Tag: human services

Dear Mayor Breed – The signatories to this letter are members of MegaBlack SF, a collective of Black-led organizations and Black individuals fighting for visibility, sovereignty, dignity and justice for Black San Franciscans.

While the City of San Francisco has taken dramatic steps in the face of the COVID-19 crisis – declaring a state of emergency, ordering shelter-in-place and opening the Moscone Center as an emergency shelter – very little of the response has been directed towards the Bayview. This is part of a longstanding pattern of ignoring the Bayview unless there are condos to build or a sewage treatment plant to locate.

Detroit activists concerned about the massive water shutoffs across the economically devastated city blocked entrances into the yard of Homrich, a firm given a nearly $6 million contract to terminate services for hundreds of thousands of people. The firm was hired by emergency manager Kevyn Orr, who was appointed by right-wing Gov. Rick Snyder, who forced the city into the largest municipal bankruptcy in United States history a year ago.

Funeral services were held in Detroit on April 25 for Mrs. Mabel Robinson Williams, the widow of African American revolutionary Robert F. Williams. The Williams served as leaders of the Monroe, North Carolina, chapter of the NAACP during the 1950s until early 1961, when they were targeted by local authorities and the FBI. The civil rights organizers became advocates of armed self-defense against racist violence perpetuated by the Ku Klux Klan and law-enforcement personnel in the city.

“This system treats us like throw-away people,” says Carolyn Brown, a Seattle volunteer with prison reform group Justice Works! An African American with a record, her effort to find a job is deeply frustrating due to systemic racism.