Dr. Sharon Whittaker-Davis, Vice President for Student Affairs at Stillman College, was a featured panelist at the Women of Color Empowerment Forum during the 60th Annual National Association of Student Affairs Professionals (NASAP) Conference on February 20th in Savannah, Georgia. The professional development organization aims to support student affairs personnel and address trends and solutions related to student issues. Highlights of the forum included empowering conversation on how participants could advance professionally.
Leaders discussed their professional journeys, career choices, strategies for success, mentorship, health/wellness, family and balancing it all. The forum featured a panel of dynamic women who have blazed a trail for women and Student Affairs professionals. Whittaker-Davis, a past president of the organization, was elected Chaplain at a meeting during the conference.
“It was an honor and privilege to serve as a panelist,” Whittaker-Davis stated. “I believe it is my moral and social responsibility to share my professional journey with other young professionals, especially women, looking to advance in higher education. To receive feedback that it was well received by women in attendance was most gratifying.”
MONTGOMERY— Attorney General Luther Strange has joined a lawsuit to stop California from imposing on Alabama and other states its own standards requiring that eggs may be sold only from chickens that live in roomy, larger-than-normal cages. Alabama is one of the top 15 largest egg producers in the United States, with production totaling 2.139 million eggs in 2012, according to statistics from the U.S Department of Agriculture. Many of these eggs are sold in other states, including California.
“In Alabama, consumers are free to make their own choice of which eggs to buy at their grocery stores, and it is preposterous and quite simply wrong for California to tell Alabama how we must produce eggs,” said Attorney General Strange. “This is not an animal-welfare issue; it is about California’s attempt to protect its economy from its own job-killing laws by extending those laws to everyone else in the country.”
In 2008, voters in California passed a proposition requiring that its own egg producers provide either free ranges or larger cages for hens. After alarms were raised that this would put California’s egg producers at an economic disadvantage with producers in other states, provisions were added to extend this mandate to any eggs imported from other states to be sold in California. The law was expressly touted as a way to provide economic protection to California egg producers in an interstate market.
“The citizens of California made a choice for their own state, and when they realized it would harm their egg producers, they made an unconstitutional decision to spread the damage to other States,” said Attorney General Strange. “If California can get away with this, it won’t be long before the environmentalists in California tell us how we must build cars, grow crops, and raise cattle too.”
Attorney General Strange and the Attorneys General of Missouri, Nebraska, and Oklahoma, and the Governor of Iowa are asking the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California to declare California’s law invalid and to stop its enforcement. They argue that California’s law is a violation of the Commerce and Supremacy Clauses of the U.S. Constitution and the Federal Egg Products Inspection Act. Currently the law is set to go into effect on January 1, 2015.
AG Announces Guilty Pleas in Elmore County for Coroner, Funeral Home Director
MONTGOMERY— Attorney General Luther Strange announced the convictions recently of Elmore County Coroner Timothy Ellison and Yancey Joe Mitchell III, director of Hillside Mortuary in Wetumpka. The convictions stem from Ellison submitting inflated charges to the county, state and several municipal entities for reimbursement in transporting bodies. Mitchell assisted Ellison by providing false paperwork.
Ellison pleaded guilty to a felony violation of the state ethics law by using his official position for personal gain, to second-degree theft, also a felony, and to third-degree theft, which is a misdemeanor. Ellison’s guilty plea included $7,913 in restitution to be made to the various public entities from which he stole. Ellison is scheduled to be sentenced on April 9. Under State law, a public official convicted of a felony is ineligible to hold public office.
Mitchell pleaded guilty to third-degree theft of property by aiding and abetting Ellison in his crimes. He was sentenced to 12 months probation and ordered to pay a $250 fine and court costs.
Under state law, a coroner has the responsibility to transport bodies from a crime scene to the Department of Forensic Sciences or to a funeral home. The coroner may be reimbursed for actual expenses in doing so. Ellison submitted inflated invoices for his costs, and Mitchell aided and abetted him with false invoices to support Ellison’s wrongful claims.
