May 25, 2014

Joint Center - Once Bastion of Black Political Research - Now Pressing to Survive
By Hazel Trice Edney

 
Spencer Overton

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, esteemed as America’s foremost think tank for Black political and economic research, is struggling with financial problems so serious that its political arm has been gutted and its interim president is working for free.

Spencer Overton, the center’s interim president/CEO, is on sabbatical from his job as a Georgetown University law professor. He assumed the interim presidency in February after the departure of Ralph Everett, who was president for about eight years. Upon Everett's departure Dec. 31, Dr. Brian D. Smedley, director of the Center’s Health Policy Institute, assumed the interim presidency briefly until Overton was announced. But Overton, who was also a member of the Joint Center’s board, recently confirmed in an interview with the Trice Edney News Wire that he took the position with no salary. 

“No, I am not on salary,” Overton confirmed in a brief interview after participating as a panelist for a Capitol Hill event early last month.

When asked previously about the financial state of the Joint Center, Overton had responded guardedly in an email saying, “The recession has affected various organizations. People of color face significant challenges, however…there is a clear need for a think tank that focuses on policies that affect people of color.  I think if we focus on the challenges of real people, produce high quality policy solutions to those challenges, maintain responsible internal practices, and clearly communicate the value of our work to potential supporters, we will grow and thrive. There is much work to do, but I’m excited about the future.”

Overton has spent the last three months meeting with people who have been affiliated with the Joint Center over the years, seeking advice and help. Despite Overton’s public silence on the state of the organization’s financial affairs, long-time Black political researcher David Bositis, who recently left the organization because of its financial woes, was not as subtle. 

“They’re having money problems. Basically right now, they’re a health group,” said Bositis, who researched Black politics for the Joint Center for 23 years. “They’re trying to hold on. And they’re not under water from the sense that they’re not closed. I mean they are still open, but the political part of it… politics is not being emphasized anymore.”

Bositis said the health research is extremely important, but Black political research - such as tracking the growth and decline of Black elected officials, voting trends, positions on issues - is still equally as needed, he says. 

“I’ve been involved in all sorts of legal cases on voting rights and redistricting. The thing is you need that research to provide information for a lot of the court cases,” Bositis said. “I’ve been talking to a variety of people in terms of where we go from here.”

Overton led the Political Law Studies Initiative at Georgetown and served as a member of the first Obama campaign, transition and administration. But, ironically, he said nothing about political research in an emailed response to questions about his vision from a political perspective. Instead, he referred to health policy as a “traditional strength.” 

Founded in 1979, the Joint Center, for the first 15 years of its existence, was actually the Joint Center for Political Studies. JointCenter.org now says the “Joint Center uses research, analysis, and communications to improve the socioeconomic status and political participation of people of color, to promote relationships across racial lines, and to strengthen the nation’s pluralistic society.”

Other sources close to the Washington, D.C.-based non-partisan non-profit have expressed deep concern about the organization’s finances and future. They include the Center’s former 30-year president, Eddie Williams.

“I’m very concerned,” said Williams, who assumed presidency of the Center two years after its founding. “I have a meeting coming up with the new president to get some perspective on that,” he said of the organization’s financial woes. “I won’t speak for the President. I think he would agree with you that you need more information about some of the issues affecting the Black community whether it’s politics or health or whatever. But, it takes money to do that. And I don’t know but I think they have lost money. That’s my understanding.”

Word began to circulate about the Joint Center’s financial problems shortly after the departure of Everett in December. In addition to Everett and Bositis, at least seven staff members have left the organization since late last year, sources confirmed. 

The Joint Center’s financial contributions largely come from foundations, corporations, government contracts and individual donors as well as fund-raisers like dinners and luncheons.  The organization’s gala dinner is coming up June 25. U.S. Senator Cory A. Booker, former Newark mayor and first Black elected to the Senate since Barack Obama, will receive the Center’s highest award, the Louis E. Martin Great American Award, named after the legendary journalist, presidential confidant and co-founder of the Joint Center. Other recipients of the Great American award include Presidents Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton; U. S. Reps. Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.), Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.), and John Lewis (D-GA.); civil rights leaders Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., Dr. Dorothy I. Height, Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, Sr., Muhammad Ali, Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed and Ambassador Susan E. Rice. 

