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Question of the Week: “How important is the teacher’s role in educating our children?”

Photo and question by Yvonne Kemp

Kim Humphreys: “As we know, it takes a village to raise a child! Our educators play as critical a role as our parents in preparing our students for the future.”

Joseph Clayton: “The role of educating children is very important because we, as teachers, play a big part in not only educating, but developing students in so many areas in their lives. It is important that we teach children through positive educational/social experiences that assist in advancing them as well-rounded individuals.”

Mary Stewart: “The teacher’s role in educating our children is important because teachers have the skills to instruct students on what society is expecting of the children in order to be productive and prosperous citizens in a global world.”

Timon Herring: “The role of the teacher is extremely important in educating our youth. However, I personally feel that having a united front between the teacher and the parent is essential in educating today’s youth.”

by Thomas E. Mitchell, Jr.

Early Tuesday morning before a gathering of Milwaukee’s civic and business leaders at the Italian Conference Center, Mayor Tom Barrett touted the future of his city by the lake.

The mayor spoke glowingly of projects on the drawing board or under construction that would literally change the city’s landscape along the lakefront, boost its economy, and change local and national perceptions.

Barrett talked about the construction of a new 30-story Northwestern Mutual office tower, a planned 44-story hotel and apartment high-rise and 17- story office building, as well as a proposal to extend Lincoln Memorial Drive into the Historic Third Ward.

He also touted the transformation of the Menomonee Valley, the continuing redevelopment of the Pabst Brewery site, redeeming and developing vacant land, turning them into urban gardens, and redeveloping foreclosed properties in the city’s neighborhoods, as well as espousing the efforts of colleges and universities that are developing curriculums focusing on high-tech jobs in “The Valley” and takes advantage of the city’s biggest asset, Lake Michigan.

Business and civic leaders seemed impressed by the details in the mayor’s presentation. Indeed, any out of town CEO of a growing company in attendance and looking to relocate his or her business would be receptive to relocating to the state’s largest city that is considered in some mainstream circles as—would you believe—“hip” and “cool.”

Later that same morning, during an interview with the Community Journal in his City Hall office, Barrett was not as buoyant talking about a potential fiscal crisis that threatens to irrevocably set-back the city’s bold plans towards a brighter future.

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and the Republican controlled Legislature— through the state’s proposed fiscal budget— is seeking to abolish statewide local governments’ ability to enforce residency requirements.

In Milwaukee, the measure would only impact the city’s police officers and firefighters. In state legislation (Act 10) that stripped most public workers and their unions of collective bargaining, the organizations representing police officers, police supervisors and firefighters were exempted, allowing them to retain their bargaining rights.

Though he wouldn’t say it directly, Barrett did not disagree with the observations of other locals who see the state’s attempt to dismantle the residency requirement as an assault on his city and an attempt to turn Milwaukee into another Detroit.

Years ago, Detroit—as well as Baltimore and Minneapolis—did away with residency requirements. It proved to be particularly disastrous for Detroit, which saw its police and firefighters leave the city, taking their property tax dollars with them

As a result, the “Motor City” is a shell of its former industrious self, teetering on the verge of fiscal collapse, while dealing with such nation-leading negative indicators as, White and middle-class flight to the suburbs, crime and joblessness.

Though the measure would impact municipalities state wide, Barrett said Walker and the Republican controlled legislature’s real target is Milwaukee.

“It (the residency measure) is payback for the unions,” Barrett said, adding ending the residency would destabilize neighborhoods and intrudes on local control.

The mayor has asked the state legislature to remove the residency busting measure from the state budget, arguing it is a policy item that should be debated and voted on by the legislature based on its own merits.

During the interview, the mayor displayed a duel map of Milwaukee showing red dots, which represented foreclosed properties—the majority of which are concentrated in the Black community—and blue dots representing the homes of public employees.

“Red (the foreclosures) is the ‘right hook’ to the face,” Barrett said looking at the map. The red dots represent the reduction of asset value of Milwaukee, which dropped from $30 billion to $25 billion (a 17% drop).

Because of the foreclosure problem, local businesses are paying five percent more of the total property tax bill. As a result, residential property values during this period dropped 30%. Commercial and manufacturing property values dropped six percent.

