September 10, 2015

By James Clingman 

NNPA Columnist 

Katrina does not need the word “Hurricane” as a descriptor; we are on a first name basis with her. Thousands died as a result of that storm, and others were abandoned, left to fend for themselves in unbearable heat, polluted waters, and filthy municipal facilities. Hundreds of thousands, called “refugees,” were relocated (or “dislocated”) in what could certainly be called Third World refugee camps. And many more were sent to what Barbara Bush thought was a pretty nice place, the Houston Astrodome. “…this (she chuckles slightly) is working very well for them.”

Ten years later, our president goes back to New Orleans again after his 5-year anniversary visit in 2010, to declare that he was “inspired” by the resilience of the people of New Orleans, and he lauded the progress made in rebuilding houses. While Obama admitted there is more work to do and cited the inequities that existed long before Katrina came to town, some residents were more open about their dissatisfaction.

An Associated Press article by Darlene Superville and Nancy Benac observed, “Colette Pichon Battle, executive director of Gulf Coast Center for Law & Policy, cautioned against slapping too happy a face on New Orleans, saying ‘rebuilding since the storm favors privileged private enterprise and this illusion of recovery is not progress.’

“City residents, too, spoke of uneven recovery. I think we have a long way to go, said Lisa Ross, 52, an appraiser. She said areas frequented by tourists have recovered tremendously but many neighborhoods have struggled.” Based on that quote, it looks like money from tourism is more important than people. But, we knew that, didn’t we?

Former President George W. Bush also returned to the scene of the crime to laud what he described as progress in the New Orleans’ education system since Katrina. Juxtaposed against his famous commendation to the head of FEMA in 2005, “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job,” his words in 2015 rang hollow.

It seems to me that rather than, or at least in addition to speechifying politicians returning to New Orleans, those companies that received billion dollar no-bid contracts to rebuild should have returned to put some of their profits back into the 9th Ward. They should have returned and set up entrepreneurship schools in that “model” school system that emerged from the disaster. It would be great if the Black festivals and conferences that come to New Orleans would leave an economic legacy with Black residents who still suffer from the vestiges of Katrina’s wrath. All it takes is the symbolism of a presidential visit for us to forget about New Orleans for another five years. Obama should have brought a check to “bailout” the residents?

Many Katrina survivors have either been permanently relocated to other states, moved to other parts of the city because of gentrification, gotten sick from the polluted water and formaldehyde in those “guvment” trailers they lived in, or have died during the past 10 years. Despite the number of laborers needed to rebuild the city, the opportunity for Black people to work was stymied by corrupt politicians, greedy corporate execs, and contractors.

After being corralled like cattle, accused of “looting” food while Whites were lauded for “finding” food, hunted down like wild animals, abandoned in stinking polluted water, turned back at gunpoint by their neighbors across the bridge, relegated to yet another Diaspora, this time in the U.S., separated from their children and loved ones and unaware of their whereabouts, used as political fodder, and now being used as props for presidential speeches, don’t you think they deserve a lot more than rhetoric?

If what is happening in New Orleans now is the best we can offer in 10 years, especially after we spent billions rebuilding Iraq in much less time, the leaders of this nation should hang their heads in shame and beg the forgiveness of those still negatively affected. After that, a “Marshall Plan” should be issued in response to the conditions under which Black and poor people have lived since – and before – Katrina. Economic empowerment is the answer, you know.

Former NAACP President Bruce Gordon, in an interview in Black Enterprise magazine (Sept. 2005), speaking about New Orleans, said, “Most recently there’s been a lot of concern about the way African Americans are treated in the French Quarter…folks there don’t treat them very nicely. I would say in addition to [marching], we should take our dollars elsewhere…That, to me, is a more significant message than a protest because it has an economic impact on the offenders.”

Gordon was right, of course; but maybe that’s why he was terminated from the money-hungry sellouts in the national NAACP. Are you listening, festival goers and conferees?

