up in the period of prehistory, before written records. So as societies evolved, their creation stories came to be understood metaphorically, not literally. No educated Italian believes Romulus and Remus

Letters to the Editor

Fully fund foreign aid

Rebecca Rivas’ excellent column “Immigration crisis: what can St. Louisans do?” notes many actions that can be taken to address the plight of immigrants. I would add to this list the need to demand action by our elected political leaders. In retaliation for the influx of migrants from Central America, President Trump has announced plans to drastically cut U.S. foreign aid to Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala. This action is both meanspirited and counterproductive.

A reader called me and found an error of fact in one of my columns. I referred to the greatest commandment as

The programs slated for elimination or reduction, by reducing poverty, violence and instability, actually deter migration because they make it easier for residents of these countries to thrive at home. Cutting these programs will simply cause more people to flee.

We must call on our members of Congress to oppose these cuts and fully fund foreign aid programs for Central America.

Greg Campbell Creve Coeur

Love the Lord

was raised by a wolf; no Brit takes the story of King Arthur literally.

The American creation myth is that America was founded by Europeans escaping religious oppression and others seeking an opportunity for a better way of life, and they ultimately had to revolt against their English overlords to ensure the blessings of liberty for them and their prosperity.

The historical truth is much different, America was colonized by a bunch of religious bigots and amoral soldiers of fortune looking to do in the New World what they couldn’t do in the Old World. But since we’re now in the historical era, the record had to twisted and distorted to support the creation myth. What you think of as American history is really an alibi for a 240-year crime spree of genocide and slavery.

Reparations is correcting the historical record and destroying the creation myth that allows white Americans to rationalize their place on the up escalator and to justify to themselves the failure of people of color to go up the down escalator. This is what our ancestors are owed for their lives and their labor. Then history will fairly judge America.

As Omar and Brother Mouzone told Stringer Bell in The Wire, “You don’t get it. This isn’t about money.”

Mike Jones is a former senior staffer in St. Louis city and county government and current member of the Missouri State Board of Education and The St. Louis American editorial board. In 2016 and 2017, he was awarded Best Serious Columnist for all of the state’s large weeklies by the Missouri Press Association, and in 2018 he was awarded Best Serious Columnist in the nation by the National Newspapers Association.

Correction

Due to an editing error, Lindsay Jones’ report on the Normandy Schools Collaborative’s STEM partnership with the Parkway School District was credited to Bridjes O’Neil. We regret the error.

love thy neighbor when we all know it is love the Lord our God. I want to thank her for the notification and apologize to anyone else offended by my mistake. James Washington Dallas, Texas

Columnist

Eugene Robinson

Photo by Bill Greenblatt / UPI

Louis civil rights icon Percy Green II pinned a captains badge onto his son Percy Green III, during promotion ceremonies at the St. Louis Fire Department headquarters in St. Louis on Thursday June 27. The elder Green was active in the St. Louis chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality and was a founding member of ACTION. He was also the plaintiff in the landmark civil rights case McDonnell Douglas Corp v. Green

Town Hall Meeting in Florissant on July 15

State Representative Alan Gray will host a Town Hall Meeting and Open Forum 5-7:30 p.m. Monday, July 15 at Christ Our Redeemer AME Church, 13820 Old Jamestown Rd. in Florissant.

Topics of discussion will include Board of Freeholders, St. Louis County government, Jamestown Mall, and Shop N Save Stores. St. Louis County Executive Sam Page and attorney Elbert Walton will be guests. Councilwoman Rochelle Walton Gray and the St. Louis County Council are co-sponsors.

To register for this event or for more information, email Alan.Gray@ house.mo.gov or call 573-751-5538.

Conference on Ending Violence on August 9-10

The Joshua Transformation Project will host its 2nd annual Conference on Ending Violence in America, in conjunction Harris-State Stowe University, August 9-10 at Beloved Community United Methodist Church at 3115 Park Ave. There will be a series of solution- based workshops and national speakers on non-violence an violence prevention. All participants at the conference will be trained on violence prevention and intervention strategies. Internationally known expert on violence, Dr. Bandy Lee of Yale University, will be the conference speaker and a workshop leader. She will speak at Harris-Stowe State University’s Emerson Theatre Auditorium at 3 p.m. Friday, August 9. Conference attendees can register at the church on either day starting at 10 a.m. For more information, contact the conference director, Pastor Richard C. Dalton, at Richarddalton87@gmail.com or 937-3041330.

Missouri must fight back against Republican gerrymandering

By Jamala Rogers For The St. Louis American

The U.S. Supreme Court just didn’t pass the buck on the issue of gerrymandering. It refused to carry out its duty to uphold basic constitutional protections. The ruling makes the passage of Missouri’s Amendment 1 last November even more significant.

Instead of standing up for democracy, the high court stood down, deciding that legal claims for redress were “beyond the reach of the federal courts.” The power should stay in the hands of state legislature no matter how racist, partisan or undemocratic these bodies were. The SCOTUS opinion was a crushing blow for states needing some relief from the powergrabbing hands of Republican-dominated state legislatures.

Some of us anticipated that the fight for voter rights was moving into a new era when the U.S. Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act (Shelby County v. Holder) in 2013. It opened the gates for the GOP to run buck wild with an aggressive voter suppression campaign that included stepping up gerrymandering to consolidate power. Unfortunately, the Democratic Party was slow to realize the impact and even slower to put its own offensive efforts into play.

The GOP now has a super-majority in 30 state houses. Scary. In eight of those states, there is a Democratic governor thanks to voters. Take Wisconsin, for example. Unlike Missouri, it has a Democratic governor, lieutenant governor, attorney general, secretary of state, state treasurer and U.S. senator. Democrats also won roughly 53 percent of the statewide vote for House seats but only took home 36 percent of the seats. Yet Republicans are still in control based on the redistricting map the party drew in 2011.

The Wisconsin voters’ lifeline is that Governor Tony Evers, a Democrat who was elected last year, has veto power. He’s vowed to use all the powers of his office to guarantee that elections will be fair and accessible. Should the state assembly come up with a partisan, gerrymandered map, Governor Evers stands ready with the proverbial veto pen. Since the SCOTUS ruling in 2013, forward-thinking stakeholders in Missouri started to scrutinize our political reality. We knew we couldn’t rely on the good graces of a Republican governor nor the stacked state and federal courts to look out for us. That’s why a progressive coalition took matters into its own hands and worked to present a ballot initiative to voters last November to address redistricting, campaign finance and political lobbying. Amendment 1, also known as Clean Missouri, was overwhelmingly passed by voters across the state.

The importance of Amendment 1 has now come front and center, particularly the component on redistricting.

Before the passage of Amendment 1, Missouri was one of a handful of states whose redistricting map was done by a commission of equally appointed Republican and Democrats. The map had to be approved by 70 percent of the commission members.

Under the new scenario, the redistricting map is in the hands of a state demographer whose selection process and qualifications were carefully crafted to minimize any political shenanigans. The district maps must follow a list of strict criteria spelled out in the constitutional amendment designed to create districts based on “partisan fairness and competitiveness.”

Any changes would still have to be approved by 70 percent of the commissioners, but it must also adhere to the Amendment 1’s criteria for fair redistricting – rooted in the language and spirit of the national Voting Rights Act. Not to comply with the law is a crime.

Our intent was to take district mapping out of the hands of politicians looking out for special interests. There are opportunities for accountability on several levels along the way. Elected officials, community leaders and voters must all be woke if we are serious about protecting and expanding voting rights. Our fight is to make sure the new law is followed every step of the way as the primary way to guarantee fairer voting districts and reduce gerrymandering.

Missouri will be a test ground on how we approach the census and redistricting. Given the political terrain, defenders of democracy have a big fight on our hands. Together, it’s a fight we must organize to win.

Percy Green III becomes fire captain

Jamala Rogers

St.

Photo by Bill Greenblatt?UPI

Continued from A1

O’Fallon Park Recreation Center on Saturday, June 29. They filled the gym with 50 vendors such as Paraquad, Women and Infants Center, YWCA, St. Louis Public Library, Family Forward, Barefoot Books, Affinia Healthcare, and Operation Food Search. They handed out free books, food, and advice.

n “The reading levels are low, and we as moms need to start first to fix the problems within our community.”

– Mia Daugherty

“It takes a whole village,” Daugherty said. “If we weren’t going to do it for our children, then who would?”

The Village focused on hunger and healthy eating within the community, as well as literacy.

“We have Operation Food Search here to demonstrate how to prepare a healthy meal,” said Daugherty. Operation Food Search provided meals for over 200 people who attended the event.

Healthcare providers also were available for parents to seek advice.

“St. Louis has one of the highest infant mortality rates for black babies, and a lot of people do not realize that,” said Daugherty. “It is just another statistic about black kids that live in the city.” But literacy remains the groups focus.

“Black kids are just being passed along, and no one is doing anything about it,” Daugherty said. “The reading levels are low, and we as moms need to start first to fix the problems within our community,” she said. “I can’t ensure that this program will help, but I will do my best to combat it, to fight it, and bring awareness to the black community that suffers trauma and to break the cycle.”

For more information, visit the Village of Moms STL on Facebook page.

ACLU

Continued from A1

rejection of the referendum petition challenging the ban and ordered Ashcroft to allow signature collection to move forward. The ACLU said once ballot language is issued by Ashcroft, supporters will have until August 28 to collect 100,000 signatures in six congressional districts.

“The Missouri Legislature and Secretary Ashcroft tried to

block two constitutional rights – the right of the people to challenge a state law through referendum and the right of the people to receive an abortion,” said Tony Rothert, legal director and acting executive director for the ACLU of Missouri.

“Blocking the ballot box was a cowardly move designed to silence the people’s voice. We are pleased with the court’s decision and will evaluate next steps in ensuring this law does not go into effect.”

n “We are not afraid of the Missouri Supreme Court reviewing this case,” Rothert said. “We think that they would reach a similar conclusion.”

– Tony Rothert, ACLU of Missouri

Though the Republican super-majority passed the bill, a Republican governor signed it into law and Republican

secretary of state is trying to block the referendum, Rothert said the appellate ruling was not partisan.

“In this case, this is really about the right and the constitution – that the people kept the right to referendum to overrule the legislature,” Rothert told The American “That’s not a liberal versus conservative value – that is something that traditionally the courts have guarded safely.”

Rothert said it is very unusual for the secretary of state to act the way Ashcroft did, because traditionally, protecting the right of referendum has not been a partisan issue in Missouri.

Ashcroft and Attorney General Eric Schmitt moved on Tuesday to either have a rehearing of the decision or transfer the case to the Missouri Supreme Court.

“We are not afraid of the Missouri Supreme Court reviewing this case,” Rothert said. “We think that they would reach a similar conclusion –that the secretary of state was out-of-bounds in trying to take this referendum petition offtrack.”

Village of Moms hosted its second annual Reading Village at the O’Fallon Park Recreation Center on Saturday, June 29.

Photo by Francene Bethune

the historical neighborhood.

An 11 ½-foot soaring bronze sculpture by nationally known African-American artist Preston Jackson was placed in Barbre Park at the corner of Elm and Kirkham avenues on May 29. Barbre Park, which has recently been renovated, is adjacent to the dominant entrance to the North Webster neighborhood.

The sculpture depicts many scenes from the roots of the 150-year-old community and celebrates the history, contributions, and lives of the journey of African Americans in North Webster. Douglass School, businesses, churches, homes, and people are etched into the bronze tribute.

Stones from the Rock Hill Presbyterian Church, built in 1845, were included at the base. The church was demolished in 2012, but many of the stones from the church were recently retrieved to be added to this tribute.

“The Preston Jackson sculpture serves as a significant reminder for current and future generations of the journey of African Americans in our community,” said Webster Groves Mayor Gerry Welch. “The park, which contains educational signage about North Webster, will also be

Gardner

Continued from A1

gag order. Austin said that the indictment of Tisaby is so overblown that it’s a clear attempt to scare Tisaby into implicating Gardner in some way.

“It’s an attempt to get Mr. Tisaby to cooperate by presenting with something where he is going to face a lengthy jail sentence on a nonsensical case,” Austin told The American in an interview. “He is innocent, and is not going to play the special prosecutor’s game.”

And this game has been going on for a while now, Austin said. Around December, Special Prosecutor Gerard Carmody’s son, Patrick Carmody, allegedly called Tisaby’s attorney Jermaine Wooten to try and make a deal, according to an April 24 affidavit signed by Wooten.

Wooten stated that Patrick called him and asked if Tisaby had information on “others” and, if so, it would be to his

a gathering spot to reflect on our past, pay tribute to our rich, multi-cultural history, and provide an inspiration point for future friendships amongst all of our citizens.”

A committee of representatives from the North Webster Neighborhood Coalition and the Webster Groves Arts Commission worked with the city’s parks and recreation director over the past two years to make this project possible, Welch said.

client’s benefit.

“It was clear to me given the context of Mr. Carmody’s question that he was asking whether Mr. Tisaby had any information on Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner,” Wooten stated. The affidavit was referenced in an April 25 motion to disqualify Gerard Carmody as special prosecutor. At the time of the phone call to Wooten, the special prosecutor had not even issued its first search warrant to Gardner to get Tisaby’s correspondence, which happened on January 24 and the correspondence was provided on February 4, the motion states. Patrick denies that he tried to make a deal, according to Austin.

The American contacted the special prosecutor to see if he planned on continuing an investigation into Gardner. Gerard Carmody is out of town and not reachable, according to the office secretary. And no one else was available either, she said.

The Tisaby indictment raises questions about Gardner not providing her notes from

n “Many of these neighborhoods that were so much like North Webster don’t exist anymore, but miraculously this area is still here today.”

– sculptor Preston Jackson

The $150,000 in funding for the sculpture came from private donations, including a sizeable gift from the Steve and Linda Finerty Family Foundation.

Jackson said he wanted to create a sculpture that pointed upwards and towards the neighborhood, “like a single wing or a finger that had strong

n “In no time in my career have I witnessed a court that is unwilling to address very important legal issues with a written or oral legal analysis.”

– Roy L. Austin

her initial interview with K.S., Greitens’ hairdresser who alleged that Greitens took a semi-nude picture of without her consent and then transferred it in a way that it could be accessed by a computer.

Austin said that they have specific answers to all these implications, but they need to wait until the appropriate time, as they don’t know what the special prosecutor’s next

steps are. However, he did say that there’s a difference between what someone writes down “contemporaneously” and what someone does well after an in-person interview as they are putting together their legal opinions. Later thoughts and opinions are classic work product that no one turns over, he said.

“The bottom line is the special prosecutor has no clue what privilege is and what

directional qualities.”

Jackson wanted the residents to feel a sense of pride that they have endured despite their adversities, he said.

“They had their own governing, their own teachers, their own professionals,” Jackson said, “and with the help of majority cultures, abolitionists, they survived. I feel directly connected to it because it’s identical to my childhood. Many of these neighborhoods that were so

privilege means,” Austin told The American. “And there are certain things that are so clearly work product that they are not turned over in any investigation.”

Austin also said he was “stunned” at the role Circuit Judge Michael Mullen played as the judge overseeing the investigation. Many of their motions were denied without explanation, he said. Among those motions was disqualifying Gerard Carmody as special prosecutor because of his close ties to members of Greitens’ law team and his conflicts of interest.

“In no time in my career have I witnessed a court that is unwilling to address very important legal issues with a written or oral legal analysis,”

Austin told The American “I want to know the basis of the denial of our motion with respect to privilege. What is

much like North Webster don’t exist anymore, but miraculously this area is still here today.” Chris Mullen has born and raised in the neighborhood, as was her father, and she attended the June 1 commemoration event. She was particularly excited that the committee chose Jackson as the artist.

“It actually reflects the history of North Webster,” Mullen said. “I just hope there will be enough of us to tell that story and keep it alive.”

the law that supports handing over privileged material to anyone? I want to know the law that supports the search warrant that allows the police department to have access to files of investigations of police misconduct that have absolutely nothing to do with whether or not Tisaby did anything.”

Rumors have been swirling that the investigation into Gardner’s actions will continue. Austin said they have no idea if that’s the case.

“We are learning what we are learning from the media,” Austin told The American. “It would be the right thing to do for Jerry Carmody to send us an email and tell us what the status of the investigation is. But expecting him to do the right thing is something we’ve learned not to expect in this case.”

Sculptor Preston Jackson greeted residents when Webster Groves dedicated a sculpture in tribute to its AfricanAmerican community of North Webster in Barbre Park on Saturday, June 1.

Photo by Wiley Price

Free family fun at the Missouri History Museum

Fundisha Enterprises and Step into the Story bring African-American stories to life

By Ellen Kunkelmann Missouri History Museum

Do your kids have a serious case of summer slump? The Missouri History Museum has the cure. The Summer Family Fun series offers a wide variety of free programs inspired by local cultures and themes in the Museum’s exhibits.

Families are invited to the museum on Sunday afternoon, July 21, for a free performance of “Fundisha Family Folktale: The Saltwater Princess.” Mama Lisa Gage, the founder of Fundisha Enterprises, explained, “The Saltwater Princess is a tale of mystery about the moon. This production will mix African performance arts with its transformational forms as manifested in the Caribbean. There will be an emphasis on color and life in the sea. The music and dance will showcase original as well as familiar island favorites.”

n “PanAfrican culture deserves a platform to express its multifaceted antiquities, free from censorship and discrimination.”