“Blue is the ‘left hook’ to the face,” said the mayor, noting if the residency requirement is abolished, the exodus of those blue dots would represent a significant loss of public employees and their property tax dollars.

Barrett noted the city is liable for $1.138 billion of the public employee pension. Sixty-eight point six percent of this amount is for police ($505.2 million) and firefighters ($276.1 million).

Under Act 10, public employees must make contributions to their pensions (seven percent). The police and firefighters are exempt from making contributions.

Instead, Milwaukee taxpayers are footing the bill to the tune of, on average, $4,700 each per year.

If the measure, eliminating residency, is passed in the budget bill and police officers and firefighters move out of the city with no agreement to pay a percentage of their earnings towards their pension through their paycheck (which would take some of the pressure off of residents), they will be getting what amounts to a “freebie.”

Though police officer and firefighter organizations are the only public unions with collective bargaining, the mayor said they don’t want to discuss a compromise that would require them to pay their fair share toward their pensions.

“Because of the Global Pension Settlement many years ago, we can’t require employees of the city to pay towards their pension unless they sign a voluntary agreement to contribute to their pension,” Barrett explained. Barrett doubts either public safety union would make that type of concession.

“I have respect for police and firefighters,” Barrett said. “But something is wrong when they want to renegotiate a 75 year agreement (the residency requirement goes back to 1938-ed.), but don’t want to give anything in return.” 

Barbara Horton

Compiled by MCJ Staff

Barbara Horton, who served as deputy acting-superintendent and then acting superintendent for Milwaukee Public Schools between 1995 and 1997, died Thursday, May 16, of breast cancer. She was 64.

Horton came close to becoming superintendent in 1997. However, the MPS School Board of Directors chose Alan Brown.

As deputy and acting superintendent, Horton was reportedly the highest- ranking woman in the district and the second Black woman to serve in the deputy superintendent’s post. The first was Debra McGriff.

Horton left MPS for a short time after being passed over for superintendent. In 2002, she returned to the district after she was elected to the school board in a special election. She was reelected to a full four-year term in 2007.

Though Horton was described as a thoughtful board member who avoided board infighting, she was not afraid to get vocal when the occasion—or issue—called for it, especially as it related to the district and its students, who she saw as “our babies.”

Horton also worked in private school education. Since 1999, she was the executive director of the Darrell Lynn Hines College Preparatory Academy of Excellence, a city charter school, and Destiny High School, a voucher school. Both schools serve approximately 300 students.

At the time of her death, Horton was completing her doctoral dissertation in educational administration from Capella University.

Horton was born in Ypsilanti, Mich., moving to Milwaukee as a teenager. She was a graduate of the former Lincoln High School. She attended Carroll College (now Carroll University) in Waukesha, earning an undergraduate degree in sociology. She also earned a management degree from Cardinal Stritch.

Horton is survived by her husband, Sandy Horton, daughter Cassandra Horton, 31 and son Jonathan, 24. No funeral arrangements had been announced at the time of this writing.

Cordelia Taylor, the founder of Family House (third from the right standing) addresses a gathering at her facility to talk about the services it offers men and women age 55 and older in a unique family oriented atmosphere and approach not found in other facilities that houses seniors. (Photo by Yvonne Kemp)

by Taki S. Raton

Milwaukee’s Magazine’s January 2008 cover issue headlines her as a “Little Lady-Big Job.”

Leaning in the southwest corner of her modest office is the American flag. She was honored November 20, 1998 with the National Caring Award presented by the Caring Institute.

The awards ceremony was held at the White House. The flag leaning in that southeast corner was flying roof top over the Oval Office at the time of her award.

Mrs. Cordelia Taylor does indeed have a huge job. But she also has a huge heart and a loving spirit to effectively and passionately assume her task.

She is founder and director of Family House, a residential longterm care facility that has served the Milwaukee community for over 20 years.

Located at 3269 North 11th Street, Family House services men and women who are 55-years and older. As the name implies, Family House is a facility that offers care in a home like setting, creating a community that becomes a family.

Mrs. Taylor takes pride that her initiative provides its elderly residents with experienced Certified Nursing Assistance on a 24-hour basis in a comfortable environment that does not resemble any facility in the city offering the same level of service.

