African-American News&Issues

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August 15-21, 2007 ™ Vol. 12 Issue 28

TEXAS’ Widest Circulated and Read Newspaper with a Black Perspective

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Houston - Galveston - Texas City - Missouri City - Conroe - Woodlands - Huntsville - Beaumont - Port Arthur - Grove - Orange - Lumberton - Liberty - Cleveland - Livingston - Crockett - San Antonio - Mexia - Gatesville - Bellmead Austin - Brenham - Hempstead - Prairie View - College Station - Bryan - Killeen - Temple - Waco - Dallas - Irving - Fort Worth - Arlington - Waxahachie - Elgin - Round Rock - Harker Heights - Copperas Cove - Ennis - Corsicana

NEW SCHOOLS NEED OLD METHODS CIS’s CEO Briggs tests “Lunch Bunch” at Chamber’s monthly meeting A real “Soul Man” in Dallas Page 9

BUD JOHNSON

African-American News&Issues

Roundup from the

Lone Star Hoods

ABILENE– The Abilene, Texas branch of the NAACP is focusing it efforts on ways to help children. At a recent Freedom Fund Banquet, members set a platform to send an important message about adopting children.

While about 12 percent of the population in Texas is African American, Black children make up 30 percent of the children in foster care. This is a disparity that the group wants to change.

President Petty D. Hunter invites all interested parties to attend the monthly brach members’ meeting, the first Thursday of each month at 6:30p.m. at GV Daniels Recreation Center, 541 North 8th St. For more information, call (325)675-0166.

AUSTIN– The Austin Independent School District is exploring the development of a Young Men’s Leadership Academy for boys in grades 6 to 12. The academy would be dedicated to preparing young males for college.

Such a program is sure to help young African American and Hispanic youth get on track and stay on track to brighter futures.

The district is seeking input from parents before making a decision on whether to move forward with the idea. School leaders also want to know what parents would want. Comments and concerns can be shared by visiting www. austinisd.org/schools/ymla/survey.phtml.

Cynthia Briggs, CEO of Community in Schools addresses the “Lunch Bunch.” Photo by Roger Jackson

NATION

From American Dream to American Nightmare Blacks, other minorities hurt most by jump in foreclosures and delinquencies

See NIGHTMARE page 3

BLACK

If you don’t HISTORY know your pa st , you don’t know your 24/7/365 f uture Proud to sponsor

BLACK HISTORY EVERYDAY

Quote of the Week

“We should, therefore, protest openly everything . . . that smacks of discrimination or slander.”

Mary McLeod Bethune

The precious memories that Rosa Lee Johnson-Holland bequeathed to those whose lives she so lovingly touched throughout a long and productive life, are especially comforting in the month of August. That’s when God gave her to the world, and thus, loved ones shared her many memorable birthday celebrations. They also reflect on the December 3, 2004 celebration of her wonderful life at Ross Mortuary Chapel, 3618 Lyons Ave. Rev. Stuart S. Bailey officiated an order of service that included: Sis. Lauretta Bailey Moss, Rev. J. P. Hubbard Sr., Minister Tommy Tarver, Rev. Leonard Barksdale, Bro. Edward Randle Sr. and Minister Loretta Glover. Active pallbearers were: Major Abram, Don Bailey, Bethel Bailey, Adolphus Ross, Leslie Mack, Wayne Randle and Edward “Treaty” Randle. The Fifth Ward Missionary Baptist Church family and New Guide Baptist Church family were the honorary pallbearers for Rosa Lee, who was born to Herbert Sr. and Rosa Nell Scott in Irvington, Kentucky (FYI:

See SCHOOLS page 7

PRESERVING BLACK HISTORY

The one Black rule in San Antonio, Texas

DARWIN CAMPBELL

African-American News&Issues

Imagine living the American dream of owning your own home only to turn around less than two to three years later wake up in a mortgage nightmare. That is what hundreds of African-Americans in Dallas, Houston, San Antonio and Austin are dealing with. Many Blacks are trapped in a harsh reality that changes in mortgage interest rates, the bottom falling out of sub-prime lender market and other life problems and changes have left them holding the bag and preparing to forfeit that American dream.

The loss of homes in Black neighborhoods not only hurts the Black community, but also dims chances for economic revival or development in areas where Black leaders have been working for years to turn

Ideally, on the first Thursday of each month the African American Chamber of Commerce of Greater Houston (in affiliation with the Acres Home Center for Business and Economic Development), holds a business networking luncheon that focus on serious issues. Nevertheless, a delightful departure from the luncheon’s usual format was not only entertaining but very insightful for the “Lunch Bunch” that gathered at the Beulah Ann Shepard Building, 6112 Wheatley, on August 2.

For sure, the guest speaker Cynthia Clay Briggs (CEO of Community in Schools Houston), baffled the “Lunch Bunch” when she deferred to a youth dressed in hip hop fash-

ion that included plenty of “bling” before launching into her presentation.

The “young thug,” aka Michael Williams, created a comical, very realistic scenario of a youth from the ‘hood lamenting on a cell phone his inability to find a job. Not knowing what to expect (when Williams imitated that he was taking his advisor’s wise counsel), the Lunch Bunch stood and applauded when he literally transformed his image (stripping off his hip hop fashion, a la basketball warm-ups), to reveal appropriate workplace attire. Nevertheless, Williams’s truly brilliant skit was upstaged by a BTW student, who simply spoke from his heart about what Community in Schools has meant to him.

Tristan Love shared a bittersweet evolution from being a near

MARIO SALAS

African-American News&Issues

The foreclosure problem is detrimental to minority communities and could indicate abusive and predatory practices and a calculated attempt to limit optimism, opportunity and growth in the Black community.

ROSA LEE HOLLAND

August 18, 1926 - November 28, 2004

Irvington is a city in Breckinridge County, Kentucky that was founded in 1888, by railroad engineer Eugene Cornwall and named the city for his hometown of Irvington, New York. As of the census of 2000, there were 1,257 people, 512 households, and 345 families residing in the city.-Wikipedia Free Online Encyclopedia.)

Rosa Lee, who was affectionately called “Peaches” by family and friends was reared and educated in Irvington, Kentucky. Although

SAN ANTONIO- It is amazing that the people of Texas have never learned the true nature of Texas history, but instead have been presented with myths that border on complete fantasy in the least, or outright racist lies at worst. When the Texas revolution took place, it was a harbinger to slave owners across the country, for it meant an end to the anti-slavery decrees of Afro-Mexican president Vincente Guerrero in 1829. With the defeat of General Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, came a forced treaty that gave slaves back to their owners inshe grew up during the height of The Great Depression, her life was reasonable joyful, insofar as her family personified the explanation in the timeline book (African Americans and The Great Depression: The Paradox), which revealed: “Just when things were so dismal, segregation was the law of the land, and African Americans were limited to menial and subservient jobs, there were areas where African American life continued as usual. In some cases people lead a more productive life. It is in this setting that we find African Americans enrolled and graduating from some of the nations prestigious universities and African Americans making major contributions in science, engineering, and the arts.”

Lest we forget, Rosa Lee also learned to lean on Jesus after she accepted Christ at an early age and was baptized in the Apostolic faith.

She married Arthur L. Holland (deceased) upon moving to Houston, Texas and she was employed with Marriott Hotels Inc. (Astrodome) where she retired.

cluding those that had escaped into Mexico and could be found.

When Moses Austin first came to Texas, there is not doubt about his slave plans to bring African American slaves into the state. When he arrived in San Antonio in 1820, he was turned away, in part, because of the distrust that Mexican Governor Antonio Martinez had for Anglos.

According to the Texas State Historical Society, Baron de Bastrop convinced the Mexican government to allow Moses Austin to set up a colony, which would be a grave turning point for Mexico and African American slaves.

Moses Austin would then have See HISTORY page 3

Rosa Lee was a family-oriented individual; she did everything she could to see that her family and friends were loved and cared for.

She often forgot about her own needs to assist others. She will be remembered for her “sweet-sweet spirit.”

On November 28, 2004 at Memorial Hermann Hospital she stacked up her hymn books, stuck her sword in the sand and went home to be with Jesus.

Her precious memories will be cherished by her two sisters, Vivian Bailey and Julia Hurd (Houston, Texas); one brother, Herbert Scott, Jr. and wife Charles (Oakland, California); devoted nieces, Rosa Pearl Bailey Abram (Major) and Varetta Bailey Williams; devoted nephews, Bethel Bailey, Jr. (Cheryl), Don A. Bailey (JoAnn), all of Houston, Texas; Rev. Stuart S. Bailey (Rhonda) Dallas, Texas; Herbert Scott, III and Keith Scott of San Diego, California; a host of great-nieces and nephews; loyal friends and neighbors, Justine Johnson, Gertrude Williams, Frankie Davis, Tina Scott and others.

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VIEWPOINTS & OPINIONS

2 • African-American News&Issues • Texas •August 15-21, 2007 Si 19 nce 94

EDITORIAL

“Our country must abandon all of the habits of racism, because we cannot carry the message of freedom and the baggage of bigotry at the same time.”

President George Walker Bush

WE MUST UNDERSTAND: Stupidity Negates Votes

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PUBLISHER’S NEWS ANALYSIS Media Power Corrupts Roy Douglas Malonson

ave you ever wondered where all the clichés that have circulated in the Black community for years came from? For instance, I bet you can’t tell me when you first heard the usually misquoted proverb: “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” It probably was one of the many random thoughts that a (reasonably conscious) person picks up as he, or she, goes about their daily activities.

Social scientists and/or educators refer to that kind of general knowledge as cultural literacy. I can’t swear to it, but I probably first heard “The pen is mightier than the sword” in an English class. Nevertheless, when I became a publisher both sayings have a deeper meaning.

In fact, a troubling thought came to mind when I put both sayings together as I researched Rupert Murdoch’s recent acquisition of the Wall Street Journal. Before I get into that, however, I must adhere to African American News&Issues’ FYI policy to never leave our audited estimated 2 million readers guessing. I’m sure most people already know the most popular version of power was accredited to Lord Action’s 1887 letter to Bishop Mandell Creighton which read: “Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. Great men are almost always bad men.”

But William Pitt the Younger, The Earl of Chatham and British Prime Minister, from 1766 to 1778 is sometimes wrongly attributed as the source. But he did say something similar in a speech to the UK House of Lords in 1770. Pitt’s version was: “Unlimited power is apt

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to corrupt the minds of those who possess it.”