– Mama Lisa

Since 1995, Fundisha Enterprises has provided African cultural arts education services, and for more than 15 years Mama Lisa has been working with the museum to bring African performance arts to children across the region. “Fundisha’s arts intend to uplift the creativity and intelligence of cultures that are sometimes marginalized,” Mama Lisa said. “Pan-African culture deserves a platform to express its multifaceted antiquities, free from censorship and discrimination.”

Fundisha’s productions begin with extensive research, often gathered through interviews, private lessons, and museum visits during Mama Lisa’s frequent travels throughout the Americas, the Caribbean, and Africa. She added, “Performance arts, in some cases, represent a genre of historical data not found in print. Its scope presents concepts that can be understood by a global audience.”

“The Saltwater Princess” is just one of many ways to share stories at the Missouri History Museum this summer. More than 100 children and caregivers gathered on June 27 to celebrate the fourth birthday of the museum’s History Clubhouse, a hands-on learning space for children. The party featured stories, unique crafts, festive birthday crowns, and—of course—cupcakes. Children were invited to gently pet or read aloud to Sergeant Pepper and Zoe, two touch-therapy dogs who work with CHAMP Assistance Dogs. Therapy dogs are regular guests at Step into the Story, a drop-in storytelling and activity program on Thursday mornings throughout the month of July.

At this program, children created shoeboxsized museums and drew birthday cakes for the History Clubhouse while listening to “Our Children Can Soar” and “Milo’s Museum,” two books about African-American history and cultural representation in museums.

Julius B. Anthony, president of St. Louis Black Authors of Children’s Literature and author of “Me! Ten Poetic Affirmations,” mentioned that only 6 percent of all children’s books feature African-American characters or families as the protagonists. “This renders an entire group of people invisible,” Anthony said. “All children have the right to see themselves in the books they read.” He said he appreciates how the museum’s Step into the Story program unites children from all over the city, giving them a chance

Mama Lisa Gage, founder of Fundisha Enterprises, said her production of the “The Saltwater Princess” at 3 p.m. Sunday, July 21 will “mix African performance arts with its transformational forms as manifested in the Caribbean.”

to learn together about different communities and perspectives. Since 2016, St. Louis Black Authors of Children’s Literature has worked with the museum to promote literacy and cultural representation.

Crystal Fisher, a preschool teacher, praised Step into the Story as a way of breaking up summer monotony and exposing kids to new, age-appropriate ideas. “This is all they’ll talk about on the bus ride back,” she predicted.

Mama Lisa encouraged families to attend the museum’s programs together for benefits that will last well beyond summer: “The important job of captivating a child’s imagination through storytelling will transfer into profound humanitarian efforts in the future. So experiencing and participating in cultural events as a family adds value in the eyes of a child.”

“Fundisha Family Folktale: The Saltwater Princess” will be performed on Sunday, July 21, at 3 p.m. in the Missouri History Museum’s Lee Auditorium. Mama Lisa and Fundisha Enterprises deliver this musical mystery that unlocks secrets from a child’s life on an island in the Caribbean. This free family event is open to all ages.

St. Louis Black Authors of Children’s Literature is committed to fostering awareness about the importance of early literacy by creating opportunities for all kids to have access to black children’s literature. Learn more at stlblackauthors.com. Step into the Story is part of the Summer Fun Family series at the Missouri History Museum, which runs through July 26. See mohistory.org/summerfamily-fun for daily schedules. The History Clubhouse is open daily from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission to the museum and clubhouse is free.

Ellen Kunkelmann is associate editor of the Missouri Historical Society.

Grand jury indicts East St. Louis officer

Veteran cop accused of billing for overtime pay while sitting at home

By James Ingram For The St. Louis American

Some of the hardest working, most dedicated, courteous and selfless police officers in America are members of the East St. Louis Police Department. I’ve witnessed it on countless occasions, from a distance and in my own personal encounters. It’s a thankless job, particularly in a highcrime community and with a shortage of manpower. That’s why it’s particularly perturbing when a rogue cop, instead of protecting and serving the community, engages in self-serving or criminal behavior unbefitting the badge they display.

Take the recent indictment by a federal grand jury of Mario Fennoy. He was a 21-year veteran and desk sergeant for the ESL police department.

Fennoy is accused by U.S. Attorney Steven D. Weinhoeft of submitting over 50 bogus claims (over 200 hours’ worth) for overtime pay (from April 2017 to March 2018), all while chilling in the comfort of his secondary home in East Boogie (he actually resides in Lebanon, Illinois).

Furthermore, the indictment (filed on June 18) alleges that “federal agents used various forms of…

surveillance” to determine that during that time Fennoy “falsely cleared calls and purported to respond to dispatches while never actually leaving his secondary home.”

This alleged administrative sleight of hand bumped Fennoy’s base salary from $69,382 to over $200,000 in total pay. He’s been on administrative leave, since May 2018, after former ESL City Manager Daffney Moore wisely called attention to the matter.

But this isn’t the first allegation of ethical conflicts

n When one allegedly shirks their responsibility, violates the public trust –especially of those in a poor community with already depleted services – it becomes a betrayal of the citizens that they pledged to serve.

for Fennoy. Previously, former State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly placed him on his “no-credibility” list.

And because ESL received over $10,000 of federal program funds during the period of Fennoy’s alleged fraudulent activity, he faces a maximum penalty of 10 years in a federal penitentiary (if convicted), as well as payment of $250,000 in restitution.

What makes these allegations even more egregious is the excessive greed and predatory nature

of the purported crime. No one denies that overtime is required in East Boogie, due to high crime and understaffing. It’s par for the course in such communities. However, when one allegedly shirks their responsibility, violates the public trust – especially of those in a poor community with already depleted services – it becomes a betrayal of the citizens that they pledged to serve, as well as a betrayal of their fellow officers who depend on them to, at the very least, to attempt to pull their weight, not sit in their easy chair while they’re on the clock.

It’s also another unforced error and blow to a community with an already bad political reputation. So in the span of one month, East Boogie has gone from celebrating state high school basketball and track championships to this, reverting from a reputation as a “city of champions” to a “city of felons.”

If these charges are true, then apparently the threat of federal incarceration hasn’t changed the political culture of the community, because too many politicians, bad cops and other blood suckers of the poor haven’t learned the lesson. Greed and selfishness continues to be the order of the day. I don’t know the answer but, obviously, a new paradigm is needed and, apparently, it won’t come from the federal prosecutor.

Email: jtingram_1960@ yahoo.com; Twitter@ JamesTIngram.

James Ingram

Changing the narrative on the police

American staff

Terrell Carter’s latest book “Police on a Pedestal: Responsible Policing in a Culture of Worship” begins with the African proverb, “Until the lion learns how to write, every story will glorify the hunter.” From there, his book outlines the idea that storytelling is the foundation for the current system of policing, especially in St. Louis.

“When I began the police academy in 1997, we were told that, as future police officers, we owned a magic pen. What that class instructor meant was that whatever we wrote in a police report about our experiences with citizens would likely be believed by prosecuting attorneys and juries,” Carter writes.

“We were in control of the narrative that was being shaped about our experiences with citizens and criminals. It was up to us to write in such a way that made us out to be the heroes and whoever we were dealing with as the villains. Even a casual observer of the relationships between police and minority citizens can see how this type of mindset can lead to trouble.”

Carter points out that this storytelling process used in law enforcement is not new.

“As the territory which would eventually become known as St. Louis grew and more white settlers arrived, they lived in fear of attack from

n “When I began the police academy in 1997, we were told that, as future police officers, we owned a magic pen.”

– Terrell Carter

Former St. Louis cop writes how problems with cops starts with the stories they tell “Police

Native Americans who did not want their land or resources unjustly taken from them,” Carter writes. “Years later, the organization that would eventually become the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department was started in part to protect white settlers from the retaliatory actions of Native Americans who previously occupied the land.”

Over time, these organized efforts to protect white settlers and their interests were adopted by people who wanted to protect the interests of Southern slave owners after the end of the Civil War. Instead of protecting whites from savages in the wilderness, people banded together to protect slave owners and corporations from the overreach of the Union and its efforts to bring an end to chattel slavery.

“After slavery ended, whites, especially those in the South, were not happy that African Americans had been granted their freedom. They could not imagine a world where African Americans were considered equal to them and living under their own direction,” Carter writes.

“So, after the Civil War and into Reconstruction, whites started militia groups whose primary purposes were to hunt down freedmen and runaway slaves and return them back to their former slaveowners or sell them to corporations where they would be forced into backbreaking physical labor. Many of these militia groups served as the predecessors to our modern police departments.”

Carter outlines how the storytelling process has been supported and utilized by not only police, but also by other groups that benefit from the current system of policing: “from private corporations that make millions of dollars from building and staffing new prison facilities, to lobbyists who become rich influencing legislators to institute laws that disproportionately affect minority communities, to lawyers who make their

bread and butter providing sub-standard legal counsel, and media outlets that make criminals out of entire people groups.”

Further, he writes, “These groups are not served well when someone begins to point out the inequities in our law enforcement system and they will push back against anyone who attempts to disturb the status quo.”

Carter said he tried to change the system from within when he was still a police officer, memories evoked my recent news events when the Plain View Project exposed racist comments that St. Louis officers posted on Facebook.

“In the past, I specifically wrote about one of the officers who was highlighted in those stories,” Carter says. “When I tried to expose his actions while I was an officer, I was threatened with retaliation. How many citizens could have avoided their lives being changed for the worse if people would have listened to me?” He said this points to a culture in police departments that must change before they can be reformed.

“The current system is unfair for officers who don’t want to go along with the status quo. If you decide to do what’s right, you do it at your own peril because if you bring one person down, it’s likely that others will do anything they can to protect themselves and the system that’s currently in place,” Carter says.

“That’s why I wrote ‘Police on a Pedestal’ – to continue to bring attention to how the story of policing is told and to try to give a voice to the citizens and officers who know that what often occurs on a daily basis isn’t right and the system desperately needs to be changed.”

“Police on a Pedestal: Responsible Policing in a Culture of Worship” is currently available through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and other book sellers.

St. Louis could start a movement for nuclear arms control

By Jason Sibert For The St. Louis American

The United States has built a defense that deforms the society it’s trying to defend.

And local government could be the key to changing this equation because politicians in a democratic republic are rattled by the power of public opinion that can be expressed in local governmental bodies. The Trump administration has chosen to classify the number of nuclear weapons the United States has and the number of nuclear warheads dismantled in 2018, according to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. Hans Kristensen of the Federation of American Scientists Nuclear Information Project said that the administration’s move takes pressure off nuclear armed states to engage in arms control efforts. Openness is essential for diplomacy and arms control; it gives diplomats the opportunity to honestly talk about arms control agreements and eliminates fear mongering and rumors.

Local governments could serve as a pressure point for the

federal government to engage in arms control efforts. The nuclear freeze movement of the 1970s and 1980s should serve as a template. The movement’s purpose was to stop a drift toward nuclear war through a United States/Soviet Russia agreement to stop the testing, production and deployment of nuclear weapons. Within a few years, nuclear freeze became a mass movement all over the U.S.

pressure from the freeze movement, U.S. Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and U.S. Senator Mark O. Hatfield (R-Ore.) announced they would introduce a freeze resolution in congress in 1982. The polls showed the American people supported the freeze.

The organizers in the movement started locally and went to organizations they belonged to for an endorsement of their ideas, as well as city councils, town halls and state legislatures. In the fall of 1982, the nuclear freeze was on the ballot in 10 states and 37 cities and counties around the country. The movement had a victory in nine states and all but three localities. By 1983, the freeze had been endorsed by 370 city councils, 70 town councils and one or more houses of 23 state legislators. President Ronald Reagan entered office in 1981 talking of a nuclear weapons buildup and the possibility of winning a nuclear war. Feeling the

n A new nuclear freeze movement must emerge to confront the Trump administration. It could start here in St. Louis.

The Nuclear Freeze Movement was successful in that the Reagan Administration toned down its nuclear rhetoric. President Reagan, who had opposed every arms control agreement in both Democratic and Republican administrations, later said that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” In 1983, as antinuclear arms proposals swept across the U.S. and Europe, Reagan told Secretary of State George Schultz that if the issue became more hot he would have to negotiate with Soviet leader Yuri Andropov on the elimination of nuclear weapons. When reformer Mikhail Gorbachev became the leader of Soviet Russia, Reagan negotiated the IntermediateNuclear Range Forces Treaty.

A new nuclear freeze movement must emerge to confront the Trump administration. The movement would work towards a defense based around arms control that is consistent with the ideals of a democratic republic. It could start here in St. Louis and spread around the country.

Jason Sibert is executive director of the Peace Economy Project.

Jason Sibert

Illinois raises age to buy tobacco to 21

Tobacco 21 reduces medical costs and improves Illinois’ health

of July

2019, people must now be at least 21 to buy tobacco in Illinois, including cigarettes, chewing tobacco, e-cigarettes, and vapes.

By Chris King Of The St. Louis American

As of July 1, 2019, people must now be at least 21 to buy tobacco in Illinois, including cigarettes, chewing tobacco, e-cigarettes, and vapes. Governor JB Pritzker signed the initiative, known as Tobacco 21, on April 7. It had been passed by the Illinois General Assembly. Illinois was the 7th state in the U.S. (tied with Virginia) to implement raising the tobacco purchasing age from 18 to 21 years. It was the first state in the Midwest to make the change.

“This law will reduce costs for our state, make our schools and communities healthier

places to learn and live, and most importantly, will save lives,” Pritzker said in a statement.

About 4,800 Illinois teens become new daily smokers each year, according to the Illinois Department of Public Health. In 2017, 7.6 percent of high school students smoked on at least one day in the past 30 days.

“Nicotine is addictive, and adolescents and young adults are more susceptible to its effects because their brains are still developing,” said Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike.

“Delaying the age when youth first try tobacco can help reduce the probability

that they will smoke as an adult. Raising the purchasing age will not only help reduce the number of people who smoke, but will also reduce medical costs in Illinois and make our communities healthier.”

She said that smoking at an early age increases the risk of lung cancer. For most smoking-related cancers, the risk rises as the individual continues to smoke. Among young people, the short-term health consequences of smoking include respiratory effects, addiction to nicotine, and the associated risk of using other drugs.

She said Tobacco 21 will help keep

See TOBACCO, A13

By E. Charles Conway For The St. Louis American

It was August 9, 2014 and I was teaching a class in Cape Girardeau, when my phone started to vibrate non-stop. I picked the phone up and viewed a young black man lying in the street. I told the class that another brother had been shot in St. Louis.

As I continued the class, the phone just wouldn’t stop. I viewed it again, this time noticing a blood trail streaming away from the body. At that point someone shared that a police officer had shot this young black man, who turned out to be Michael Brown. An immense feeling came over me, something I hadn’t felt since the age of 15. I didn’t realize until that moment that the incident from a police hitting me with a baton for no reason still was effecting me.

I was supervising a residential/outpatient treatment program in St. Louis for adolescents between the ages of 12-17 who were dealing with substance abuse. My thoughts immediately went to the residential guys and wondered how they were taking this information.

After I finished teaching, I drove back to St. Louis and ask the guys what were their feelings. A few in the group shared that they wanted to hit the streets to protest, but one stated, “Mr. Charles, you guys dropped the ball.” I asked him what does that mean? And he said you keep telling us that through peaceful protest and waiting on the process to work we will see changes.

The white distress flag went up as it relates to addressing the needs of the young brothers in our community.

This was a turning point in my life and the way Preferred Family Healthcare addressed their issues. My vice president asked me one time what we were going to do with our consumers, because they were dying and

Can cannabis help patients in pain avoid opioids?

The Illinois Department of Public Health is trying to find out

Since February, patients in Illinois have been able to swap their opioid prescriptions for marijuana. And many are doing just that. They’re part of a program designed to let patients who might not qualify for the state’s regular medical marijuana program exchange an opioid prescription, like Oxycontin, for weed.

“We have almost 900 patients enrolled in the program now,” said Conny MuellerMoody, who works on medical cannabis at the Illinois Department of Public Health. “And over 300 physicians who have created a user account and submitted a physician certification for a patient.”

There is no restriction on what conditions qualify for the program, only that the patient have an existing relationship with the provider and an existing opioid prescription. Certification must be renewed every 90 days. The state is still gathering statistics on why

patients are participating. But nationwide, chronic pain is the most common reason people turn to medical marijuana. And for some people, pot is more appealing than powerful opioids.

Gavin Glass is a student at Southern Illinois University who has suffered from back and nerve pain since he was in high school. He was barely able to get through his classes, he said, and struggled to make it through the day.

“I was never actually on any opioids. But they were certainly recommended to me,” he said.

Because he refused opioids, Gavin is part of the state’s medical marijuana program, not the opioid alternative program. He says medical marijuana has made a huge improvement in his life.

“I felt like I had got my life back again, and I felt comfortable doing things because

Patients taking medical marijuana say they have fewer side effects than other medications. And states that allow marijuana use show a drop in prescriptions for opioids.