“I am pleased that this prosecution put an end to the crimes of a corrupt public official who betrayed the public trust and stole taxpayers’ money,” said Attorney General Strange. “Today, Ellison and his accomplice have been held to account for their wrongdoing. With the conclusion of this case when Ellison is sentenced, we expect that the stolen funds will be restored to their rightful public entities.”
Attorney General Strange commended those involved in bringing this case to a successful conclusion, noting in particular Assistant Attorneys General Bill Lisenby and Pete Smyczek, and Special Agents of his Special Prosecutions Division. He also thanked the Elmore County Sheriff’s Office and the police departments of Wetumpka, Millbrook and Tallassee for their assistance, and the State Ethics Commission for its referral of this matter.
AG ANNOUNCES CONVICTION OF FORMER AUTAUGA COUNTY OFFICIAL
(MONTGOMERY)–Attorney General Luther Strange today announced the conviction of a former chairman of the Autauga County Commission for crimes he committed related to additional positions he also formerly held as chief of the Autaugaville Volunteer Fire Department and head of the Autaugaville Water Works. Danny Chavers, of Prattville, pleaded guilty this morning in Autauga County Circuit Court to five felony charges, two for violations of the state ethics law and three for first-degree theft.
Sentencing is set for May 14. The ethics violations and first-degree theft charges are class B felonies, punishable by two to 20 years imprisonment and fines of up to $30,000.00 for each count.
“These are serious crimes involving extensive betrayal of the public trust and theft of taxpayers’ money,” said Attorney General Strange. “I am pleased that this defendant stands convicted for these violations, but I hope that he will meet with a punishment fitting of what he has done. At the time of sentencing, we will seek jail time as well as restitution.”
Related charges still are pending against Ernest Terry Stoudemire of Autaugaville also former chief of the Autaugaville VFD; and Mack Cell Harmon of Autaugaville, is a former assistant chief of the Autaugaville VFD. Attorney General Strange’s Special Prosecutions Division presented evidence to an Autauga County grand jury on November 5, 2013, resulting in indictments* against the three.
Chavers was convicted for illegal activities related to his positions with the Autaugaville VFD and Water Works. Specifically, Chavers pleaded guilty to three counts of first-degree theft, from the Autauga County Commission, the Autaugaville Volunteer Fire Department, and the State of Alabama; and two counts of ethics violation, by using his official positions as chief of the Autaugaville Volunteer Fire Department and head of Autaugaville Water Works for unlawful personal gain.
Chavers’ crimes were described by the prosecution in court today as follows: As chief of the Autaugaville VFD, Chavers used his office to obtain personal gain for himself by using money in the VFD account for personal purchases such as merchandise from Victoria’s Secret, restaurants and hotels in Florida, gas stations, online gambling and a casino in Mississippi, in the amount of more than $240,000. Regarding the theft from the State of Alabama, Chavers falsified documentation in order to obtain a $4800 grant, placed these grant funds in the VFD account, and continued to make personal purchases with this money. Also, Chavers used his position as head of the Autaugaville Water Works to obtain two checks totaling $49,000 from the Autauga County Commission, which was supposed to go to the town of Autaugaville but which Chavers instead placed in the VFD fund and continued to use for personal purchases.
No further information about the investigation or about the other defendants’ alleged crimes other than that stated in the indictment may be released at this time.
Attorney General Strange commended Assistant Attorney General Bill Lisenby and Special Agents of his Special Prosecutions Division for their outstanding work in these cases. AG ANNOUNCES CONVICTION OF FORMER FUND CUSTODIAN FOR THEFT FROM DEPARTMENT OF REHABILITATIVE SERVICES
(MONTGOMERY)— Attorney General Luther Strange today announced the conviction of a former fund custodian for the Alabama Department of Rehabilitation Services for the theft of $339,314 from the agency’s local Birmingham office. Erica Fredrose Johnson, 39, of Birmingham, pleaded guilty in Jefferson County Circuit Court on Monday to first-degree theft of property.
