Newspaper Page Text
8
December 28, 1995
Hang in there, Larry!
Can Larry Sconyers play the game and win? Don’t bet on it.
OF Larry Sconyers is beginning to whine
and duck before he gets his big toe in the
ring. The Rib King has started acting like
“Chicken Little” at the first sign of a scuf
fle with Billy Morris and the boys down at
the Augusta Chronicle. People close to the
scene tell us that old Larry hasn’t seen
anything yet.
Mr. Sconyers is going to learn that Au
gusta politics is much more about might
than right. The word is out that the guys
downtown are already measuring the com
missioner chairman’s seat for another play
er. Others are beginning to wonder if the
Southside kingpin has the temperament
for a serious bout of scorched earth polit
ical warfare — Augusta style.
TO BE EQUAL
Stopping juvenile crime
The National Center for Juvenile Jus
tice recently issued a report entitled
“Juvenile Offenders and Victims: A
National Report.”
The Center presented three startling
findings that should give all thoughtful
Americans serious pause. They are:
*Over the past decade, arrests of 10- to
17-year-olds for violent crimes soared by
100 percent.
*The homicide rate alone among 14- to
17-year-olds jumped by 165 percent dur
ing this period.
*The teen population is expected to in
crease by 20 percent over the next decade.
*lf these trendlines continue, arrests of
juveniles for violent crimes will double
again in the next decade.
During the 1980 s, spending on prison
construction soared by 612 percent.
Meanwhile, society disinvested in the
very programs—settlement houses, after
school activities and park-rec facilities —
that keep young people off the streets, out
of the clutches of gangs, and in the hands
of adults who genuinely care that they do
well.
Do you realize that the money Washing
ton seems intent on spending to add 100,000
police to city streets could instead pay the
salaries of 300,000 part-time youth work
ers?
If each one of them worked intensely
with a half-dozen or so youngsters, they
could reach some 2 million youngsters ev
ery day.
Now does anyone think that 100,000
officers will detect more crime than 2 mil
lion teen-agers won’t commit if they’re
with caring adults every day?
Suppose we made certain that every pre
teen and teenager had a safe space, an
academically and developmentally sup
portive program, and a caring adult to
connect to after school and over the sum
mer?
Suppose we helped youngsters who’ve
opted out of school, and hooked them up
with a highly structured program like the
National Guard Youth Challenge Corps,
Since 1981
A Walker Group Publication
1143 Laney Walker Blvd.
subscribe,
. Please Enfer My Subscription for □ 1 Year □ 2 Years
I kl r^YY^V^ * l9 -95 I
pName I
. --.- * ।
I Clty
| Dy I
|<lM^Mgu«fa Feous, 1143 LansyWalkar Blvd., tagasta, GA 30901
AUGUSTA FOCUS
WB
The real test is going to come when busi
nessman/philosopher Sconyers is faced with
the choice of voting in the interest of the
people of Augusta on a particular issue or
doing what Phil Kent and Billy Morris feel
would be in their best interests.
Bets are that the Southside Rib cartel
fronted by Sconyers is quickly bounced from
power if they fail to make the proper alli
ances and learn how to stand up to the
bullies. Could Sconyers muster enough sup
port from south Augusta businessmen to
keep the power guys downtown from mus
cling him out of the picture?
Come Jan.l we’ll get plenty of opportuni
ties to see if Mr. Sconyers has to get out of
the kitchen.
"If ever there's a cause that
should unite all Americans," says
Hugh B. Price, "it's the realiza
tion that Our Children = Our
Destiny, and thus we must all,
individually and collectively,
attend to their development."
which still costs less than police and pris
ons, and which puts aimless teens back on
the right track in the bargain?
We could begin turning things around.
When I was a kid, my junior high and
high schools stayed open almost until din
ner time, brimful of clubs, team sports and
other extracurricular activities.
The city’s park-rec department operated
teams headed by coaches who expected
you to show up, and gave you grief if you
didn’t.
Politicians back then didn’t call these
kinds of programs “pork.”
Everyone, be they parents, taxpayers or
politicians, considered these after-school
and summer programs to be a basic feature
of a balanced, well-funcitoning communi
ty.