Taylor first came to Milwaukee with her husband, James, around the mid-1950’s.

In April of 1960, the Taylors moved on North 11th Street right in the heart of central-city Milwaukee. In 1975 while working for American Motors, the company moved her husband to the Toledo, Ohio plant. Taylor was able during this time in Toledo to earn her nurse’s license. American Motors soon moved the Taylors back to Wisconsin five year later in 1980. They brought a house in suburban Brown Deer and in 1983, she became director of nursing at the Plymouth Manor Nursing Home on Sixth and Walnut Street in Milwaukee.

In 1986, Taylor received her administrator’s license. She was then promoted to administrator of the home. According to Michael E. Hartmann in his “Wisconsin Interest” writing on Family House, company officials came to Taylor and expressed to her that the nursing home was not making enough money. The operation was described as providing close to the bare necessities in residential care:

“I couldn’t take what was going on in the nursing homes,” she said in the Hartman account. “There wasn’t enough to do in what needed to be done. Things just aren’t the way they should be.”

Barbara J. Elliott in “Street Saints: Renewing America’s Cities,” recounts this eye-opener period in Taylor’s career as she describes how the administrator, “saw people who had a sparkle in their eye when they came in, but they lost the motivation to live.”

Taylor further witnessed for example the application of arbitrary rules for residents “that were convenient for the staff but hampered the quality of life for the elderly. She saw care driven more by costs than by caring.”

Seeing that the patient’s needs were often placed second to the desire for profits, Taylor made some suggestions as to how the operation could be improved to better meet the needs of the residents. Her ideas were rejected. But drawing upon her Mason, Tennessee upbringing during the challenging era of Jim Crow, Cordelia Taylor was not a quitter.

With the spirit and the drive to make a better life for those in her care and for those of whom she cared about, she shared with her husband her frustration, pain and sorrow for what she was then experiencing at the nursing home.

He in response challenged her to open her own residential treatment center for the elderly that would, in the words of Elliot, “be more like a real home and make care available to them regardless of their income.”

She accepted her husband’s challenge and decided to open her own center. Although the Brown Deer address was very reflective of the fruit of their hard work, Taylor and her family in the mid-80’s opted to move back on 11th Street where they left years prior.

After fixing up their house room-by-room and meeting the requirements for a Community-Based Residential Facility (CBRF) in the midst of what has been noted as an environment of “crime and squalor,” this first Family House facility opened with eight residents.

The “crime and squalor” however were very real on this 11th Street block. Reportedly, members of the GDN (Gangster Disciple Nation) gang and a rival nearly nightly had shooting matches with bullets “zinging” over the backyard of their house.

As described in Elliot, the elderly residents had to hide under their beds and during all hours`, drug dealers “shamelessly trafficked” within the neighborhood counting on the resident’s fear that they would not be reported to the police. A building in the alley behind her center was described as a “drive-through drug pickup.”

“Cordelia,” writes Elliot, “was incensed with their brazen trafficking and walked out boldly to tell the dealers to take their business elsewhere. One man pulled a gun on her. ‘I told him to go ahead and shoot. He’d just get me to heaven faster than I had planned to go.’ She fixed him with her steady gaze, and he slowly lowered the gun. Then he put it in his pocket and said, ‘I won’t be back, lady, you can have this neighborhood.’”

She complained to the police about the shooting and the activity on her block. The police were uncaring and unresponsive.

But in her own words, Taylor vividly recalls that she was so fed up with the 11th Street conditions that she drove down to police headquarters and told them in no uncertain terms that unless they took action and cleaned up her block, she would take her story of the gangs and drugs to the area television station. In no time, even before she could return home good enough, police cars were swarming the neighborhood.

Taylor had the courage to stand up to rival gangs, face down drug dealers and demand respect and action from the local authorities.

This one African American woman of slight statue, big heart and an undying spirit, alone, save for the support of her family, changed the climate and presence of an entire neighborhood.

What began as one Family House has now expanded to encompass nearly a whole block with 7 units housing 58 residents manned by a staff of 51 employees on a 24- hour, 7-day shift.

The residents each have their own rooms with a TV, hand-made quilts thrown across their chairs and their names on the doors. There are no mandatory clock hours as in the earlier facility she left. Family House residents can retire to bed whenever they wish, stay up and watch TV and feel at home.

