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2014
Yearly Archives: 2014
Brightline joins Midtown residents and ALRP to file the biggest rent control petition in...
On Monday, Feb. 3, residents of Midtown Park Apartments, joined by civil rights nonprofit Brightline Defense, legal services provider AIDS Legal Referral Panel and over 50 supporters, filed the biggest rent control petition in the history of the City and County of San Francisco. The petition requests protection against unlawful rent increases and evictions for 139 low- and moderate-income Western Addition households.
Sonoma State University president seeks to impose new $500 annual fee on all students
President Ruben Armiñana is on a fast track to announce a $500 annual fee increase for all students at SSU. He has set up a number of Associated Students-controlled meetings starting Feb. 6 with the goal of informing his decision by Feb. 15. Experienced SSU observers believe that he has already made the decision to impose the fee and is just going through the motions of consultation required by CSU policy.
Ten points about college hoops All-American Marcus Smart pushing a ‘fan’
Oklahoma State guard Marcus Smart, a 19-year-old top NBA draft prospect, shoved 40-year-old Texas Tech fan Jeff Orr. He has told coaches that he did so after being called “the n-word.” Orr has a wretched reputation, stretching back years, as a Texas Tech “super-fan” who gets off by yelling horrible things at teenagers. Former OSU players like John Lucas III have taken to Twitter to testify about John Orr.
Menard hunger strikers refusing water until face-to-face hearings begin
The Menard hunger strikers have apparently decided to go without liquid as well as food, and their physical condition could deteriorate rapidly. Before the end of January, the Menard hunger strikers presented a proposal to the warden. “Once the informal face-to-face hearings begin, we will take your word that the other issues are going to be addressed and we will ALL come off our hunger strike.”
Dan Gertler flips DR Congo’s Atlantic Coast oil rights for huge gain
This week’s mining and business headlines reported that Israeli billionaire Dan Gertler turned a nearly 30,000 percent profit by buying the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s oil rights in waters off its Atlantic Coast in 2006, then selling the same rights back to them six years later. KPFA’s Ann Garrison spoke to anti-corruption and resource theft watchdog Global Witness and filed this report.
Menard hunger strikers cheered by protesters, threatened by staff
The following information is drawn from letters received from prisoners in Administrative Detention at Menard Correctional Center in Menard, Illinois, and compiled on Feb. 2 by Attorney Alice Lynd. The prisoners have not heard anything about Armando Velasquez. Officers have told the prisoners that an independent review is being conducted, but no one has talked to the inmates.
Third Street Stroll …
CRUSHED! Disappointed the 49ers did not play SUPERBOWL SUNDAY! The NFC CHAMPIONS should have been there! HEARTBROKEN over the loss to the Seattle Seahawks. MISSED opportunity to have ONE MORE victory parade down Market Street, one last hurrah! Like many fans who watched the game in SAM JORDAN’S, popular bar on 3-street, disappointed over the outcome! NO more roars from sell-out crowds at Candlestick Park.
Wanda’s Picks for February 2014
I am recovering from a huge blow – my computer was taken along with other personal irreplaceable items. We stopped by Loon Point to visit the shore before driving back to the San Francisco Bay Area Jan. 30. It was early, we’d just finished our first session of the Winter Quarter. We left our luggage in view in our cohort’s car. In Oakland, we’d not have done that, but somehow the seashore, mountains and quiet terrain deceptively seduced us.
Marcus Garvey, the African Union, the African Diaspora
In the year 2014, as we recognize this as the centennial year of the Jamaican, Caribbean born Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey’s (born Aug. 17, 1887, died June 10, 1940) founding of the Universal Negro Improvement Association and African Communities League in 1914, Pan Africanists need to hold conferences to discuss the conditions of over 1,200,000,000 Africans and people of African descent.
Midtown residents fight potential displacement
Nearly 100 residents of Midtown, representing virtually every household at a vibrant and diverse low and moderate income community in the Fillmore District, submitted a petition to Mayor’s Office of Housing Director Olson Lee asking him to withdraw his termination of Midtown’s 45-year-old lease with the City and County of San Francisco. Later that same day, Director Lee, a former Redevelopment Agency official, gave Midtown residents his answer: No.