A12

ST. LOUIS AMERICAN • JULY 11 – 17, 2019

As

1,

E. Charles Conway

Tobacco

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tobacco out of high schools. Most underage tobacco users rely on social sources like friends and family to get tobacco. Approximately 90 percent of those who supply cigarettes to minors are themselves under the age of 21, she said.

National data indicate about 95 percent of adult smokers begin smoking before they turn 21. According to a study from the National Academy of Medicine, Tobacco 21 policies could reduce overall smoking by 12 percent by the time today’s teenagers become adults. The biggest decrease in tobacco use could be among youth ages 15-17 (25 percent) and 18-20 (15 percent).

n “Raising the purchasing age will not only help reduce the number of people who smoke, but will also reduce medical costs in Illinois and make our communities healthier.”

– Illinois Department of Public Health Director Dr. Ngozi Ezike

Smoking-related health care costs in the U.S. are estimated at almost $5.5 billion annually, with another $5.3 billion lost due to smoking-related losses in productivity.

The law also contains a number of other provisions. It:

• Requires tobacco and e-cigarette retailers to update all posted signage required by Illinois law with the minimum sales age of 21 for tobacco products, tobacco accessories, alternative nicotine products, e-cigarettes, and e-liquids and solutions, regardless of whether they contain nicotine.

• Requires tobacco and e-cigarette retailers to update age verification training programs for employees.

• Specifies age verification requirements for retailers, requiring a person who appears to be under the age of 30 to show government-issued photo identification.

• Clarifies penalties against retailers for violation of sales provisions – in a 24-month period, 1st offense - $200; 2nd offense - $400; 3rd offense - $600; 4th or subsequent offense - $800.

• Removes penalties for youth possession of covered products, including fines (previously $50$100) or attendance at a smoker’s education or youth diversion program.

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I wasn’t in pain all the time,” he said. The list of patients for the alternatives to opioids program is confidential, and Side Effects Public Media was unable to reach anyone who is participating.

BJC Book Brigade sends kids home with books

When second-graders in public school districts served by BJC HealthCare pack up their desks at the end of the school year, they had a brand-new book to take home to encourage their summer reading.

In its fourth year, the BJC Book Brigade provides more than 26,000 books to rising third-graders in over 300 public and charter schools in 63 districts throughout the communities served by BJC hospitals including St. Louis, St. Louis County, St. Charles County, Columbia, Sullivan and Farmington in Missouri; and Alton, Belleville and Shiloh, Ill. The program is a BJC community outreach effort in recognition of the correlation between education and higher income, better health and longer life expectancy.

As part of the program, Rick Stevens, Christian Hospital president, visited Jury Elementary School in the Hazelwood School District on May 6 to read to area second graders and distribute books. The opportunity to spend time with the young students is a bright spot in his day.

“It’s very rewarding to spend time with these students and give

Since February, patients in Illinois have been part of a program designed to let patients who might not qualify for the state’s regular medical marijuana program exchange an opioid prescription, like Oxycontin, for weed.

them an educational boost during a pivotal point in their reading education,” said Stevens. “We know the importance reading plays in helping secure a child’s future and to experience firsthand their enthusiasm for the BJC Book Brigade program was very impressive.”

Book titles are selected by curriculum specialists based on ageappropriate content and storyline messages. Employees have the opportunity to donate books online through Scholastic Books, and BJC supplies the remainder. Books are packaged and delivered in partnership with Valley Industries sheltered workshop in St. Louis.

“While it may seem like a modest effort to us, many of the children who received a book last year wrote touching notes to express thanks for a brand-new book of their own,” Stevens said. “In the journey toward higher education and better health, the BJC Book Brigade is one small step that will take a very long time. But, we believe it’s well worth the long-term effort toward improved reading, high school graduation rates and, ultimately, better health for the future.”

Pot also makes overdose less risky. In 2017, there were more than 2,000 opioid-related deaths in Illinois.

That doesn’t mean patients can’t overdose on marijuanathey can, though it’s extremely unlikely for adults. And even if that happens, it’s unlikely to result in death

in something that tastes good. You wouldn’t put ibuprofen in the gummy bear. Why would you put cannabis in the gummy bear?” he said. “A 4-year-old kid or a dog wouldn’t know the difference, and they’ll eat the whole bag.”

Data from 2016 shows an estimated 50 million Americans experience chronic pain. There are many reasons someone can experience long-term pain, for example, lingering impacts of an accident or injury, or as a result of a chronic illness like rheumatoid arthritis or diabetes. Chronic pain is challenging to treat, in part because many people will need to take medication for many years. That increases the risk of side effects and addiction, particularly when it comes to opioids. Even over-the-counter drugs, like ibuprofen, can have serious side effects if someone takes them for a long time. But not everyone is sold on the benefits of marijuana. And because the federal government limits research on it, the impact is still uncertain.

Males

Continued from A12

it seemed that no one knew what to do. That bothered me, because I have been specially trained in cultural specificity and dealing with black culture. It hit me that I have been dealing with black culture but somehow in the process I had hit the snooze button. At that point it became my mission to change the way treatment is presented in St. Louis to black boys. Preferred Family Healthcare is located in many states, but

“The problem is that the medical marijuana there’s a lot of anecdotal evidence, there’s not a lot of true scientific studies out there with double blind studies or any scientific background whatsoever,” said Bill McCreary, a retired pharmacist and member of

part of our mission statement is providing integrated services to individuals in the communities they resides in.

So have you ever seen a house without a foundation? At this site, we introduce consumers to who they are and where they come from, which is foundation building.

Why do black men continue to keep killing each other? We have groups as well as sessions on selfesteem and pride, knowing that black lives are valuable and the many things we have accomplished and not focusing on what society tells us about ourselves.

the Center for Rural Health at Southern Illinois University.

Still, McCreary supports the medical marijuana program, noting that everyone responds differently to treatment. And he says opioids carry greater risks than the chemical components of pot.

“The long-term effects of opioids are, at this point, much more serious than long-term effects of cannabinoids and

We try to understanding different types of black families and how their views have shaped and formed the consumers we deal with today.

How are black men viewed? Through a therapeutic process which addresses the way, we dress, wear our hair, dialect, music, how some police see us, and how society as a whole views young black men.

We provide therapy to black boys who have normalized people being shot, overdosing and waking up to poverty almost every day. We assist them in believing there is a way out. We identify mentors and

THC,” he said. Patients taking medical marijuana say they have fewer side effects than other medications. And states that allow marijuana use show a drop in prescriptions for opioids.

“With opioids, we know that the neural functioning of the brain is actually altered. And it doesn’t come back,” said McCreary.

resources in their communities to assist in bringing about change and venues that take them away from past dysfunctions.

We offer music therapy and have a music studio, realizing that our consumers express themselves through music. We bring in the same police that many have feared to explain the role they play and how to change the process instead of fearing it, sometimes leading to very intense meetings relieving years of stress from encounters with police.

We have a mentor program that follows consumers up

Dr. Peter Grinspoon is a physician in Massachusetts, where medical marijuana has been legal since 2012. He believes it’s effective, especially for patients who need lifelong pain management.

“If you have to have a substance for life because of chronic pain, your life is so much better on cannabis, which doesn’t take anything away from you,” he said. “It isn’t opiates, which sort of sucks the life out of you.”

But Grinspoon also sees a role for regulation, particularly how medical marijuana is packaged and sold. He’s especially cautious about edibles that can appeal to children, who are vulnerable to overdosing.

“If marijuana or cannabis is a medicine, then don’t put it

until the age of 19. We have kids who were basically written off by society who are now achieving in the same communities that wrote them off. We are working on establishing an alumni group so the consumers can become mentor’s themselves.

We understand that in a constantly changing world the need for prevention is of the most importance. We would like to begin providing intervention services in the community that are specific to the culture and community they arise in because we all know the younger we address substance abuse issues the

He also noted that smoking anything can increase the risk of developing lung cancer and said he typically recommends vaping or taking pills that dissolve under the tongue. Grinspoon also notes that some people are not good candidates for marijuana. It shouldn’t be used by adolescents or by women who are pregnant or breastfeeding. And patients shouldn’t drive while using it, which is true of many pain medications.

The Illinois program requires doctors to have an existing relationship with the patient requesting marijuana – in part so they can discuss these concerns. . This story was produced by Side Effects Public Media, a news collaborative covering public health.

Reprinted with permission from news.stlpublicradio.org.

more likely they can be prevented.

E. Charles Conway is the community manager for Preferred Family Healthcare.

“Homegrown Black Males” is a partnership between HomeGrown STL at the Brown School of Social Work at Washington University in St. Louis and The St. Louis American, edited by Sean Joe, Benjamin E. Youngdahl Professor and associate dean at the Brown School, and Chris King, managing editor of The American, in memory of Michael Brown.

Rick Stevens, Christian Hospital president, visited Jury Elementary School in the Hazelwood School District near the end of the school year to read to second graders and distribute books.

Police acted counter to ‘thoughts’ of Public Safety director on Gardner/Tisaby

Before Jimmie Edwards became St. Louis’ public safety director, he was a longtime circuit judge and lawyer. Now he officially commands the police and fire departments, the jails and various others divisions.

What Edwards is publicly saying regarding the June 14 indictment of William Tisaby — the circuit attorney’s private investigator during the Eric Greitens’ felonious invasion of privacy trial — contradicts the legal pursuit of his police department.

On March 19, 2018, Tisaby, a former FBI agent and now a private investigator, gave his testimony during a deposition to Greitens’ law team. The short version is: it was a mess. Many things Tisaby stated were inaccurate. Documents were not produced. Then there’s the issue of why Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner didn’t correct the record, though Gardner was not under oath.

Tisaby was indicted on six counts of perjury and one count of tampering with physical evidence. It surrounded a twohour interview on January 29, 2018 that Tisaby had with K.S., Greitens’ hairdresser who alleged Greitens took a seminude picture of her without her consent and then transferred it in a way that it could be accessed by a computer.

The Tisaby deposition ultimately led to Gardner dropping the case. Greitens later resigned as governor, over something completely separate: the state Legislature compelling his political donor information, much of which remains undisclosed through a loophole that exempts several classes of non-profit organizations from disclosing donors. If this case hadn’t involved the former governor, things would have ended there.

Even if Tisaby lied during his deposition, people don’t get charged with perjury during depositions in Missouri, Edwards said.

“I’m shocked that a grand jury would indict anyone on a perjury case in a deposition,” Edwards said after a nonrelated press conference on June 28. “In my entire career, it has never happened. This is something that is brand new in respect to jurisprudence in the state of Missouri. I wish that it had never happened. I think we should not be in this space at this time.”

Edwards said this after KMOX reporter Kevin Killeen asked him if he was preparing for any civil unrest if Gardner herself gets indicted. When Edwards answered, it was with conviction, as if this had been weighing on him for some time. When Killeen pressed again about Edwards’ plans for the potential unrest (as if an indictment were a done deal), Edwards said that wasn’t in his “domain.” What he was giving Killeen was his opinion as a former circuit judge and attorney, he said. Edwards even said that it was a case of first impression, meaning that it had never happened before.

“When cases of first impression become part of our community, it raises lots of issues,” he said.

Various other lawyers told The American that they had never heard of someone being indicted for perjury during a deposition, but could not say whether or not this was the first time that it has ever happened in the region. Washington University Law Professor Peter Joy said that Edwards’ opinion is “shared by a number of people because [indictment for perjury in a deposition] is very unusual.”

So why spend hundreds

Public Safety director Jimmie Edwards commands Police Chief John Hayden and the rest of the police department. Police pursued criminal charges against William Tisaby for alleged perjury in a deposition. After Tisaby was indicted, Edwards said, “I wish that it had never happened.”

of thousands of dollars in taxpayer money to pay for a special prosecutor — as well as the legal defense fees for Gardner — to go after Tisaby?

The American asked Edwards, “Are you surprised that the charges got this far?” He said, “Yes.” The American asked Edwards if he was surprised that so many resources have been allocated for pushing this charge forward. He replied, “I’m not going to comment on what’s in others’ minds and hearts, but I’ve shared my thoughts.”

The police chief answers to Edwards, a mayoral appointee. Police under the command of Edwards and Police Chief John Hayden acted in direct contradiction to Edwards’ “thoughts” on the case.

On May 15, 2018, attorneys for Greitens contacted the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department to report that Tisaby committed perjury during his deposition. The police department — that

has repeatedly shown disdain for Gardner — asked City Counselor Julian Bush, a mayoral appointee, to file suit in Circuit Court on the police department’s behalf to seek the appointment of a special prosecutor to review Tisaby for perjury.

Bush — who technically represents both the police department and the circuit attorney — filed the suit on June 27, 2018. Private attorney Gerard T. Carmody was appointed special prosecutor.

For the past several months, Gardner and the special prosecutor have been under a gag order. Even after the indictment came out, the gag order was still in place, so Gardner could not comment on the perjury charges or the contents of the indictment.

The gag order expired at the end of the grand jury term on Monday, July 8.

Gardner was not indicted.

The American contacted Carmody to see if he planned

on continuing an investigation into Gardner. Carmody is out of town and not reachable, according to the office secretary. And no one else was available either, she said.

Gardner’s defense

Roy Austin, Gardner’s attorney, said he agreed “wholeheartedly” with Edwards. “There was never any perjury here,” Austin said. Sworn testimony that is false has to be material to the case to be charged as perjury. “There is no materiality to anything regarding Tisaby the second the videotape was produced,” he said.

We asked Austin to break down what it means for something to be “material” to a case.

“What is significant here is what the victim says about what former governor Eric Greitens did to her,” Austin said. “If any of us on the outside hear her statement and have our own impression, that’s not what’s important. But if you have her statement, everyone else’s impression of what she said is not important.”

There is no reason Tisaby would be a trial witness, he said, and his handwritten notes would not matter either.

Back to the video at the heart of the matter: The indictment states that Gardner did not produce the video because she thought it was damaged. And Tisaby states this too. It also makes insinuations that she lied about reaching out to her IT department to try and get the video to work. Austin said that despite this long drawnout investigation, the special prosecutor could not find a motive for trying to hide the video.

“The House Select

Committee viewed the videotape and the videotape was consistent with K.S.’s statements before the committee,” Austin said. “There was zero reason for anyone in the Circuit Attorney’s Office to hide that videotape. It was fantastic. Why would I hide my best evidence? They can’t find a motive for anyone to hide that video because that videotape was fantastic.”

Tisaby’s defense

According to Tisaby’s attorney Jermaine Wooten Tisaby is being used as a scapegoat to get to Gardner. In an April 24 affidavit, Wooten said that as early as late December or early January, the special prosecutor was already attempting to make deals with him to get Tisaby to provide information that could lead to the circuit attorney’s indictment.

Wooten stated that Patrick Carmody, Gerard’s son, called him and asked if Tisaby had information on “others” and if so, it would be to his client’s benefit.

“It was clear to me given the context of Mr. Carmody’s question that he was asking whether Mr. Tisaby had any information on Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner,” Wooten stated. The affidavit was referenced in an April 25 motion to disqualify Carmody as special prosecutor. At that point, the special prosecutor had not even issued its first search warrant to Gardner to get Tisaby’s correspondence, which happened on January 24 and the correspondence was provided on February 4, the motion states.

Patrick denies this claim, according to Austin.

Photo by Rebecca Rivas

Business

Lauren Wesley Wilson:

‘We are fulfilling a need’

Helping women (and now men) build community

Lauren Wesley Wilson, founder of ColorComm, was named to Advertising Age’s Class of 2019 Women to Watch. ColorComm’s sixth annual conference will take place July 24-26 at the

By Pat Matreci

For The St. Louis American

You work for a major corporate communications firm with global reach that has no top-level executives who look like you. Nor do many other organizations in marketing, communications, media and advertising industries. What do you do?

As a woman of color, St. Louisan Lauren Wesley Wilson asked herself that question as a 25-year-old. In response, Wilson created a unique, invitation-only luncheon series for women like her in communications that in eight years has become multimillion-dollar corporation.

ColorComm (www.colorcommnetwork. com) focuses on advancing women to leadership positions, as well as on diversity and inclusion, in the workplace through mentorship, programming, new business development and

n “I learned how to bring revenue into the business, how to create campaigns, develop strategies, build teams and build relationships – key skills that are necessary when building your own company.”

job opportunities.

“ColorComm has placed women in hundreds of jobs, created a community for inclusion, and has given women the resources to advance in work and in their personal lives,” Wilson said.

“This is not only rewarding, but over time it has proven a necessary community for women of color working in communications.”

ColorComm’s membership numbers more than 40,000, and includes 10 chapters in

together

the United States and one in London, UK. ColorComm hosts three national conferences that attract Fortune 500 companies as financial partners. ColorComm events have attracted speakers such as Arianna Huffington, Gloria Steinem, Gayle King and Whoopi Goldberg.

“What has surprised me the most is how much we are fulfilling a need and how many women share that they are the ColorComm community,” Wilson said. “They are building and shaping their own community, which is inclusive of their culture, needs and resources.”

Wilson, who grew up in Chesterfield and attended Whitfield School, admits she had very friends of color growing up and even fewer African-American friends.