Working parents knew that they and
their children needed these programs.
And so did neighbors and merchants,
who were delighted to have the youngsters
off the streets, out of harm’s way, out of
mischief, and in the hands of caring adults
who were committed to our success.
And one of the principal payoffs was
community safety.
If ever there’s a cause that should unite
all Americans, it’s the realization that Our
Children = Our Destiny, and thus we must
all, individually and collectively, attend to
their development.
Let us commit to lead the children out of
darkness and, in the words of the distin
guished historian Charles Wesley, help
them “March Onward and Upward To
ward the Light.”
Charles W. Walker
Publisher
Frederick Benjamin
Managing Editor
Dot T. Ealy
Marketing Director
Rhonda Jones
Copy Editor
Rhonda Y. Maree
Reporter
Derick Wells
Art Director
Lillian Wan
Layout / Graphics Specialist
Sheila Jones
Office Manager I Sales Rep.
Jimmy Carter
Circulation/Photography
Editorial
It is good that the word
came in on the Focus last
day ofl99spublication and
also on the eve of its 15th anni
versary.
The word is, the U.S. Justice
Department has officially ex
pressed its concern about the
state rolling back the clock for
Afro-Americans who consti
tute over 25 percent of Geor
gia’s population.
The attached story is on our
new NAACP president, who
will join in this good fight for
justice. It is from the Atlanta
Constitution, the Dec. 12,1995
issue.
NAACPmakesgood choice
In filling its top leadership
positions this year, the Na
tional Association for the Ad
vancement of Colored People
has considered image as well
as ability. In February, Myrlie
Evers-Williams, widow of civil
rights martyr Medgar Evers,
was named chairwoman of the
NAACP board to replace Wil
liam F. Gibson, whose exten
sive use of his expense account
I’ve written a lot about
the so-called welfare re
form and the impact
that the republicans’ bills
will have on poor women
and children. I’ve followed
closely the various drafts of
the bills which threatened
to take away infant formula
and food and income from
poor children, and which
threatened foster care and
adoption services for those
children abandoned or
abused by their parents. So
I thought I had seen it all,
that I understood the depths
to which this Congress could
sink as it seeks to take food
from the mouths of poor
children in order to finance
a tax cut for the rich and to
give the Pentagon $7 billion
that they didn’t even ask
for.
But then I opened the New
York Times to find that the
House-Senate conference
committee had put in a lit
tle-noticed change which
would end health coverage
for our nation’s poor. Just
as many of us gave a little
sigh after we had success
fully gotten the Women and
Infant Children (WIC) feed
ing program to continue
assisting pregnant women,
infants and children at risk
and seemed to have gotten
school lunches back for poor
children, then the grinches
that stole Christmas take
away health care for poor
children.
The new bill says that
states are not required to
i |MI|
W’WfK' '*^ll Wu
sa.. 'WxV < GCTTAHANDITTO W »
?/ non-essential
y I federal workers
/ I they have awesome WWaaMMaWBI
J 1 SURVIVAL SKILLS.
BY MacNELLY FOR THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE
GOING PLACES
Here’s the good word
CIVIL RIGHTS JOURNAL
Grinches who stole Christmas:
How low will Congress stoop?
Says J. Philip Waring, "the U.S. Justice
Department has officially expressed its con
cern about the state rolling back the clock
for Afro-Americans who constitute over 25
percent of Georgia's population."
had been questioned.
Now the board has cho
sen U.S. Rep. Kweisi Mfume
(D-Md.) as president and
chief executive officer of the
nation’s oldest civil rights
organization. A leader of
national stature and prov
en abilities, Mfume is a good
choice as the permanent
replacement for Benjamin
Chavis, ousted last year af
ter revelation of a secret
agreement to pay $332,400
in NAACP funds to settle a
sexual harassment com
plaint against him.