Johnson was sentenced to 32 months, which was suspended for a term of five years supervised probation, and ordered to pay $75,000 in restitution to the Birmingham Rehabilitation Revolving Fund and $263,514 to the agency’s insurance company, Fidelity and Deposit Company of Maryland Insurance. Previously, Johnson had repaid $800 to the insurance company.
“This woman not only betrayed the citizens of Alabama, by whom she was employed and whose money she stole, but she also exploited those in need that the Birmingham Rehabilitation Revolving Fund was meant to serve,” said Attorney General Strange. “I am pleased that Erica Fredrose Johnson has been held to account for her crime and that the money is being repaid.”
The defendant was employed as the fund custodian from 2005 until her resignation in 2012. During this time, she wrote a total of 280 checks from the revolving fund to pay personal accounts as well as to provide money to her family and friends. When she received bank statements which contained the images of checks written from the fund’s account she would alter the check images to give the appearance that the check was written to a legitimate creditor.
The Attorney General’s Criminal Trials Division presented evidence to a Jefferson County grand jury, resulting in Johnson’s indictment in December of 2013. Attorney General Strange commended Assistant Attorney General Ternisha Miles and thanked the Alabama Bureau of Investigation.
Rand Paul vs Hillary Clinton 2016
by Jesse J. Lewis, Sr.
According to CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference)
For the second year in a row, libertarian Rand Paul was chosen as their leader. Paul laid out his vision one day after winning the CPAC’s 2016 presidential straw poll and several days after a Washington Post columnist suggested he has emerged as the top choice among the GOP’s conservative wing.
On Sunday, Paul acknowledged that he has tapped into young Americans, including those ‘fed up” with the National Security Agency tapping into their cellphone records.
“The fourth Amendment is just as important as the Second Amendment,” said Paul, who had been critical of the scope of the NSA’s domestic spying since those efforts were exposed last year. “That ‘s what distinguishes me from other Republicans.
Paul defended his foreign policy views, including his position that the United States should seek “respectful”relations with Russian President Vladmir Putin, who has sent troops into the Crimean region of Ukraine amid the country’s political turmoil.
Paul said he would warn Putin that he’s crewing ‘chaos” and potentially the next Syria-type crisis. He also said he embraces the Reagan maxim of “Don’t mistake our reluctance for war for a lack of resolve.”
Said Paul: “People still need to know this. Were I in charge, I think they would.”
He also said he has discussed with his family a presidential run and has “done everything that would make it work, but I still haven’t made up my mind.”
Paul finished with 31 percent of the CPAC vote, ahead of Texas GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, considered Paul’s top competition for the Republican Party’s conservative mantle.
William J. Bennett, U. S. secretary of education from 1985 to 1988 and director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy under President George H.W. Bush, wrote in a CNN.com piece that the GOP must embrace multiculturalism if it expects to compete with Democrats in future elections. “With the nation’s changing demographics, Republicans can no longer rely on the south and Midwest to carry them to victory in 2012,” he stated, “Instead, they must broaden their base into traditionally purple and blue states. It’s an uphill battle: President Obama leads by a sizable margin with women and by wide margins with Latino and Black voters. But it’s not insurmountable.”
Patricia Carroll, a CNN camerawoman, made headlines after she says whites at the Republican National Convention threw peanuts at her. “This is what we feed animals,” she says they quipped during the assault. Carroll suggested that the lack of minorities at the convention might have contributed to her attack. She told Journal-isms, “This is Florida, and I’m from the Deep South. You come to places like this, you can count the Black people on your hand. They see me doing things they don’t think I should do … There are not that many Black women there … People were living in euphoria for a while. People think we’ve gone further then we have.”
Artur Davis, a former Alabama congressman, who changed his party affiliation from Democrat to Republican, told the Post that the GOP can’t expect to reach Blacks by emphasizing its opposition to Big Government. “It’s not just enough to go into the Black community and say, ‘We want to keep government from taking over your life,'” he said. “That doesn’t resonate in a whole lot of the Black community, who have come to see government as a salvation and as an economic leveler. It’s going to take being willing to define conservatism as not just a defense of economic liberty but a broader way of constructing a society that can promote social mobility.”