Need I tell you Murdoch could well be the most powerful man in the world now that he has added the Journal to his media empire?

News Corporation was already the world’s #3 media conglomerate (behind Time Warner and Walt Disney), with media operations spanning film, television, and publishing. It produces and distributes movies through Fox Filmed Entertainment, while its FOX Broadcasting network boasts more than 200 affiliate stations in the US. The company also owns and operates about 35 TV stations, as well as a portfolio of cable networks. Its publishing business includes HarperCollins, along with a slew of newspapers and magazines. In addition, News Corp. owns almost 40% of satellite broadcasters DIRECTV and British Sky Broadcasting? When I think of how a small Black newspaper changed Houston’s history the man scares me. In case you’ve forgotten, a Black publisher fired the first shot that sunk Rep. Sylvester Turner’s “little boat” that had a good chance of docking with the big ships at Houston, Texas’ City Hall.

So I hope power doesn’t totally corrupt Murdoch. Especially since Black people allow the mainstream media to think for them. That’s not my opinion. I read that in an August 1, 2007 The Black Agenda that revealed: “The Black masses have not undergone any political sea change; they have simply been abandoned by their representatives, who have been suborned or terrorized by money and concentrated media and lobby power. Corporations have embraced ‘diversity’

negative statement if we suggest that Black leaders who consider it a positive liaison when Black publishers “sharecrops” with the White media (that hasn’t been our friend in the past), have to be stuck on stupid?

We Must Understand, politics makes strange bedfellows and that’s the primary reason for a free press.

Albert Jay Nock made that plain in his 1934 A Journal of These Days, when he quipped: “The old proverb about politics making strange bedfellows is quite wrong; it makes the most natural bedfellows in the world.

Crook lies down with crook in any bed that interest offers; swine snoozes with swine in any pen that interest opens.” Thus, it’s our hope that Black Texans remember that wisdom in the future if the Black media collaborates with the mainstream media on issues such as statewide bond elections. We won’t belabor the point at this time, but you can bet that your church’s 11 a.m. services are going to have prestigious guests in the very near future.

Meanwhile, AAN&I will be researching the history of bond elections for our readers.

It will be interesting to learn whether, or not, Blacks’ voting for bonds were treated fairly in the past.

Unfortunately, Black people get brain lock when they hear “educating kids.” How can education be negative?

The school districts seeking bailout bonds are counting on that. Even so, Black leaders should wake up and address a bigger problem than closing “under performing” schools in dying minority neighborhoods. Black leaders have to realize that good schools are the cornerstone of any community. Even if they’ve moved out of the ‘hood so their kids could be closer to the stateof-the art schools that bond money (we voted for in the past) built.

It is our intentions ... No, make that our promise to not allow history to repeat. So do yourself a favor and let Texas’ widest circulated and read newspaper with a Black perspective enlighten you about the pending bond elections henceforth. Unless you want the powers that be pimp you again. Translation: Stupidity Negates Votes.

BUD’S EYEVIEW

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persisting complaint that African American News&Issues has gotten since we started reporting all news without fear or favor from a common sense Black perspective (in February 1996), is that our editorial policy reflect too negatively on Black America’s leadership. Denial notwithstanding, there’s great wisdom in the Greek philosopher Demosthenes’ proverb: “Nothing is easier than self-deceit. For what each man wishes, that he also believes to be true.” We dare say this because there’s absolutely nothing negative about telling it like it is, if it really and truly is like it is. Nevertheless, there’s a big problem if one doesn’t know how it really is, therefore has no way on knowing if it is how it’s supposed to be.

We Must Understand, it’s indeed, insulting to infer that an inordinate number of made in America African’s intelligentsia are stuck on stupid. Yet, when you consider that descendants of slaves would be stupid to depend on a historically racist media (controlled by descendants of slave owners), for their major source of information, stupid is what stupid does, certainly comes to mind. Even so, a negative truth becomes a positive message if it makes Black people realize they’re unwittingly allowing a special agenda media’s promulgation to shape their philosophy of life that they pass on to the next generation. That’s where Willie Lynch was coming from in that letter. Especially when one is brainwashed to buy into the idiocy that we must “get over” our slave history and focus on the challenges of the twenty first century.

Yes, we use offensive terms such as “brain dead” to describe clueless Black leadership. Yet, if one can grasp the concept of a people having their own unique lines of communication, they understand the relevancy of the Freedom Journal. Not to mention the thousands of Black newspapers ideally dedicated to challenging media that denigrate African Americans in the past that have been silenced. Think about that historical truth for a minute and realize that 250 remaining Black newspapers are ideally the only voice that Black America has. Now please explain why one would consider it a

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ON: Whole Truths

Bud Johnson: The Old African Warrior

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oebeit I’m aware that clueless Black folks arbitrarily assume that I only write for Black newspapers (because I couldn’t write for White “rags”), I simply consider the source, rather than take it personal. Denial notwithstanding, many made in America Africans’ intelligentsia still suffer from the residual effects of Willie Lynch’s “How To Make A Slave” indoctrination. Hence, they fall in a category that’s aptly tabbed WMIICS (pronounced: whim-mics), by the brilliant CPA Rodrick Dow (See Texas Marketplace), whose expertise is often questioned by our people wont to judge folks by the color of their skin rather than the content of their character. But, before I drag you into The Twilight Zone, mayhaps I should decipher the WMIICS acronym.

Then again, have you already figured out that it translates to “White Man’s Ice Is Colder?” Okay, okay, I won’t drift into The Outer Limits of racial stereotyping. On the other hand, you know, and I know, wannbe White brothers and sisters tend to think that Black newspapers are poor replications of White newspapers. Consequently, African American News&Issues’ uncompromised Black perspectives are rejected by far too many supposedly intelligent brothers and sisters, sans mainstream media validation. Self-aggrandizement aside, I was the most pursued “token Black” in the nation when affirmative action forced “Lily white” entities to add a little color. However, I became an “untouchable,” because I idealistically considered my “old school” journalism indoctrination as a sacred vow.

I truly believe that I’m obligated to objectively report all news without fear of favor by always telling the truth, the whole truth and

as a weapon. About a decade ago, they realized that their vast wealth empowered them to create an alternative Black political structure, and that there were plenty of Black opportunists eager to be recruited.

At this point, corporate victory is all but complete, having neutered Black electoral and traditional insti-

tutions in lightning speed.

“The disaster puts in graphic relief the failures of legal strategies, which are so narrow that nine people on the Supreme Court can thwart the will of 40 million African Americans, and the impotence of conventional electoral strategies…through sheer force of

nothing but the truth. In my day, journalists were considered public servants. We were exalted as the nation’s conscience. And our mission was to be the intellectual watchers on the wall (dedicated to taking the spin out of misinformation and special interest propaganda) that divided and confused politically-naïve citizens by telling it like it is. Perish the thought I’m saying that I’m smarter, or better than today’s journalist, but I have no peers when it comes to spotting journalistic Trojan horses. I say this because I see misleading articles that others over look, or don’t think they’re significant. In fact, if most of today’s’ reporters were in my freshman journalism class they would fail.

Let’s take an Associated Press article about the Black pilot Barrington Irvin’s history making flight for an example. The reporter wrote: “A 23-year-old pilot landed his single-engine plane as onlookers cheered Wednesday, becoming

what he says is the youngest person to fly solo around the world.”

Do you see anything wrong? Well, you’re not a trained journalist, so you don’t realize the story lead lacks the rudimental elements of truth, insofar as it doesn’t include the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. In essence, the article actually debased Irving’s feat. The reporter adds more confusion writing: “He claims he is the first Black person as well as the youngest person to complete the journey alone, though it was unclear how the claims would be validated,” which is an outright lie.

In fact, in the same article it’s revealed: “EarthRounders.com, which tracks round-the-world flights, lists 255 journeys, including 82 solo trips since 1929. The trip has been done in far less time than Irving, and by younger pilots, though they were not flying solo.”

Hooray for the truth. Yet, it’s not the whole truth insofar as both pilots were White. Thus, I felt obligated to do a little research to reveal the whole truth, which is: according to Earthrounders.com’s Claude Meunier’s e-mail: “Irving will be the youngest (solo) and only Black person.” Hey, I’m good and I know it. I have to be, because clever White reporters use all kinds of devious ways to discredit Black folks’ accomplishments.

Even so, if you still want to think that I sacrificed fame and fortune (offered by White newspapers and only work for Black newspapers because I wasn’t smart enough to work for the mainstream press), surely you jest. I wonder if anybody knows where I’m coming from?

To contact Bud Johnson, please call 281- 847-9929 (8-5- Wed. & Fri.) or via e-mail at Africanwarrior@aol.com

money. There is no substitute for a mass movement in opposition to the cages that capital erects around us. The corporate project uses its media to invent a fantasy Black polity, and then deploys its media muscle and money to make it so.

Some of us believe the constantly See MEDIA page 3

African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007 • 3 NIGHTMARE-from Page 1 the heads of corporate America to invest in the Black community by bringing construction, storefronts, shops and jobs into deteriorating economically depressed and jobstarved areas. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, foreclosure can occur when payments become three to four or more months late, depending on the mortgage terms. In most cases, even if the bank is able to sell the property, the borrower may be liable for any shortfall that may occur between the remaining balance on the loan and the sales price of the property at foreclosure, depending on the mortgage terms and state law.

Foreclosure stays on a credit report for seven to 10 years. Elizabeth Mueller of the University of Texas at Austin recently addressed the foreclosure problem in a June report to the Federal Reserve Bank in Dallas. The report, called “The Problem of Foreclosures in Texas” outlined how Blacks and other minorities are impacted and suffering most when dealing with foreclosures. Texas is ranked 6th overall in foreclosures in the nation. There were more than 36,302 foreclosures from July 2005 to June 2006, according to Mueller. Of those, Dallas County leads the state in the number of foreclosures with 15,406 in a four year period.

During that same period, Harris County had 12,689 followed by Bexar County with 6,040 and Travis County reporting 3,327 foreclosures during the period, the report said. Some of the possible causes for losses of home and property are changes in job, family situations, such as death or divorce and excess debt. However, one major trend was evident in all Texas counties with Blacks and other minority populations cited was the lending practices and constant higher interest rates contained in the mortgages of minorities.

According to Mueller, those with lower credit ratings were more likely to be at risk for higher interest rates and loans with worse terms.

Again, Black neighborhoods fared worse in this study. Blacks and other minorities in Texas with the weakest credit also were more likely to have sub-prime loans, opening the door for exploitation and unreputable lenders.

