Newspaper Page Text
LOCAL
THE CHAMPION, THURSDAY, JUNE 22 - 28, 2023 • PAGE 2
The conference was hosted by Center for Black Women’s Wellness,
Charter, Dogwood Alliance, and Science for Georgia. Photos by Jay
Phillips
Several speakers gave examples of how communities in Georgia fought
for environmental justice.
Environmental conference
focuses on communities
taking action
BY JAY PHLLIPS
JAY@DEKALBCHAMP.COM
Emory University's Rollins School of Public Health hosted
the second annual Environmental Justice and Climate
Protection Conference on June 15.
The conference was "planned to provide multiple
perspectives on the issues that are facing Georgia as a result
of climate change and environmental injustices," according
to an introduction video.
The event featured speakers from DeKalb County
and other areas of Georgia who discussed examples of
environmental justice, community coalition building, and
how residents can facilitate environmental change in their
communities.
The event was organized by Science for Georgia,
Dogwood Alliance, Center for Black Women's Wellness, and
Emory's Center for Children's Health Assessment Research
and Combating Environmental Racism. In addition to
presentations from the organizers, Climate Reality Project,
soilSHOP, Environmental Protection Agency, Emory's
Hercules Exposome Research Center, and other groups gave
presentations.
Event organizers said community leaders and elected
officials, academic and industry experts, and concerned
citizens were in attendance and that the goal of the event
was to identify innovative solutions and create lasting
positive change for all Georgians.
"The conference will not only facilitate insightful
discussions but also encourage active brainstorming to
SEE CONFERENCE ON PAGE 10
Author discusses roots of
the Black working class
BY KATHY MITCHELL
FREELANCE REPORTER
After the American Civil War ended,
recently emancipated people were faced
with the challenge of finding work to
support themselves and their families.
Working strategically and in cooperation
with others who shared their plight, Black
workers, male and female, found ways not
only to survive but also to build families
and communities, according to Blair Kelley,
author of Black Folk: The Roots of the Black
Working Class.
Speaking June 14 at Charis Circle, the
nonprofit programing arm of Charis Books &
More on the campus of Agnes Scott College
in Decatur, Kelley—in conversation with
Bettina L. Love, a professor at Columbia
University—said her recently released
book chronicles how Black workers took
jobs considered undesirable in the larger
community and used them to elevate future
generations and their communities as a
whole.
In its information about the presentation
Charis Circle noted, "Black Folk highlights
the lives of launderesses, Pullman porters,
domestic maids, and postal workers, who
established the Black working class as
a force in the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries. Taking jobs White
people didn't want and confined to
segregated neighborhoods, Black workers
found community in intimate spaces, from
stoops on city streets to the backyards of
washerwomen, where multiple generations
labored from dawn to dusk, talking
and laughing in a space free of White
supervision and largely beyond White
knowledge. As millions of Black people left
the violence of the American South for the
promise of a better life in the North and
West, those networks of resistance and joy
sustained early arrivals and newcomers alike
and laid the groundwork for organizing for
better jobs, better pay, and equal rights."
"Black people who left the South
were fleeing a bad situation, but they also
brought with them valuable skills," Kelley
SEE WORK PAGE 10
NOTICE OF PROPERTY TAX INCREASE
The Governing Authority of the City of Avondale
Estates has tentatively adopted a 2023 millage rate
which will require an increase in property taxes by
10.42 percent.
All concerned citizens are invited to the public hearing
on this tax increase to be held at Avondale Estates
City Hall, 21 N. Avondale Plaza, Avondale Estates,
GA 30002 on Wednesday, June 21st, 2023, at 5:30
p.m.
Times and places of additional public hearings on
this tax increase are at Avondale Estates City Hall on
Wednesday, June 28th at 5:30 p.m. and Thursday,
June 29th at 6:00 p.m.
This tentative increase will result in a millage rate of
9.8 mills, an increase of .925 mills. Without this tenta
tive tax increase, the millage rate will be no more than
8.875 mills. The proposed tax increase for a home
with a fair market value of $450,000 is approximately
$166.50. The proposed tax increase for non-home-
stead property with a fair market value of $625,000 is
approximately $231.25.