NeNe Leakes Sues Saying Racism Accepted on ‘Real Housewives’ Page A3
States Only Black Female D.A. Solves Decades-Old Cold Case Page A9
News Observer Bakersfield
Volume 48 Number 34
Serving Kern County for Over 48 Years
Observer Group Newspapers of Southern California
Johnson & Taft Mortuary Grand Opening
Ready to Serve the Community By Rhyan Nile Feature Writer (Bakersfield, Ca.) – This was a dream that has been in the making since 1993, and the Grand Opening that was prayed for, is finally here! The Johnson & Taft Mortuary is officially open. Billy Taft had the idea to go into the Mortuary business when he was a young man living in Fort Worth, TX. Taft stayed next door to Mr. Ron Baker, who owned one of the largest Mortuary in Fort Worth, which just so happened to be blackowned. Taft used to admire Baker because he dressed so nicely. And from that moment, he knew he wanted to be an undertaker. Taft served in the United States Army and went to the Vietnam War. After seeing all the mangled bodies he showed compassion and was signed to the morgue to put things back together. “I didn’t enjoy it but I knew it was a need,” said Taft. In 1993, Taft became an aide to Bishop Benjamin Crouch, and he was there, holding his hand as he passed away, and before Crouch did he said something to Taft that changed his life from then on out; he said “Billy you’re living below my means. There’s more to you than this.” The next month, Taft enrolled in Mortuary school at the Dallas Institute, in Fort Worth, TX, and got an A degree in Mortuary Science. After ministering for ten years, Taft went to see what it takes to open up his own Mortuary. Taft’s brother, Elder Theophiles “Arthur” Taft Jr. recently passed on September 25, 2021, due to COVID-19, and he was a huge part of making this dream come true. Taft’s brother was always there reassuring him that no matter how many “no’s” he received there would always be a yes waiting for him. Taft’s brother would pray for him and his dream every day, and give him the encouragement he needed to keep striving. “Go for it, you can do this,” said Arthur Taft Jr. Tonie Taft, the daughter of Billy Taft plays a big role in the Mortuary. Tonni has many roles, she is the social media/PR coordinator, and is in the process of going to school, to get her embalming and funeral director’s license. She has 15 more months left in school. Once she has her license she will be working beside her father. Tonie is a nurse for the L.A. county and worked a lot with the COVID-19 unit. “During COVID, people were treated so coldly. People’s families were not being buried on time, and I was there to be a prayer Continued on page A10
Wednesday, April 27, 2022
Body of Boy Found in Indiana was Inside Suitcase
SELLERSBURG, Ind. (AP) – The body of a young boy found over the weekend in southern Indiana was contained inside a hard suitcase, state police said Tuesday. The suitcase has a distinctive Las Vegas design on its front and back, Sgt. Carey Huls said. A Washington County resident hunting mushrooms found the body around 7:30 p.m. Saturday, police said. The body was located in a heavily wooded area of eastern Washington County. A toll-free tip line in the case was established on Monday and has generated about 200 calls, but none of the calls have led to the identification of the boy, Huls said. An autopsy on the boy was conducted on Tuesday but no information as to the cause of death was determined, Huls said. Based on information provided by the autopsy, investigators believe the child was about 5 years old, Huls said. He was previously described as between the ages of 5 and 8 years old. He was Black, about 4 feet (1.2 meters) tall, with a slender build and short haircut. He is believed to have died sometime within the past week. Police say anybody with information on the boy should call 1-888-437-6432.
Sharpton to Give Eulogy for Patrick Lyoya, Shot by Police
(Left to Right) Ronnetta Johnson, Pastor Bryon Carter, and Billy Taft. (Photo: Carrington Prichett)
Celebrating Earth Day, Focus on Water and Pollution
Aldon Thomas Stiles California Black Media Last week, people around the world celebrated Earth Week with commemorations and activities leading up to Earth Day, on Friday, April 22. Activists and advocates in California marked the annual event by highlighting the urgency of climate change and why, more than ever, communities of color need to be engaged and informed. “We’re already in a climate disaster,” said Simeon Gant, the African American Executive Director of Green Technical Education and Employment, an organization dedicated to getting young Black people more involved in environmental justice.” “We’ve got fire disasters every year, more than we’ve ever had,” said Gant. “People are dying, whole cities are being burned down in California and other places.” The state’s ongoing drought, now in its third year, is another major environmental concern. “Here in California, we are already seeing the effects of the climate crisis in the form of drought, record heat waves, and wildfires that have devastated entire communities,” said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA-13). “As the United Nations and scientists around the world have made clear, we can still preserve a livable climate for future generations. But that window is closing fast,” Lee continued. “This year, we also must recognize that we are running out of time to save the planet for our children and grandchildren.” Gant agrees with Lee. “In the Central Valley, we’re having problems with water. Not just the fact that we’re in a drought but the little bit of water that even comes out of Central Valley is often contaminated,” Gant pointed out -- before he invoked Flint, Michigan and the water crisis that city experienced from 2014 to 2019. Gant says water contaminated by drilling for fossil fuels in California is preventable. On Tuesday, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office announced that the state will be contributing $22.5 million to mediating the effects of the drought. “With the climate crisis threatening communities across the West, we must double down on our work to build water resilience in our communities for the long haul,” said Newsom. “All of us must do our part to tackle the intensifying drought conditions felt across the state. We’re investing critical resources to battle the drought’s impacts on our communities and ecosystems and finding innovative solutions to deal with these new realities.” At the national level, Gina McCarthy, White House National Climate Advisor, told California Black Media that the Biden administration is committed to addressing issues of clean drinking water. “The bipartisan infrastructure law is going to be a way of investing in climate change and it’s also going to be a way of investing in the communities that have been left behind,” said McCarthy. “That means getting the lead out of the paint in homes, that means getting the lead out of our drinking water systems, that means investing in communities that don’t have safe
Take One!
