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HAPPY NEW YEAR S' Nrwa-Brvinu THE PEOPLE’S PAPER Vol. 1 Telephone Co. Denies Discrimination Charges In a report filed with the Federal Communications Commission, the Equal Opportunity Commission charged The Bell Telephone Company with discrimination against women, blacks and Spanish-surnamed people. The job-bias commission said that “the Bell monolith is, without doubt, the largest oppressor of women workers in the U.S.” The agency also accused Bell of proposing artificially high educational and testing requirements for Blacks. “The failure of the Bell System to provide real equality of opportunity must be considered a national tragedy,” the agency concluded. Blacks in the nation as a whole lose over $225 million annually in wages because they’re “not employed in AT&T’s Bell System in numbers proportionate to their percentage in the population and because those who are employed work in low-paying jobs. News-Review interviewed Southern Bell district manager, John Owen, concerning employment practices on the local level. News-Review: To what extent does the local telephone company meet employment standards set by the federal government, particularly in regard to women and minority groups? Owen: We, at Southern Bell, in Augusta, think that we have done a real fine job in this respect. This is evidenced by .the number of Blacks you will find working in the offices in Augusta. We feel we have done a good job and with the program that we have in mind the things we anticipate that we will do, we think it’s even going to be better in the months to come. News-Review: What is the percentage of Blacks and women employed at the local company? Owen: At the present time, I believe that this figure is somewhere in the neighborhood of fifteen percent. News-Review: "Is that for Blacks or for women? Owen: That is for minority groups. News-Review: What about women? Owen: Most of our employees are women. We have somewhere in the neighborhood of between 500-600 women operators. In the commercial department, we have. . .1 would say that we add up all the employees that we have in Augusta men and women the women would outnumber the men by about two to one. ALPHA PHI ALPHA Each year Alpha Phi takes pride in offering to the public an evening of entertainment bringing in the New Year. Some have been invitational and some have been pay affairs. Yet we have never neglected our responsibility in offering the public the feeling of togetherness on our Award New Year’s Eve Ball. This year the public will be fpvored with another gala affair-10-2a.m. at the National Guard Armory, Dec. 31,1971. Admission will be $5.00 per couple. Tickets on sale at the door or from any Alpha Brother. News-Review: What percentage of these women are in the higher paying managerial and supervisory positions? Owen: For each working group, you have so many supervisors and we have been able to employ and to train competent people. In my organization, here in the Georgia Railroad Bank Building, in the commercial department, I have about forty-five people and we have about 8 or ten women supervisors. We have two male supervisors myself and one other man. The rest of them are women. So really, women run our business, I guess, if you really get down to it. News-Review: To what extent are minority group employees employed in supervising and managerial positions? Owen: I don’t have any exact figures on that, but over in our traffic department, where I’m going to take you later, you’ll see that we have some service assistants who are of the minority race that are training people and telling them how to do their job. So we are developing these people and bringing them along rather well, we think. News-Review: What is your procedure for recruiting and employing minority groups? Are there any particular skills that prospective employees have to have or do you train them on the job? Owen: We have what we call “entrance” jobs. As you know, we have a union in this company. And there are certain jobs that are entrance jobs-jobs you can hire people off the street and bring into without posting bids. When we need employees, and as you know, we just recently cut over to direct distance dialing in Augusta, which in itself gave a surplus of people. So at t present time we are mon or less dormant on our hiring, because we are trying to use up this surplus. We didn’t want let anybody go. To get specifically to your answer, we will advertize that we need certain people and we will give them some simple tests that determine their qualifications. 930 Gwinnett St. Then we hire the most qualified persons of those groups. Working in traffic and in certain places you have to have good speech, and talk where people can understand. We’d not be in a position, in that particular type job, to handle anybody that might have an impediment in his speech. News-Review: Some employers now feel that the “most qualified man” theory is valid only when there has been equal opportunity to become equally qualified for the job. What are your views on this? Do you feel that this is a valid consideration and do you offer specific training programs in light of this consideration? Owen: Yes; when we bring people into the organi zation—be they white or Black—all of them have an equal opportunity to go through the same training procedures in that given department. And as they apply themselves and as they absorb the knowledge of that department, then they are given the opportunity to go into other areas. And as I explained earlier, one of the best things we think about our organization is the fact that when we have a better job available, we post a notice on the bulletin board saying that in such and such department SEE OWEN Page 3 Clean Air Committee To Meet Captain James G. Beck of Augusta’s police dept, and Sheriff William Anderson will meet with the Richmond County Clean Air Committee