According to the report, Dallas foreclosures were primarily comprised of Blacks and Hispanics with more than 24 percent of those loans being sub-prime loans at very high rates. Also, nearly a quarter of the home forfeitures were homes owned by customers who made below median income and who were

Roy Douglas Malonson-Chairman Shirley Ann Malonson-Pres./CEO Bud Johnson-Mgr. Editor Emeritus Darwin Campbell- Cont. Writer Mario Salas-Cont. Writer Marvin D. Cloud-Production Mgr. Lisa Smith - Production Assistant Billy Groves-Cont. Writer Malik Kenyatta - Cont. Writer Lori Landry - Cont. Writer Hattie Smith - Cont. Writer Oswald J. Scott -Cont. Writer Roger Jackson-Photographer Jesse Simon-Cont. Writer Fred Smith-Advertising/Sales James Johnson-Distribution Allen Carlton-Distribution David Johnson-Distribution • Advertising: 713-692-1178 • Houston: 713-692-1892 • DFW Metroplex : 817-283-7945 • Fax Line: 713-692-1183 • General: news@aframnews.com • Ads: sales@aframnews.com • Web: www.aframnews.com African-American News &Issues is published by African-American News &Issues, Inc., 6130 Wheatley Street Houston, Texas 77091, 713.692.1892.

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high school dropouts. The highest level of foreclosures was in the predominantly Black areas of South Dallas, Oak Cliff, Cedar Hill, Desoto and Lancaster.

In Houston and Harris County, more than 60 percent of foreclosures were African American and Hispanics. Average incomes in those families was a staggering 120 percent below normal median income levels with over 27 percent of all loans being approved at higher than normal interest rates.

In Fort Worth, nearly 2,000 homes are currently in foreclosure with a substantial number of those homes owned by African Americans and Hispanics.In San Antonio, foreclosures were highest in the Black and Hispanic communities where greater than 68 percent lost their homes. More than 20 percent of owners were high school dropouts whose loans were over 24 percent were done at very high interest rates.

In Austin and Travis County, Blacks and other groups faired slightly better with a little over 40 percent suffering foreclosure. Only about 10-percent of loans approved were approved at the higher interest rates. Neighborhoods with large poor and minority populations in places like Cleveland, Chicago, Philadelphia and Atlanta have also experienced a sharp rise in foreclosures, in some cases more than a doubling, according to an analysis of court filings and other housing data by The New York Times and academic researchers.

The Black home ownership rate even dipped slightly last year, according to the Census Bureau.

Blacks are twice as likely as Whites to have taken out expensive subprime mortgages, most of which will jump to higher interest rates in the next two years, according to a national banking report. According to Mueller, Texas statistics fit a pattern indicating an imbalance in how interest rates, income and race play a role in foreclosure rates.

The report makes it clear that minority foreclosures are likely in minority communities because of low median incomes, education, language skills and race. The study revealed that those factors put borrowers at a disadvantage when navigating the lending process and pursuing their dream of owning a home. Excessive fees and higher interest rates and poor terms in contract also bring a higher risk of foreclosure.

The National Community Reinvestment Coalition’s most recent study underscores this point, finding that discrimination against minorities persists in mortgage lending. The Federal Reserve Board, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the FDIC have all made similar observations.

The foreclosure problem is detrimental to minority communities and could indicate abusive and predatory practices and a calculated attempt to limit optimism, opportunity and growth in the Black community.

With race being a factor and Black neighborhoods being impacted by high foreclosure rates, Mueller said answers are needed now to stop the problem. The NAACP is taking steps to change the tide, filing suit in Los Angeles federal court against 14 of the country’s largest lenders, alleging systematic, institutionalized racism in sub-prime home mortgage lending. According to the lawsuit, African American homeowners who received sub-prime mortgage loans from these lenders were more than 30 percent more likely to be issued a higher rate loan than White borrowers with the same qualifications.

Failure to settle this issue will result in serious consequences and affect the economic and development health and wealth of Black people and communities in the near future.

Blacks must get educated about financing the American dream, but first, Black leaders must wake up and demand better for our community and our people.

HISTORY -from Page 1

permission to bring in slaves and to eventually “steal” Mexican lands for the purpose of setting up a slave state. Moses Austin’s colony would also come to violate Mexican antislavery laws (in 1829) and pave the way for the creation of a pro-slave Texas being admitted to the United States in 1845.

Expecting to be rewarded for their support of Santa Anna, Stephen F. Austin and the settlers, wanted the Mexican government to repeal its laws restricting the importation of Black slaves into Texas.

Austin and the settlers tried to circumvent Mexican law by appealing to Canary Islander slavers and other pro-slavery Mexicans for help.

Jose Antonio Navarro, a pro-slavery Tejano, who has a street named after him in downtown San Antonio, sided with the Anglo slavers against Santa Anna.

Santa Anna was by no means a “good guy,” as he had become a dictator in Mexico and had sought to “whiten Mexico” as a Spaniard by carrying out wars of annihilation against Mexico’s native Indian population. Austin and other racist forces saw this as an opportunity to make Texas a slave state. Austin’s abiding aim was to institute slavery in Texas, which he never abandoned.

According to Kenneth Mason, slaves in San Antonio were sold twice a week at the “auction houses of such well-known names as Henry Burns, John M. Carolan, Charles F. King, George Collamer, WD. Greenwood and Company, J. N. Henriques, E. J. McLane, and Francis Giraud.” Reportedly, in the 1800s, the first slave in San Antonio was William Baylor, though this appears false because of the Spanish slave system that existed with the arrival of the Canary Islanders in the 1700s, and the Spanish slave system that existed in Mexico in the 1500s. There were many slaves and free Blacks in San Antonio, long before the 1800s.

Interestingly, the slave situation was tempered in San Antonio by the large number of mixed race people in Bexar County that was about 25 percent of the population MEDIA-from Page 2 repeated lie.” No! That should be far too many of us believe the lies. I’m talking supposedly political astute Black leaders that let the media think for them. Frankly, I think we’re fooling ourselves to believe an African American, or a female Democrat can become president.

Especially when angry White men have Black folks just where they want us: Disproportionately unemployed, or underemployed, nearly broke, begging and politically divided and confused. But the worse thing about the sorry state of Black America, the power to change things is in the hands of Black voters. We only have to take advantage the power struggle destabilizing the Dems and GOP that has little to do with us per se. We need to organize on a grassroots level nationwide, instead of following compromised Black leader’s lead. We can change the course of America’s history simply by setting an agenda that’s best for us, go to the polls on Nov. 4, 2008 en masse and vote accordingly. But to do that, gullible Black people have to stop believing everything they read, hear, or see in the media.

Ellison to retire AUSTIN- She worked at the Austin Police Department for 28 years and recently served as the first African American female acting chief. Now, with the changing of the guard, Cathy Ellison is retiring.

Ellison started with the department in 1979 and worked her way up to assistant chief. She became acting chief in May 2006 and recently was a finalist in the running to be the city’s next police chief.

in 1860. The Black population was as high as 16 percent in 1870, thus refuting the false conception that the African American population was never higher than it is now at 7-9 percent. Because the mulatto population was so high in San Antonio, along with free Blacks and Afro-Mexicans, Whites could not differentiate between free and enslaved Blacks.

This caused the racial situation to be somewhat subdued as compared to other Southern cities. It also caused confusion and fear, because racist-minded people seek standard ways to fit individuals into categories based on skin tone. There were a lot of “ethnically vague” people in San Antonio as a result of intermarriage between Indians and Blacks and other mixtures.

This interracial mixing in San Antonio resulted in less policing of slaves and confusion among Whites. By the middle 1860s, the slave population in San Antonio grew. This also led to an increase in San Antonio’s Black population by 1870 to almost 16 percent and an increase of slaves living across the Mexican border.

Whites grew fearful of the number of Blacks in positions of power in the 1800s when Governor E.J. Davis sent several Black policemen to San Antonio and other Texas cities during Reconstruction. One such officer was named Smith (first name unknown) who was a San Antonio policeman in 1872 and probably attached to Governor Da-

vis’ Black militia police force.

Despite the claim that San Antonio was always a nice friendly city which never had a riot or racial problems, nothing could be further from the truth. The “reform movement” of the 1930s to end Black power, and Black political boss Charles Bellinger in San Antonio, was a racist maneuver to establish new clothing for domination and segregation. Business interests dominated the “reform movement,” and the political actors.

Former mayor W.W. McAllister, a banker, was from the beginning an active player in the rise of the consolidated form of governance.

The concentration of power in the hands of the business community in the 1950s removed the old ward system of paternal empowerment for Blacks, and replaced it with what could be called the “only one Black rule.” Only one Black would be on the GGL executive committee, only one Black could be considered for city council, and then, this one Black man, would have to be one that was concerned with the “whole” community (meaning White concerns come first).

To ensure that this “representative” would adhere to this colonial control, he would have to be handpicked. This allowed the White elite to continue paternal colonial role.

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POLITICAL NEWS

4 • African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007

Stop the violence rally takes place in Houston JOLANDA JONES

African-American News&Issues

HOUSTON- On Sunday, July 29, approximately 150 people showed up to voice their support in a rally to Stop the Violence from Black on Black Crime. Although the march and rally were organized by Kathy Blueford, to commemorate the one-year anniversary of the murder of her son, Patrick Murphy, on July 30, 2006. He was a victim of Black on Black crime.

It was also an invitation for others with the same passion, to help start a movement. Ms. Blueford’s refusal to allow son’s death to be in vain, inspired her to act. She invited a number of people to join her on the march down Homestead from Tidwell to Parker, where Patrick was killed.

People marched on sidewalks where available and in the street where sidewalks weren’t available or were not safe to walk on. When theRU081207AA_5_56x10 marchers were in the 8/7/07 street, numerous groups volunteered to

keep a protective barricade around them, including the Dust Kickers Trail Riders from Trinity Gardens; the United Bikers from Fifth Ward; Brother Jerome Walton, and MUV All Freight. With Homestead being down to one lane due to the marchers, drivers were kind and courteous, many honking to support the cause.

People living in the apartments that lined the street and patrons and workers from businesses along the route, raised their fists and shouted in support. Some even joined the march. All were welcomed.

Ms. Blueford invited families and friends of other murder victims. Each group of family and friends, which supported a particular victim, wore matching t-shirts.

There were banners and posters to celebrate the lives of the victims.