The Joint Center’s Board of Governors include such political heavy weights as Democratic strategist Donna Brazile and political scientist Dianne Pinderhughes of Notre Dame University. There is also heavy corporate representation on the board including Robert R. Hagans, Jr., vice president and CFO, AARP; A. Scott Bolden, managing partner, Reed Smith LLP; Frederick S. Humphries, Jr. vice president, Microsoft; Freada Kapor Klein,  trustee, Mitchell Kapor Foundation;  Reed V. Tuckson, M.D., chief of Medical Affairs, UnitedHealth Group; Robert Raben, president, The Raben Group; Anne Chow, vice president, Premier Client Group, AT&T Global Services; and board Chair Barbara L. Johnson,  partner, Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker LLP.

Among the associates that Overton has sought for advice is Dr. Elsie Scott, former president/CEO of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation, who raised millions with the CBCF’s annual dinner.

“I’m very impressed with his commitment to try to raise the funds and keep the Joint Center moving and preserve the rich legacy,” says Scott, who confirmed she met with Overton two weeks ago to discuss fund-raising strategies. “It’s going to be a hard hill for him to climb. But, I think that if anybody can do it at this time, I think he would definitely be a person who has the commitment and drive.”

Dr. Scott, who now heads the Ron Walters Institute at Howard University, says she discussed collaboration between the Joint Center and the Walters’ Center to seek funds for political research using the help of students from Howard and other universities to do exit polls and other surveys.

She said she also encouraged Overton to “really beat the bushes to see how many people that he knows who will support the dinner because they believe in him.” 

In the Feb. 11 press release announcing his interim presidency, a list of nationally known bi-partisan activists and public policy advocates praised Overton’s appointment. They included Sen. Booker; Benjamin Ginsberg, a counsel to the Bush-Cheney and Mitt Romney presidential campaigns; Harvard Law School professor, Charles J. Ogletree, founding and executive director of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice and Rashad Robinson, executive director, Color of Change.

Dr. Scott concluded that much weight will likely be placed on the amount of money raised at the upcoming dinner which would go toward “core support” like staff, upkeep of the building and operational funds to sustain them while they seek grant money, she said. “I think the dinner is going to be a major decision point for their board. If they don’t do well, the board is going to have to make some decisions.”

May 25, 2014

African Leaders Vow  'Total War' Against Kidnappers as U.S. Sends Troops to Search for Girls

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from Global Information Network

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – Still unable to account for the over 276 teenage girls kidnapped in Nigeria more than a month ago, the government of Pres. Goodluck Jonathan has agreed to step up the fight against the Boko Haram militants with regional and international support. Among that support is largely U. S. Air Force troops.

President Obama last week told Congress he has deployed 80 troops to adjoining Chad to help in the search for the missing girls. “These personnel will support the operation of intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft for missions over northern Nigeria and the surrounding area,” President Obama said in a letter to Congress. He said the troops will remain deployed “until its support resolving the kidnapping is no longer required.”

Meanwhile, at a summit  in Paris,  Nigerian President Jonathan met with African leaders and agreed to wage a “total war” against the rebel group now said to be overrunning neighboring Cameroon and Chad. The meeting was hosted by France and attended by representatives of the U.S., the UK and the European Union. African presidents in attendance were from Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Benin.

The rebels, seeking to install a radical form of Islam, are believed to be better armed than the Nigerian military, with advanced weaponry thought to be coming from the stockpile of former president Moammar Gaddafi whose entire trove of military might was “liberated” upon his murder in 2011.

Nigerian foot soldiers have given evidence of the imbalance of fighting strength when they shot at their own commander after being ordered into a Boko Haram ambush. The deadly ambush led to over half a dozen casualties among the soldiers.

Speaking before the talks in Paris, UK foreign secretary William Hague urged West African nations to put aside their differences. "This is one sickening and terrible incident,” he said of the kidnapping, but (the insurgents) continue almost every day to commit terrorist attacks and atrocities of other kinds, so they have to be defeated in the region."