The seven adjacent houses are connected in the rear with an accessible wheelchair wooden deck painted brown, lending the opportunity for mobility, sitting in the sun and sharing quality time with neighbors.

Multiple garden plots provide the opportunity for residents and young visitors who volunteer to work with the seniors to grow vegetables and learn about plants and gardening. The gardens are raised from the ground so that the wheelchair-bound can easily seed and cultivate their own plots.

In addition to long-term elderly care, Family House offers youth educational and leadership programs, a youth summer camp, after school tutoring, a food and clothing pantry, asthma management education, a medical health clinic, and an improvement in local area housing.

Family House has also provided community and economic development, job creation, a stabilization of the local area tax base, a reduction of crime, a sizable decrease in area usage of illegal drugs and alcohol and a provision of local and accessible positive role models.

“Committing herself to the needs of the community, Mrs. Taylor believes that if you’ve lived in a community that has been good to you, you should give back,” as cited in the Spring 2009 edition of Alliance for Aging Research.

“This is why she’s gone beyond the resident facilities and reached out to the neighborhood with services, employment, and friendship,” adds this feature.

She was awarded at $50,000 “Use Your Life Award” from Oprah’s Angel Network and a host of numerous additional awards dating back from 1989. Among them are the 1995 and 1999 Governor Tommy Thompson Certificate of Commendations, the 1995 Official Recognition by Mayor John O. Norquist, the 1999-2000 Elite Who’s Who Among Outstanding Females Executive Award, the January 17, 2000 Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Humanitarian Award and the 20th Annual Black Women’s Network Recognition Award.

“Aging can be a difficult and challenging period. The Family House is a blessing for those in the African American community who are facing this season in their life,” shares Dr. William Rogers, Chairman of the Family House Board of Directors.

He adds that “this resident facility was designed to offer compassionate and loving care to elders in need of assisted living care.

Ms. Taylor has been diligent and passionate in making sure Family House can lovingly meet the needs of its residents. This residence is truly an ‘oasis’ and clearly a ‘bridge over trouble waters’ for seniors who seek its services.”

Many have called Mrs. Cordelia Taylor an “amazing woman” as cited in Alliance. “But it’s not amazing,” she replies.

“It’s what people do in life. God doesn’t have big or little projects for people. Whatever He gives you to do, you do, and you do it to the best of your ability.

Compiled by MCJ Staff

Funeral services were held Friday, May 17, for Malcolm Lateef Shabazz, the grandson of human rights leader Malcolm X. He was 28 years old.

According to reports by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Shabazz died of blunt-force injuries he suffered during a May 9 fight at the Palace Bar in the tourist area in Mexico City known as Plaza Garibaldi.

According to the BBC report, the owner of the bar demanded payment from Shabazz for an inflated bar tab including music and “female companionship.”

When Shabazz refused to pay, he was allegedly beaten and thrown from the second-floor establishment. He reportedly died May 10 in a Mexico City hospital.

Mexico City prosecutors say they have arrested two men in connection with the death of Malcolm Shabazz, the grandson of political activist Malcolm X.

An official of the city’s prosecutor’s office, who was not authorized to be quoted by name, says the two suspects are employees of the bar where Shabazz was assaulted.

Much like his grandfather, Shabazz spent his youth in and out of trouble. At 12, he set a fire in his grandmother’s apartment, a blaze that resulted in the death of Malcolm X’s widow. After four years in juvenile detention, Shabazz was later sent back to prison on attempted robbery and assault charges.

In recent years, the first male heir of Malcolm X seemed to seek redemption, saying he was writing a memoir and traveling around the world speaking out against youth violence.

Before his trip to Mexico, he reached out to a group of Mexican construction workers in the U.S. and then visited in Mexico with a leader who had been deported.

Malcolm X, who inspired books and the 1992 Hollywood movie named after him, was shot to death as he delivered a speech in a Harlem ballroom in 1965. Shabazz’s mother was only 4 at the time.

The Shabazz family said in a statement they were saddened to hear of the death of Malcolm X’s grandson.

“To all who knew him, he offered kindness, encouragement and hope for a better tomorrow,” said the statement. “We will miss him.”