“My world was small, isolated, privileged and lacked diversity,” she recalled. “I got conditioned and used to being the only one and

See WILSON, B2

‘Repeal of the gainful employment rule is reckless and irresponsible’

Regulatory rollback on student loans takes away borrower protections from schools

By Charlene Crowell For The St. Louis American

Every Fourth of July celebrates this nation’s founding. But this year, only a few days before the annual freedom celebration, an ill-advised governmental action will financially doom rather than free millions of student loan borrowers – as of July 1. Moreover, this action arrives as the cost of higher education continues to soar and household incomes remain largely stagnant. On June 28, the Department of Education announced the end of an important student loan regulation that since 2015 has held colleges with career training programs accountable for failure to provide an education that resulted in

marketable skills and earnings high enough to repay student loans. Known as the Gainful Employment rule, it required career and technical training programs that receive federal financial aid to prove that students would receive the education promised or forfeit future federal funding dollars. Additionally, covered institutions and programs were required to disclose to prospective students the career earnings and student debts of recent graduates.

In other words, the rule was intended to rein in abusive schools before they could harm students or waste taxpayer-funded aid. Finalized in 2014, the rule was too late to help the tens of thousands of student borrowers affected by the failures of huge for-profit institutions, Corinthian Colleges, and ITT Technical Institute. Borrowers at these nowshuttered colleges were left without degrees, or credits that could be transferred, but carried with them unaffordable debts that have devastated the stability of their families. These closures also resulted in massive losses to taxpayers who fund federal financial aid.

See CROWELL, B2

Rhonda Key was named assistant superintendent of Jennings Public Schools. She was the 2019 St. Louis Region Principal of the Year and has over 30 years of experience in education and over two decades in education leadership. Previously she also was director of secondary education in Jennings, where she took a greater role with community partnerships, including implementing the National Academy Foundation curriculum.

Tim Portlock was one of three artists selected for the ninth Great Rivers Biennial Arts Award Program 2020. More than 80 artists applied for the collaborative initiative between Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis and the Gateway Foundation designed to recognize artistic talent in the greater St. Louis metro area. It awards each artist with $20,000 and a major exhibition in CAM’s main galleries.

Carole Weddington Hunt joined Provident Behavioral Health as psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner. She will lead an expansion into psychiatric services for the nonprofit organization with a 159-year history of service to the St. Louis region. She will lead the integration of psychiatric services with counseling, suicide prevention, and other Provident programming. She has been a licensed professional counselor for more than three decades.

Anthony Anderson joined the finance team at Cortex Innovation Community as an accountant. He has a B.S. in Accounting from Harris-Stowe State University and brings with him the accounting experience of working for various nonprofit organizations plus plans on establishing innovative ideas to the operation of Cortex finance department. His goals is to continue to promote diversity, community involvement and develop programs that help cultivate tomorrow’s leaders.

Pamela “Pam” Lambkins was selected for the St. Louis Business Diversity Initiative’s Fellows Program. She is branch manager at American Eagle Credit Union in Florissant. She was instrumental in helping to develop the branch’s financial literacy workshops after learning there was a need for education and resources. The initiative, a part of the St. Louis Regional Chamber, assists area companies in building successful diversity and inclusion programs.

Dr. Will Ross was appointed to the Board of Directors of the St. Louis Economic Development Partnership by St. Louis County Executive Sam Page. The board oversees economic development agencies and promotes business growth throughout the St. Louis region. Ross is the associate dean for Diversity Programs, principal officer for Community Partnerships and professor of medicine at Washington University School of Medicine.

On the move? Congratulations! Send your

Pamela “Pam” Lambkins

Tim Portlock

Dr. Will Ross

Anthony Anderson

Rhonda Key

Carole Weddington Hunt

Ritz Carlton in Miami, and will bring

over 500 women of color in communications.

Charlene Crowell

Wilson continued from page B1

token black woman among a sea of white friends. I thought that this was the norm.”

After enrolling at Spelman College, Wilson experienced the diversity of her own race, and gained a better understanding of who she was. She earned a bachelor’s degree in political science, but had no plans for life after college.

“The summer after graduating from Spelman College, I was home researching communications/ public relations internships and master’s degree programs. I saw that Georgetown was still fulfilling its first class for a master’s in communications and applications were ending soon,” Wilson said.

“I flew out of St. Louis to Washington, D.C., the day after I discovered the program, to meet the administration at Georgetown. I applied within the timeframe and got in. It was the best decision at the time, expanded my world and led me to my very first job in this business.” Wilson remained in Washington, D.C., for a while before moving to New York more recently. She quickly learned some very important lessons that would serve her well when she ultimately decided to start her own business.

“Working for someone else at major companies and brands

Crowell

continued from page B1

Even so, the Gainful Employment rule has been effective in two other ways.

First, it pushed many other forprofit institutions to cut their worst performing programs.

Secondly, it controlled tuition costs. Either violation brought regulatory sanctions. Now, instead of these

taught and shaped important lessons before heading to run my business full time,” she said. “I learned how to bring revenue into the business, how to create campaigns, develop strategies, build teams and build relationships – key skills that are necessary when thinking about leaving your full-time job and launching your career as your own boss and building your own company.”

When taking that leap of faith to go out on her own, Wilson did have role models to follow. Business owners dot

protections, consumers are left on their own –directed to an expanded web resources known as a “College Scorecard,” where information on student debt and earnings now includes 2,100 certificate-granting programs.

her family lineage, including her mother, Valarie, who was founder and CEO of Wilson Sculley Associates, an advertising agency that had offices in Creve Coeur and Chicago.

“She truly understands what I go through day in and day out,” Wilson said. “She is a huge advocate, supporter, mentor and friend.”

After eight years in operation, Wilson said companies truly see the value in sponsoring ColorComm programs and initiatives.

“They sponsor ColorComm

to reach industry talent, to invest in their rising star employees, to highlight their own diversity initiatives, and to learn,” she said.

And that’s why she recently expanded her business to include a male component.

The first Men of Color in Communications Luncheon was a sellout in January 2018.

“I had many conversations with men in the industry who would approach me and say, ‘I wish we had something like what you’re creating for men,’” Wilson said. “We started out slowly to test this need. Our

n “The Education Department is giving low-quality, for-profit colleges a free pass to charge high tuition for worthless credentials that leave students with insurmountable debt.”

– U.S. Rep. Bobby

“These important reforms are a more complete and effective way to hold all types of higher education institutions accountable and make sure that students have a full suite of data when making a decision about their

Lauren Wesley Wilson, founder of ColorComm, speaks with Gayle King. ColorComm focuses on advancing women to leadership positions, as well as on diversity and inclusion.

very first Men of Color in Communications Luncheon sold out and we knew we were onto something.”

The Men of Color series continued in New York and Los Angeles before ending the year with the Men of Color in Communications Summit at Bloomberg HQ.

“We brought together over

200 men of color to discuss business development, media training and branding, how to get into the C-Suite, build wealth and more,” Wilson said.

“It was a huge success in its first year and shows there is a

“Students need protection against unaffordable loans,” said James Kvaal, president of The Institute for College Access & Success (TICAS).

Scott

education,” said Secretary DeVos in a statement.

Saying that information is the equivalent of regulation is simply not true. Effective regulations impose penalties, fines, and conditions on future actions – all to deter bad actors from repeating behaviors. By contrast, information only discloses with no guarantee that what is shared will be truthful, complete, or current.

Elected officials and consumer advocates were quick to point out the shortcomings of student loan deregulation.

“[B]y eliminating this rule without enforcing any alternative standard the Education Department is giving low-quality, for-profit colleges a free pass to charge high tuition for worthless credentials that leave students with insurmountable debt,” noted U.S. Representative Bobby Scott (D-Virginia), chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor.

“This rule rolls back the clock on those very protections. At a time when millions of borrowers are struggling with debt they cannot afford, the department’s repeal of the gainful employment rule is reckless and irresponsible.”

The ills that TICAS’ Kvaal points out are welldocumented.

A 2018 research report,

“The State of For-Profit Colleges,” by the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL) analyzed student debt on a state-by-state basis. It concluded that investing in a for-profit education is almost always a risky proposition.

Undergraduate borrowing by state showed that the percentage of students that borrow from the federal government generally ranged between 40 to 60 percent for public colleges, compared to 50 to 80 percent at for-profit institutions.

CRL also found that women and blacks suffer disparate impacts, particularly at for-profit institutions, where they are disproportionately enrolled in most states. For example, enrollment at Mississippi’s for-profit colleges was 78 percent female and nearly 66 percent black. Other states with high black enrollment at

need for men to come together in a more formal away outside of fraternity organizations and sports outings.” Wilson’s story has been featured in the Washington Post, Black Enterprise, Essence, Forbes and more. She has been recognized by PR Week as one of the 50 Most Powerful in PR. Her star continues to rise, as Wilson recently was named to Advertising Age’s Class of 2019 Women to Watch.

“I don’t just see this as an honor for me, but for the many teams who work to build ColorComm” she said. “This is truly an honor for our work and what we’ve built.”

After expanding reach into London, Wilson envisions ColorComm establishing a greater international presence.

“Entering the EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa) will be key growth areas to come, and we look forward to building communities in those markets,” she said.

More immediately, ColorComm’s sixth annual conference will take place July 24-26 at the Ritz Carlton in Miami, and will bring together over 500 women of color in communications. Featured speakers include former Today Show cohost Ann Curry, Michelle Lee of Allure Magazine, author Nely Galan, and Linda Johnson Rice, chair and CEO of Johnson Publishing Co. Information is available at www. colorcommconference.com.

for-profits included Georgia (57 percent), Louisiana (55 percent), Maryland (58 percent) and North Carolina (54 percent).

“Betsy DeVos’ decision to eliminate this important education protection is a disservice to the public and only serves to put corporate interests ahead of struggling students and taxpayers,” said Debbie Goldstein a CRL executive vice president, following the recent rescission of the Gainful Employment rule. “Completely removing oversight of these programs and leaving parents and students to navigate the college loan system is irresponsible and wastes federal money on programs that aren’t performing.”

Similarly to CRL, the National Consumer Law Center (NCLC) has found that for-profit college students borrow more, and more often. More than 80 percent of for-profit college graduates incurred nearly $40,000 in debt at the time of graduation. Further, black and Latino student loan borrowers were found to default on their loans at twice the rate of similarly situated whites.

“Repealing the Gainful Employment rule will cost taxpayers over $6 billion over the next decade, and ending this rule will worsen the student loan debt crisis, especially for the people of color and low-income students who disproportionately attend career education programs and who are often targets of predatory recruitment practices,” said Abby Shafroth, an NCLC attorney who works with its Student Loan Borrower Assistance Project.

“The department’s unfounded claims that students will benefit from ‘more access’ as a result of the repeal are bogus: Students don’t need access to more failing schools, they need a student loan system that doesn’t set them up to fail.” With 44 million student borrowers owing $1.5 trillion nationwide at the end of 2019’s first quarter, removing federal guard rails against future borrower risk is as costly as it is unsustainable. As the federal government turns its back on these borrowers, perhaps another level of government can and will fill the void.

“Now more than ever,” concluded Goldstein, “states have important roles to play in regulation, oversight, and enforcement.”

Charlene Crowell is the Center for Responsible Lending’s Communications deputy director. She can be reached at Charlene. crowell@responsiblelending. org.

n “I don’t have an ego; it’s dead. It had to die for me to be who I am.”

— NBA center

Dwight Howard

Sports

Surge hosts Chicago Breeze

Teams to clash Saturday at the Washington University Fieldhouse at 6 p.m.

The St. Louis Surge has been the model franchise in the Women’s Blue Chip Basketball League for much of their eight years of existence.

The Surge won a couple of national championships in 2014 and 2016 and played for national titles in three other seasons while playing an exciting brand of basketball that filled gymnasiums in the summer.

Earl Austin Jr.

For the 2019 season, the Surge have changed course and are now competing in the relatively new Global Women’s Basketball Association, which formed in 2016. The GWBA is a fourteam league that has provided the Surge with a higher level of competition as well as more opportunities for the players to also play professionally overseas as the league is a farm system to those leagues abroad.

On Saturday, July 12, the Surge will conclude the home portion of its schedule as they host the Chicago Breeze at the Washington University Fieldhouse at 6 p.m. It will also be Fan Appreciation Night for the Surge, who have revamped their roster with six new players and a new coach in former University of Iowa standout Duez Henderson. Even in the new league, the Surge continues to attract big crowds to their home games.

“I am proud that we set a record attendance in the home opener, and we are excited to see the city show up and show out for our final game of the season this Saturday,” said Surge owner and General Manager Khalia Collier. “The new league,

NBA free agency winners and losers

The 2019 NBA free agency period started off with a bang. Kevin Durant and Kyrie Irving got the party started early by taking their basketballs and bolting to Brooklyn. That move set the tone for what became one of the wildest, craziest weeks in free agency since Tom Chambers became the first unrestricted free agent in 1988. This offseason has seen major shakeups that will fundamentally change the power structure of the league. Defending champs? Gutted. South Beach 5? Ransacked.

Nearly every NBA team has made moves since the free agency period officially began by signing, waiving and/or trading players. The question is: Which teams are the biggest winners and losers in the NBA’s Drake-infused game of musical chairs?

Winners: Los Angeles Clippers

Just when you thought the free agency fervor couldn’t grow any larger with the Brooklyn coup, Kawhi

Leonard told the entire league to hold his beer. Leonard and his team stayed tight-lipped during the process. That left fans, media and “insiders” to lob their best guesses as to where Leonard would ultimately land. Even still, those with the wildest imaginations would have never predicted Leonard’s ultimate power move. Leonard convinced Paul George to request a trade from the Oklahoma City Thunder so that the two stars could team up for the Los Angeles Clippers. OKC obliged, sending George to the Clippers for Shai GilgeousAlexander, Danilo Gallinari, five first-round draft picks and two first-round pick swaps. What’s so incredible about the deal is that George was just one year into a four-year, $137 million contract with the Thunder. Furthermore, George finished third in the voting for both MVP and Defensive Player of the Year. Alongside Leonard, the NBA Finals MVP, and defensive menace Patrick Beverley, the Clippers should field one of

memory. Losers: Dallas

SURGE, B5

Ishmael H. Sistrunk

St. Louis Surge guard Kelsey McClure (00) gets push back from Wisconsin Glo’s guard Angela Rodriguez (23) during game action at the Washington University Athletic Complex on Saturday, June 30. The Glo would defeat the Surge 88-74.

With defensive stalwarts Kawhi Leonard, Paul George and Patrick Beverley (not pictured), the Los Angeles Clippers should field one of the stingiest defenses in recent memory. The team is expected to battle with the Lakers for Western Conference supremacy.

Photo by Wiley Price

SportS EyE

With Alvin A. Reid

Hakim catches XFL coaching gig here as football returns to STL Saturday

America.

A familiar name will guide the St. Louis XFL squad’s wide receiving corps – former St. Louis Rams standout Az-Zahir Hakim

A member of the “Greatest Show on Turf” Rams that won the Super Bowl following the spectacular 1999 season, Hakim was drafted in the fourth round of the 1998 NFL draft.

In four seasons with the Rams, Hakim caught 148 passes, totaled 2,032 yards and registered 16 touchdowns. An All-Pro return specialist, Hakim also returned two punts for touchdowns. Hakim was the wide receivers coach for the San Diego Fleet of the American Alliance of Football before the league tanked after just a month of operation.

Heading the offense for head coach Jonathan Hayes will be offensive coordinator Doug Meacham – a guy who was fired midway through the 2019 season at KU, which had one of the worst offenses in college football history.

Let me defend my former Jayhawk. Former KU head coach David Beaty, who was fired a few weeks after Meacham but allowed to finish the season, had dreams of running a wild run-and-gun spread offense. The team never had the skilled talent to pull that off and the offensive line made every play a dangerous adventure for any of the three quarterbacks who played last season.

Meacham isn’t incompetent. He just chose the wrong job at the wrong time under the wrong guy, who was probably the worst head coach in

Before the KU debacle, Meacham served at Samford, Oklahoma State, Houston, and TCU – all of which had high-powered offenses. Other coaching hires include: Jay Hayes – defensive coordinator, was defensive line coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Brian Braswell –offensive line, was Cleveland Browns offensive quality control director. Nicholas Siciliano – tight ends, directed football quality control at the University of Minnesota. He was an offensive assistant for the Cincinnati Bengals from 2012 to 2013. Matt Raich – co-defensive coordinator/linebackers, was assistant defensive line coach for the Cincinnati Bengals. He also worked for the Detroit Lions, Arizona Cardinals and Pittsburgh Steelers.

Tim Lewis - defensive backs, was head coach of the AAF Birmingham Iron. He has worked for the Pittsburgh Steelers, New York Giants, Carolina Panthers, Seattle Seahawks, Atlanta Falcons, and San Francisco 49ers.

XFL showtime is Saturday

Football officially returns to St. Louis on Saturday (July 13) when the XFL holds its Summer Showcase at Lou Fusz Training Facility in Earth City. Yep, it’s the former Rams Park that Stan Kroenke can buy for a buck in a few years. The showcase is invitation-only and offers players a

chance to audition for spots on respective XFL rosters. The St. Louis Showcase is the XFL’s last of the summer, with each being held in the city of an XFL franchise.

The league is interested in former NFL players (or ones not under contract), alternate football league players or players who have recently completed their college eligibility.

Patterned after the NFL Combine in Indianapolis, players will have their height, weight and measurements taken. Athletic testing, including the 40-yard-dash and shuttle drills, will be included. Individual positional workouts and 1-on-1 drills, led by XFL coaches, are also part of the Showcase.

