California Black Caucus Black History Month Event Celebrates Business Owners

Antonio Ray Harvey

California Black Media impact, not only for your families but for those that you employ and those that you provide good service to.”

The California Black Chamber of Commerce (CBCC) and the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC) recognized the success of 16 thriving Black-owned businesses at its annual Legislative Business Brunch at the Citizen Hotel in Sacramento.

The brunch, organized to celebrate Black History Month, honored the achievements of the businesses, and celebrated their commitment to professional service and making an impact on the economy of communities around California.

Sponsored by Amazon and Instacart, the business program attracted Black business leaders, non-profit operators, and all 12 members of the CLBC. Three Black constitutional officers – Secretary of State Dr. Shirley Weber, State Controller Malia Cohen and Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond -- were recognized at the event held at Citizen Hotel. Cohen and Thurmond were present to accept their awards, and Reginald “Reggie” Fair, Deputy Secretary of State for Operations, accepted the award on behalf of Weber.

Tempe AZ Considers Replacing Street Names Tied to KKK

TEMPE, Ariz. (AP) – An Arizona city council scheduled a vote next month on replacing park and road names that have century-old ties to the Ku Klux Klan.

Tempe councilmembers will consider replacement names during a March 2 meeting. The new names were proposed by community members and vetted by councilappointed volunteers who met several times.

The renaming effort began in 2021 after historical research determined that several parks and streets were named after former community leaders who were members of an area Klan chapter in the 1920s. Resident Drew Sullivan helped start the initiative and staffers at the Arizona Historical Society and Tempe History Museum had a hand in the research, which also used records from the Phoenix Public Library.

A Klan chapter called Butte Klan No. 3 included many prominent Tempe residents, including mayors, council members, bankers and other power brokers, according to documents released by the city. At the time, the city’s elementary schools were segregated, as was a swimming pool at Tempe Beach Park.

The Tempe Elementary School District already has renamed three schools bearing some of the associated names.

Tempe city officials in February settled on the list of proposed replacement names, which includes civil rights activists, the first African American landowners in what is now Tempe, and married pioneers Adolfo Romo and Joaquina Jones, who fought and won in court for their children to be able to attend school with white children. Their 1925 case helped pave the way for desegregation in the United States.

“This is really touching to me because I’ve had people (in my family) who have died by hanging by the Ku Klux Klan, so I understand what this means emotionally,’’ Berdetta Hodge, the first Black woman to sit on the city council, told the Arizona Republic.

Pending action by the City Council, it could be the summer for the actual name changes are made.

The city is still organizing how it will reimburse residents who have to update their addresses. Residents will have one year to file claims after the properties are officially renamed.

Naval Academy Renames Building after Jimmy Carter

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) – A building at the U.S. Naval Academy that had been named after a leader in the Confederate Navy was renamed Friday in honor of former President Jimmy Carter, who graduated from the academy in 1946.

The decision to rename the engineering building in Annapolis was made after a commission mandated by Congress determined several military assets across all branches of the service had to be renamed because of Confederate ties.

The building that had been called Maury Hall was built and named in the early 1900s after Matthew Fontaine Maury, a naval officer and scientist who joined the Confederates.

President and CEO Jay King, and CLBC vice chair Sen. Steven Bradford (D-Inglewood). Anthony Williams, the California Public Policy Director for Amazon, was the guest speaker.

King reminded the attendees that the event was made possible by Aubry Stone, who started the advocacy for Black businesses in the state in 1995 until his passing in November 2018.

Stone facilitated networking among different business organizations across the state and fostered relationships with local governments. In the process, he opened doors of access to all races, King said.

The Naval Academy superintendent’s house and a nearby road are named after Franklin Buchanan, the academy’s first superintendent who left to join the Confederate Navy at the start of the Civil War. The academy also is renaming the house and road, but has yet to announce those changes.

Carter, who is 98, was president from 1977 to 1981. He did not attend the ceremony, though some of his relatives did.