Labor activist Miguel Suarez, who was traveling with Shabazz, told The Associated Press that his friend was beaten up at a bar near Plaza Garibaldi, a downtown square that is home to Mexico City’s mariachis.

Plaza Garibaldi is popular with tourists, but the pair were at a bar across the street from the plaza in an area of rough dive bars tourists are warned against going to.

Suarez said he and Shabazz were lured to the bar on Wednesday night by a young woman who made conversation with the American in English. The Palace bar is on one of Mexico City’s busiest avenues.

“We were dancing with the girls and drinking,” said Suarez. Then the owner of the bar wanted them to pay a $1,200 bar tab, alleging that they should pay for music, drinks and the girls’ companionship.

“We pretty much got hassled,” he said. “A short dude came with a gun.” Suarez said he was taken by the man to a separate room. Shabazz stayed in the hall. Suarez said he heard a violent commotion in the hall and escaped from the room and the bar altogether as he saw half-naked girls running away, picking up their skirts from the dance floor.

Minutes later, Suarez came back in a cab to look for Shabazz and found him on the ground outside the bar severely injured.

“He was in shock. His face was messed up,” said Suarez. “He was alive.”

“I grabbed him, and I called the cops,” said Suarez, who was recently deported from the United States.

He said he took Shabazz to a hospital but his friend died hours later of blunt-force injuries.

Suarez said Shabazz had traveled to Mexico to support him and his movement advocating for more rights for construction workers. He crossed the border from San Diego to Tijuana with Suarez’s mother and then the pair took a bus all the way to Mexico City.

“We were planning to go to Teotihuacan, to see the Aztec pyramids,” he said.

U.S. State Department spokesman Patrick Ventrell did not offer details on whether they are working with Mexican investigators.

“We’ve been in contact with family members and have been providing appropriate… assistance,” Ventrell said. “At their request, we have no further comment at this time.”

Ruth Clark, Shabazz’s godmother, said that her heart was heavy, but that she believes he is now “among angels.”

“Malcolm is part of a welcoming kingdom, sharing his bright smile, intelligence, and wisdom.”

Shabazz was born on Oct. 8, 1984 to Qubilah Shabazz, one of six daughters of Malcolm X and his wife Betty Shabazz.

In June 1997, Malcolm Shabazz set the fire at his grandmother Betty Shabazz’s home. She died from severe burns, and he served four years in juvenile detention.

He later expressed regret for his actions, telling The New York Times in 2003 that he would sit on his jail cot and ask for a sign of forgiveness from his dead grandmother.

“I just wanted her to know I was sorry and I wanted to know she accepted my apology, that I didn’t mean it,” he said. “But I would get no response, and I really wanted that response.”

Despite the encouragement and support by his family’s numerous supporters in New York, he struggled. He joined the Bloods street gang and after moving to the small city of Middletown, near New York’s Catskills region, he had additional legal scrapes.

Shabazz also served time on a 2002 attempted robbery conviction, and was released in 2005. In 2006, he pleaded guilty to criminal mischief for smashing the window of a Yonkers doughnut shop.

More recently, Shabazz had taken on public speaking engagements and traveled, describing himself as a human rights activist. On his Facebook profile, he said he was attending John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.

Yet his entanglements with law enforcement continued.

In one of the last posts on his blog, in March, Shabazz had complained that FBI agents had recently questioned him about his international travels.

He also accused officers with the Middletown police department of harassing him since the fall, and said an arrest in the city over the winter prevented him from traveling to Iran in February to participate in a film festival.

Shabazz also wrote about traveling to Damascus, Syria to study and to Libya as part of a delegation of Americans who met with Muammar Gaddafi, prior to his ouster and death.

Police officials in Middletown didn’t return phone messages Friday. An FBI spokesman in New York had no immediate comment.

He proudly embraced the legacy of his grandfather, one of the most influential Black people in history who had a more radical, angry approach than Martin Luther King Jr.’s nonviolent movement in the 1950s and into the 1960s.

On his Twitter page, Shabazz posted a picture of himself mimicking the famous photograph of his grandfather, peering out at a window with a rifle in one hand.

“Grandson, name-sake and first male heir of the greatest revolutionary leader of the 20th century,” he wrote.