Amiri Baraka: Poet on fire (1934-2014)
The name Amiri Baraka has been known to me since my teens, when I was a member of the Black Panther Party. Baraka posed an intriguing figure, for he radiated both love and rage, funneled through his poems, which pulsated with revolutionary fire. He was born in 1934 in Newark, N.J., as Everett LeRoy Jones and become a rising star of the Beat era in the East Village of New York.
Formerly Incarcerated People’s Policy Academy launches in Los Angeles
Typically we don’t show up to the fight until several of us have been shot. We don’t show up early on not because we don’t care, but because in general we don’t know how. That’s why Legal Services for Prisoners with Children (LSPC) is establishing a policy academy to increase civic participation by formerly incarcerated people, both locally and statewide. Our first training drew 50 people to the Watts Labor Center in Los Angeles.
Golden State Giants football is back: an interview wit’ Golden State Giants President Tirrell...
San Francisco has a semi-professional football team called the Golden State Giants, which has been holding open tryouts over the last couple of weeks. Tirrell Muhammad is the president of the San Francisco based Golden State Giants, and we sat with him to do this exclusive Q&A about the Pacific Coast Football League, the Golden State Giants, and NFL policy. Read Tirrell Muhammad in his own words ...
Sekou Odinga and Dequi Kioni-Sadiki: Marriage in a prison visiting room
My friend Dequi Kioni-Sadiki is a schoolteacher and grandmother in her early 50s who’s married to a former Black Panther serving time upstate. Dequi met her husband, Sekou Odinga, a few years ago, in the course of her activist work, visiting prisoners in New York State. Dequi and Sekou fell in love and were married almost three years ago. You think something’s wrong with Dequi for getting involved with a prisoner?
Joe Debro on racism in construction: A study of the manpower implications of small...
All the ingredients of human bondage and denigration which characterize Anglo treatment of minority peoples in the United States are also present in Oakland, California. A study of Oakland’s socio-economic situation demonstrates, as the Kerner Report and many other similar queries have done throughout the country, that the poor are cut off dramatically from the middle and upper classes.
Marcus Books launches ‘Keep It Lit’ campaign and vows to remain a lighthouse for...
Marcus Book Store is in the midst of a grassroots campaign – from Jan. 20 to Feb. 20 – to raise a million dollars in 30 days. Personally I am committed to reaching out to the people directly. The power is still in the people. Exercise your power. KEEP Marcus Books LIT! For the next 30 days we would like everyone to memorize and repeat the mantra, “Please, donate $20 in your own name and HELP ten others do the same! Thank you.”
Kev Choice releases soon to be classic ‘Oakland Riviera’
If you take a little Theolonius Monk, mix it with Yasiin Bey aka Mos Def, with a little twist of some Lauryn Hill and Curtis Mayfield and put it on an Oakland soundscape, you’ll get what bandleader and pianist Kev Choice cooked up on his newly released, soon to be classic album, “Oakland Riviera.” By far this is one of the best sounding, most creative and most political albums to come out of Oakland’s Hip Hop scene in the last few years.
Block Report: Plots, plans and the Dan Siegel campaign
The Block Report is in a rebuilding phase after being unjustifiably banned from the Pacifica airwaves under a plan engineered by former Pacifica lawyer and current Oakland mayoral candidate Dan Siegel. One of the main campaigns we are working on right now is to expose Siegel’s pro-police history to the left leaning crew that supports him in his Oakland mayoral campaign.
John Stewart management evicts cancer surgery patient for having care provider
I’m writing to express what I believe to be fraud by The John Stewart Co., which manages the Martin Luther King Marcus Garvey Square cooperative apartments where I lived for 26 years. I was evicted for having a care provider in my home. To demand a thorough investigation of the fraud at King-Garvey, I’m asking all who read this to call HUD Operations Director Angela M. Corcoran: (415) 489-6400.
California Homeless Bill of Rights: ‘We’re coming back and back till we get this...
On Friday, Jan. 17, 2014, Western Regional Advocacy Project (WRAP), coordinated its West Coast Days Of Action across three states and 11 cities. From 2005 to 2014, WRAP has worked to build a large people’s movement rooted in and accountable to groups and individuals defending poor peoples’ constitutionally-guaranteed human right to exist in public space, acquire housing and employment, and enjoy equal protection under law.