Church hymns were sung during the march leading up to the rally.

Other invited family and friends were there to celebrate the short lives of victims Jackie Louis Morris, 10:25 AM Page 1 killed March 25, 2007; Dona Kay Dennis (32), killed April 30, 1984;

Huge

Savings

Chukwuemeka “Emeka” Jones (19), killed May 31, 1996; and other victims whose names weren’t mentioned. Dona Kay was my aunt and Emeka was my brother. Jackie’s mom, Faye Morris, was overwhelmed with emotion. Ms. Morris said with tears in her eyes, “If just one child changes his life, based on my son’s death, then my son’s death wouldn’t have been in vain.”

Blueford implored the marchers to do something about the problem; not to just sit around and do nothing. She made reference to the African proverb that “it takes a village to raise a child.” Both moms told how they cried everyday.

Blueford stated that “not an hour goes by that I don’t think about my baby.” She said she “cried more tears than anyone could have imagined.” All of the victims left a host of relatives and friends who attended the rally.

Neither Patrick nor Emeka had children but Jackie left behind an infant son and one child on the way.

Neither of these children will get to know their father. Also in atten-

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One of the banners features Jackie L. Morris II who was killed on March 25, 2007. dance were the mom and son of an imprisoned man, who at 16, took a life of a teenager.

The man is my cousin, and the woman and grandson, are my aunt and cousin. Their life is and will continue to be profoundly affected as well. My aunt struggles with the fact that her child took a life, which life was taken from his parents and family.

She is also left to raise her grandson who was born while his father is in prison and who will be 17 before his father becomes eligible for parole. Although my mom couldnÅft attend due to illness, I know she cries everyday for my brother.

Holidays and his birthday are especially hard.

She’s gone through grief counseling and the pain still hasn’t gone away in over 11 years. This problem affects all involved and it does so in a negative way. There are no winners.

Rev. Matthew Alix, Sr., pastor of Greater True Vine Missionary Baptist Church opened the rally with a prayer and great words. He was Patrick’s pastor. City Council member Jarvis Johnson attended, as well as a representative from City Council Member Ronald Green’s office.

Johnson spoke, as well as Brother Derrick Muhammad, of the Millions Man More Movement.

Muhammad’s words were inspiring. I read a poem, which I wrote, for my brother Emeka’s wake and funeral. A number of people requested a copy of it.

The march and rally was just a

beginning. Other marches and rally are being scheduled for all over Houston because it’s a city-wide problem. The next one will be on the southwest side of Houston, where both Jackie and Emeka were killed.

Jackie was killed at Amity Park in Alief. Emeka was killed in some apartments on W. Bellfort. A task force is being set up to address the issues which lead to the senseless violence and killing.

Solutions mentioned were increasing police officers and their presence and educating law enforcement on diversity issues within communities; community policing; more active parenting from the parents and the “village”; economic development; after-school programs for kids; better public school education, participation in the political process through voting and attending city council meetings, among other things. It was enlightening and exciting to see the community get together to find solutions. We must keep this momentum going.

We must solve out internal problems first, then we can invite others to join our fight. I hope the Stop the Violence from Black on Black Crime continues. I’ll surely be a part of it.

For more information in getting involved in the Stop the Violence from Black on Black Crime Movement, please contact Kathy Blueford at (713) 594-5643, Jolanda Jones at (713) 874-1111 or Joseph Ballard at (281) 850-0388.

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Houston City Council, At-Large Position 5 candidate Jolanda Jones addresses the crowd gathered for the rally.

Photos by Malik Kenyatta

MLK III has a dream of his own DALLAS- Martin Luther King III is embarked on a dream of his own – he wants to end poverty in America. “We’ve taken this initiative to bring together all of the community, religious, political and business leaders,” King said. “We’re resuming the work of the Poor People’s Campaign and hope to eradicate those evils in the community.

King is chairman and CEO of Realizing the Dream, Inc., an Atlantabased human rights organization. He was in Dallas to participate in a town hall meeting at the Central Pointe Church of Christ in southern Oak Cliff.

Read us online at www.aframnews.com.

To get FREE coverage of your political events and news and announcements, please send items to news@aframnews.com.

TX-4

COMMUNITY & EVENTS Give it up! Your organs that is African Americans highly represented in organ recipients, poorly represented in organ donors GORDON JACKSON

Texas Publishers Association

Everson Walls and Ron Springs, both former standout football players from the glory years of the Dallas Cowboys, made the play of their lives this spring. And comedianactor George Lopez and his wife, the former Ann Serrano, gave the performances of their lives two years ago. Their grand accomplishments far exceeded anything that had to do with sports or entertainment, but involved something much more serious.

The above friends and husbandand-wife team represent two of the most high-profiled stories to date about organ transplant operations, critical medical procedures that did more than win a ball game or a Grammy award - they saved lives.

The four individuals being African American and Hispanic are even more paramount. The day of August 1 was National Minority Donor Awareness Day and every April has been designated National Donate Life Month.

They both represent a nationwide observance to raise awareness of the desperate need for donation and transplantation in the African American community (as well as the Latino community) and to educate the public on the facts and myths about organ donation.

The reason is simple: The African American community is in desperate need of African American organ and tissue donors. Although they make up 14 percent of the United States population, approximately 35 percent of those on the waiting list for kidney transplants are African American.

Other alarming statistics show: * While Blacks comprise 27 percent of individuals on the national transplant waiting list, they represent only 12 percent of organ donors. * As of May 2006, there were 25,177 African Americans registered on the U.S. transplant waiting list compared to 6,598 in 1991, a 382 percent increase. * Approximately 51 percent of those waiting for a transplant are minorities and 27 percent of those are African Americans. * In 2005, 5,212 African Americans received an organ transplant; there were 1,136 African American deceased donors and 889 liv-

ing donors.

Springs, ailing badly from the effects of type 2 diabetes, which caused the amputation of a foot, managed to beat such odds when Walls, his best friend, found out that he was a match. As with all healthy humans having two kidneys, doctors told Walls that he could give one of his good ones to Springs and still maintain a healthy normal life. “I would still do it again for my friend,” Walls told an audience this spring at a sports luncheon held at the African American Museum.

“Whatever was going to affect Ron’s family, because we were so close, I knew it was going to effect mine. Once I was determined to do it, I was hell-bent.” For his “hellbent” actions, Walls, a Texas Black Sports Hall of Fame inductee, was later honored as a hero by the state legislature at the state capitol in Austin.

State representative Helen Giddings spearheaded the tribute with wishes that it jolts others to do the same. “It is my hope that the bond between Mr. Walls and Mr. Springs inspires each of us to do what we can to help our fellow man,” Giddings said. “Furthermore, I commend the two gentlemen for having the initiative to begin a foundation to encourage organ donation for both living and deceased donors.

With death can spring life and with compassion spring hope.”

Walls was inspired by friend and fellow Dallas native Serrano. After finding out that husband George, star of the television series The George Lopez Show, and popular stand-up comedian, had deteriorating kidneys due to a genetic disorder, she did not hesitate to donate one of hers to Lopez in April 2005.

Other stories of successful kidney transplants have involved pro basketball players Alonzo Mourning and Sean Elliott.

Unfortunately, there are also far too many stories of failures involving organ donor transplants among African Americans. Farrah Gray, the former teenage tycoon sensation, who became a millionaire at age 14, lost his sister, Greek, to leukemia in Sept. 2006 after failing to find a matching bone marrow donor. “I’ve been speaking to everyone from Ebony to 20/20, especially Black people, to go out to their local blood banks and register to

African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007 • 5 be an organ donor,” said Gray, now 21, who was honored last year at a Texas Publishers Association conference.”

Only 3 percent of bone marrow donors are African American while they make up thousands of individuals being diagnosed with leukemia and we cannot find a donor match.” Other highly publicized losses include Jackie Donahue, sister of rapper Nelly, who died of leukemia in March 2005 and pro football running back legend Walter Payton, who succumbed to a rare liver disease in November 1999.

Both lives could have been saved by matching donors, but no one was found in time.

Pam Silvestri, public affairs manager, of the Dallas-based Southwest Transplant Alliance, thinks that the number of such heartbreaking stories in the African American community is about to curb down, if it hasn’t started already. Reasons behind the severe lack of organ donors among African Americans include: An overall lack of trust in the medical industry due to previous cases of adverse treatment; Pure mis-education and lack of information about organ donation; The inability and thus resistance for the low-income and uninsured sector of the African American community to seek medical care, particularly among Black males; Traditional religious beliefs.

“We’re not out of the woods yet,” Silvestri said. “But the amount of donations has made leaps and bounds over the past 10 years. Our initial goal was to encourage minorities to donate at a rate that reflected the numbers within their population. We’ve blown past those numbers.”

Yet, with the number of African Americans needing new kidneys, other organs and fresh bone marrow having increased so sharply the last decade, Silvestri said they’ve had to raise the bar. “Now, we’re encouraging minorities to donate at a rate that reflects the numbers on the waiting list,” she said. But lights of hope beam through, with more stories of everyday people of color receiving organ transplants and returning back to society.

“As more minorities get transplants and go back into the world, it’s helping subdue those fears,” Silvestri said. “They’re finding out that not everybody getting kidneys are White and rich. They’re seeing that a lot more look like them.”

Those looking like us include Walls and Springs, who have formed the Everson Walls and Ron Springs Gift of Life Foundation to get the word out to the African American community about organ and bone marrow donation and to shatter the debilitating myths. “We’re going to make sure that we beat that drum for anyone that wants to hear

Juanita Craft honored at first Civil Rights Sunday DALLAS- Area poets, writers, artists, and musicians joined together to celebrate the life of Dallas’s own Juanita J. Craft. It was the first in a series of “Civil Rights Sundays” at the Craft House Museum. Craft was an N.A.A.C.P. organizer and was instrumental in forwarding the cause for civil rights in Texas.

A former Dallas City Counsel woman, she was out front in the fight for justice and equality when it really mattered. Craft passed away 22 years ago on August 6, 1985. There was a spoken work tribute to her, the civil rights movement, and African American history hosted by area poets Michael Jackson, Rock Baby and others.

The Juanita J. Craft Civil Rights House is free and open to the public for tours from 10:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. from Tuesday through Friday.

All tours must be booked in advance: For more information, contact The Juanita J. Craft Civil Rights House Museum, 2618 Warren Avenue, Dallas, Texas 75215 or call (214) 670-8637.