Hillary Clinton has not said whether or not she’s running for president in 2016. The polls indicate that she has 65 percent of the vote. I’m sure the number will change, but I can never remember a candidate’s polling being this high and she has not yet said she’s running.
If the Republican Party is going to win any national election they must must have support from the minority community – Asian, Hispanic, Blacks, etc. It is obvious they do not have a clue of how this can be done. C-PAC devoted part of their program to reach out to minorities in a hall that seats 2500 people and there were only 16 people present.
Phillip Academy’s Princess and Pop Dance Creates Warm Memories
On Saturday, March 1, the Parent Teacher’s Association (PTA) at Phillips Academy Elementary School held a Princess and Pop Ball for little Princesses in the first through six grade and their dads. The Ball was held in the school gym which was magically transformed into a dining hall, complete with tablecloths, soft lighting, punch bowls for effect, and a dj who was obviously a favorite of the young Princesses.
I would estimate that there were approximately a hundred couples in attendance including myself, who attended with my little Princess, Danielle, who is a fourth grader at Phillips. The evening is one I will remember a long time. The sight of over 100 beautiful little girls, all dressed up in their nicest gowns, with their hair done, and wearing their little pieces of jewelry. And the dads sitting around just as proud as we could be.
I have often noted over the years that the best thing a dad can do for his daughter is to make her feel like a Princess. I believe that many young ladies who grow up without the influence of a father that loves them, start out in life looking for what they did not get as a child. And I think the emptiness that they start out with makes it easier for others to use them later in life. That is part of the reason it was so refreshing to be a part of this beautiful evening.
I shared part of the evening with my good friend Cedric Sparks and Todd Morris, and their little Princesses. Todd Morris gave remarks for the evening, and in his remarks he talked about our role in teaching our little Princesses how to become Queens, and how a part of the way we teach that is through the way they see us treat the Queens in our lives who are their mothers. Cedric Sparks showed off the dance skills he learned pledging Alpha, as he showed off with his Princess. It seemed throughout the night that the fathers who were fraternity members definitely had it going on as compared to the Non- Phi- Non crowd like myself.
But this night was not about who had the best dance moves, or even which Princess was the prettiest (Mine was), this night was about 100 little girls getting dressed up for an evening with their dads. It was about little Princesses learning what it’s like to be treated like a Princess and the glow on their faces as they showed off their dads to their classmates.
As exciting as the evening was it still had its moments. I remember at one point after dinner had been served I was standing around with several other fathers while our Princesses were doing a line dance. Me and the other dads kind of looked at each other like no our babies aren’t making moves like that already, and realizing we were just years away from even worse. But that is a whole other story.
For now congratulations to the PTA and staff at Phillips Academy Elementary School for an excellent job in presenting the Princess and Pop Ball. Memories were created that will last a lifetime, but even more importantly our little Princesses had a great time and made us all proud.
Popular belief is that China holds the greatest portion of our debt. But that distinction belongs to the Federal Reserve (Fed).
As most readers are aware, the national debt is gargantuan. The total owed is approximately $17.35 trillion. This translates into $54,472 per person or $149,968 per taxpayer.
Managed by the U.S. Treasury, the national debt comprises two components: debt held by the public ($12.35 trillion) and intragovernmental holdings ($5 trillion). The latter is debt owed to 230 federal agencies such as the Social Security Trust Fund and the Military Retirement Fund and consists of excess cash transferred by the agencies to the Treasury.
Latest available data reveal the Fed owned $2.16 trillion of the public debt in the form of government securities – Treasury bills, bonds, and notes – at the end of 2013. This amount was $890 billion more than the $1.27 trillion owned by entities in China.
These numbers sharply contrast with the amounts owed in January 2009, when President Obama took office. At that time, the positions were reversed. China had $744.2 billion in government securities to $475.2 billion held by the Fed.
During the intervening years, the Fed dipped its toes into uncharted waters. It used unconventional monetary policy, purchasing large volumes of government securities, in an attempt to jump-start the economy. In addition to being the largest purchaser of government securities, the Fed holds $1.49 trillion in mortgage-backed securities also purchased to bolster the economy.