Private workouts with XFL coaches, as needed, could also be part of a player’s day.

College players must apply and be approved by the XFL to attend. An application is at XFL.com.

Martin not color blind

Missouri’s football program is awaiting word from a NCAA penalty review committee if its one-season bowl ban, restricted recruiting edict and other punishment in connection with the case of the tattling tutor will be

reduced.

Meanwhile, its basketball program under the guidance of head coach Cuonzo Martin is not linked to the ongoing college basketball recruiting scandals. Big-name programs with big-name coaches are smack in the middle of the shenanigans, Missouri is clean.

But Martin has views on the situation, and he has not missed that all the shoe company representatives and assistant coaches destined for prison after being found guilty or pleading their guilt are black.

Kansas coach Bill Self, Auburn coach Bruce Pearl, Sean Miller of Arizona, Mark Gottfried, the current coach of Cal State Northridge and former coach of tainted North Carolina State, Hall of Fame former coach Rick Pitino of Louisville, Andy Enfield of USC and Will Wade of LSU have all had their names directly connected to respective recruiting no-nos.

Pitino was shown the door, but he was already on the thinnest of thin ice. Wade was suspended but has been reinstated. The athletic director that took action against Wade, after he was caught on a wiretap sounding very suspicious, has retired.

All the coaches are white. Martin recognizes that fact.

“You want the right thing to be done,” Martin said during an interview last month in Columbia.

“That’s the most important thing. Rules are being broken and those universities should be accountable for their actions. Not to make it sound black and white, but it appears to me that when you have four

coaches with the FBI, but the head coach is still OK, and not to say that I know everything that’s going on, but I just think there has to be a level of accountability.”

Martin said the accountability for recruiting cheats should not stop at the head coaches office.

“I think for me, the presidents of those schools or the athletic directors, something has to give at some point,” he said.

“Because you made the hire.”

It’s not the losses or fear of losing a job that drives coaches to go astray, according to Martin.

“I think that guys do things the right way, that’s who you are,” he said.

“I don’t think guys that lose a few games, you try and do this now. That doesn’t happen. That’s who you are as a person.”

Martin was clear that he won’t go down the cheating path to save his job.

“When they let me go, it will because ‘he didn’t win enough,’” Martin said.

“It won’t be because of that (illegal recruiting) stuff.”

Should Martin not qualify for the NCAA Tournament this season, the “he doesn’t win enough” will begin growing louder.

The Reid Roundup

First it was college and now its bad luck in the NBA for former Mizzou Tiger Michael Porter Jr. Two days before the NBA Summer League games began, Porter suffered

A familiar name will guide the St. Louis XFL squad’s wide receiving corps – former St. Louis Rams standout Az-Zahir Hakim

a knee sprain in practice and is not competing with the Denver Nuggets Summer League squad. He is expected to be ready for training camp come late September… The Nuggets are rumored to be one of the team’s interested in acquiring Russell Westbrook from Oklahoma City… Even with Kawhi Leonard and Paul George I don’t think the L.A. Clippers will reach the NBA Finals. They are still the Clippers… Good luck with Kyrie Irving and Kevin Durant, Brooklyn. You’ve got two great players and two even greater divas… Congrats to the USWNST. My gosh, they play, talk, and celebrate like black NBA and NFL players… Jimmie Walker who played J.J. Evans on Good Times, said last week that rich black athletes should not be political. “I think that when you’re making $150 million a year, people don’t want to hear your political views.” Do you remember that Good Times producers and CBS killed John Amos’ character, James Evans, after he challenged them about “J.J.” being a black buffoon? Walker obviously is still playing that role.

Alvin A. Reid was honored as the 2017 “Best Sports Columnist – Weeklies” in the Missouri Press Association’s Better Newspaper Contest and is a New York Times contributor. He is a panelist on the Nine Network program, Donnybrook, a weekly contributor to “The Charlie Tuna Show” on KFNS and appears monthly on “The Dave Glover Show” on 97.1 Talk.” His Twitter handle is @aareid1.

Alvin A. Reid

Clutch

Continued from B3

Going into the offseason, the Mavericks’ rumored top outside targets were Kemba Walker and Danny Green Walker quickly committed to the Boston Celtics. Green stiffed the Mavs to sign a two-year, $30 million deal with the Los Angeles Lakers. If you make Danny Green one of your top priorities and can’t seal the deal, it’s time to make some wholesale changes. Maybe the Mavs should offer a trove of picks to the Toronto Raptors for team president Masai Ujiri

Losers: New York Knicks

After clearing enough cap space to sign two players to max contracts this offseason, the Knicks struck out on every big name player available. Durant, Leonard, Irving, Walker, Khris Middleton and Tobias Harris all said

“Nah” to the New York Knicks.

Thus far, the Knicks’ biggest signings have been Julius Randle (three years/$63M) and Bobby Portis (two years/$31M) and they play the same position. Despite playing in the No. 1 media market in the nation, the Knicks can’t seem to attract elite free agents. The culprit is likely team owner James Dolan. Players and fans just don’t seem to like him. It’s not hard to see why. Dolan took over the Knicks as chairman in 1999. The team lost to the San Antonio Spurs in the NBA Finals that season. Since then, the Knicks have suffered through 15 losing seasons and 14 coaches. The team’s last playoff appearance came in 2013. Until Dolan finally decides to sell the team, that might be its last playoff appearance, period.

Winners: NBA fans

The biggest winner for this insane offseason is the fans.

For the past several seasons, the NBA has been dominated by the Warriors and Cavaliers. Once LeBron James left for Los Angeles, things opened up in the East. Now, Leonard has followed James to L.A. (albeit in the other locker room) and left the East wide open once again. Things are open in the West again due to injuries and departures in GSW. In the East, title contenders include the Bucks, Celtics, 76ers and Nets (once Durant returns to health). In the West, the Lakers, Clippers, Rockets, Jazz and Trail Blazers can be considered legitimate threats to the throne. The NBA has not seen this level of parity in quite some time.

Losers: Oklahoma City Thunder

Long-term, the Thunder may turn out like bandits from this offseason deal. The team earned a record number of picks for George. But in this moment, OKC fans probably

Continued from B3

coaching staff and six new professional players added to the roster this season has made this the biggest season by far in terms of the growth trajectory of the franchise.” As well as the winning culture that the Surge franchise has built over the past eight years, another reason why they bring the fans to home games in droves is the exciting, highscoring brand of basketball they play. The team loves to run and shoot and they have scored more than 100 points on three occasions this season.

n “I am proud that we set a record attendance in the home opener, and we are excited to see the city show up and show out for our final game of the season.”

– Surge owner and General Manager Khalia Collier

have a sick feeling deep in their stomachs.

Not only did George bounce, but now the team is expected to deal Russell Westbrook in the near future. That means the Thunder will go into full rebuild mode. What that also means is that during its 11 years in Oklahoma City, the Thunder have watched Durant, Westbrook, George and James Harden all walk through revolving doors and have zero championships to show for it.

Be sure to check In the Clutch online and also follow Ishmael on Twitter @ ishcreates.

The leader of the team into this new era continues to be guard Rebecca Harris, the former Mascoutah High standout, who averages 20 points and five rebounds a game. She was the GWBA Player of the Week in early June after scoring 35 points, grabbing eight rebounds and handing out six assists in a victory over the Flint Monarchs.

Harris is one of the six players from the St. Louis area who are on the team. Another top player is 6’2” guard Brittany Carter, who was a former standout at Incarnate Word Academy. Carter was the GWBA Player of the Week at the end of June after a 25-point, five-rebound performance in a victory over the Music City Icons.

The other St. Louis area players on the Surge roster are veteran forward Jaleesa Butler (Alton), guard Nakiah Bell (Incarnate Word), guard Mikala McGhee (Pattonville) and forward Marina Laramie (Fort Zumwalt West).

Another big addition to the Surge as been 5’9” guard Nici Gilday, a former standout from Santa Clara University. Gilday has been averaging more than 10 points a game, including a pair of 17-point performances in the team’s two victories. The rest of the roster consists of Kelsey McClure, Treyvonna Brooks, Kristi Bullock, Sydney Bauman and Leti Lerma. Admission to Saturday’s home finale at Washington University is $15 for General Admission, $10 for students and free for children that are four years old and under.

St. Louis-area players on the Surge

Rebecca Harris, Mascoutah High Brittany Carter, Incarnate Word Academy

Jaleesa Butler, Alton

Nakiah Bell, Incarnate Word

Mikala McGhee, Pattonville Marina Laramie, Fort Zumwalt West

In addition to watching Paul George depart, it appears that Oklahoma City Thunder fans will have watched James Harden, Russell Westbrook and Kevin Durant all come and go with zero championships to show for it.

August 1 deadline to apply for MSD rainscaping grants

There is an August 1 deadline to apply rainscaping grants from the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District. Approved landowners residing within the designated Program Area will be reimbursed up to $4,000 for installing rainscaping features on their property, which helps the environment by reducing the amount of stormwater entering the sewer system. Using simple techniques, rainscaping collects and filters rainwater where it falls instead of transporting it somewhere

else. Lowering the amount of stormwater runoff entering the sewer system helps improve the water quality and ecological balance of area creeks, streams, and rivers by reducing sewer overflows. It also reduces stormwater pollution, which occurs as runoff flows toward the street, absorbing contaminants before it enters the sewer system. For homeowners, rainscaping has the added benefit of minimizing basement backups and supporting biodiversity by creating a

habitat for a wide variety of garden life.

Only landowners residing within the Grant Program Area are eligible to apply; see the searchable map at https:// tinyurl.com/rainscapingare. Applicants are required to attend a Landowner Orientation Session within the current (2019-2020) or previous (20182019) program round. Advance registration is required.

For more information, visit www.ProjectClearSTL.org/ SmallGrants or call 314-5770202.

Information & Application Session for census workers on July 13

The Madison County Urban League (MCUL) has partnered with the U.S. Census Bureau to recruit workers for temporary jobs available nationwide in advance of the 2020 Census. On Saturday, July 13, the MCUL is hosting an Information & Application Session from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Boys & Girls Club of Alton, 2512 Amelia St. During the session, attendees will learn more about working

for the U.S. Census and get hands on help with applying.

The Census Bureau has already begun recruiting and hiring hundreds of thousands of temporary workers for the 2020 Census – often described as the nation’s largest civilian mobilization. Jobs include census takers, recruiting assistants, office staff, and supervisory staff. To be eligible, you must be at least 18 years old, have a valid Social Security number, and

be a U.S. citizen. All males must register with Selective Service at www.sss.gov before applying.

“We understand the many ways in which 2020 Census data can impact our area,” says Krista Miller, MCUL coordinator. “Participating in the 2020 Census is a civic duty.”

For additional information regarding the session, contact the MCUL at (618) 463-1906

State begins accepting medical marijuana facility applications on August 3

The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) will begin accepting medical marijuana facility applications on August 3. At medicalmarijuana. mo.gov, potential applicants can find medical marijuana facility worksheets for use when submitting responses to evaluation criteria questions as part of the application. The worksheets follow the content and order of the evaluation criteria questions in the Facility License Application Questions

and Scoring Criteria guide Applicants must use these worksheets to upload responses to the online facility application system between August 3-17. Applicants are able to begin using these worksheets now to prepare their applications.

Prior to August 3, DHSS will release a facility application instructional video which will allow applicants to preview the online application before submitting an application and reference the video guide throughout the

application submission process.

DHSS has also posted an interactive map online at https://tinyurl.com/ MO-cannabis-map showing, by county, where prospective cultivation and infused product manufacturing facilities have had pre-filed application fees submitted. Because the official application process does not begin until August, there is no guarantee these numbers will be representative of where actual proposed facilities will be positioned.

A groove under the arch

Johnny Gill and Keith Sweat bring R&B to the Fair Saint Louis party

By Kenya Vaughn Of The St. Louis American

“These are true Keith Sweat fans,” KMOV-TV anchor Courtney Bryant said.

“The rain has started, but nobody has moved.” She tried to shield herself from the drizzle as she and BJ The DJ of Majic 103.7 FM introduced the headlining musical act for the Friday night Fair Saint Louis concert on July 5.

“Keith Sweat, Keith Sweat, Keith Sweat…” fans began chanting just after 8 p.m. – just moments before Bryant and BJ took the stage. Fans hovered towards the gate that separated the pit area from the performance stage at Gateway Arch National Park. Storm clouds had been present all afternoon.

Neither the threat of rain – or actual rain – could keep them from the show they’ve waited more than a month to see as part of the Fair Saint Louis entertainment lineup. The ones closest to the stage came hours earlier to secure a prime viewing location. The crowd stretched from the hilltop of the park, where the stage was located because of flood levels, all the way to Market Street.

Both Sweat and featured performer Johnny Gill proved worth the See GROOVE, C4

At one with St. Louis music and nature

Filmmaker Jon Alexander’s

Of The St. Louis American

Local filmmaker Jon Alexander pulled off the impressive feat of showcasing the beauty and variety of St. Louis terrain and the music scene at the same time with his short film, Broken into three parts, the film features keyboardist/ producer Mad Keys, singer/songwriter Tonina Saputo and DJ Hoodbunny. The artists are plucked from their natural habitat onstage, putting them at one with Mother Nature. They performed live in the middle of trees, fields of grass, flowing springs and rocks.

“My goal was to try to capture all seasons within the series,” Alexander said. “We got little bit of the winter and the fall with him Keys]. You see the leaves and the snow on the ground.”

Alexander screened “Nature of Sound” two weeks ago at 2720 N. 14th and held a post-show discussion that included the All Black Creatives collective. The film will be released digitally on July 28.

“It was about surrounding yourself with health and wellness – being outside and rejuvenating yourself and resetting,” Alexander said. “ It’s just keeping that whole movement of health and wellness. I want everybody to be cool and happy.

See ALEXANDER, C4

Local filmmaker Jon Alexander premiered his latest film, “Nature of Sound” two weeks ago at 2720 N. 14th St. The film will be released digitally on July 28.

By Kenya Vaughn Of The St. Louis American

Toni Morrison learned the power of words before she understood how to write and combine them in sentences. With an understanding of that power and the intention to reflect an underrepresented perspective within fiction, she would later successfully set about changing the landscape of American literature. With “Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am,” documentarian Timothy Greenfield-Sanders gives curious minds a first-person peek inside her creative genius.

The film premiered at Sundance this winter and will open in theaters nationwide on July 12.

An outspoken voice that expresses her love and dedication to black life and reflecting the black experience through her work, the film provides a full spectrum of Morrison’s own life:

‘Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am,’ which explores the life of the Nobel and Pulitzer Prize-winning author, opens in theaters nationwide on Friday, July 12.

Photo by Lawrence Bryant

Johnny Gill during Fair Saint Louis July 5th

How to place a calendar listing

1. Email your listing to calendar@stlamerican. com OR

2. Visit the calendar section on stlamerican.com and place your listing

Calendar listings are free of charge, are edited for space and run on a space-available basis.

concerts

Fri., July 12, 7:30 & 9:30 p.m., Jazz St. Louis presents Carlos Brown, Jr. & Ingenuity. Jazz at the Bistro, 3536 Washington Ave., 63103. For more information, visit www.jazzstl.org.

Sat., July 13, 7 p.m., The Ready Room presents Leikeli47: The Acrylic Tour. 4195 Manchester Ave., 63110. For more information, www.thereadyroom.com.

Sat., July 13, 7:30 p.m., 95.5 The Lou presents The Tom Joyner One More Time Experience feat. Tom Joyner, KEM, and Maze feat. Frankie Beverly. Chaifetz Arena, 1 S. Compton Ave., 63103. For more information, visit www. thechaifetzarena.com.

Mon., July 15, 7 p.m., The Ready Room presents Devin the Dude. The Ready Room, 4195 Manchester Ave., 63110. For more information, visit www.thereadyroom.com.

Sun., July 21, 6 p.m., Fox Sports Midwest Live presents Bone Thugs-NHarmony ft. Dirty Muggs. 601 Clark Ave., 63102. For more information, visit www. eventbrite.com.

Sun., July 21, 7:30 p.m., Stifel Theatre presents Earth, Wind & Fire. 1400 Market St., 63103. For more information, visit www. ticketmaster.com.

Thur., July 25, 8 p.m., The Fox Theatre presents Diana Ross: Music Book Tour. 527 N. Grand Blvd., 63103. For more information, visit www. fabulousfox.com.

Sat., July 27, 8 p.m., Blac Youngsta Live. Ambassador, 9800 Halls Ferry Rd.,63136. For more information, visit www.metrotix.com.

local gigs

Thur., July 11, 6:30 p.m., 2019 Whitaker Urban Evening Concert Series feat. Kim Massie. St. Louis Park Place, Rauschenbach & St. Louis Ave., 63107. For more information, visit www. gracehillsettlement.org.

Fri., July 12, 7:30 & 9:30 p.m., Jazz St. Louis presents Celebrating George Benson Performance by the Montez Coleman Quintet. Jazz at the Bistro, 3536 Washington Ave., 63103. For more information, visit www.jazzstl.org.

Sat., July 13, Atomic Cowboy presents Kim Massie: Steely Dan Tribute. 41410 Manchester Ave., 63110. For more information, visit www. ticketmaster.com.