Girls Inc. “No Limits” annual luncheon FORT WORTH- Strong, Smart and Bold “No Limits” Luncheon Friday, August 17, 2007 from 10:30 a.m. until 1:30 p.m. at the Fort Worth Convention Center, 1201 Houston Street. The featuring special guest speaker will be Erin Gruwell, Revolutionary Educator and Catalyst for Social Change. Nothing could have prepared Erin Gruwell for her first day of teaching at Wilson High School in Long Beach, Calif.

A recent college graduate, Erin landed her first job in Room 203, only to discover many of her stu-

dents had been written off by the education system and deemed “unteachable.” As teenagers living in a racially divided urban community, they were already hardened by first-hand exposure to gang violence, juvenile detention and drugs.

Ticket pirces are $ 70.00 and all proceeds will go to Girls Inc. Call Stephanie Smith at (817) 468-0306 or email development@ girlsinctarrant.org for registration, sponsorship, or table host information. To volunteer for the Luncheon Committee, call Gregory J. Barberee at (817)226-1211.

Houston Unity Day 2007 held in Miller OutdoorTheatre HOUSTON- The City of Houston will host a Unity Day for the city on Saturday, August 18, 2007 at the Miller Outdoor Theatre in Hermann Park. Unity Day is more than just a day of food and different activities, its a cultural experience that any family can enjoy. This unity celebration will allow the different communities in Houston to unite to celebrate their diverse heritages, regardless of religion, ethic background, or social status.

The admission is free to enter the event. On Unity Day, the Houston Zoo will be half-price admission, from 11 a.m. - 2 p.m and from 2 p.m. - 6 p.m., there will be a Unity Kids Zone. Also, from noon - 10 p.m., a Unity Day market place will be held in addititon to a 7 p.m.

Unity concert.

For more information on Unity Day 2007, please call (281)431-9393 or visit the Web site at UnityDayHouston.com.

about it,” Walls said. Adverse religious beliefs have changed for the most part.

Every major religion in the United States supports organ and tissue donation as one of the highest expressions of compassion and generosity. Other programs and organizations are in place. Donate Life America is a national organization that directly seeks to educate the U.S. population about the need for organ and tissue donors

Anyone can be a potential donor, regardless of age or medical history. A single donor can save or improve the lives of more than 50 people. You can register to be living donor or arrange to have your organs donated in the event of your death. For more information, visit www.donatelife.net.

Gordon Jackson is a syndicated columnist for the Texas Publishers Association and Managing Editor of The Dallas Examiner.

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6 • African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007 ACCOUNTANTS

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homeless (fire destroyed his family’s house), high school dropout without resources into a Linda Lorelle Scholarship receipent. Inasmuch as Brigg’s message was that every adult is obligated to be an asset to our younger generation, replete with an asset checklist that was passed out to the Lunch Bunch that was asked to check any of the 40 boxes that young people in their lives could claim as an asset (starting with 1. I receive high levels of love and support from family members and culminating with: 40. I am optimistic about my future), Tristan personified how concerned citizens can not only turn young people’s lives around, but motivate them to reach their full potential.

Briggs beamed with pride as Tristan admonished the Lunch Bunch to start showing young people love, instead of impulsively fearing them because of the negative image the mass media projects.

It’s no surprise that Briggs has dedicated her career to the at-risk children served

by CIS. “My parents instilled in me the belief that ‘to whom much is given, much is required,’” says Briggs who grew up in a family where education and the importance of sharing with others was paramount.

Briggs, a sister of well-known community activist Monarchie Clay, has a true sense of community responsibility, her family taught by example daily. She grew up in Houston’s Kashmere Gardens, attended local schools, and carefully watched her parents as they contributed to church and community. After graduating from Xavier University in 1975 with a degree in sociology and social work, she returned to Houston and joined the HISD as a school social worker.

She continued her studies at TSU and UH, and received both her Social Work Certification in 1984 and her Master’s of Social Work degree in 1998 from University of Houston. In 1979, Texas’ first Communities in Schools program was organized in Houston and Briggs realized her calling. She joined CIS Houston and was charged with designing and directing the new program; she established CIS Houston’s first site at M.C. Williams Middle School. In 1987, she became program director in charge of several CIS sites, and in 1989 was named to her current position as Executive Director. Briggs’ expertise in organizational and staff design, coordination of school and community liaisons, and maximizing delivery of services to a diverse client base has allowed CIS to expand under her leadership. She now

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force Commission (TWC) is inviting Paris-area business owners and managers to the Texas Business Conference Date (TBC) on Friday, August 24, 2007. The conference will be from 8:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Top: Tristan Love shares a bitterat Love Civic Center, 2025 sweet testimony of his evolution S. Collegiate Drive in Paris. from being near homeless because into being a Linda Lorelle Registration is from 7:30 a.m. of a fire, Scholarship recipient. to 8:30 a.m.

Registration is $85 per perRight: Michael Williams transson and is nonrefundable. forms himself from a “hip hop” job Interested attendees may applicant to a professional seeking a job. complete registration forms Photos by Roger Jackson online at http://www.texasworkforce.org/twcinfo/tbcforms/tbcform.html.

has full CEO responsibilities for an organization with nearly 200 employees and an $8 million annual budget with programs in more than 90 schools in five districts.

During the past year, CIS provided nearly one million hours of services to more than 41,000 children and youth.

In spite of the success CIS has experience, Briggs was asked a nettlesome question that related to Tristan’s assertion that kids’ esteem and self worth is reinforced when they see familiar faces in their performing space, whether they’re family, neighbors, church members, or, most assuredly, teachers and CIS members.

“Even if you’re sitting on the end of the bench, it makes you feel good when you see people you know and respect cheering for your team,” Tristan assured the Lunch Bunch. Thus, the question was: Is CIS networking in the ‘hood to regenerate the kind of community support kids desperately need? “We’re working on it,” a thoughtful Briggs assured an appreciative Lunch Bunch enjoying another enlightening event with table sponsors: Shirley Ann Black Art & Kollectibles Showroom, African American News&Issues, Communities in School and Houston Community College.

In fact, she has started networking with AACCGH to devise an effective plan to reach out to communities and revitalize the old “Whole Village” method of educating our children. In essence, new schools of today’s high tech era need “old school” methods. Remember when the whole neighborhood shut down whenever kids were involved in important activities?

Briggs certainly did, and so did her CIS supporters that included: Alberta Herron, Mabel Gibbs, Sylvia Teague, Keith Labrie, Janet Chung, Angelica Adams and Melissa Simon, Lisa Harrison, Michael Gray, Flora Adams, Kristina Dave, Sarah McIver, Alicia Booth, James Moore, Kathryn Franklin and Katrina Dowdell. Also enjoying the event and delicious repast catered

by Lacy’s Restaurant was HCC’s Dr. Lois Avery, Sheron Bruno, Jackie Howard, Victor Vega, Robert Sims, Oralia Green, Johnny Sessums and Beverly Perry.

The “Man with a Plan,” CPA Rodrick Dow, was also in the house with: Sean Johnson and Shirley Ledet (NHC); Avernia Waddle (NHMA); Marcus Milburn (Sheraton Suites of Houston); Fernell Hogan and Fernell Hogan II (Young Mac Foundation); Janaeya Carmouche (Councilman Johnson); Anita James (Congresswoman Lee); Scott Burke, Susan Lewis, Stevie Gipson (Centerpoint); Dallas Singleton (Texas Forestry); Alexandrina Rawls (Comerica); Madie Harrison, Ms. Jackson, Corine Sweed, Callie Hector, Annie Lott, Gilbert Johnson and Fred Sanders Sr. (Seniors); Keitia Gray (CNP), Gary Job Corp’s Randolph Goodman, Bernadette McClemore, Rev. Joseph Baker, Sandra Patterson, Mrs. Andrew Nunley and her son, Rev. Andrew Nunley Jr., Carolyn Webb, Rev. Rufus Brown and Lionel Cooper.

Matriarch Beulah Ann Shepard was missing in action due to an illness, but Robert Leday and chairman Keith Silas performed with their usual aplomb. Final remarks were given by Chairman Emeritus Roy Malonson who announced that Anthony W. Hall Jr., the City of Houston’s Chief Administration Officer, will be the keynote speaker for the Chamber’s Sept. 4, 2007 luncheon. For more information and call (713) 692-7003.

To get FREE coverage of business, please send items of interest to news@aframnews.com For more information, call (713) 692-1892.

TX-7

COMMUNITY/EDUCATION

8 • African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007

Texas Celebrates the Legacy of Marcus Garvey HOUSTON- The Caribbean Impact Foundation, the Love Community Foundation, the Texas Sudanese Lost Boys Foundation, and the Shrine of the Black Madonna, in collaboration with the City of Houston and the Mickey Leland Center at Texas Southern University, will host their first annual Marcus Garvey World House Festival to celebrate the legacy of the Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey, national hero of Jamaica and the only global leader to date of Africans in the Diaspora.

Garvey was born on August 17, 1887, in the parish of St. Ann, Jamaica , and manifested genius and leadership in his teens. He migrated to the United States from where his mass movement promoting Black pride, economic empowerment and liberation from colonialism extended to over 40 countries in the Caribbean, Latin America and Africa .

Garvey’s businesses, writings and lectures positioned him to influence such leaders of African independence movements as George Padmore of Liberia, Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, Nnamdi Azikwe of Nigeria, Julius Nyrere of Tanzania, and Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana. The parents of both Malcolm X and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were official members of his organization. The official red, black and green colors of Garvey’s UNIA-ACL have been used to commemorate his efforts into posterity by those first leaders and others since in national flags and organization symbols worldwide.

The Houston tributes will begin on Friday, August 17, 2007 with a reception and lecture on Garvey’s impact. On Saturday, August 18, 2007 the Marcus Garvey World House Festival will be held at the George R. Brown Convention Center featuring international and local performers, vendors of multicultural arts, crafts, fashion, food and drinks, as well as city, state and national officials. The final event on Sunday is a memorial tribute at the Shrine of the Black Madonna Pan African Orthodox Christian Church, an institution established in the fashion of the African Orthodox Church that Garvey founded. Members of the Garvey family will be in attendance at all events.

Proceeds from the festival will benefit charitable organizations and funding efforts to construct a radio station with programming from throughout the African Diaspora. For more infromation, call (832) 461-9364 or visit www.

MySpace.com/garveyworldfest.