The Fed’s policy of purchasing securities, both Treasuries and mortgage-backed instruments, has been widely criticized in some circles. Various economists and politicians, both Democrat and Republican, have voiced concerns about the magnitude of the national debt.
They are especially worried about the amounts required to service the debt – to pay the interest as it comes due – now running about $230 billion per year. Rather than paying off the indebtedness, the Treasury pays the interest by issuing new securities.
Erskine Bowles, President Clinton’s chief of staff and co-chairman of the National Commission of Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, is the latest Democrat to speak on the issue. He recently pointed out that if interest rates were to rise to the level of the 1990s, “we’d be spending not $230 billion a year but $650 billion per year.”
Wayne Curtis, Ph.D., is a former superintendent of Alabama banks and a Troy University business school dean. He is retired from the board of directors of First United Security Bank. Email him at wccurtis39@gmail.com.
Birmingham’s Civil Rights Icon Imposters Proliferate
The real “guy in the picture” being attacked by a Birmingham police dog, according to a Jet Magazine interview done in February 1963. and a subsequent Oral History interview done by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, factually confirmed the student in the Hudson’s AP picture actually is Mr. Walter Gadsden, a then 10th grade Ullman High School (not Parker High School) student as some national media have erroneously reported). Civil rights protesters were set upon and viciously attacked by Birmingham, Alabama police dogs on May 3, 1963 in downtown Birmingham. The photographic image of one of those students became universally acclaimed world-wide, symbolizing the courage and sinew of then young African American students determined to be free of racist oppression in a city termed “America’s Johannesburg.”
A young man believed to be an Ullman High School student, Walter Gadsden, according to an October, 1963 news story appearing in a 1963 Jet Magazine interview with the then 10th grade student, was photographed at the moment of the dog attack. Associated Press photographer Bill Hudson shot that photo and has been seen all over the world, especially during civil rights anniversaries.
As decades passed and memories fade, commemorative anniversaries of “The Birmingham Campaign, Project C,” as coined by civil rights organizers, the identity of the real life person attacked by the Birmingham police dogs on May 3, 1963, and other iconic images of those “fire hose, dog bite, and church bombing days” have become dogged by continued “historic identity theft.”
According to “senior reporter” Greg Garrison of The Birmingham News/AL.com, “Walter Lee Fowlkes, 72, who died last year known to friends and family as “Lee,” died on Feb. 13. He had suffered from dementia in recent years and was not able to do interviews. Civil rights attorney Demetrius Newton, who represented Rosa Parks and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and later became the first Black speaker of the Alabama House of Representatives, the Birmingham News/AL.com reported last February that . . . Walter Lee Fowlkes, the young man attacked by dogs on May 3, 1965.” More particularly AL.com claimed Fowlkes was the person captured in the famous Bill Hudson photo behind AL.Com’s “Unsung Hero” story. Interestingly, AL.com held its news story more than a year before Newton and Fowlkes’ deaths. It is not known whether Garrison actually interviewed Mr. Newton about Fowlkes’s identity claims.
Citizens For better Schools & Sustainability, upon learning of the “Unsung Hero” story, requested of AL.com a retraction, and correction, of its errant news article. The publication to date has not retracted its news story regarding the Fowkles/Gadesden identity issue. Our review of the historic record clearly debunks AL.com’s contention that Mr. Fowlkes was the person in Bill Hudson’s famous civil rights photo of 1963 demonstrations. Birmingham Municipal Court arrest records show that Fowlkes was arrested on May 3, 1963, the day of the showdown between police dogs and demonstrators but Fowkles was not the person in Hudson’s famous photograph.
Citizens For Better Schools & Sustainable Communities expresses great umbrage with The Birmingham News/AL.com’s coverage of its “Unsung Hero” rewrite of Birmingham Civil Rights history.
Fowlkes’ unfounded claim is but the latest misappropriation of an authentic 1963 student civil rights demonstrator’s identification. Last year the Detroit News exposed Birmingham’s Carolyn McKinstry as having misappropriated the historic identity of the young demonstrator who was blasted by Bull Connor’s fire hoses.
