PRST STD U.S.POSTAGE PAID TWIN CITIES MN PERMIT NO. 6391
— See more Chamblis photo exhibit on pg. 6
THE VOICE OF THE AFRICAN AMERICAN COMMUNITY SINCE 1934 November 23-29, 2017 Vol. 84 No. 16 www.spokesman-recorder.com
From pain to purpose:
Democratic Party faces a crossroads
Chronicling one man’s call to serve
Rep. Ellison says it needs to become ‘an everyday party’
By Charles Hallman Staff Writer
this summer, predicts that the Democrats can be successful next fall only if they move from their current national focus to being more state-based. “The Democratic Party has allowed itself to become a presidential focused party,” he said. “They should be an everyday party, a 50-state party, [and] reemphasize the grassroots part of our party. It’s to elect Democrats up and down the ballot.” Inclusion and welcoming more young people and
Democratic Party gubernatorial wins in Virginia and New Jersey earlier this month have generated optimism a year after the party lost the White House and at a crucial time for the party. All 435 Congressional seats, 33 U.S. Senate seats and 39 state governor offices, including Minnesota’s, are up for grabs in next year’s midterm elections. “No elected official owns the office they are in,” U.S. Congressman Keith El■ See Crossroads on page 8 lison (D-Minn.) stressed. He, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), and others spoke October 22 at the University of Minnesota’s Ted Mann Concert Hall on their party’s forward movement after the 2016 presidential election. Ellison, who was elected Democratic National CommitKeith Ellison tee (DNC) co-chair MSR file photo
By Paige Elliott Online Editor First of two parts
V
isions of mourning mothers still haunt Steve Floyd. It’s been more than a decade since he served as an advocate for homicide victims, but memories of anguished goodbyes remain engraved in his mind. Floyd is a man of many seasons. In addition to being an advocate for victims of homicide, people may know him as a spiritual advisor, a gang and youth outreach worker, a basketball coach or an accomplished, globetrotting photographer. These days Floyd is more accustomed to capturing the images of others, but he recently sat down with the MSR to reflect on his storied career, what drives and inspires him, and why his most recent trip to Africa left him contemplating a move to the continent. As the oldest of nine kids, Floyd learned quickly to fend for himself growing up on South Side of the Chicago, Illinois. In his early years, his family lived in
Steve Floyd as he appeared in the ‘90s Photos courtesy of Steve Floyd/Tony Webster via Creative Commons the notoriously crime-ridden and now-demolished Robert Taylor Homes projects in Bronzeville, and later moved to Englewood. Tall and lean with natural athletic prowess, Floyd found a bit of shelter from the streets through sports. “Most of the guys who were involved in the streets had dropped out of school and were involved in gangs, and I was playing basketball,” remembered Floyd. “So they sort of protected me, as if [to say], ‘You’ve got a way out.’ They kinda looked
out for me and wouldn’t allow for me to get into trouble.” Stray gunfire is no respecter of persons, however. Shaken one night after a bullet grazed his head, Floyd sought comfort in church and was moved by a sermon that encouraged congregants to hold fast to their dreams. Soon Floyd would study theology, journeying in 1980 to what was then North Central Bible Institute, now North Central University in Minneapolis, to take up religious studies and play basket-
ball. After graduating, he played basketball in a pro league overseas for a year and a half before returning to the Twin Cities in 1984 to work with troubled youth. “I started out at Park Avenue Methodist Church as an athletic director and gang outreach worker,” recalled Floyd. “So, that meant that [I’d work with] all the [young gang members] that came around Park Avenue when they used to have what they ■ See PurPose on page 8
New report declares ‘enough is enough’ Initiative calls for a police-free Minneapolis!