Wed., July 17, 7 p.m., Sean Coray. Renaissance St. Louis Airport Hotel, 9801 Natural Bridge Rd., 63134. For more information, visit www. seancoray.com.

Thur., July 18, 6 p.m., EDP Productions, LLC presents An Evening with Erica Reed: A Gospel and Blues Affair. With guest artist Vince Martin and Friends. Kranzberg Arts Center, 501 N. Grand Blvd., 63103. For more information, visit www.metrotix.com.

Sat., July 20, 7 p.m., Masters Touch Summer Concert The Ambassador, 9800 Halls Ferry Rd., 63136. For more information, visit www. thenewambassadorstl.com.

special events

Sat., July 13, 11 a.m. City of Jennings 3 on 3 Basketball Tournament, Koeneman Park. Please call 314-388-3040 for details.

July 13 – 14, Nightchaser

The Guide

Kenya Vaughn recommends

presents Daychaser in Forest Park. An outdoor dance party with a hearty dose of circus, art, yoga, flow, and more. World’s Fair Pavillion, 1904 Concourse Dr., 63110. For more information, visit www. eventbrite.com.

Wed., July 17, 10 a.m., JobNewsUSA presents a St. Louis Job Fair. DoubleTree Westport, 1973 Craigshire Rd., 63146. For more information, visit www.jobnewsusa.com.

Sat., July 20, 12 p.m., Frizz Fest 2019: To Encourage Self-Love and Inspire Confidence Among Women. Vendors, food trucks, performances, activities, giveaways, and more. Tower Grove Park, 4256 Magnolia Ave., 63110. For more information, visit www. eventbrite.com.

July 20 – 21, Ultimate HBCU Experience Majorette Dance Workshop. Auxiliary Studio, 8894 Jennings Station Rd., 63136. For more information, call (314) 884-8650.

Sat., July 20, 7:30 p.m., The Willie Akins Scholarship Benefit Concert. Scholarships provide tuition assistance to music majors at Webster University. The Grandel, 3610 Grandel Sq., 63103. For

more information, visit www. facebook.com.

Wed., July 24, 9:30 a.m., HireLive presents St. Louis Job Fair. DoubleTree Westport, 1973 Craigshire Rd., 63146. For more information, visit www.hirelive.com.

Wed., July 24, 6 p.m., Jammin’ At The Zoo: The Zoo Uncorked feat. Dirty Muggs. 1 Government Dr., 63110. For more information, visit www.stlzoo.org.

Sat., July 27, 10 a.m., Saint Louis World Day Against Trafficking. International Institute, 3401 Arsenal St., 63118. For more information, visit www.unausa.org.

Sat., July 27, 4 p.m., Queen Camp, Inc., presents Worthy: The 6th Annual Miss Divine Destiny Pageant. St. Louis University Center for Global Citizenship Auditorium, 3672 West Pine Mall, 63108. For more information, visit www. thequeensguidetolife.com.

Sat., July 27, 6 p.m., StyleTaneous Styles 4th Annual Fashion Show. New Spring Church, 10229 Lewis and Clark Blvd., 63136. For more information, visit www. styletaneousstyles.com

The Fox Theatre presents Diana Ross: Music Book Tour. For more information, see CONCERTS.

facebook.com.

July 19 – 23, 41st Annual YMCA Book Fair. The largest single fundraising event for the Gateway Region YMCA. Greensfelder Recreation Center, Queeny Park, 550 Weidman Rd., 63011. For more information, visit www.ymcabookfair.org.

Sun., Aug. 11, 7 p.m., Churchboy Productions presents Lyricism: The Show. Church will infuse the smooth melodic sounds of R&B with the classy artistry of poetry. The Grandel, 3610 Grandel Sq., 63103. For more information, visit www. metrotix.com.

Sat., July 13, 10 a.m., Pulitzer Arts Foundation presents a Family Day Block Party. Designed for ages 3 –12. Grand Center Arts District, 3716 Washington Blvd., 63108. For more information, visit www.pulitzerarts.org.

comedy

Sun., July 28, 3 p.m., The Metropolitan St. Louis Fisk University Alumni Association Back to School Reception. Incoming and returning students of Fisk University are invited. West Side Missionary Baptist Church, 4675 Page Blvd., 63113. For more information, call (314) 226-6841 or (314) 503-2580.

Fri., Aug. 9, 7 p.m., Anita Jackson: This Woman’s Work! A candid conversation with hard-working women. The Grandel, 3610 Grandel Sq., 63103. For more information, visit www. metrotix.com.

literary

Thur., July 11, 7 p.m., Left Bank Books hosts author Letitia Gomez, author of Queer Brown Voices. 399 N. Euclid Ave., 63108. For more information, visit www.leftbank.com.

Sat., July 13, 6 p.m., Author Teresa Dickerson Book Signing. Dickerson will discuss her new book The Blu Print to Owning Your Own Fashion Boutique Graffiti Girls Boutique, 4532 Gravois St., 63116. For more information, visit www.

Thur., July 11, 8 p.m., Smart, Funny & Black with Amanda Seales: U Kno the Vibeonics: 101. The Pageant, 6161 Delmar Blvd., 63112. For more information, visit www. ticketmaster.com.

July 18 – 20, Helium Comedy Club presents Don “DC” Curry. 1151 St. Louis Galleria St., 63117. For more information, visit www. heliumcomedy.com.

Fri., July 19, 7 a.m., The Funniest Friday Night Ever. Feat. Deon Benson, Brandon Taylor, and Mike Gerdine. Special Tymes Banquet Hall, 5950 Natural Bridge Rd., 63120. For more information, visit www.facebook.com.

July 19 – 20, Funny Bone St. Louis presents Roy Wood Jr 614 Westport Plaza, 63146. For more information, visit www.stlouisfunnybone.com.

July 25 – 28, Helium Comedy Club presents Tony Rock 1151 St. Louis Galleria St., 63117.

theatre

July 11 & 20, Encore Theater Group presents A Raisin in the Sun. Fellowship

STL, 3453 S. Jefferson Ave., 63118. For more information, visit www.eventbrite.com.

July 12 – 14, Independent Theater Company presents For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf. The Theatre Guild of Webster Groves, 517 Theatre Ln., 63119. For more information, visit www.brownpapertickets. com.

Through July 14, St. Louis Actors Studio presents Labute New Theater Festival. Set One includes: Great Negro Works of Art, Color Timer, Privilege, and Kim Jong Rosemary. The Gaslight Theater, 358 N. Boyle Ave., 63108. For more information, visit www.stlas. org.

Through 16, The Muny presents Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella. 1 Theatre Dr., 63112. For more information, visit www.muny. org.

July 19 – 20, JPEK Creative Works presents A Deeper Shade of Blues. A one-man show, interwoven through music, dance, and monologue about being Black in America. .Zack, 3224 Locust St., 63103. For more information, visit www.metrotix.com.

July 26 – 27, Rockshow Productions presents Disney’s Frozen Jr. The Grandel, 3610 Grandel Sq., 63108. For more information, visit www. metrotix.com.

lectures and workshops

Thur., July 11, 5:30 p.m., Focus St. Louis presents Equity in City/County Reform. Missouri History Museum, 5700 Lindell Blvd., 63112. For more information, visit www.focus-stl.org.

Sat., July 13, 11 a.m., Queen Key Escapes hosts Human Trafficking Awareness and Vendor Fair. Keynote speaker Dr. Shante Lampley, performances, and testimonies. Club Diamond, 3156 Pershall Rd., 63136. For more information, visit www. eventbrite.com.

Sat., July 13, 1 p.m., St. Louis Area Violence

Kenya Vaughn recommends

Prevention Commission presents Conversations on the Future of Community Policing in St. Louis. St. Louis Public Library, 5760 W. Florissant Ave., 63120. For more information, visit www. slpl.org.

Tues., July 16, 5 p.m., Grace Hill Women’s Business Center presents a Legal Clinic. Meet with an attorney from Legal Services of Eastern Missouri to discuss business related questions. 2125 Bissell St., 63107. For more information, visit www. eventbrite.com.

Tues., July 23, 9 a.m., U.S. Small Business Administration Workshop St. Louis Public Library, 1301 Olive St., 63103. For more information, visit www.slpl. org.

July 23 – 24, St. Louis Equitable Economic Development Strategy Open House. 23rd: Vashon High School, 3035 Cass Ave, 63106. 24th: Sheet Metal

Workers Union No. 36, 2319 Chouteau Ave., 63103. For more information, visit www. stleconomicdevelopment strategy.com.

Thurs., July 25, 7 p.m. (6 p.m. registration) The Comedy Credit Clinic with speaker Stacy C. Notley, President and CEO of The Manning Group, Room C, Brentwood Community Center, 2505 S. Brentwood Blvd. For more information, visit www. Manning-Group.com.

health

Sat., July 13, 10:30 a.m., Transformation Christian Church & World Outreach Center hosts a Free Community Health Fair & Funfest. 4141 Cook Ave., 63113. For more information, call (314) 535-1176.

Sat., July 20, 11 a.m., Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., Omicron Theta Omega Chapter presents a Pathway to

Health – Health Fair. Ferguson Community Empowerment Center, 9420 W. Florissant Ave., 63136. For more information, call (3140 4398306.

Mon., July 22, 6 p.m., Update on Single Payer Medicare for All. Belleville Public Library, 121 E. Washington St., Belleville, IL 62220. For more information, call (314) 265-3412.

spiritual

Sat., July 13, 8:45 a.m., Refuge and Restoration Church presents Not Easily Broken Marriage

Conference. Renaissance Airport Hotel, 9801 Natural Bridge Rd., 63134. For more information, visit www. facebook.com.

Sun., July 14, 10 a.m., Newstead Avenue Missionary Baptist Church’s 49th Educational Anniversary. 4370 North Market St., 63113. For more information, call (314) 371-4436.

July 15 – 19, Newstead Avenue Missionary Baptist Church invites you to Vacation Bible School. 4370 N. Market St., 63113. For more information, call (314) 371-4436.

July 19 – 20, Ferguson Gospel Choral Workshop The Gospel Workshop will culminate in a Saturday evening performance highlighting the workshop choir. St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church, 33 N. Clay Ave., 63135. For more information, visit www.eventbrite.com.

Sat., July 20, 1 p.m., Speak to the City presents Speak! 2019 Outdoor Family Concert. Feat. Tish Haynes

Stifel Theatre presents Earth, Wind & Fire. See CONCERTS for details.

Continued from C1

– and the wet.

wait

Johnny Gill, who ironically performed the New Edition hit “Can You Stand The Rain,” came out with a message of love for St. Louis fans. He told them that St. Louis is his hands-down favorite city to perform for and expressed his gratitude for the city’s unwavering support.

“The love that you guys have given me over the years has been unbelievable,” Gill said, after kicking off his portion of the show with dance hits “Fairweather Friend” and “Wrap Your Body Tight.” “I’m talking about when people were saying, ‘you’re over, you’re done, don’t nobody want to hear from you.’” When I would come to St. Louis, it never changed. The energy and the love you guys have given me over the years has given me the strength to stand in front of those people and let them know today that I am still standing.”

That energy that Gill spoke of was palpable as he showed them love for the love they showed him.

“I’m gonna try to sing every damn song I know tonight,” Gill said, which was met with even more screams of encouragement. “They are gonna have to kick my [expletive] off the stage. I don’t even have to say anything about partying tonight, because I see my people are

Alexander

Continued from C1

That’s what my work is about.”

Much like the scenery he presents in the film, the trio of artists he selected represent the depth and variety of St. Louis music

“I chose Mad Keys because I always been a fan of his and I love the music he produces,” Alexander said. “He gives like

Morrison

Continued from C1

already ready to go. I see y’all partying and I’m coming down there before the night is over and we’re gonna party together.”

He kept his promises – and even handed out roses and a teddy bear when he maneuvered through the crowd during

a really relaxing feeling – like I’m in a jazz club or something real fancy. I really enjoy his sound.”

Keys has a sound that is a throwback to the best of the Neo Soul movement during the late1990s and into the new millennium. Smooth piano chords over pulsing beats inspired by hip-hop that compel a smooth head nod.

Saputo – a local bassist and vocalist that gained international acclaim when she

Her early days growing up in Ohio; her blossoming as a writer by finding her voice in the drama department of Howard University; her work as an educator; and the serendipitous manner in which she landed the position that made provisions for her to develop as a writer –and guide to some of the most endeared figures in black culture to finding their own voices through her work as an editor – are touched upon. Interviews with Angela Davis, Fran Lebowitz, Walter Mosley, Russell Banks, Oprah Winfrey, and her longtime editor Robert Gottlieb weave

a performance of “My, My My.” It was the culmination of an hour-long performance that included more than a dozen songs from Gill’s 30-plus year career as a solo artist and a lead singer of R&B group New Edition. “Can You Stand The Rain” was the only New

was name-dropped by former president Barack Obama as part of his favorites playlist of 2018 – offers a unique sound that inspires nature to be at one with her as she sits and croons a smooth ballad while playing the guitar.

“Tonina, I just really love her voice – she has a dope voice,” Alexander said. “She is a really talented singer and I felt like she would really fit in nature. I don’t know if y’all could hear it, but when we

together the film along with past and present footage of Morrison.

She was nearly 40 and established in her career managing an editorial department at Random House when she decided that she needed to give African-American readers literature created with them in mind. “The Bluest Eye” was her introduction. Her

Edition track. He worked in newer selections such as “Game Changer” and “Soul of a Woman” before closing the show with his breakthrough solo hit “Rub You The Right Way.”

Keith Sweat picked up the groove where Johnny Gill left

were recording, the birds started chirping in the background while she was singing. I was like, ‘this is beautiful.’

DJ Hoodbunny brings the turnup to the woods when he gets on the tables to mix the best of the rising rap stars St. Louis has to offer for the film’s final element.

“I really love how he mixes songs up and his mashups,” Alexander said of Hoodbunny. “And I felt like I needed something a little ratchet to close it

work would go on to garner Morrison a Pulitzer Prize, an American Book Award, a Nobel Prize and a Presidential Medal of Freedom from Barack Obama.

For five decades, mainstream literature leaned on Morrison to provide authenticity, passion and hard truths regarding race and the African American experience. She has continued writing well into her 80s – with her most recent work being 2015’s “God Help the Child.”

In the film, Morrison discusses how she writes for herself – the black reader. Her intimate knowledge of her community and the desire to express the fullness and richness that lies within the challenges and trauma of being an oppressed and suppressed people are the first order of business. What has set her apart from other black authors has been the complete absence of any special care or framing to lend additional understanding to anyone other than the black

off by opening the show with dance hits “Make You Sweat” and “Don’t Stop Your Love” before slowing things down with “Get Up On It.”

“I have to keep it family-friendly,” Keith Sweat told the crowd as he crooned. Known for his “grown and

out. “I also thought it would be dope to have St. Louis artists in the mix.”

With his turntables perched on a rock across from a flowing stream, Hoodbunny chops and screws selections from Zaddo, Jiggy Keys, ICE, Freshanova, Leonard, Charlie Free & Sav Karti and Meela Li.

Hoodbunny said Alexander talked about the concept of making a film that blended St. Louis music and St. Louis

reader.

She points this out herself in the documentary, particularly with a reference to Ralph Waldo Ellison’s literary classic “Invisible Man.”

“Invisible to who?”

Morrison said in response to the title – while pointing out the tendency of other writers to work as a tour guides through the black experience by writing with a white reader in mind.

“Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am” brings a human connection to a woman who has been deified because of her work since soon after her 1970 literary debut.

Outspoken about her race and representing black people through her writing, the woman behind the work isn’t usually the topic of conversation when Morrison gives interviews.

However, in “Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am,” the brilliant mind that brought the world “Beloved” and “The Bluest Eye” is given the platform to brag about her carrot cake recipe and discuss the

sexy” vibe, he remained as PG as possible while staying true to the music that his fans have come to know and love. He doesn’t have the simulated sex and raunchy lyrics that have become par for the course for some of the contemporary R&B, but a tad bit of scaling back was required – including leaving “Freak Me,” a song he penned for 1990s group Silk off of the set list. Otherwise, it was the same Sweat that fans have followed through the 80s, 90s, 2000s and now. Gill was invited back to the stage to perform the hit “My Body,” by the R&B super group that was comprised of Gill Sweat and late singer Gerald LeVert. Sweat switched back between midtempo and quiet storm with songs such as “Make It Last Forever,” “How Deep Is Your Love” and “Just Got Paid,” a song Sweat penned for late Bahamian singer Johnny Kemp. He went tit for tat between dance tracks and ballads – including “Twisted,” “I’ll Give All My Love To You” and “Nobody” before closing with a cover of Cameo’s “Candy.” He too declared his love for St. Louis – saying that the city is one of his favorite places to perform. The fans always show up for him as well. He said he couldn’t remember the last time he came to St. Louis. It was last November, but Sweat and the fans connected like it had been several years since the last time he graced the stage.

nature while they were hiking for Hoodbunny’s birthday.

“We talked about this –and here we are a year later,” Hoodbunny said. “It was a really collaborative project,” Alexander said. “I’m just all about bringing people together – everybody getting their shine and making it happen.”