As journalists, AL.com has a duty to print the truth accurately. We call on AL.com to immediately retract its “Unsung Hero” article of February 23, 2014. That article paints Mr. Gadsden in a false light by repugnant innuendo; insinuating Mr. Gadsden as an imposter.
Knowing the past sordid history of false civil rights identity claims recently made in Birmingham, we must require punctiliously reporting on this subject. Even cursory review of the public record, even visual examination of May 5, 1963 press photos of that day, would clearly establish that Fowkles, whom Garrison begrudgingly now admits was “unable to do interviews” for his “Unsung Hero” article, was not the “guy” (i. e., young man) in Bill Hudson’s iconic photo.
BIRMINGHAM’S CIVIL RIGHTS ICON IMPOSTERS
Judge Ware Carolyn McKinstry Michael Dizzar Walter Lee Fowlkes
The Detroit News report, by Francis X. Donnelly, said McKinstry admitted that it was not her in the photo when contacted on Sunday. “Now the Detroit News has published a story saying that one of Birmingham’s most prominent civil rights activists, Carolyn McKinstry, 65, has for years been claiming to be the girl in a famous Life magazine photograph of demonstrators being blasted by water from a firehose, while Mamie Chalmers, 71, the actual person in the photograph, lives in Detroit.” A former Western-Olin High School student named [ ] Charlmers.
With this hisory well known to the The Birmingham News.AL.com, prior to the Fowlkes story’s publication, the “Unsong Hero” story is journalisticly incredulous. True, Fowlkes was among the May 3, 1963 demonstrators. He was not, however ” the young man” captured for history in Bill Hudson’s famous Associated Press photo.
Garrisons’ Fowlkes-Newton alleged interview is further questioned by AL.com’s subsequent “blogs” electronic “update” of Garrision’s original February print report “Unsung Hero, which AL.com has taken the original report offline.
Citizens for Better Schools & Sustainable Communities immediately contacted Mr. Garrison asking for retraction of his “Unsung” story due to its historical inaccuracy regarding the Bill Hudson photo and identification of Mr. Gadsden’s high school, Ullman High.
The passage of time can dull memories and recollection of pertinent details, and mistakes can be made in recounting historic events. In journalism, however, “A mistake does not become an error” unless it refuses correction. Citizens For Better Schools & Sustainable Communities has called on AL.com to correct its “Unsung Hero” error. We have also requested the Associated Press (AP) and the New York Times to update their reports on Birmingham’s “Children Campaign,” which spread the AP Hudson photo of Bull Connor’s police dog attacking a young Walter Gadsden to record that Mr. Gadsden attended Ulllman High School, not Birmingham’s venerable Parker High.
Such curative corrective action will both properly respect Birmingham’s real civil rights history and properly place appropriate credit where it is due. We are also mindful that this May 17th is the 60th anniversary of the Brown v. Board of Education decision, now under unrelenting assault by “conservative” forces, national and local (through “tuition vouchers” and “charter schools” – “Jim Crow” by another name). Our history (Not “his” story.)
President John F. Kennedy in an address at the Waldorf Astoria to the National Press Association said: And so it is to the printing press – to the recorder of man’s deeds, the keeper of his conscience, the courier of his news – that we look for strength and assistance confident that with your help man will be what he was born to be: free and independent.”
Knowing the real truth of Birmingham’s 1963 “Children Campaign.” This is our history – not “his story.”
The real guy in the picture, again, according to the Jet Magazine interview in 1963 and Birmingham Civil Rights Institute oral history, was Walter Gadsden, who attended Ullman High School in 1963. Ronald Jackson, a classmate of Gadsden at Ullman, says it is Gadsden in the picture. There were other demonstrators attacked by dogs, including Walter Lee Fowlkes, who city records show was arrested May 3, 1963.
It’s Red Cross Month and we would like to recognize our Everyday Heroes who reach out to help their neighbors when they are in need.
These everyday heroes are our volunteers who help disaster victims get on the road to recovery. They give blood to help someone in the hospital. They brighten the day of an injured service member in a hospital far from home. They take our classes and step forward to help someone having a heart attack or to save a drowning child.