By Charles Hallman Staff Writer
not venting, but for real change,” he declared. “There was a world without police,” This year, the Minneapolis Police Department (MPD) celebrated 150 years of said Essie Schlotterbeck, a member of policing. However, a new report that examines the department’s past and present offers “a practical pathway” in hopes of its dismantling in the near future. MPD150 is an independent community-based initiative that wants a “police-free” Minneapolis, say its members. The group last Saturday released Enough is Enough: A 150 Year Performance Review at the nonprofit CTUL workers center on Chicago Avenue in South Minneapolis. CTUL is shorthand for Centro de Trabajadores Unidos en Lucha, which describes itself on its website as “an organization led by low-wage workers, dedicated to building the power.” “There will be skeptics” about the report, Ricardo Levins Morales told an estimated 250 persons who attended last weekend’s event. “This report is Tony Williams
the MPD150 research group. She explained that most police departments in this country were mainly formed to protect the wealthy and their property and
be “a tool of the state” to enforce laws, Tony Williams asked the audience which often included police brutality to discuss next steps in small groups. and other injustices, especially against He told the MSR afterwards, “Too often, Blacks and other people of color. discussions are built around alternatives to police, and they feel so radical or some utopian vision that’s hundreds of years off,” he pointed out. “I hope what folk come away with today is the idea that this is something we need to start now.” When asked if the timing of the report’s release nearly two years after Jamar Clark’s death was coincidental, Sheila Nezhad, a local social justice consultant responded, “We were waiting [until] after the elections.” Clark’s death on November 15, 2015 sparked the nearly 20-day Fourth Precinct occupation in North Minneapolis; the Minneapolis police officers involved in the shooting weren’t charged. “We’ve had enough of this over-policing, especially in North
(l-r) June, Loretta VanPelt
Photos by Charles Hallman
Men of color talking By Dwight Hobbes Contributing Writer “More than a Single Story,” an on-going forum curated and hosted by founder Carolyn Holbrook, presented Nov. 15 a two-panel “Men of Color in 2017” event at Pohlad Hall, Minneapolis Central Library. On hand to reflect and comment on the subject were local men of letters Clarence White, Bao Phi, Anthony Ceballos, Keno Evol and IBé, who opened the event performing a humorous poem about a husband and dad going about
their domestic duties. Moderating was David Mura, award-winning author of Memoirs of a Sensei, Famous Suicides of the Japanese Empire and Where the Body Meets Memory: An Odyssey of Race, Sexuality and Identity. Emmanuel Ortiz, scheduled to appear, could not attend. The program was billed as “a discussion [of] what it means to be a man of color [these days]. What are the stories? What are the models of masculinity that have been given? How do they see themselves as sexual beings,
fathers and partners?” Holbrook herself is a well accomplished writer (Ordinary People, Extraordinary Journey: How the St. Paul Companies Leadership Initiatives in Neighborhoods Program Changed Lives and Communities). Through a career dating to the groundbreaking Colors, a journal of opinion essays, she is a leading figure in and, in fact, a veritable architect of what has evolved into today’s Twin Cities literary community. She founded SASE: The Write Place, and
■ See PoliCe-free on page 8
Entertainment icon Della Reese dies at 86
■ See Men of Color on page 8
(l-r) Bao Phi,Keno Evol, Anthony Ceballos, Carolyn Holbrook, Clarence White, David Mura and Ibrahim Kaba Photo courtesy of Facebook
Della Reese, born Delloreese Patricia Early, was indeed one of the greats, her internationally stellar career spanning more than a half-century as vocalist, actor and television personality. Discovered by gospel immortal Mahalia Jackson as a teenager (she graduated high school at 15), young Della sang on radio, went on tour, and later formed her own Meditation Singers before her father’s ailing health interrupted her education at Wayne University. Signing with Jubilee Records,
she segued to secular music, releasing six albums and the single And That Reminds Me, which charted in the top 20, going gold as she was voted Most Promising Singer by Billboard and Cashbox magazines. Then came her signature song for RCA, Don’t You Know? While she never quite repeated the monumental success of that song, she enjoyed a long, lucrative stay on the airwaves with songs like Not One ■ See reese on page 8