on Thursday night, January 6. The purpose of the session, according to Clean Air Chairman, Dick Ransom, is to discuss ways of helping to implement 1971 state legislation concerning exhaust emissions on streets and highways. The meeting will be held in The Respiratory Center of the Medical College on Harper Street, and will begin at 8:00 p.m. F John Owen James Brown to star in Ossie Davis film According to Jet magazine, Soul singer James Brown will play the lead role in an upcoming film. The film will be made in Nigeria and will be directed by Ossie Davis. Brown is featured on the cover and in an eight page spread in the current issue of Jet Magazine. Essayist Mel Watkins described Brown as “an artist and entertainer. James Brown is the personification of Blackness, the embodiment of the Black life style...He is a Black troubadour.... What his songs characterize is the physical, emotional and downfront nature of Black life.” In Africa Brown is heralded Arbor Day plans start Planning for Arbor Day, 1972, is underway with a meeting scheduled in the County Commission Chambers of the Municipal Building at 10:00 Thursday morning, January 6. Mrs. Herbert Youngblood, chairman of the Beautification-Conservation Committee which is sponsoring distribution of trees on Arbor Day, observed on February 18, states that all local organizations interested in taking part in Arbor Day should send a representative to the January 6 planning session. Augusta Ga Phone 722-4555 along with boxer Mohammad Ali as “the most respected and the most-asked-about Black American personalities.” Comparing the Black American with his African counter-part Brown told Jet after a recent trip to Nigeria where he was made a freeman of Lagos, “We’re all the same. Take the suits and the collars off and everybody’s the same, here and there. Over there, the brothers have the land and the potential, over here , we have the education and the experience. All of us can be freemen as soon as we find a way to hook things up.” Jet states that “Brown’s commitment to Blackness is more than just moral and verbal. Through James Brown Enterprises, he provided jobs for hundreds of ghetto dwellers in businesses that are in and part of the Black community. In cold cash, it adds up to around $250,000 a year. Money earned, around $25,000 from a special benefit at the Apollo in December, 1969, was left in Harlem through various community Agencies and the year before, Brown received a list of 3,000 needy New York families and presented them with gift certificates. A percentage of his earnings goes into a James Brown Scholarship Fund to enable Blacks to attend college, which adds a certain poignancy to his ‘Don’t be a dropout’ admonition.” tit ■-WF-. ~lff- w<- ftw i i I v .wHs \ i A *% t >wy» x ?sv x KW it/lel X<it Faces of P.C students express different emotions as they await the beginning of coronation activities. Rollins’ Letter To Judge Stirs Controversy C&S realty investors will meet projections Citizens and Southern Realty Investors expects to meet or exceed its projections for 1972, according to an announcement made today by Philip S. Barrett, president of the Atlanta based real estate investment trust. “Our recently published annual report showed primary earnings of $1.84 per share,” Barrett reported, “and our present portfolio plus commitment backlog of $244 million indicates that we will top next year’s projections.” When asked to comment on statements by Trustee and Secretary Durand A. Holladay of Continental Mortgage Investors that his trust expected lower earnings for 1972, Barrett replied, “1 do not foresee this problem at C&S.” He added that “bank sponsored trusts will continue to perform in the construction and development lending field because of their low borrowing costs and ability to produce profitable investments.” December 30, 1971 No. 41 School superintendent Roy E. Rollins’ recent letter to U.S. District Court Judge Alexarder Lawrence urging Lawrence not to implement the integration plans developed by the Rhode Island experts has caused much controversy. The daily newspapers printed excerpts from Rollins letter in October. The News-Review responded editorially in the October 28th issue. Since that time many persons have requested that the entire letter be printed. It reads as follows: Dear Judge Lawrence: Even though the time alloted to us was too limited to do justice to the subject, I do appreciate your thoughtfulness in permitting our board to submit this list of difficulties which we will encounter in implementing each of the plans as submitted by Mr. Herman and Dr. Munzer. Aside from the official reply by our Board of Education, I would like to take this opportunity to make a personal plea for our schools and our community. First, I would like to say that after reading the speech you made on November 12, 1958, to the Magna Charta Dames, which was lauded so highly by the late Senator Russell and entered in the Congressional Record, and when I recall the many fine things Judge Scarlett said to me about you prior to your appointment to the judgeship, it is difficult for me to picture you as one of those social extremists who you and 1 and most of the people of our country know are destroying our nation. I can assure you that if either of the plans submitted by the two gentlemen from Rhode Island are imposed on our community another small part of our great country will be destroyed. The education of 36,000 boys and girls will be sacrificed for a radical social experiment which will serve only to multiply the bitterness SEE ROLLINS Page 4 The News-Review is very eager to have news from Athens as well as other areas wherein the News-Review is circulated. Persons in Athens wishing to have news printed in the News-Review should send their news items to Mr. Roosevelt Green, P.O. Box 321-N-R, Athens, Ga. Announcements of events should be sent in at least a week in advance.