March is also a great time to become part of the Red Cross. It’s easy. Household members can work together on a preparedness plan. People can sign up to take a class or volunteer their time. They can give blood or make a financial donation.
The Red Cross responds to nearly 70,000 disasters a year in this country. It provides 24-hour support to members of the military, veterans and their families; collects and distributes about 40 percent of the nation’s blood supply and trains millions of people in first aid, water safety and other life-saving skills every year.
Here in Alabama, the Alabama Red Cross responded to more than 2,200 local emergencies, assisted more than 6,000 military families and trained nearly 30,000 people in lifesaving skills during fiscal year 2013 (July 2012 through June 2013). And, people from this area donated approximately 98,000 units of blood between July 2012 and June 2013.
Red Cross Month is observed in dedication of everyone who supports our mission. We are grateful to people for their generosity which enables us to continue our work, and encourage everyone to become an Everyday Hero during Red Cross Month by helping their neighbors.
Sincerely,
Mark Beddingfield
CEO, American Red Cross
Alabama Region
Jerry J.K. Tillery
CEO, American Red Cross
Southern, Alabama and Central Gulf Coast and Puerto Rico Blood Services Region
Former NAACP president & CEO will focus on social impact investments in tech startups and community organizations that narrow gaps
OAKLAND, Calif. – Benjamin Todd Jealous, who served as President and CEO of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) until last December, will join the Kapor Center for Social Impact as a partner, the Center has announced.
“The startups and nonprofit organizations the Kapor Center invests in have tremendous potential to expand opportunity for all Americans, particularly for communities that have been historically left behind,” said Jealous. “The Kapor team is an exceptionally diverse band of geniuses working to close gaps in access, opportunity, wealth and participation and I am proud to continue working on those issues with them.”
The mission of the Kapor Center for Social Impact is to provide educational access for all Americans, diversify the tech industry, and support startup companies that have a positive social impact. The Center works in two ways: Kapor Capital makes seed-stage investments in tech companies that close gaps in education, healthcare, economic inclusion and access to opportunity for Americans affected by growing inequality; and the Foundation invests in community organizations that focus on closing the same gaps.
“As an entrepreneur and an investor, I’ve built my career on seeing the possibilities of good ideas and the right team, and then bringing that vision to life,” said Mitchell Kapor, co-founder and co-chair of the Center. “By bringing Ben to the Kapor team, we are making a bet that someone who has succeeded in changing the broader world in so many ways will do the same in our world.”
“Ben has spent his career working to end racial and economic gaps in society, from the criminal justice system to education to health care,” said Freada Kapor Klein, co-founder and co-Chair of the Center. “We are tremendously pleased that he will bring his vast experience, strategy and energy to the tech sector as the next frontier in his life’s work for justice and inclusion.”
Jealous will also join the board of directors of the Kapor Center-funded Level Playing Field Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to eliminating barriers faced by people of color in science, technology, engineering and math.
“I welcome Ben to the Kapor team,” Nicole Sanchez, Kapor Center, Co-Managing Partner said. “His energy, commitment and intellect will be invaluable as we continue our work to create more opportunities for more Americans from all walks of life.”
The Kapor Center for Social Impact was one of 10 foundations that joined the White House last week to pledge participation in the groundbreaking My Brother’s Keeper initiative to support young men of color in academic achievement. Kapor Center Co-Managing Partner Cedric Brown represented the Kapor Center at the White House.
At the NAACP, Jealous was recognized as a leader of successful state and local movements to ban the death penalty, outlaw racial profiling, defend voting rights, secure marriage equality, and free multiple wrongfully incarcerated people from prison. Jealous said that his first order of business will be to initiate a learning tour of Silicon Valley to learn from the entrepreneurs and innovators who are shaping this sector.
ANGOLA, La. — A man who spent nearly 26 years on death row in Louisiana walked free of prison Tuesday, hours after a judge approved the state’s motion to vacate the man’s murder conviction in the 1983 killing of a jeweler.