Allen pledges to stop priviledged students from buying their freedom from TAKS MONTGOMERY- Around the state of Texas, it is a well known fact that in order for a graduating high school senior must complete and pass each part of the State mandated Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test in order to graduate from high school. State law is explicit that if a secondary student can’t pass the state assessment test, they can’t graduate from a public school. At Parkway Christian School, in Montgomery County, the students are in the midst of this situation.

Representative Parkway Christian School does not receive neither Alma Allen public nor State funded school, therefore, the TAKS test in not required as a part of graduation requirements.

Parkway only requires that the student has the required 22 credits in order to graduate and pays $250.00 for a diploma. “It’s horrible,” said State Rep. Alma Allen. “It’s hollow, it’s shallow and it’s appalling to me.” Allen, who has spent nearly 40 years as an educator in public schools and four terms on the State Board of Education, said that the students in this case are being taught the wrong lesson.

She further stated that, “It’s teaching them how to circumvent, and there’s no other word for it, a diploma for sale. Some parents in the community feels as if this is the answer to so many of their children graduating from high school, because so many of them who do not pass the TAKS test will eventually become a school drop out.” Dr. Alma Allen pledges to try to change state law to try and stop this practice.

“I will be looking at filing a bill that will close the loophole for our children,” Rep. Allen said. Most parents are hoping that the bills does not pass and the new law never happens, because schools like Parkway Christian allowing good kids a chance at a future, despite a bad test score from a senseless test that sometimes even students in the top 10 percent of their class can’t even pass.

Please help support and educate our youth!

If we don’t, who will?

Segregation in San Antonio schools MARIO SALAS

African-American News&Issues

SAN ANTONIO- Texas public schools were never truly integrated and San Antonio perhaps describes the process by which many schools were desegregated. When Brown vs.

Board became law in 1954 and 1955, the power elite, along with their economic and political allies, sought ways to soften desegregation efforts. San Antonio school districts began to integrate under a “gradual formula” which was never to be completed in the Black community after the Brown decision. Sam Houston High School, which was mostly White at one time, would suffer “White flight,” while Phyllis Wheatley High School, the African American school, would go through a series of manipulations that only produced new forms of segregation.

The San Antonio Register, the oldest African American newspaper in San Antonio, reported that on March 30, 1954, then City Councilman Henry B. Gonzalez, later to become a U.S. Congressman, made a motion for the City of San Antonio to officially desegregate all “municipally-owned facilities”, even before the Brown implementation decision. The motion passed, but this did not end segregation in San Antonio, nor did it prevent the exclusion of Blacks from city boards and commissions.

It was a gesture designed to induce quiescence (planned quietness) by piece-meal approaches. Despite the fact that a progressive Mexican American made the motion, White support was needed to pass it. Using a gradual approach formula would prevent a White backlash, and at the same time impose the idea that White sponsorship was needed for Black progress.

Additionally, the desegregation of municipally owned building affected mostly the downtown

area where city officials could benefit from the move in national tourist publications. The San Antonio branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was aware of this attempt as a gradual integration plan being proposed by the San Antonio School District.

In September of 1955, the local branch expressed its opposition as reported in the San Antonio Register of September 16, 1955: “The San Antonio branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, this week voiced its opposition to the ‘gradual’ system of integration projected, this fall, by the San Antonio Independent School District, and petitioned the school board, Wednesday, to reorganize all San Antonio schools on a non-discriminatory basis.” The San Antonio Register again reported on October 28, 1955, during Thurgood Marshall’s speech to a crowd “estimated at more than 800,” at St. Paul Methodist Church in San Antonio that: “Gradual desegregation merely provides Negrophobists with an opportunity to mobilize their forces and to plan ways and means to circumvent the Supreme Court decision.”

The federal government demanded desegregation, but San Antonio’s power elite found a way around it. Although public facilities would be “officially” integrated, the private sector would continue allowing for segregated facilities. San Antonio Banker William Sinkin’s assertion, in Holmesly’s (2003) book HemisFair ’68, about the fact that “San Antonio has never had a race riot” because the racist Good Government League (GGL) began a “process of opening doors” is totally erroneous.

San Antonio had at least four “riots” that are a recorded fact of history. One was at Sam Houston High School when there was de facto attempt at desegregation in the 1970s, and another riot took place in the center of downtown San Antonio led by SNCC activists in protest of the San Antonio Police

Department (SAPD) beating and killing of Bobby Joe Phillips in 1969.

There was another riot in downtown San Antonio after the Civil War in which one Black was killed, and another riot prevented Blacks from voting during Reconstruction.

“Integration” would not come officially until 1967-68, when the building of HemisFair, a San Antonio based World’s Fair, prompted concerns about tourist dollars being lost, and economic instability that could be caused by militant action and negative publicity. There was talk about blowing up the Tower of the Americas after the assassination of Martin Luther King in April of 1968 by Houston and San Antonio radicals. HemisFair ’68 was not a “cooperative symphony of harmony” as touted by some city officials. Integration was an economic and political decision because of the possibility of Black civil unrest and loss of tourist dollars.

When a business-oriented council-manager form of governance replaced the commission form of government, and “boss politics” in 1951, Blacks were removed from the power scheme, and a token system was put in place. The GGL became very experienced in using some Black preachers as token mouthpieces. This was done in the case of the late Rev. S.H. James of Second Baptist Church. The denial of true Black political participation would be maintained until the national civil rights struggles began to demand Black inclusion in political and social affairs.

The GGL, with the economic interests it had in HemisFair, opened a small crack in the segregated door, a door that they controlled and wrote the agenda for.

Given the racist politics of former late Mayor Walter McAllister, there can be no doubt those altruistic reasons for integration in San Antonio where never present in the thinking of the White elite. Integration in most of Texas followed this pattern and in many cases took place without a whisper.

M. B. Smiley High School to hold 15-year reunion HOUSTON -M.B. Smiley Class of 1992 will celebrate its 15-year reunion the weekend of September 7-8, 2007. The planning committee is working hard to pass the word in an effort to rally their classmates for the big event. There will be a $35.00 fee for singles and a $75.00 fee for a family of 3 or more.

On Friday, September 7, there will be a cocktail party from 8 p.m. -12 p.m. and a Fun Day in the Park, on Saturday, September 8. The family outing will include a moonwalk for the children as well as delicious food, face painting and more family-oriented activities. The Saturday event will also serve as an opportunity to discuss health-related issues affecting our Black communties.

On Friday, September 7, 2007, the reunion will kick off at Café 4212, 4212 Almeda Rd from 8pm – 12pm and Saturday, September 8, 2007, the Fun Day in the Park will be held at Deussen Park, Pavillion 16, 12303 Sonnier Street from 3p.m. – 7p.m. Class reunion dues are due now. Please make all checks and/or money orders to Shatonya Marshall and mail to MB Smiley 1992, 5110 Prosperity Circle, Houston, TX 77018.

For more information, please call Nascha Wanza at (832)651-3947 or Celena Robinson at (832)7545920.

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ENTERTAINMENT/AUTOMOBILES African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007 • 9 Dallas “Music Man” preaching value of culture and the classics need a steadier career to fall back on, so he majored in electrical engineering at Texas Tech (although he ended up graduating with a degree in advertising and marketing). As a part-timer at KLDK, the local CBS affiliate in Lubbock, Davis rose from cameraman to technical news director for the evening newscasts. He got his chance to produce commercials, direct the news and all of the cameramen.

After college, he worked in Dallas at fledgling Warner Amex Cable, the first cable franchise for the City of Dallas. “We produced programs about the community for cable TV at several broadcast facilities, Lincoln High School and Richland College, and helped train nonprofits like the Dallas Independent School District to produce their own shows,” he recalled.

After additional production jobs with the City of Dallas Public Affairs Department, Davis helped create the Film Liaison Office for the City, which awarded permits for films and ads that shot in Dallas. “We were very successful in taking advantage of the then-popular Dallas television show.” In 1993, Davis’ dream job finally came along.

“All the elements and experience I wanted—from creating advertising to driving the direction of the station’s music—were here,” he states. “I’d also been involved with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, as well as local theatre, so it was exactly my cup of tea.” In his current position, Davis is largely responsible for the look and feel of WRR, a station that now has listeners as far away as

DARWIN CAMPBELL

African-American News&Issues

Jordan Franklin

Miss Black Texas HOUSTON- On July 29, Jordan Franklin was crowned Miss Black Teen Texas USA 2007. She was also selected as the talent and evening gown winner, Miss Hospitality, and Miss Cover Girl 2007. The 16-yearold is a senior at Westfield High School in Houston, Texas.

In addition to representing Texas, Franklin wins a $1,500 scholarship from the pageant as well as a prize package including dental care from Dr. Chiara Combs and Ideal Smiles, a stylist package from Travis Cal and Fashionably Loud, a gift certificate from High Society Boutique, a Tiffany & Co. ring, and a traditional crown and sash. Miss Black Teen Missouri City USA, Ngozi Ashibuogwu (Interview winner) was named first runner-up. Miss Black Teen Stafford USA, Nicole Hickl (Fitness winner and Miss Congeniality); and Miss Black Teen Fort Bend County USA, Marissa Franklin (Miss Photogenic), were selected as second and third runners-up, respectively.

DALLAS- It has all come together for Gregory Davis: a love for public television, cultural radio, classical music and a great city with abundant cultural excitement. As General Manager of WRR Radio Classical 101.1 FM. Davis harmonizes the best of these worlds with the newest technological and audience-pleasing innovations to create a masterpiece revered the world over.

“Great communities are defined by their culture,” Davis said.

“Dallas is a great city that’s coming into its own, culture-wise.

It deserves a radio station that works extremely hard to promote the arts, from live broadcasts of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra to student musician competitions.”

While WRR has been around since way back in 1912—it was Dallas’ first radio station— in recent years, Davis’s quiet fire has ignited the station into a powerhouse of classical music that has won scores of awards and fans.

A Denison, Texas native, Davis was perhaps pre-destined for the civic and cultural airwaves. “My father owned a radio and television repair shop,” he said. “Crystal sets, Philco radios…people would bring them in and dad magically restored the voices and the visuals. Even back in the early 1960s, I was a loyal WRR listener. You could hear broadcasts of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra loud and clear in Denison, and I thought classical music was the coolest thing ever.”

During the time, Davis was

Gregory Davis a student at McDaniel Junior High, President Lyndon Johnson set aside portions of the airwaves for public television channels. McDaniel was chosen to be the Denison area recipient of the local channel and housed its facilities. That allowed Davis an opportunity to take an educational TV course that was offered to students and he jumped right in.