For more information about Jon Alexander, visit: https:// chillseason.me/home

challenges of being a single parent while simultaneously working as an author and an editor.

The film gets convoluted at points with the continual back and forth between past and present footage. The film culminates with Morrison’s history making honor for her contributions to her field – but because the milestone happens 25 years from now, it feels as if there are chapters missing.

“Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am” doesn’t delve too deeply into its subject’s creative process, but perhaps GreenfieldSanders was more intent on presenting the woman behind the work. Through her writing, Morrison continues to prove not only the power of words –but also illustrates how giving words to a people transfers that power through representation.

Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am opens in theaters nationwide on Friday, July 12. The film is rated PG-13 with a running time of 119 minutes.

Keith Sweat on stage during the July 5th Fair Saint Louis concert.

Photo by Lawrence Bryant

Celebrations

Birthdays

Reunions

yahoo.com or send your questions to P.O. Box 155, Florissant, MO 63032.

Beaumont High School Class of 1969 will celebrate its 50-year reunion Sept 20-22, 2019 at Embassy Suites St. Charles. Come join us as we celebrate these golden years, “Living Life Like It’s Golden.” For more information contact Dennis Hayden 314 276-6188 or beaumontclassof1969@

Beaumont Class of 1974 is planning its 45-year reunion for the weekend of July 26-28, 2019. To update us with your information please email us at ten55jw@yahoo.com, forward communications to Beaumont Alumni 1974, PO Box 37091, St. Louis MO 63141 or call James White, 314-494-5554. Details coming soon!

Beaumont High School Class of 1979 is planning its 40-year reunion. All activities are scheduled for the weekend of September 27-29. The location is The Airport Marriot at 10700 Pear

Tree Drive, St. Louis 63134. For more information, contact Milton Jackson at 314-2764392 or Yolanda Lockhart at lockhartyo08@gmail.com.

Kinloch Class of 1969 is planning its 50-year reunion, August 21-23. Dinner dance at Orlandos, 2050 Dorsett Village Plaza. For information call Ruben at 314-239-5202 or Ophelia at 314-280-6596. Classmates please respond by April 2019.

Northwest Class of 1979 is planning on cruising for our 40-year reunion and would love for you to join us! Date to sail is set for July 20, 2019 and you can feel free to contact: Duane Daniels at

314-568-2057 or Howard Day at 414-698-4261 for further information. Please don’t miss the boat!

Parkway North Class of 1999 will celebrate its 20-year reunion on July 20 at 7 pm at the Fox Sports VIP Lounge at Ballpark Village. Cost is $60/ person. For info contact Cyndi at Cyndi@varsityreunion.com.

Soldan is having its 14th AllClass Alumni Picnic, August 17, 2019, at Tiemeyer Park, 3311 Ashby Rd., St. Ann, MO 63074 from 10 am-6 pm. Bring your own basket or grill out there. Food trucks will be present. T-Shirts are $15—get your grad year on your t-shirt before August 3, 2019. For

or call 314-749-3803. Soldan Class of 1979 is planning its 40-year reunion for the weekend of August 2-3, 2019. Yearlong reunion activities will begin with a kickoff at Soldan High School Homecoming on Saturday, October 13, 2018 prior to the game at 1 p.m. For more information or to assist with reunion activities, please email at:

and Del Weston

Brielle Walls

DeMarco Farrar

Swag Snap of the Week

R&B love and showers at Fair Saint Louis. STL. R&B mainstays Johnny Gill and Keith Sweat served up soggy Stone Soul Picnic realness during the urban night of Fair Saint Louis Friday at Gateway Arch National Park. I was expecting John Legend or India.Arie’s Live on the Levee numbers as far as the crowd size, but I had to remind myself that, since lunchtime, the weather was acting like it was going to cut up. Considering the storm clouds that were constantly ready to clown, it was a respectable representation – with record breaking enthusiasm. Johnny and Keith responded by matching the energy of the crowd that stayed put even after the drizzle stayed steady – especially Johnny! He sang, he stomped the stage down with some fully orchestrated combination choreography, he worked the crowd. The folks had the nerve to have a few cute little notes in them when he went to the audience and gave them a chance to sing along. And most importantly he gave our city credit for having his back from the get and showing him support over the highs and the lows of his career. Now before folks start accusing him of jumping on Beyoncé’s bandwagon as far as the Frankie Beverly and Maze “Before I Let Go” cover, I must let y’all know that he has been performing that song about as long as he has been handing out individual roses during “My My My.” I’ve seen him perform it twice at The Ambassador alone. And who else feels like they have been sleeping on Mr. Johnny’s new stuff after hearing his performances of “Game Changer” and “Soul of a Woman?”

A cute set from Keith Sweat. Keith Sweat’s portion got off to an interesting start even before the singer took the stage, when his gorgeous background dancer twirled clean up out of her wig during her opening solo. The poor thing. I can’t blame her for hitting a kick-turn-spin with enough force to carry her right back off stage. It was like a tornado, girl. I’m not sure if I ever saw her again. That wig logistical nightmare was the only setback of Keith’s portion of the show. His little hype man/dancer came out with him and Keith came out rocking to “Make You Sweat” with that little shoulder dip, hip swivel move that he has made last forever. Y’all know it was filled with croon crying, but that’s Keith Sweat’s trademark, right? And I wasn’t mad about any portion of the show – which he kept more upbeat and family friendly than

By Delores Shante dshante@stlamerican.com

Photos by V. Lang

usual. I was even more thrilled that Keith and Johnny were on the same bill for the show when he came back on stage with Keith and paid tribute to their LSG days with a rendition of “My Body.” It made me sad that my late great teddy bear Gerald LeVert couldn’t be up there singing with them, but I still enjoyed it. And speaking of enjoy, that female backup singer Keith carries around with him is absolute life. Can anybody confirm whether or not she is the original Kut Klose lead singer, because she sure sounds like it. And she hits spot-on with the “Make It Last Forever” vocals as well as spot on delivery of the Kut Close featured tracks. And Keith followed Johnny’s lead with a family cookout classic by closing the show with Cameo’s “Candy” – which worked much better than I expected it would from him.

Hot and heavy at Hey Luv. Listen, the folks were out in these streets on “4th of July Eve!” The club was going up on a Wednesday, honey. My first stop was R&B groove offered up by Shadzilla, DJ Reminisce and DJ J Mo, better known as HeyLuv. I don’t know what was in the air that night, but the folks who stopped through Sophie’s were definitely in the mood for some 90s raunchy slow jams. From “Knockin’ The Boots” to “Freak You” to “Freak Me,” there was a NSFW R&B sing along happening from the time I came through until I left. And who was that couple in white that decided to reenact the words of those filthy songs for everyone in the spot to see? I was lowkey uncomfortable. I promise you that is not what the creator of the classic quote

“dance like nobody’s watching” had in mind. Shame on y’all! Pepper Lounge was poppin’ for FireWorks. After I left Sophie’s, I scooted on down Locust to Pepper Lounge for what has now become an annual tradition for me the “FireWorks” pre-holiday jam. Because the HeyLuv crowd is an early one, I got to the Pepper Lounge just as things were starting to get popping. They had all the who’s who in the building – and they had the VIP booths on lock. Just like last year, it was full of cute folks having the cutest of times. Because of how Pepper Lounge is set up, I couldn’t quite see who was spinning the sounds for the night. But whoever you are, you were getting it in!

A Smoke Session with Twista. Before y’all accuse me of any illicit activity with the rapper that can spit verses as fast as Usain Bolt can run, let me break it down to y’all that Smoke Session is a North County Hookah Lounge that hosted the hip-hop veteran Saturday night. Smoke Session lived up to its name – so much so that I regret not taking the time to do a full wash and deep condition before Sunday service because there were some serious sniff/ side-eye combinations. But back to the event: I have never been in the spot before – which was more intimate than I expected, to house a big name like Twista. They had a full house too – and I’m glad that it was a chill vibe where folks weren’t falling all over each other and getting rowdy like some folks can be when trying to make connections with rap stars when they make club appearances. I also want to give a special shout out to the organizers of the Saturday’s set for pulling out all the stops to make sure that I felt at home for my first time at Smoke Session.

A Breakaway jazz triple header. I know y’all don’t care to hear too much about jazz – even if our city has been putting its foot in the genre from the very beginning. But it would be silly for me not to mention that I stopped through Breakaway Productions Jazz Triple Play at The Grandel Saturday Evening for some smooth sounds featuring Mark Harris II, The ColemanHughes Project and the show headliners The Bosman Twins It was a good grown time with

Platinum-selling rap artist Twista was in town as J. Dubb celebrated his birthday Saturday night at Smoke Session. Twista’s camp made sure that fans knew that the hip-hop vet had dropped his new mixtape, entitled “Summer 96” – and encouraged them to download the project.

Glow of Art Bae was supported by Ptah as she hosted RELAUNCH Sunday @ The Monocle

Ltonya and Jason made sure they didn’t miss the opportunity to see Johnny Gill and Keith Sweat sing their classic hits Friday @ Fair Saint Louis.

Jazz Triple Play headliners The Bosman twins surprised Marilyn and Jeffery with a photo op just before they hit the stage Saturday @ The Grandel.

Camile and Devin were among those packed inside The Monocle supporting some of St. Louis’ top beat makers @ Fresh Produce Friday night.

Deidre and Roy headed to their seats as the musicians were tuning up for the Jazz Triple Play @ The Grandel Theatre.

Downtown Cho and Klick Klack were just two of the beatmakers that competed @ Fresh Produce Friday night @ The Monocle.

Sam and KMJtheDJ were spotted @ Pepper Lounge for the FireWorks Party Wednesday night.

The Fair Saint Louis kickback was in full effect @ Gateway Arch Park as Shakira, Fred, Umeca and Kesha sang along with Johnny Gill.

Sisters Shanee and Shanice started their weekend on Wednesday at Sophie’s with the HeyLuv crew.

Brittany, Crystal and LaQuina caught up during the Umbrella Group’s Cancer Bash Saturday @ Privilege Lounge.

COMMUNICATIONS DIRECTOR

MO Coalition for Environment

seeks Comm Dir for graphic design, production & distribution of branded outreach materials across all electronic & print mediums, including website, newsletter, social media, e-alerts, press releases, annual report. Qualifications: Familiarity w MS Office, Adobe or similar programs & demonstrated success w websites, social media, email marketing, media outlets. Excellent verbal & written skills. Flexible work style that can work independently or with team, meet deadlines, balance many projects. Full-time, benefits. See www.moenvironment.org. Send resume, cover letter, work sample & 2 references to moenviron@moenviron.org with Communications Director in subject line.

POLICE OFFICER AND FIREFIGHTER/ PARAMEDIC

The City of Clayton is now accepting applications for the full-time positions of Police Officer and Firefighter/ Paramedic. To apply, go to www.claytonmo.gov/jobs.

EOE

PLANNING EDUCATION SPECIALIST

MOSERS is recruiting for a Financial Planning Education Specialist. This position reports to the Defined Contribution Education Coordinator who is located in Jefferson City, but works remotely in the greater St. Louis and Southeast Missouri areas. This position is in the field 80% of the workweek, meeting with plan participants and presenting about our 457 and 401a plans and providing information about investment concepts, cost of living in retirement, and financial planning. Three years’ experience in financial planning and Certified Financial Planner or Chartered Financial Consultant designations strongly preferred. Bachelor’s degree required. Starting salary $56,500 - $61,500 dependent on experience. Read full job description and apply at www.mosers. org, click “Careers”. EOE:M/F/V/D.

SCHOOL BUS DRIVER

Looking for a long term career with growth opportunities? Great opportunity to join an organization making a positive impact in the community. Excellent pay, Employer pays 100% of Medical and Dental premiums all year long, safety & attendance bonuses, pension and 403(b) retirement, vacation and holiday pay and breakfast. Lift For Life Academy is seeking seasoned bus drivers looking for Full or Part time driving for our new Elementary School K-2 students opening August 1st.

Must have valid Class B CDL with Passenger and School Bus endorsements, DOT card, good driving record and relevant driving experience. Must be able to pass fingerprint background check and drug screen. Please email your resume to HR Director at jderby@liftforlifeacademy.org or call James Lane, Transportation Manager at 314-565-4231 . EOE

JUSTICE ORGANIZER WANTED

To staff the Missouri HIV Justice Coalition and serve as the main conduit to community groups, advocates, and other supporters of modernizing Missouri’s outdated laws regarding HIV. A strong commitment to social justice and experience working with marginalized populations – such as people living with low incomes, people living with HIV (PLHIV), People of Color (POC), and or Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender & Queer (LGBTQ) communities. Please send resume and cover letter to jobs@empowermissouri.org

Seeking person to manage offices of a historic church located in St. Louis City. Organized, Microsoft Word and good public relation skills needed. Reply to unionmemorialumc@sbcglobal.net The Metropolitan St. Louis Equal Housing & Opportunity Council (EHOC) seeks:

www.ehocstl.org/job-opportunities for info EHOC is an equal opportunity employer.

CLIENT ANALYST

HS Diploma. Responsible for processing assigned caseload for the Housing Choice Voucher Program (Section 8). Conducts interviews, orientation sessions for applicants seeking assistance through Section 8. Process changes in client status to vacate, evictions, inspection action notifications, voucher issuance, program terminations, contracts, lease agreements, inspection requests, income changes, interim reviews, housing assistance payment adjustments and/ or withholdings. Good communication skills and ability to deal with the public. Must type 30 wpm. Starting Salary $36,855 Annually. Apply or send resume to: St. Louis Housing Authority, HR Division, 3520 Page Blvd., St. Louis, MO 63106 by 5:00 p.m. July 23, 2019 via our website www.slha.org or email athomas@slha.org. A Drug Free Work Place/EOE.

POLICE OFFICER/PUBLIC SAFETY OFFICER

The Des Peres Department of Public Safety is hiring a full-time Police Officer/Public Safety Officer. Starting salary is $56,117 to $61,692 depending on qualifications and experience including an excellent fringe benefit package. Successful applicant may be cross-trained as a Firefighter and Emergency Medical Technician (EMT), and will be primarily assigned to patrol operations or the West County Center Detail (until fully trained). Applications are available at www.desperesmo.org or apply in person at the Des Peres Department of Public Safety, 1000 N. Ballas Road 63131. Applications will be accepted until 5:00 P.M. on Friday, July 19, 2019.

DOING BUSINESS WITH THE U.S. NAVY & MARINE CORPS

As part of St. Louis Navy Week, Mr. Jimmy Smith, Director, Department of the Navy’s Office of Small Business Programs, in partnership with the Missouri Procurement Technical Assistant Centers, will conduct a small business workshop on September 5th at Grant’s View St. Louis Public Library.

This small business workshop is designed to educate small businesses on how to do business with the Navy and Marine Corps. The workshop will also cover how to find out about upcoming contracting opportunities and how small businesses can contribute to the warfighter mission.

Location: Saint Louis Public Library Grant’s View 9700 Musick Ave. St. Louis, MO 63123

Date & Time: Thursday, September 5th from 9:30 AM – 12:30 PM CT

Cost: FREE

Registration: bit.ly/ptacnavysep5

Washington University in St. Louis offers rewarding opportunities in various fields at all levels, with positions in engineering, nursing and health care, research, administration, technology, security and more.

Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs for Diversity & Inclusion – Job 44631

Washington University in St. Louis (Washington University) seeks a new Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Affairs (AVC) and Dean of the Center for Diversity and Inclusion (CDI), with a targeted appointment date of January 1, 2020. A leading, AAU-member research university whose recent investments in facilities and advising structures provide an unsurpassed undergraduate residential life experience, Washington University is infusing considerations of diversity and inclusion throughout every part of its operation, including multiple, concurrent signature initiatives proceeding from the Office of the Provost (http://diversity.wustl.edu), the Academy for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (the Academy), and the Department of Human Resources. The CDI is the student-facing piece of this strategic institutional priority.

Director of Religious, Spiritual, and Ethical Life (TimeLimited) - Center for Diversity & Inclusion Job ID: 44631

The director will serve as an integral member of the Student Affairs Diversity & Inclusion cluster as the campuses lead on student religious, ethical and spiritual life issues. The Director supports the mission of the Division of Student Affairs with respect to diversity, inclusion, and interfaith efforts; direct initiatives related to supporting students in the development of their religious, ethical, and spiritual lives; and plans an array of programs and events in collaboration with other university departments and the Washington University Interfaith Campus Ministers Association. The Director provides leadership in the planning and implementation of the campuses’ public ritual events and assumes a leadership role and compassionate presence during celebratory, challenging, and crisis times.

Supervisor, DCM Facilities - Comparative Medicine - 43917

This position directs facility operations, vivarium equipment and animal laboratory processes. Directly supervises 6-15 husbandry personnel. Assists the Facility Manager in the management of the animal care and husbandry program in accordance with the regulations and guidelines of Animal Welfare Act, The Public Health Service and University Policies to assure a quality animal care program that supports the research and teaching at Washington University. This position plays a leadership role within the Division of Comparative Medicine. Rotational work on weekends and holidays is required. The ideal candidate will have the following: Bachelor’s degree plus 3 years of experience in a laboratory animal facility or equivalent combination of education, AALAS certification and laboratory animal or supervisory experience totaling 7 years.

For a full description of these positions and other career opportunities, please visit https://jobs.wustl.edu/ to apply. Click search jobs and enter the job ID number.

