www.afro.comOctober 11, 2014 - October 11, 2014,
Volume 123 No. 10
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OCTOBER 11, 2014 - OCTOBER 17, 2014
Civil Rights Groups Fight Impact of Black Vote Not to Retain Voting Rights to be Underestimated #ElectProtect By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent Fewer than 30 days before Election Day, civil rights groups are ramping up efforts to educate and protect voters’ rights amid a more challenging legal landscape. “[We] are doing everything we can to prepare voters for the first elections since the Supreme Court impaired the
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fresh and hard-hitting responses. [And], the Lawyers’ Committee and its non-partisan Election Protection partners offer new resources to empower voters before, on and after Election Day.” According to Arturo Vargas, executive director of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO) Educational Fund, 7.8 million Latinos are expected to vote this This app for smartphones can year, an 18 percent be purchased from iTunes and increase from 2010. Google Play. But voter confusion can Voting Rights Act last year contract turnout. in the infamous Shelby v. Research shows that “the Holder case,” said Barbara lack of reliable and accessible Arnwine, president and information on the voting executive director of the process is one of the greatest Lawyers’ Committee for Civil barriers to Latino electoral Rights Under Law, in a press participation,” Vargas said. call Oct. 7. “New threats to And voter confusion voting rights must be met with Continued on A3
By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent As candidates campaign for Maryland governor’s mansion, overlooking the Black vote would be unwise, experts said, as that bloc historically has made the difference in the state’s election outcomes. “The Black vote is something you can’t take for granted,” said Larry Gibson, a longtime campaign advisor and political operative. That point was driven home during the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections when Black voters—who many pundits had dismissed as apathetic and disillusioned—turned out to the polls in record numbers and proved instrumental in ushering Barack Obama into the White House with resounding victories. The same can be true in Maryland. Comprising about one-fourth of the state’s electorate, African-American voters have the political heft to swing an election—usually in the Democrat’s favor since Blacks vote overwhelmingly Democrat. “I don’t know when we’ve had a recent election in which Democrats got a majority
of the White vote. The White vote has gone for the Republican Party from the [Parris] Glendening election through [Bob] Ehrlich…. So when a Democratic governor wins in this state, it’s largely because of Black voters,” Gibson said. And yet, Black voters historically have been written off or ignored—by Republican candidates, who figure they don’t need African Americans, who likely won’t vote for
Election 2014 See more on A5
them anyway; and by Democrats, who see Black voters as guaranteed supporters that don’t need extra courting. “This election is a perfect example of when the African-American community’s votes are going to be needed to decide the election and are right now being taken for granted,” said Marvin “Doc” Cheatham, a Baltimore City-based elections specialist and community activist. Just 9 percentage points currently separate Continued on A3
Ignorance of the Law No Excuse for Police By Gloria J. Browne-Marshall AANIC Supreme Court Correspondent Like most people, Sgt. Matt Darisse said he believed driving with a broken tail light was against the law, but he was wrong. On Oct. 6 the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments that ignorance of the law is no excuse for police officers or well as private citizens. This was the first case of the Supreme Court’s new term. Sgt. Darisse was on the look-out for guns and drugs in April 2009, when he spotted a Ford Escort with a broken brake light. Maynor Javier Vasquez and Nicholas Heien were on I-77, in Surrey County, N.C. Vasquez drove. Heien, the car’s owner, slept in back. Darisse pulled them over and wrote a ticket for the tail light. But, he said the men
“A police officer does not have to be perfect.”
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struck him as suspicious. Darisse asked to search the car. Heien and Vasquez agreed. That is when the officer found a
Baltimore’s Section 8 Waiting List to Open for First Time in Over 10 Years By Roberto Alejandro Special to the AFRO Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake announced the reopening of the city’s Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher Program (HCVP) Waiting List, Oct. 6. According to the Housing Authority of Baltimore City (HABC), this marks the first time in over 10 years that the list has been open to receive preliminary applications. From Oct. 22 through Oct. 30, residents wanting to apply for a Housing Choice Voucher, a federally funded but locally managed program that helps low-income persons afford housing on the private rental market, will be able to submit a preliminary application. Applications will only be accepted online, via the city’s newly minted website www. jointhelist.org. To assist those who may not have access to the internet, or who may need special accommodations, the city will operate five remote sites between Oct. 28 and Oct. 30. In order to accept new applications, the city has been continually updating and purging
the existing list since 2003, when it was closed down after ballooning to over 18,000 persons (for persons or families with disabilities, the waiting list had remained open until 2008). According to Cheron Porter, director of communications for Baltimore Housing, of the last batch of 2,700 names on the waiting list that the city cleared, some were deemed no longer eligible for a voucher (for example, some persons on the list had since passed away), some were removed because the city no longer had valid addresses for them, and approximately 300 persons were able to receive vouchers. The city is not sure how many people may submit preliminary applications over the course of the nine-day window at the end of October, but Porter tells the AFRO that Pittsburgh, Penn. went through a similar process recently and saw 48,000 applications in two days, and that Miami saw 78,000 over the course of a week when the Southern Florida city reopened its waiting list. “We suspect that it would be comparable (in Baltimore), those are Continued on A4
cellophane wrapper with white powder residue in the driver’s door panel and burnt marijuana seeds in an ashtray. It was a duffel bag in the back hatch area containing cocaine that resulted in a sentence of two consecutive prison terms of 10 to 12 months for drug trafficking. Heien appealed. One broken brake light is not against the law in North Carolina. Allowing Darisse’s legal mistake to stand would “vastly expand police powers,” said Jeffrey Fisher, attorney for Heien. Darisse, sporting a six-inch salt-and-pepper goatee, sat in the far corner of the courtroom as attorneys argued over his back when brake lights were called automobile lamps. Heien argued that his constitutional rights were violated. He said he wants the Supreme Court to Continued on A3
Baltimore Men To Read in Schools, Oct. 13
An Initiative to model Manhood and Encourage Community Outreach By Zenitha Prince Senior AFRO Correspondent On Oct. 13 from 8:30 to 10:30 a.m., men of all ages, backgrounds and races will read to students in schools throughout Baltimore as part of The Michael Carter Men Reading in Baltimore City Public Schools Initiative. Now in its fourth year, the program is meant not only to foster reading among students, but also to model manhood and encourage more community outreach among men, said the program’s founder Marvin “Doc” Cheatham Sr. Schools, community groups and other institutions that are visible in neighborhoods tend to be run by women, Cheatham said. “So we just needed a way to get men more involved. [And,] usually what has been happening is the men get hooked into becoming involved in additional stuff at the school because the principal and teachers recruit them.” The impact, he said, “is many of our children, because we’re in an urban area, haven’t had great relationships with their fathers, so this gives them a chance to see and interact with a male figure in a positive way.” For 15-20 minutes on the day, the men are allowed to read anything—after Continued on A4
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