“I learned how to write a script, run a camera, you name it,” he said. “For my class project, I wanted to put my band mates on TV. So I worked our quartets and ensembles into our broadcasts and everyone was excited to be local celebrities.”

Davis continued to pursue a musical career in high school, serving as band president. “Music was certainly my passion. I also took private lessons at nearby North Texas State University in Denton (now UNT).”

He wanted to pursue a future in music, but thought he might

Japan and Korea.

“Our station is, in a sense, an international audio ambassador that promotes the image of Dallas as a cultural leader,” he said.

Davis also oversees long-range planning for the station and production of locally-based programming for music, dance, theatre and museum entities. One of Davis’ main goals in the not-toodistant future is to renovate WRR’s Fair Park facilities, which have stood relatively unchanged since the 1930s and the Texas Centennial era.

“WRR is synonymous with Fair Park and South Dallas,” he said.

“It’s the only entity in Fair Park that reaches around the globe every day. We would like to better incorporate the very latest technologies into the framework of the most modern facilities possible.

This will enhance the quality of our broadcasts.”

He has also helped to spearhead high definition radio technology installation for the station.

“As more people buy HD radios, they will be able to experience the full effect of HD,” he believes.

“You can now look at your radio and see the title of the song that’s playing. What’s more, you can read the score and lyrics as the song plays!

He has a relaxed attitude and renewed faith in this radio station.

If WRR has a unique spirit, it is driven by Gregory Davis’ heart and soul. This is a man who knows that wishes do come true.

“I am so blessed to be working with such a gifted staff,” notes Davis. “Every one of them has the sense that each day, he or she is truly making a difference. And

Deals & Wheels Lifetime warranty not “too good to be true!”

GWENEVERE M. CLOUD Automotive Correspondent

HOUSTONIn last week’s column, I wrote about Chrysler’s announcement of its new lifetime powertrain warranty. Readers throughout Texas called and emailed me, basically wanting to know if the product was real. I understand, because most of us have been conditioned to believe that “if it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn’t.”

However, the caveat is, unless “it is a statement of confidence in the reliability of Chrysler products.”

When I started this column, my goal was to educate the consumer so that he or she can make intelligent buying decisions-regardless of the make or model of vehicle. However, I must admit, this makes me proud to work for the Chrysler organization.

Now to be clear, there are some qualifications: The warranty covers all parts and labor as long as the owner brings the car in to a Chrysler dealer at least once every five years for a free powertrain inspection. It applies to the original owner and is not transferable. If the car is sold within the first three years, the warranty reverts to the previous 3 year/36,000 mile coverage for subsequent owners. That’s a small sacrifice to make in exchange for peaceof-mind reassurance.

Gwenevere M. Cloud is Business Development Manager for Gulfgate Dodge, 7250 Gulf Freeway, Houston, TX. For more information, call (281)4776767 ext. 6130 or email her at gcloud@ gulfgatedodge.com.

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Read us online at www.aframnews.com.

To get FREE coverage of your lifestyle events and news and announcements, please send items to news@aframnews.com.

TX-9

CHURCH/COMMUNITY NEWS

10 • African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007 CHURCHES

CHURCHES

SUNDAY SERVICE

Hope in Christ Church 10310 Antoine Drive Suite A Houston 77091 (832) 882-7925

8 AM and 11 AM BIBLE STUDIES Wednesday 7:30PM

DUNCAN MEMORIAL

Mt. Ararat Baptist Church 5801 W. Montgomery Houston 77073 (713) 692-9954

Leonard N. Barksdale, Pastor

Fifth Ward Missionary Baptist Church

CHURCH OF GOD IN CHRIST

4300 Noble Street, Houston TX 77020 Ph: 713/675-5111 • Fx: 713/675-1522

Pastor Elder Supt Ohmas Edwards

Website: www.fwmbc.org

(713) 674-5466

Mt. Calvary Lutheran Church and School 1055 W. Tidwell Rd. Houston 77091 (713) 680-1419

Fifth Ward Missionary Baptist Church members will endeavor to provide a strong foundation of love; we will stand on Biblical Truths; and we will equip one another to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ in our community

2222 Lockwood Dr.

“Preaching The Tx Gospel Houston, 77020Is More Important Than Philosophizing.

SUNDAY Soul Winning Is More Important Than Building Membership Morning Prayer: 9:15 am .”

If youSunday are looking church School: for 9:30aam home, you might want to come Church Services: 11 am fellowship with these folks. Besides Sunday, they meet for prayer on Tuesday morning at 11 am, and on Friday the Bible Band Mission meets from 12 to 1 pm and a Bible

GREATER FRIENDSHIP MBC

SHADY ACRES

CHURCH OF CHRIST

Rev. Johnny L. Goff, Sr.,

14055 Dublin

730 West 26th St, Houston, TX 77008

Houston, TX. 77085

Office: 713-7289503

FIDELITY CHURCH OF CHRIST “The Church That Cares”

713/861-6625

www.gfmbc.com

Sunday

Experience the Friendship! Greater Friendship Missionary Baptist Church is a church with a mission- “Let Each One, Reach One!” They have been committed to following the Lord’s command to reach out to the lost (Matt. 28: 18-20) since their found-

Sunday

Morning Bible Class 9:30 a.m.

Morning Worship 10:45 a.m.

Evening Bible Class 5:00 p.m.

Evening Worship 6:00 p.m.

Chorus Group Rehearsal 7:30 p.m.

Minister Frank Melton Jr. Res.713/733-0868 Off. 713/861-9249 FX 713/861-2744 Assoc. Minister Glen Burgess, Sr. Res.713/734-8983

Greater Progressive Missionary Baptist Church 840 Ringold Houston 77088 (281) 445-8603

Wednesday

MINISTER: Mid-Week Bible Class Theaster Maloy, Sr. 7:00 p.m.

OFFICE: 713/674-5131

Early Worship 6 am Sunday School 9:30 am Regular Worship 10:30 am Evening Worship 6 pm

The Divine Diva- More Than a Woman Conference ARLINGTON -The Divine Diva-More Than A Woman Conference Tour- “Know Your Worth” is for the everyday woman who wishes to change her image by unleashing the diva that lies within. The Divine Diva was designed to help a women change their perception as to how they see themselves.

The Divine Diva is to help girls, teens, and women build their confidence, self-esteem, self worth, through the word of God. To rid women of the myths that plague their hearts, from the rules that has held women from becoming the woman that God has created. A Divine Diva is a woman who has style and grace.

She is a woman who presence speaks for itself. Here is how we assist in creating the diva within. The Divine Dive-More Than A Woman Conference Tour - this conference is a hands on conference that teaches, trains, and motivate women that they can be a diva in their own rights.

This conference consist of seminars, luncheon, products, manuals, and the opportunity to meet other women who are in divas training. The Conference will run Friday, August 17, 2007 - Saturday, August 18, 2007, starting at 6:00 p.m. The venue will be held at the Wyndham Hotel, 1500 Convention Center Dr. Dress casual and be sure to bring your workout attire. Tickets for the event is $30.00. For more information on this event, please call (817)784-8666.

Wednesday

Cliffdale Baptist Church announces Pastor and Wife’s 10th Anniversary

General Song Practice

St. Monica Catholic Church 8421 West Montgomery Rd. Houston 77088 (281) 447-5837

140 Fidelity Rd. Houston Tx 77029

Church News Hotline!

(713)692-1892 Pastor and First Lady Fred Sanders, III

saturday August 18, 2007 10 a.m.-5 p.m.

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HOUSTON -Cliffdale Baptist Church would like to announce the 10th Anniversary Celebration program for their Pastor and First Lady Fred Sanders, III. The Sanders have completed ten faithful and dedicated years with the Cliffdale Baptist Church family.

The celebration services will be held at Cliffdale Baptist Church, 854 Enterprise, during the month of August and September. On the last Sunday of the celebration, Dr. Edwin Davis, pastor of Gailee Missionary Baptist Church, will be the closing keynote speaker. For more information, please call Cliffdale Baptist Church at 713-447-8850.

Pastor’s wife offers first-hand solutions for being thrust into a leadership position Humble- Vince Lombardi, legendary football coach for the Green Bay Packers, is often quoted as saying, “Leaders are made, they are not born.” Most people would be hard-pressed to recite the rest of his admonition, “They are made by hard effort, which is the price which all of us must pay to achieve any goal that is worthwhile.” Perhaps no one knows that better than Anetta Parker, who just four short years ago, was content with being a “pew member” at her church.

Anetta, whose role changed dramatically when her husband, Lionel Parker Jr., was catapulted from the ranks of associate minister, to pastor of a progressive Houston, Texas church, is encouraging women like herself, who once faithfully occupied a seat in the pews - to not be afraid when it is their set time. She said, “… my goal is to remind them and encourage them that we did not call ourselves. God calls and chooses us.”

In her first book, Anetta, author of From The Pew To First Lady, (Lionel Parker Ministries, $13.00) takes the reader on a fascinating journey of self-discovery and provides you with the same Word of God she used to cross the rivers of despair and discouragement, when all of a sudden, her husband was select-

ed as pastor after the untimely death of its former leader. And since most people believe the “Hollywood” portrayals of pastors and their glamorous lifestyles to be the norm, one might think that this was a dream come true.

Not so. The author openly tells of ill treatment of her family, from church members who didn’t support them as the first family. Yet, From The Pew To First Lady is not a tome filled with bitterness and anger. Rather, it is a testimony of how God can bring you through every trial imaginable and a reminder that Romans 8:28 is still true: “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.”

Anetta will be the featured in the official launching and book signing of her book on Saturday, August 25, 2007 at 12 p.m. at Great New Grove Christian Worship Center Church, 7518 E. Mount Houston Rd. She is described as “A Proverbs 31:1028 woman” because she aptly fits the description by the writer when he asks, “Who can find a virtuous woman? For her price is far above rubies, Her children rise up and call her blessed... .”

She is committed to God, and she willingly submits to the lead-

ership of her husband Pastor Lionel Parker, Jr., yet she is the cornerstone of prayer and intercession in their home. Her philosophy is to love God, love her husband, and love her children. She works tirelessly to care for the home and commit to the ministry by showing her love to God’s people and living by example. First Lady Parker lives a lifestyle rooted in faith and biblical foundation principles according to Hebrews 6:12.

For more information, call (281)449-5593.