He said Nigerian security forces were not well structured to deal with the threat posed by Boko Haram.

"We can help with that, which is why we are offering to embed military advisers within the Nigerian headquarters," he said. "Nigeria has the main responsibility and must be the leading nation in tackling this and that includes to mount an effective security response."

Yet low morale and other problems within the Nigerian military – low pay, poor housing, ageing weapons – have even been cited by the soldiers themselves. “Our equipment doesn’t work and they give us just two magazines (about 60 bullets) to go into the bush,” one officer complained to Sky News.

Other soldiers told the Associated Press that some in their ranks actually fight alongside Boko Haram – a suspicion echoed by the President who admitted publically in 2012 that Boko Haram members and sympathizers had infiltrated every level of his government and the military.

U.S. State Dept. officials attending the Paris meeting said the group would meet again soon and that sanctions could be imposed against Nigerian officials in the next few weeks.

Meanwhile, supporters of the Nigerian President are said to be calling for postponement of next year’s general elections by 18 months. Their campaign is called “Preserve Nigeria’s democracy: Postpone the 2015 now.”

The Trice Edney News Wire contributed to the updates in this story.

May 24, 2014

Study: In States With No Drug-Testing, Jobs Given to White Women, Not Blacks
By Frederick H. Lowe

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from TheNorthStarNews.com

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Pre-employment drug tests are fairly common throughout the United States, but in states where companies are not required to drug test potential employees before hiring them, the available jobs go to white women instead blacks, although more white women than black women are being imprisoned for drug use.

"I find some evidence that employees substitute white women for blacks in the absence of drug screening," Abigail K. Wozniak, associate professor of economics at the University of Notre Dame, wrote in paper titled "Discrimination and The Effects of Drug Testing on Black Employment." The National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, Mass., published the paper in May.

"The evidence on employers substituting white women when testing is not available is suggestive," Wozniak wrote in an email message to The NorthStar News & Analysis. "Unfortunately, I don't have more details beyond what was in the paper." White women 20 years old and older have the lowest unemployment rate and black men 20 years old and older have the highest, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Wozniak does not delve into this issue, but The Sentencing Project released a study that reported that more White women than black women are being incarcerated in state and federal prisons for property crimes related to illegal and prescription drug use.

"I think your question---do employers know the facts and ignore them without testing or do they really not know---is an intriguing one and deserves more research," she added.

Wozniak notes that drug testing in the U.S. labor market began in the early 1980s, driven by the fact that workplace accidents in which drugs were alleged to play a role were occurring, the development of accurate and inexpensive screening devices were readily available, rising public anxiety over the prevalence of drugs in society and federal incentives for workplace drug testing.

In 1987, President Ronald Reagan issued an executive order requiring that federal agencies adopt testing to establish "drug-free workplaces." The 1988 Drug Free Workplace Act went further, requiring federal contractors to adopt comprehensive anti-drug policies.

By the late 1980s, grounds as to which employers could require testing were well-established by the courts, notably with a major U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1989.

Anti-testing states have small black populations compared to pro-testing states, which have large black populations. Most of the testing states are in the South and Midwest. And most of the anti-testing states are in the Northeast.

According to the 2006-2007 Guide to State and Federal Drug Testing Laws, 14 states require employers to test job applicants for drugs and seven are anti testing.

More whites use drugs than blacks but that belief is not shared by by employers. Their own racial prejudices coupled with news reports and so-called reality television shows depicting police arresting mostly Blacks for drug-related offenses have led most people to believe that African-Americans use drugs more than Whites.  
The reality is much different from the reel news.

From 1990 to 2006, 13 percent of Whites and 12 percent of Blacks reported some drug use in the past month. Less-skilled blacks and less-skilled Whites reported drug use of 19 percent, the report said.

Police, however, have developed a set of perceptions in which they disproportionately target Blacks, which has become part of the mindset of small business owners and corporate America.

"In a survey of hiring managers, there is a belief that blacks are more likely to fail a drug test and they cite evidence that even black youth overestimate their down drug use relative to whites. They also cite a 1989 survey in which 95% of [hiring survey] respondents described the typical drug user as black," the report stated.