Contributors to this article: The Grio.com and Associated Press writer Bradley Klapper from Washington and David Caruso from New York City.

Beaufort, SC – MAY 4: Top 3 contestant Candice Glover greets fans during her hometown visit on May 4, 2013 in Beaufort, South Carolina. (Photo by FOX via Getty Images)

by Ronda Racha Penrice, theGrio 

African-Americans have won American Idol plenty of times, so Candice Glover’s win is not unique in that regard. Yet as a native of Beaufort, South Carolina, an area scholars generally deem to be among the most culturally significant to African-Americans who are descendants of slaves, she stands alone. For many Americans, Candice Glover did not just become the current American Idol; she became an ambassador for Gullah Geechee culture.

What is Gullah Geechee culture, you ask?

Gullah, as the culture is most typically called, largely refers to descendants of enslaved Africans from the coastal areas of South Carolina, particularly its Sea Islands, and Georgia, where the Geechee term is more often used. In the 1700s, white colonists realized that rice could grow well along this coast and purposely sought out Africans from what some called the “Rice Coast” or “Windward Coast,” the rice-growing region of West Africa where modern-day Senegal, Sierra Leone and Liberia are located, to cultivate the crop in this region.

Preserving Gullah culture

Although historians do not know exactly from whence the word originates, many believe the word comes from Angola, Congo, or “Congo and Angola,” which immigration records indicate was a port of origin for many of those enslaved Africans. Others point to a tribe named “Gola” near the border of Liberia and Sierra Leone.

What is known is that because the coastal areas of South Carolina and Georgia were swampy and whites were highly susceptible to disease, Africans tended to outnumber whites greatly in this region, which many refer to as the Lowcountry. As a result of their large numbers, they were able to retain high levels of their cultural roots. Language is one of the biggest. African American scholar Lorenzo Dow Turner, working in the 1930s, concluded that Gullah, which also refers to the spoken language as well as the culture, contained over 4,000 words from many different African languages as well as English. Some languages include Krio, Mandinka, Wolof, Bambara, Fula, Mende, Kongo and more. In addition creole languages spoken in Jamaica and Barbados also come into play.

In addition to language, lots of other vestiges of African culture have been found, including stories that mirror those in many African countries as well as traditions such as making sweetgrass baskets, knitting fishnets and quilting. Music shows a high level of retention as well plus there are food traditions such as gumbo and red rice that have also been passed on.

When the Civil War ended and slavery was abolished, large enough numbers of Gullah people remained to pass on the traditions. As a result, certain elements of the culture persist to this day. In addition, the Penn Center was established early on to teach the recently freed slaves and many who passed through it recognized the unique culture that remained and worked diligently to document and preserve it. Today, the Penn Center remains central to this mission and there have been several other initiatives to recognize and preserve the rich cultural heritage of the region. It must be noted, however, that, like many areas, lack of employment or the ability to sustain a family off the land resulted in many Gullah descendants, especially in the 20th century, leaving the area and so fewer numbers of people were able to actively carry on the traditions.

But even though Candice Glover may be the latest prominent representative of Gullah culture, many of us have long been exposed to the area’s significance through films like Julie Dash’s groundbreakingDaughters of the Dust, Gloria Naylor’s impactful novel, Mama Day and Jonathan Green’s affecting art, among others. Others of Gullah/Geechee descent include football great Jim Brown who hails from St. Simon’s Island, Georgia; Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who is from Pin Point, Georgia and spoke Gullah as a child; and U.S. Congressman James Clyburn, who has made great strides to preserve the Gullah Geechee culture, who hails from Sumter, South Carolina. In addition, institutions like the Gullah Museum of Hilton Head Island, initiatives like the Gullah Geechee Cultural Heritage Corridor and the Mitchelville Preservation Project work also to recognize and preserve the culture.

Today, because a lot of this coastal land is of great value, many Gullah Geechee people feel under siege and are battling to preserve their way of life and traditions, not to mention their land, which is in constant threat of being turned into fancy resorts and high-priced real estate. Perhaps Candice Glover’s win will aid in their fight in the long run, but, right now, there’s no denying that Glover has once again helped shine a bright light on an area of high cultural importance not just to African Americans but to the nation as a whole.