Glenn Ford, 64, had been on death row since August 1988 in connection with the death of 56-year-old Isadore Rozeman, a Shreveport jeweler and watchmaker for whom Ford had done occasional yard work. Ford had always denied killing Rozeman.
Ford walked out the maximum security prison at Angola on Tuesday afternoon, said Pam Laborde, a spokeswoman for Louisiana’s Department of Public Safety and Corrections.
Asked as he walked away from the prison gates about his release, Ford told WAFB-TV, “It feels good; my mind is going in all kind of directions. It feels good.”
Ford told the broadcast outlet he does harbor some resentment at being wrongly jailed: “Yeah, cause, I’ve been locked up almot 30 years for something I didn’t do.”
“I can’t go back and do anything I should have been doing when I was 35, 38, 40 stuff like that,” he added.
State District Judge Ramona Emanuel on Monday took the step of voiding Ford’s conviction and sentence based on new information that corroborated his claim that he was not present or involved in Rozeman’s death, Ford’s attorneys said. Ford was tried and convicted of first-degree murder in 1984 and sentenced to death.
“We are very pleased to see Glenn Ford finally exonerated, and we are particularly grateful that the prosecution and the court moved ahead so decisively to set Mr. Ford free,” said a statement from Gary Clements and Aaron Novod, the attorneys for Ford from the Capital Post Conviction Project of Louisiana.
They said Ford’s trial had been “profoundly compromised by inexperienced counsel and by the unconstitutional suppression of evidence, including information from an informant.” They also cited what they said was a suppressed police report related to the time of the crime and evidence involving the murder weapon.
Currently, there are 83 men and two women serving death sentences in Louisiana, according to Laborde.
A Louisiana law entitles those who have served time but are later exonerated to receive compensation. It calls for payments of $25,000 per year of wrongful incarceration up to a maximum of $250,000, plus up to $80,000 for loss of “life opportunities.”
Marching to Selma’s 50th: 50 Cities/50 Cars/ 50 Voters Campaign to Register One Million Voters Nationwide
The Annual Bridge Crossing Jubilee, commemorating the 49th anniversary
of Bloody Sunday and the Selma-to-Montgomery marches in 1965, kicks off a yearlong voter
education and registration campaign in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2013 decision that
dismantled a key provision of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
The Saving Our Selves (S.O.S.) Movement for Justice and Democracy, a regional association of 40
organizations and activists, organized the Marching to Selma’s 50th: 50 Cities/ 50 Cars/ 50
Voters At A Time campaign that began on Monday, March 10 with “The Caravan for
Democracy: From the State Capitols to the Nation’s Capitol ” following culminating activities
on Sunday, March 9, after the annual pilgrimage across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma.
S.O.S. organizers and activists say there is nothing to celebrate if the unequivocal right to vote,
without voter suppression tactics, is not fully restored, in honor of those who were jailed,
beaten, tear-gassed and killed to win voting rights for all citizens. The Marching to the 50th’s
two-fold campaign includes: 1.) bringing attention to increased voter suppression that resulted
from the Supreme Court’s 2013 dismantling of the Voting Rights Act; and 2.) organizing
participation in a massive voter registration effort that will result in at least one million new
voters nationwide by March 2015, the 50th anniversary of the Selma-to-Montgomery marches.
The Caravan for Democracy will stop for rallies at state capitols in Montgomery Ala., Atlanta
Ga., Columbia S.C., Raleigh N.C. and Richmond Va. Participants can join the caravan from these
cities along the way, as well as those who travel from other cities and states, to converge in
Washington, D.C. on Wednesday, March 12, at the U.S. Supreme Court and then march to the
U.S. Capitol. The march will culminate in a rally that protests the Supreme Court’s adverse
decision on voting rights and urges Congress to fully restore the Voting Rights Act.
The D.C. rally marks the beginning of Marching to the 50th’s yearlong voter registration drives
around the country. Organizations and individuals committed to social justice in every city and
state are asked to participate by registering at least 50 voters each in order to reach the one million-
new-voters goal by March 2015.
For more details about the campaign, visit www.sosmovement.net/marching-to-the-50th/ or
text “selmajubilee” to 72727.