¡It would be impossible to overstate what this Academy and the Navy has meant to my grandfather, and by extension to my family,’’ said Josh Carter, Jimmy Carter’s grandson, in a news release from the Navy.

California State Controller Malia Cohen accepts Constitutional Officers Award at CBCC/CLBC’s luncheon. (Photo: Antonio Ray Harvey/CBM)

“I am thankful that today, as it being the month of February and celebrating Black History Month, we get the opportunity to celebrate Black businesses. We get the opportunity to celebrate each one of you who are pouring into your communities in a meaningful and economic way,” said Assemblymember Lori D. Wilson (D-Suisun City), chair of the CLBC. “You are making an economic

“We are the California Black Chamber of Commerce, and we believe in diversity, equity and inclusion. I believe that means everybody. We shouldn’t leave anybody out,” King said. “We help small businesses. Today, it just so happens to be African American small businesses because of the many obstacles they face every day.”

Each honoree was selected from the state lawmakers’ districts, including four special recognitions selected separately by King. The following proprietors received business awards from the CLBC and CBCC:

Demetrius Porter, Center Cork Wines (Fresno); Chandra Brooks, Chandra Brooks International (San Jose); Juana Williams and Blair Paysinger, Downtown Disney (Anaheim); Earl Johnson, Home and Work Mobile Oil Changers (Fremont); Deborah A. Day, Ashay By The Bay (Vallejo); and Clayrone Clark, Coop and Fire; (Gardena); and Dr. Leonard Thompson III, M.A.N.D.A.T.E. Records, (San Diego); Rounding out the business honorees are Keith Corbin, Alta Adams (Los Angeles); Reggie and Nicole Borders, Pound Bizness (San Francisco Bay Area); Lee Williams, Lee Williams Real Estate Group (San Pedro); Ann Hamilton, Robsag Real Estate, LLC (Pasadena); Twina Brown, Mama T’s Food For the Soul (Moreno Valley); Austin Clements, Slauson & Co (Los Angeles); Zion F.A. Taddese, Queen Sheba Ethiopian Restaurant (Sacramento); Tyrei Lacy, Restaurant Seven Nineteen by G/S (Los Angeles); and Bo and Kay Anuluoha, Kutula by Africana (Los Angeles).

The CBCC is an African American non-profit business organization that represents hundreds of small and emerging businesses, affiliates and chambers of commerce throughout the state. It provides advocacy assistance for supplier’s diversity needs, and business development and training for small businesses. The CLBC, formed in 1967, was created to address the concerns of African Americans and other citizens of color. According to the organization’s website, the members believed that a caucus would provide political influence and visibility far beyond their numbers. Today, there are 12 members of the CLBC serving in the California Assembly and Senate.

Courthouse Named for Harvard Law Professor Who

Taught Obamas

MERCED, Calif. (AP) – A courthouse in California’s agricultural heartland was named for a native son who went from working in the fields to a distinguished career at Harvard Law School, where he taught Barack and Michelle Obama.

Family members and supporters attended a ceremony Friday naming the Merced County courthouse to honor Charles James Ogletree Jr.’s contributions to law, education and civil rights, the Fresno Bee reported. Ogletree, 70, represented Anita Hill when she accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment during his U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings in 1991, and he defended the late rapper Tupac Shakur in criminal and civil cases. He also fought unsuccessfully for reparations for members of Tulsa, Oklahoma’s Black community who survived a 1921 race massacre by white people.

The legal scholar, who retired from Harvard in 2020 after a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s, did not attend. But a brother and sister were among dozens of people, including judges and notable community members. Ogletree has spoken of his humble roots, where he grew up in poverty on the south side of the railroad tracks in Merced in an area of Black and brown families. His parents were seasonal farm laborers, and he picked peaches, almonds and cotton in the summer. He went to college at Stanford University and then Harvard Law School.

Richard Ogletree said if his brother had been present for the ceremony, he would expect him to say what he has heard him say in previous speeches and presentations: “I stand on the shoulders of others.’’ “He always wants to give credit to others and not accept credit himself, which he so richly deserves,” said Ogletree, who called his brother his hero.