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. (AP) – Funeral services have been scheduled for Patrick Lyoya, an unarmed Black man fatally shot following a traffic stop and struggle with a white police officer in western Michigan. The Rev. Al Sharpton will deliver the eulogy Friday in Grand Rapids for Lyoya, according to Sharpton’s National Action Network and the office of attorney Ben Crump, who is representing Lyoya’s family. Services will begin at 11 a.m. at Renaissance Church of God in Christ in Grand Rapids. Lyoya, a native of the Democratic Republic of Congo, was face-down on the ground April 4 when he was shot in the back of the head. Video footage released Wednesday by the police department showed the officer straddling Lyoya’s back at the time of the shooting. Video also showed the officer stopping Lyoya for driving with a license plate that didn’t belong to the vehicle, Lyoya’s attempt to run away before being tackled to the ground, and a struggle over the officer’s stun gun. The officer could be heard repeatedly ordering Lyoya to “let go’’ of his Taser, at one point demanding: “Drop the Taser!’’ Michigan State Police are investigating the shooting and the events that led up to it. Grand Rapids Police Chief Eric Winstrom released the videos during a news conference. Citing department policy, Winstrom said he only would release the officer’s name if and when the officer is charged. Lyoya’s family and Crump have demanded that the city identify the officer. More than 100 people marched to Grand Rapids City Hall before a City Commission meeting last Tuesday night, chanting “Black lives matter’’ and “No justice, no peace.’’ Other protests also have been held in the city of about 200,000 people about 150 miles (240 kilometers) northwest of Detroit. Sharpton is founder and president of the National Action Network. The New York-based civil rights organization says it will help cover the costs of Friday’s funeral. Lyoya’s family asked Sharpton to deliver the eulogy, the group said.
Mississippi Set to Become Final State with Equal Pay Law
(Shutterstock Photo)
portable drinking water.” But water is not the only environmental issue facing Californians, says Gant. “In Los Angeles, they have oil pumps right in the hood,” Gant said. “It’s bad for the environment and bad for the air that we’re breathing.” There are 5,000 known, active oil or gas pumps in Los Angeles County. According to Gant, the oil industry’s impact on the environment is also being felt in the Bay Area. “In the Bay Area, in the Richmond area, where we have a whole community sitting next to an oil refinery that often has problems whether it’s catching fire or pollution and fumes that go from the oil refinery into the Richmond area,” said Gant. Gant also pointed to illegal dumping and freeways running through Black neighborhoods in California as causes for concern. According to McCarthy, the White House is committed to tackling environmental equity “to ensure that the communities left behind end up being the focus of investments moving forward.” McCarthy says equity is a part of President Biden’s “Justice40’’
initiative. The program commits 40% of the benefits from energy and climate investments to communities disproportionately affected by climate change. So far, McCarthy says, that effort has been worthwhile. “We have done everything we can, through guidance, through direction to states and local communities,” said McCarthy. However, Gant feels more needs to be done to ensure the investments being made impact the people they are intended to help. “They take that federal money, and they send it down to the local government and then they leave it up to local government to send it to the community-based organizations that are closer to the community,” said Gant. “Unfortunately, it doesn’t get from the local government to the community-based organizations in an effective way.” But, according to McCarthy, that is not solely the responsibility of the executive branch of the US federal government. “We’re also going to not give up on calling on Congress Continued on page A2
By EMILY WAGSTER PETTUS Associated Press JACKSON, Miss. (AP) – Mississippi will become the final state with a law requiring equal pay for equal work by women and men. Republican Gov. Tate Reeves signed House Bill 770 on Wednesday, and it will become law July 1. A 1963 federal law requires equal pay for equal work, but Mississippi has the only state without its own law since Alabama enacted one in 2019. The Mississippi law says a lawsuit must be filed within two years of when a worker “knew or should have known’’ about pay discrepancies. If the pay discrimination lawsuit is successful, the employer would have to increase wages of the lower-paid worker rather than decrease wages of the higher-paid one, said House Judiciary A Committee Chairwoman Angela Cockerham, an independent from Magnolia who pushed for the legislation. The law says businesses with at least five employees must pay equal wages to women and men who work full-time jobs that require “equal skill, education, effort and responsibility” and that are done “under similar working conditions.’’ Several exceptions are allowed, including seniority, merit, quantity or quality of production and “any factor other than sex,” including salary history and whether there was competition to hire an employee. Cassandra Welchlin, leader of the Mississippi Black Women’s Roundtable, advocates for equal pay but said the new law is “harmful’’ because it would allow an employer to pay a woman less than a man based on the pay history that workers bring into new jobs. A 2017 report by the Mississippi University Research Center showed women earned 27% less than men for full-time work in Mississippi, compared to a 19% wage gap nationwide. The study said some of the gap could be explained by the types of jobs women and men were working, but the unexplained wage gap remained about 18% in Mississippi and about 15% nationwide.