50 Senators Urge NFL To Endorse Name Change Of Redskins

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Seattle Medium

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – Fifty U.S. Senators have signed on to a letter sent to NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell that calls on the National Football League (NFL) to formally endorse a name change of the Washington football franchise.

The call to action marks the largest Congressional endorsement of a name change for the football team in the nation’s capital. It comes amidst building momentum from Tribes, civil rights organizations, sports leaders and elected officials for the NFL to change Washington’s mascot. A pre-Super Bowl video by the National Congress entitled “Proud to Be” has generated more than 1.8 million views on YouTube. On Monday, the state assembly in the home state of NFL headquarters – New York – passed a bipartisan resolution denouncing the use of racial slurs as team names.

In the letter – led by Senator Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and signed by 47 other Senators – the Senators urged the NFL to follow the example of the National Basketball Association (NBA) in sending a clear message against racism in sports. The Senators pointed to NBA Commissioner Adam Silver’s swift decision to ban Los Angeles Clippers’ owner Donald Sterling from the league for his racist comments about African-Americans attending basketball games.

“Today, we urge you and the National Football League to send the same clear message as the NBA did: that racism and bigotry have no place in professional sports,” the Senators wrote. “It’s time for the NFL to endorse a name change for the Washington, D.C. football team.

“The despicable comments made by Mr. Sterling have opened up a national conversation about race relations. We believe this conversation is an opportunity for the NFL to take action to remove the racial slur from the name of one of its marquee franchises.”

Civil rights organizations and Tribes across the nation have called on the Washington football team to change its name. Other prominent national organizations in support of a name change include the NAACP, National Council of La Raza, American Association of People with Disabilities, the ACLU, National Organization for Women, and the Anti-Defamation League.

“Now is the time for the NFL to act,” the Senators wrote. “The Washington, D.C. football team is on the wrong side of history. What message does it send to punish slurs against African Americans while endorsing slurs against Native Americans?”

Tribal organizations representing more than 2 million Native Americans and more than 300 Tribes have called on the NFL for a name change. They include the Oneida Indian Nation, which launched a national “Change the Mascot” campaign to end the use of a racial slur in the team’s name. The National Congress of American Indians, the largest organization representing Native Americans passed a resolution in October in support of a name change. A name change has also been endorsed by United South and Eastern Tribes, and the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians, and the Navajo Nation. On Monday, the New York State Assembly unanimously passed a bipartisan resolution denouncing the use of racial slurs as team mascots.

“This is a matter of tribal sovereignty – and Indian Country has spoken clearly on this issue,” the Senators wrote. “Tribes have worked for generations to preserve the right to speak their languages and perform their sacred ceremonies. Yet every Sunday during football season, the Washington, D.C. football team mocks their culture. The NFL can no longer ignore this and perpetuate the use of this name as anything but what it is: a racial slur.”

Senators who signed the letter include: Cantwell, Reid, Jon Tester (D-MT), Charles Schumer (D-NY), Patty Murray (D-WA), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), John Walsh (D-MT), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Carl Levin (D-MI), Mark Begich (D-AK), Brian Schatz (D-HI), Christopher Coons (D-DE), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY), Martin Heinrich (D-NM), Mazie Hirono (D-HI), Tim Johnson (D-SD), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Ron Wyden (D-OR), Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI), Christopher Murphy (D-CT), Elizabeth Warren (D-MA), Tom Udall (D-CO), Debbie Stabenow (D-MI), Jack Reed (D-RI), Richard Durbin (D-IL), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Bob Casey, Jr. (D-PA), Angus King (I-ME), Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), Tom Harkin (D-IA), Cory Booker (D-NJ), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Claire McCaskill (D-MO), Amy Klobuchar, (D-MN), Al Franken (D-MN), Edward Markey (D-MA), Mark Udall (D-CO), Michael Bennet (D-CO), Tom Carper (D-DE), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Ben Cardin (D-MD), Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH), Kay Hagan (D-NC), and Mary Landrieu (D-LA). Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) also sent a separate letter to Goodell calling for a name change.