Even as it celebrates
Mfume’s willingness to leave
Congress for this new chal
lenge, the NAACP owes a debt
of gratitude to Earl Shinhoster
"The new bill says that states are not required
to provide medical care to any individual
receiving aid or assistance in the form of Aid to
Families With Dependent Children, foster care
payments or adoption assistance," notes
Bernice Powell Jackson. "The Children's
defense Fund estimates that 4.6 million parents
and 1.6 million children over 12 would lose their
health benefits."
provide medical care to any
individual receiving aid or
assistance in the form of
Aid to Families With De
pendent Children, foster
care payments or adoption
assistance. The Children’s
defense Fund estimates
that 4.6 million parents and
1.6 million children over 12
would lose their health ben
efits. In addition, state pro
grams that would extend
health-care coverage to
working poor families, like
those in Tennessee and Or
egon which are designed to
encourage families to get
off welfare, would not be
allowed under the new bill.
All of this means poor chil
dren will be sicker next year.
It means that children with
special needs or disabilities
who are in foster care or
eligible for adoption will no
longer be eligible for health
care, and thus less likely to
be adopted or placed with
foster parents, whohave the
love but not the money. It
means poor children will be -
of Atlanta, who has served
as the group’s interim execu
tive director since Chavis was
fired. As a candidate for the
permanent job, Shinhoster
could not match Mfume’s star
quality or outsider’s fresh
perspective. But for the past
year he has worked hard with
Evers-Williams to restore the
NAACP’s image and finan
cial standing, and has made
significant progress toward
both goals.
Kweisi Mfume (pro
nounced Kwah-EEE-see
Oom-FOO-may) assumes his
new duties in February, and
must work to accelerate the
process begun by Evers-Wil
liams and Shinhoster. He
must boost the morale of
sicker while we get tax cuts
that many of us don’t want
and none of us need. It
means poor children will be
sicker while the Pentagon
tries to figure out how to
spend dollars it did not re
quest.
In a recent talk to the
nation’s religious leaders
Marian Wright Edelman,
president of the Children’s
Defense Fund, asked the
question “What does it mean
to be an American?” She
asked that question in light
of the $250 billion in pro
posed budget cuts that will
finance the $245 billion in
tax cuts. She asked that
question in light of proposed
cuts in child welfare servic
es, food and nutrition pro
grams, and health and in
come programs for our na
tion’s poorest and most vul
nerable. She asked that
question while pointing out
how 26,000 families togeth
er earned less than one en
tertainment executive in
1993.
national headquarters staff,
which was hit hard by bud
get cutbacks. And he must
rally the N.AACP’s 2,200 lo
cal branches around common
causes. They have been vir
tually without national guid
ance for more than a year.
Mfume says he wants the
NAACP to counter the “ultra
right-wing agenda,” but he
doesn’t want it to be simply
reactive. He promises to push
for increased black voting, to
preach the importance of edu
cation and individual respon
sibility and to address the eco
homicproblemsplaguingblack
Americans.
The NAACP must “re
claim,[its] rightful place las
the voice of African-Ameri
cans and others who believe
in the power of the premise
that all persons are, in fact,
created equal,” Mfume says.
His task is to bring that
voice back into the national
dialogue, and to see that it
speaks with unchallenged
moral authority.
“Babies are sacred gifts of
a loving God,” said
Edelman, “but we would
deny them food, immuniza
tion, health care and educa
tion. This is not reform, but
a Trojan*horse for republi
can ideology.” Edelman add
ed that republicans have
made “entitlement” a dirty
word, when it really means
a fundamental moral prin
ciple that our nation had
agreed upon—that our fed
eral government should be
the protector of last resort
for the most vulnerable of
our society — poor women
and children — that when
husbands and families and
states fail them, poor wom
en and children can count
on the rest of us for help.
What does it mean to be
an American? Does it mean
that the rich and the middle
class care only for their own
and the rest must go for
themselves? Does it mean
poor children will be sicker
and hungrier while the rest
of us prosper? Does it mean
that those who are disabled
and abandoned will have
no chance of living in a fam
ily? Does it mean that we as
a nation have lost our soul?
If you care, write Presi
dent Clinton, The White
House, 1600 Pennsylvania
Avenue, Washington, D.C.
20500 or call (202) 456-1414
and ask him to stand strong
and veto any bill which de
nies health care to poor chil
dren.