Fountain of Praise to host prospective volunteer training

Mer cury exit

Northeast Northeast Campus 713-718-8300

555 Community College dr.

HOUSTON -Volunteer In-Prison Training, Community Awareness and Family Ministry opportunities – Designed for New and Prospective Volunteers, will be held, August 25, 2007 at the Fountain of Praise, 13535 South Post Oak Road, South Post Oak Campus, Room 201.

The in-prison course equips volunteers with the knowledge, skills and Biblical foundation necessary to participate in a minis-

try to those who are incarcerated, their families and to discuss reconciliation to God and community. They will also present Transformational Discipleship and Reconciliation of ex-offenders to family, Community and God. The State of Texas will conduct safety and security training for new prospective volunteers to enter the Texas Department of Correction prison and jail units.

Topics from Prison Fellowship

Read us online at www.aframnews.com.

include: Biblical Foundations for an In-prison Ministry, Discipleship, Getting to Know the Criminal Justice Professionals, Introduction to the Prison Environment, Community needs, Common Problem Areas for Prisoners’ families, Collaboration, Do’s and Don’ts on Prison Grounds, Transitioning to the free world, Partnership, Facilitating Small-Groups, Learning to Listen, and other Ministry Opportunities.

To get FREE coverage of your church events, news and announcements, please send items to news@aframnews.com.

TX-10

COMMUNITY/EDUCATION

8 • African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007

Texas Celebrates the Legacy of Marcus Garvey

HOUSTON- The Caribbean Impact Foundation, the Love Community Foundation, the Texas Sudanese Lost Boys Foundation, and the Shrine of the Black Madonna, in collaboration with the City of Houston and the Mickey Leland Center at Texas Southern University, will host their first annual Marcus Garvey World House Festival to celebrate the legacy of the Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey, national hero of Jamaica and the only global leader to date of Africans in the Diaspora.

Garvey was born on August 17, 1887, in the parish of St. Ann, Jamaica , and manifested genius and leadership in his teens. He migrated to the United States from where his mass movement promoting Black pride, economic empowerment and liberation from colonialism extended to over 40 countries in the Caribbean, Latin America and Africa .

Garvey’s businesses, writings and lectures positioned him to influence such leaders of African independence movements as George Padmore of Liberia, Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya, Nnamdi Azikwe of Nigeria, Julius Nyrere of Tanzania, and Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana. The parents of both Malcolm X and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. were official members of his organization. The official red, black and green colors of Garvey’s UNIA-ACL have been used to commemorate his efforts into posterity by those first leaders and others since in national flags and organization symbols worldwide.

The Houston tributes will begin on Friday, August 17, 2007 with a reception and lecture on Garvey’s impact. On Saturday, August 18, 2007 the Marcus Garvey World House Festival will be held at the George R. Brown Convention Center featuring international and local performers, vendors of multicultural arts, crafts, fashion, food and drinks, as well as city, state and national officials. The final event on Sunday is a memorial tribute at the Shrine of the Black Madonna Pan African Orthodox Christian Church, an institution established in the fashion of the African Orthodox Church that Garvey founded. Members of the Garvey family will be in attendance at all events.

Proceeds from the festival will benefit charitable organizations and funding efforts to construct a radio station with programming from throughout the African Diaspora. For more infromation, call (832) 461-9364 or visit www.

MySpace.com/garveyworldfest.

Allen pledges to stop priviledged students from buying their freedom from TAKS MONTGOMERY- Around the state of Texas, it is a well known fact that in order for a graduating high school senior must complete and pass each part of the State mandated Texas Assessment of Knowledge and Skills (TAKS) test in order to graduate from high school. State law is explicit that if a secondary student can’t pass the state assessment test, they can’t graduate from a public school. At Parkway Christian School, in Montgomery County, the students are in the midst of this situation.

Representative Parkway Christian School does not receive nei- Alma Allen ther public nor State funded school, therefore, the TAKS test in not required as a part of graduation requirements. Parkway only requires that the student has the required 22 credits in order to graduate and pays $250.00 for a diploma. “It’s horrible,” said State Rep. Alma Allen. “It’s hollow, it’s shallow and it’s appalling to me.”

Allen, who has spent nearly 40 years as an educator in public schools and four terms on the State Board of Education, said that the students in this case are being taught the wrong lesson.

She further stated that, “It’s teaching them how to circumvent, and there’s no other word for it, a diploma for sale. Some parents in the community feels as if this is the answer to so many of their children graduating from high school, because so many of them who do not pass the TAKS test will eventually become a school drop out.” Dr. Alma Allen pledges to try to change state law to try and stop this practice.

“I will be looking at filing a bill that will close the loophole for our children,” Rep. Allen said. Most parents are hoping that the bills does not pass and the new law never happens, because schools like Parkway Christian allowing good kids a chance at a future, despite a bad test score from a senseless test that sometimes even students in the top 10 percent of their class can’t even pass.

Please help support and educate our youth!

If we don’t, who will?

Segregation in San Antonio schools MARIO SALAS

African-American News&Issues

SAN ANTONIO- Texas public schools were never truly integrated and San Antonio perhaps describes the process by which many schools were desegregated.

When Brown vs. Board became law in 1954 and 1955, the power elite, along with their economic and political allies, sought ways to soften desegregation efforts. San Antonio school districts began to integrate under a “gradual formula” which was never to be completed in the Black community after the Brown decision.

Sam Houston High School, which was mostly White at one time, would suffer “White flight,” while Phyllis Wheatley High School, the African American school, would go through a series of manipulations that only produced new forms of segregation.

The San Antonio Register, the oldest African American newspaper in San Antonio, reported that on March 30, 1954, then City Councilman Henry B. Gonzalez, later to become a U.S. Congressman, made a motion for the City of San Antonio to officially desegregate all “municipally-owned facilities”, even before the Brown implementation decision. The motion passed, but this did not end segregation in San Antonio, nor did it prevent the exclusion of Blacks from city boards and commissions.

It was a gesture designed to induce quiescence (planned quietness) by piece-meal approaches. Despite the fact that a progressive Mexican American made the motion, White support was needed to pass it. Using a gradual approach formula would prevent a White backlash, and at the same time impose the idea that White sponsorship was needed for Black progress.

Additionally, the desegregation of municipally owned building affected mostly the downtown area

where city officials could benefit from the move in national tourist publications. The San Antonio branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was aware of this attempt as a gradual integration plan being proposed by the San Antonio School District.

In September of 1955, the local branch expressed its opposition as reported in the San Antonio Register of September 16, 1955: “The San Antonio branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, this week voiced its opposition to the ‘gradual’ system of integration projected, this fall, by the San Antonio Independent School District, and petitioned the school board, Wednesday, to reorganize all San Antonio schools on a non-discriminatory basis.” The San Antonio Register again reported on October 28, 1955, during Thurgood Marshall’s speech to a crowd “estimated at more than 800,” at St. Paul Methodist Church in San Antonio that: “Gradual desegregation merely provides Negrophobists with an opportunity to mobilize their forces and to plan ways and means to circumvent the Supreme Court decision.”

The federal government demanded desegregation, but San Antonio’s power elite found a way around it. Although public facilities would be “officially” integrated, the private sector would continue allowing for segregated facilities. San Antonio Banker William Sinkin’s assertion, in Holmesly’s (2003) book HemisFair ’68, about the fact that “San Antonio has never had a race riot” because the racist Good Government League (GGL) began a “process of opening doors” is totally erroneous.

San Antonio had at least four “riots” that are a recorded fact of history. One was at Sam Houston High School when there was de facto attempt at desegregation in the 1970s, and another riot took place in the center of downtown San Antonio led by SNCC activists in protest of the San Antonio

Police Department (SAPD) beating and killing of Bobby Joe Phillips in 1969. There was another riot in downtown San Antonio after the Civil War in which one Black was killed, and another riot prevented Blacks from voting during Reconstruction.

“Integration” would not come officially until 1967-68, when the building of HemisFair, a San Antonio based World’s Fair, prompted concerns about tourist dollars being lost, and economic instability that could be caused by militant action and negative publicity. There was talk about blowing up the Tower of the Americas after the assassination of Martin Luther King in April of 1968 by Houston and San Antonio radicals.

HemisFair ’68 was not a “cooperative symphony of harmony” as touted by some city officials. Integration was an economic and political decision because of the possibility of Black civil unrest and loss of tourist dollars.

When a business-oriented council-manager form of governance replaced the commission form of government, and “boss politics” in 1951, Blacks were removed from the power scheme, and a token system was put in place. The GGL became very experienced in using some Black preachers as token mouthpieces. This was done in the case of the late Rev. S.H. James of Second Baptist Church. The denial of true Black political participation would be maintained until the national civil rights struggles began to demand Black inclusion in political and social affairs. The GGL, with the economic interests it had in HemisFair, opened a small crack in the segregated door, a door that they controlled and wrote the agenda for.

Given the racist politics of former late Mayor Walter McAllister, there can be no doubt those altruistic reasons for integration in San Antonio where never present in the thinking of the White elite. Integration in most of Texas followed this pattern and in many cases took place without a whisper.

M. B. Smiley High School to hold 15-year reunion HOUSTON -M.B. Smiley Class of 1992 will celebrate its 15-year reunion the weekend of September 7-8, 2007. The planning committee is working hard to pass the word in an effort to rally their classmates for the big event. There will be a $35.00 fee for singles and a $75.00 fee for a family of 3 or more.

On Friday, September 7, there will be a cocktail party from 8 p.m. -12 p.m. and a Fun Day in the Park, on Saturday, September 8. The family outing will include a moonwalk for the children as well as delicious food, face painting and more family-oriented activities. The Saturday event will also serve as an opportunity to discuss health-related issues affecting our Black communties.

On Friday, September 7, 2007, the reunion will kick off at Café 4212, 4212 Almeda Rd from 8pm – 12pm and Saturday, September 8, 2007, the Fun Day in the Park will be held at Deussen Park, Pavillion 16, 12303 Sonnier Street from 3p.m. – 7p.m. Class reunion dues are due now. Please make all checks and/or money orders to Shatonya Marshall and mail to MB Smiley 1992, 5110 Prosperity Circle, Houston, TX 77018.

For more information, please call Nascha Wanza at (832)651-3947 or Celena Robinson at (832)7545920.

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TX-8

AANI_Fall07_9.8125x4_Aug13.indd 1

8/9/07 10:22:23 AM

12 • African-American News&Issues • Texas • August 15-21, 2007

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