We seek people from diverse backgrounds to join us in a supportive environment that encourages boldness, inclusion and creativity. EO/AA/VET/Disability Employer

METROPOLITAN

ST. LOUIS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

St. Louis Community College will receive separate sealed bids for Contract No. F 20 601, Roof Overlay on Service Building, St. Louis Community College at Meramec, until p.m. local time, Tuesday, July 23, 2019. Bids will be publicly opened and read aloud at the office of the Manager of Engineering and Design, 5464 Highland Park Drive (Plan Room). Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from the Manager's office, at the above address or by calling (314) 644-9770.

Voluntary Pre-bid Meeting: July 16, 2019

An Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer

NOTICE TO CONTRACTORS

Sealed bids for 2019 CRS Pavement Rehabilitation, Area C, St. Louis County Project No. CR-1789, will be received at the Office of the Director of Procurement for the County of St. Louis, County Government Center Administration Building, 41 South Central Avenue, 8th Floor, Clayton, Missouri 63105, until 11:00 a.m. on July 31, 2019. Plans and specifications will be available on July 1, 2019 from the St. Louis County Web Site (www.stlouisco.com), or by contacting County Blue Reprographics, Inc., 1449 Strassner Drive, St. Louis, Missouri 63144, (314) 961-3800.

ST. LOUIS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

St. Louis Community College will receive separate sealed bids for Contract No. F 19 002, Concrete Work, St. Louis Community College at Meramec and Florissant Valley, until 2:00 p.m. local time, July 16, 2019. Bids will be publicly opened and read aloud at the office of the Manager of Engineering and Design, 5464 Highland Park Drive (Plan Room). Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from the Manager's office, at the above address or by calling (314) 644-9770.

Voluntary Pre-bid Meeting: By Appointment

An Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer

NOTICE TO

ST. LOUIS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

St. Louis Community College will receive separate sealed bids for CONTRACT NO.

F 20 401A, Pre-Demolition Abatement of A and B Towers at St. Louis Community College at Forest Park Campus, until 10:00 a.m. local time, July 23,2019. Bids will be publicly opened and read aloud at the office of the Manager of Engineering and Design, 5464 Highland Park, St. Louis, MO 63110-1314. Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from the Manager’s office, at the above address or by calling (314) 644-9770.

Mandatory Pre-Bid Meeting: July 10, 2019, 1:00 pm, Meet at “D” Tower, Plaza Level – Forest Park Campus

An Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action Employer

Public Notice of Single Source Procurement

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is proposing to procure: 6,8,12 inch Pumps and Accessories. The District is proposing single source procurement to Mobile Mini Tank & Pump Solutions for this equipment because the vendor is able to provide the equipment needed as repairs are done on an out of service pump station due to the 2019 Flood. Any inquiries should be sent to ameyer@stlmsd.com.

Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

METROPOLITAN ST. LOUIS

SEWER DISTRICT

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is accepting proposals in the Purchasing Division, 2350 Market Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63103-2555 until 10:00 a.m. on August 12th, 2019 to contract with a company for: Sleep Study Services.

Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from www.stlmsd.com, click on the “MSD AT WORK” link, (bid opportunities). The bid document will be identified as 10010 RFP. If you do not have access to the internet, call 314.768.2735 to request a copy of this bid.

Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

Public Notice of Single Source Procurement

Public Notice of Single Source Procurement

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is proposing to procure: iPACS & FAST Annual Maintenance and Support. The District is proposing single source procurement to enfoTech for this service. Any inquiries should be sent to ameyer@stlmsd.com.

NOTICE TO CONTRACTORS

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is proposing to procure: ESRI ArcGIS Software Annual Renewal. The District is proposing single source procurement to ESRI for this software. Any inquiries should be sent to ameyer@stlmsd.com.

Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

NOTICE TO CONTRACTORS

METROPOLITAN ST. LOUIS SEWER DISTRICT

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District will receive sealed bids in the Purchasing Division, 2350 Market Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63103-2555 until 10:00am August 9, 2019 for: BREAKERS

Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from www.stlmsd.com - click on “MSD At Work”, then “Bidding on Projects”. The bid document will be 10052 RFQ. If you do not have access to the internet, call (314) 768-6314 to request a copy of this bid.

Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

METROPOLITAN ST. LOUIS

SEWER DISTRICT

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District will receive sealed proposals in the Purchasing Division, 2350 Market Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63103-2555 until 11:00 a.m. on August 13, 2019 to contract with a company for: INDUSTRIAL VENDING MACHINES – SAFETY SUPPLIES & EQUIPMENT.

Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from www.stlmsd.com, click on the “MSD AT WORK” link, (bid opportunities). The bid document will be identified as 10036 RFP. If you do not have access to the internet, call 314-768-6254 to request a copy of this bid.

Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

Equal Opportunity Employer.

BIDS for Retrofit AntiLigature, Northwest Missouri Psychiatric Rehabilitation Center,St.Joseph, Missouri,Project No. M1911-01 willbereceived byFMDC, StateofMO, UNTIL1:30 PM,8/1/2019. For specificproject informationand orderingplans,go to:http://oa.mo. gov/ facilities

Notice is hereby given that The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (District) will receive sealed bids for Mackenzie I/I Reduction (Resurrection Cemetery, Wehner Park, Kenrick Seminary, and Nerinx Hall) under Letting No. 12336-015.1, at this office, 2350 Market Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63103, until 02:00 PM on Wednesday, August 14, 2019, at a place designated. Bids will be received only from companies that are pre-qualified by the District’s Engineering Department for: SEWER CONSTRUCTION – St. Louis County drainlayer’s license required Plans and Specifications are available for free electronic download. Please go to MSD’s website and look for a link to “ELECTRONIC PLANROOM.” Plans and

ST. LOUIS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer. Website and Newspaper

Saint Louis Zoo 2019 Railroad Track Replacement RFP

The scope of the project includes: The Saint Louis Zoo requires for several sections of track making up the Zooline Railroad be removed and then replaced. All eligible bidders will be required to attend a pre-bid meeting and walkthrough on 7/16/2019 at 9:00 AM. Meet in the lower Rotunda of the Living World.

Sealed bids marked with project name will be accepted on or before 8/8/2019 at 2:00PM. Documents can be found on 7/10/2019 at: https://www.stlzoo.org/about/contact/

E-bids for St. Louis Community College Invitation for Bid No. B0003842 for a Moving & Storage Service, will be received until 2:00 p.m. (local time) on August 5, 2019 at Purchasing@stlcc.edu, and immediately thereafter opened and read. Bid documents can be accessed on our website at www.stlcc.edu/purchasing or call (314) 539-5226. EOE/AA Employer.

the District’s Engineering Department for: SEWER CONSTRUCTION – St. Louis County drainlayer’s license required Plans and Specifications are available for free electronic download. Please go to MSD’s website and look for a link to “ELECTRONIC PLANROOM.” Plans and Specifications are also available for viewing or purchase at Cross Rhodes Reprographics located at 1712 Macklind Avenue, St. Louis MO 63110. All bidders must obtain a set of plans and specifications in order to submit a bid in the name of the entity submitting the bid. The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

ST. LOUIS COMMUNITY COLLEGE

E-bids for St. Louis Community College Invitation for Bid No. B0003841 for Athletic Equipment and Supplies, will be received until 2:00 p.m. (local time) on August 2, 2019 at Purchasing@stlcc.edu, and immediately thereafter opened and read. Bid documents can be accessed on our website at www.stlcc.edu/purchasing or call (314) 539-5226. EOE/AA Employer.

BIDS

Great Rivers Greenway is seeking bids for the demolition of one residential property. Check https:// greatriversgreenway.org/ jobs-bids/ and submit by August 1, 2019.

INVITATION TO BID

Ferguson-Florissant School District District Pest Control Services AND Playground Ground Cover

Two (2) sealed bids will be accepted for the following projects: Mark sealed envelopes accordingly until Wednesday July 17, 2019 1) Pest Control Services 10:00 a.m. CST Matt Furfaro 314-506-9184

2) Playground Ground Cover 10:30 a.m. CST Mike Kirchoff 314-506-9185 by the Ferguson-Florissant School District, and will be publicly opened and read aloud at the Facilities Department 7469 Mintert Ind. Dr. Ferguson, MO. 63135. Submit interest at District Web site http://new. fergflor.k12.mo.us/facilities-rfq.

ELECTONIC BIDS forthe REBIDOF Repair ParkingLotsand Driveways,Troop CHeadquarters, WeldonSprings, St.Charles County, Missouri,Project No.R1905-01 will bereceivedby FMDC,Stateof MO, UNTIL1:30PM, 7/25/2019.For specificproject informationand orderingplans, goto: http://oa.mo.gov/ facilities

SEALED BIDS

o Building Connected - support@buildingconnected.com

https://app.buildingconnected.com/public/560b8771b f6a170700342164 o ABC Heart of America Plan Room - 816-994-5990 https://www.abcksmo.org/business-development/bidnotification/ o The Builder’s Association Plan Room - 816-531.4741 https://www.buildersassociation.com/WCM/Plan_Room/ WCM/_PlanRoom/Plan_Room.aspx?hkey=88f4960d%20 -8355-4746-9a12-8c13c7331d9b

o Drexel Technologies Plan Room - 913-371-4430

http://planroom.drexeltech.com/View/Default.aspx

Nabholz Construction Corporation encourages all small, minority-owned, women-owned, or disadvantaged business enterprises to submit bids for this project.

The Board of Equalization will meet from July 1st through August 23, 2019. The deadline to appeal to the Board of Equalization is July 8, 2019. Any person may appeal their assessment by writing to the Board of Equalization, 1200 Market Street, Room 120, St. Louis, MO 63103 or by email to zasr@stlouis-mo.gov.

Michael R. Dauphin City of St. Louis Assessor

NOTICE TO CONTRACTORS

Notice is hereby given that The Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District (District) will receive sealed bids for Briarbrae Drive #1033 Sanitary Sewer Replacement (IR) under Letting No.13265-015.1, at this office, 2350 Market Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63103, until 02:00 PM on Wednesday, August 07, 2019, at a place designated. Bids will be received only from companies that are pre-qualified by the District’s Engineering Department for: DEEP SEWER CONSTRUCTION – St. Louis County drainlayer’s license required Plans and Specifications are available for free electronic download. Please go to MSD’s website and look for a link to “ELECTRONIC PLANROOM.” Plans and Specifications are

METROPOLITAN ST. LOUIS

SEWER DISTRICT

Notice is hereby given that the Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District will receive Proposals in the Purchasing Division, 2350 Market Street, St. Louis, Missouri 63103-2555 until 11:00 a.m. on July 31, 2019 to contract with a company for: CCTV TRUCKS.

Specifications and bid forms may be obtained from www.stlmsd.com, click on the “MSD AT WORK” link, (bid opportunities). The bid document will be identified as 10015 RFP. If you do not have access to the internet, call 314-768-6254 to request a copy of this bid. Metropolitan St. Louis Sewer District is an Equal Opportunity Employer.

SEALED BIDS

forRepair, Sealcoat&Stripe AsphaltPavement, MissouriNational Guard,Camp Clark, CampCrowder, &IkeSkelton Training Sites, Nevada, Neosho,Jefferson City,Missouri, Project No.T1925-01, willbe receivedby FMDC, StateofMO, UNTIL1:30PM, 8/1/2019 Forspecificproject info

orderingplans,go to:http://oa.mo. gov/ facilities

SEALED BIDS

Improvements, ElephantRocks StatePark,Pilot Knob,Missouri, ProjectNo. X1707-01 willbereceived byFMDC, Stateof MO, UNTIL 1:30PM, 7/25/2019 Forspecific project informationand orderingplans,go to:http://oa.mo. gov/ facilities

ROOMS, AVCRADARMY AVIATION SITE, SPRINGFIELD, MISSOURI, Project No.T1828-01 willbe receivedby FMDC, Stateof

UNTIL 1:30

Advertised herein is subject to the Federal Fair Housing Act, which makes it illegal to advertise any preference, imitation, or discrimination because of race,color, religion, sex, handicap, familial\status, or national origin, or intention to make any such preference, limitation, or discrimination.“We will not knowingly accept any advertising for real estate which is in violation of the law. All persons are hereby informed that all dwellings advertised are available on an equal opportunity basis.”

Rev. Adam Jefferson Richardson named senior bishop of AME Church

Leads world’s oldest denomination founded by African Americans

The Right Reverend Adam Jefferson Richardson Jr. was installed as the senior bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME) Church on June 26th during the AME Church’s Annual Council of Bishops and General Board Meeting Worship Service at the Birmingham-Jefferson County Convention Center in Birmingham, Alabama.

Richardson will serve as senior bishop until his retirement in 2024.

The senior bishop is the active bishop with the longest tenure of service in the AME Church and is first in order of precedence among the Council of Bishops. The position occupies a key role in the polity and practice of the AME Church.

While a Senior Bishop has existed since the incorporation of the church as a denomination in 1816, the first formal investiture ceremony occurred at the 2004 General Conference. The ceremony includes the passage of the senior bishop’s regalia – a solid gold medallion with the logo of the denomination donated by the family of Claude Stephens.

“I am honored for service at this time in the history of our church I seek an interest in your prayers that I may rise to the occasion, that inadequacies may not be too glaring,” Richardson said during his investiture. “Whatever successes, whatever achievements, the credit, the glory will belong to God in Christ.” Richardson succeeds the Right Reverend McKinley Young who died in January. He was elected and consecrated the 115th bishop at the 1996 General Conference.

With service in pulpits throughout Georgia and Florida, the last church Richardson pastored prior to his election was Bethel AME Church in Tallahassee, Florida where he served for 18 years. He obtained the Bachelor of Arts degree from the Florida A&M University (where he was noted as the head drum major of the “Marching 100”

Band). He received his Master of Divinity and Doctor of Sacred Theology degrees at the Interdenominational Theological Center in Atlanta, Georgia.

As a bishop, he has served churches in Sierra Leone, Ghana Liberia, Cote D’Ivoire, Togo and Benin (14th District), the Republic of South Africa (19th District), Virginia, North Carolina, Maryland and Washington, DC (2nd District) and currently Florida and the Bahamas Islands (11thDistrict). He has served as chair of the Health Commission, Lay, Commission on Seminaries, Colleges and Schools and as president of the Council of Bishops.

He has represented the AME Church in a number of ecumenical bodies including the World Methodist Council and the National Congress of Black Churches. He is also a prolific author with articles or chapters

in several books including the “AfricanAmerican Devotional Bible” and “Headlines to Homilies.”

Reflecting on his time as a Florida A&M University drum major he said, “There are quite a few steps (literally and figuratively) between the patch (the practice field) and senior bishop.”

He and his wife Connie Speights Richardson are proud parents of two adult children Monique (a Leon County Judge) and Trey (a certified hospital radiographer and professional saxophone player).

Founded in 1787 by Richard Allen, the African Methodist Episcopal Church is the world’s oldest denomination founded by African Americans. It has over 2 million members in 40 countries on five continents. For more information visit www.amechurch.com.

How many of you have ever been too embarrassed to pray, too afraid or really just too ashamed? Maybe you were afraid, or perhaps just feeling a little guilty. Because we claim to know Jesus, it is during very difficult times, that to kneel down before the Lord, (especially after you’ve done exactly that thing which represents the absolute worst in you) seems impossible. I know this firsthand. Sin, you see, comes in many shapes and sizes and colors and flavors. Only you and the Lord know how successful the world has been in tantalizing you to do exactly what you know you shouldn’t. Only Satan can tempt you in ways that leave you utterly defeated. He reigns in a world where one of his primary jobs is to get you to do what you’ve professed to God and man that you would never do. And you know better. It must be rough then, when, instead of you calling on God, He makes a house call on you.

After Adam ate the apple, the bible says God went looking for him. Adam knew better and He knew in his heart that he couldn’t hide from his creator. And so it is with us.

Real believers must pray and ask for forgiveness. In doing so, quite a few things should become crystal clear. One, you can’t procrastinate where God is concerned and two, you can’t hide from the truth. And the truth is you’re a sinner. We all are. And to make matters worse, the closer you get to God, the more obvious it is to you and Him how much of a sinner you really are. When sin succeeds in your life, it is appropriate to seek forgiveness.

I’m just acknowledging how hard it is to be forthright enough to say to God through Jesus, “I’m sorry.” We know as Christians we are obligated to do our very best. It, at times, might seem like a cruel joke to aspire to something you’ll never be able to achieve. None of us will never commit a sin against God. Living without sin is an impossibility. The obligation is to try. Our success lies in our effort and our intent.

We are obligated to seek Him out and let Him know that we know better and are truly repentant when we screw up. The closer we get to His light, the more likely we are to see the countless stains on our soul. Imperfection ingloriously stands out in the illumination of perfection. That’s just a fact. We need to understand that it’s okay to look for the Lord even when we know we have no right to ask for His mercy. Part of the mystery of faith, at least for me, is constantly coming to grips with just how much God loves me. In spite of what little I have to offer, He receives me and you as He would His own Son. I think it’s important to remember you can always go home. Home is wherever God is. If that be the case and I’m trying to be a vessel for the Holy Spirit, then I have to accept that God resides in me and wherever I am is home.

James Washington

Senior Bishop Adam Jefferson Richardson Jr. (left)