Jim Clingman, founder of the Greater Cincinnati African American Chamber of Commerce, is the nation’s most prolific writer on economic empowerment for Black people. He can be reached through his website, blackonomics.com. He is the author of   Black Dollars Matter: Teach Your Dollars How to Make More Sense, which is available through his website; professionalpublishinghouse.com and Amazon Kindle eBooks.

August 27, 2015

By Charlene Crowell 

NNPA Columnists 

Recently in Houston, the nation’s oldest minority professional real estate trade association held its 68th annual convention. Founded in July 1947, the National Association of Real Estate Brokers (NAREB) grew from a fledgling group of one woman and 11 men from only eight locales, into today’s national network of mortgage professionals and an estimated conference attendance of more than 1,000.

Long before civil rights legislation was introduced in Congress, NAREB stood for all those who believed that owning a home in America should be both affordable and obtainable, but were somehow locked out of their own American Dream.

That kind of leadership and service deserve a celebration. In spite of restrictive covenants commonplace as early as the 1940s, to the years of block-busting and White flight of the 1960s, NAREB and other housing advocates held fast to their founding principles and never gave up or gave out.

The irony is that today despite their dedication and advocacy of other housing groups – or even federal laws that guarantee equality and protections in housing and credit regardless of race or creed – the American Dream is still elusive, especially for consumers of color. Nationwide, Black America’s homeownership is shrinking. A 2013 NAREB report titled, The State of Housing in Black America, found that Black homeownership rates dropped from a high level of just of under 50 percent in 2004 to 43 percent by 2013.

By late 2014, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, only 42 percent of Black families were homeowners, more than 22 percentage points lower than that of the nation (64 percent) and 30 percentage points lower than that of Whites (72 percent).

The obvious question is: Why is Black homeownership shrinking?

An analysis by the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL) of the most recent Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) report for 2013 showed that both Black and Latino homebuyers are typically denied access to private sector conventional mortgages that over the life of a loan are far cheaper than the government-backed offerings. Little access to private conventional loans leaves consumers of color with disproportionately high use of mortgages underwritten by government-backed programs such as FHA, VA and USDA.

Those entrusted with leadership positions must develop answers to these and other housing dilemmas. This national problem, as analyzed by CRL, deserves a response equal to its challenge:

Blacks received only 36,903 loans – just 4.8 percent of all purchase mortgage originations in 2013, despite the Black population at 13.6 percent, exceeded 39 million residents.

Hispanic borrowers received slightly more mortgage originations at 7.3 percent of all purchase mortgage originations in 2013, even though they represent

6 percent of the population and more than 51 million people.

Similarly, in refinance mortgage lending, Black borrowers received only 191,004 – only 4.4 percent of more than 4.3 million the previous year. This comparatively low level of lending continues a trend that began after the nation’s housing crisis.

“When families receive responsible mortgage loans, they are able to build a financial safety net that they can access during challenging times,” noted Keith Corbett, a NAREB panelist and executive vice president with the Center for Responsible Lending. “For most Black families, owning a home is the key building block for their financial security. Until we raise the level of Black homeownership, it is doubtful we will see racial wealth gaps closing either.”

Earlier CRL research found that many homebuyers of color were steered into higher-cost, subprime loans – even when they qualified for cheaper ones. After analyzing 50,000 subprime loans, CRL concluded that Blacks and Latinos were almost a third more likely to receive a higher-priced loan than were Whites with the same credit scores.

Additionally, research by the Center for Community Capital at the University of North Carolina found that borrowers of color and low-wealth families who received safe mortgages that were fully-underwritten during the housing crisis saw their home equity appreciate by $23,000.

Earlier this summer, Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies released its annual State of the Nation’s Housing report. Its findings show even more disparities in homeownership:

Despite the housing rebound in many parts of the nation, minority and low-income neighborhoods remain severely distressed.

As of 2014, the homeownership rate for minorities as a group remains 25.5 percentage points lower than that of Whites.

More than 40 percent of Hispanic and Black households with mortgages report paying interest rates above 5 percent, compared with less than a third of White and Asian/ other minority households.

“All of these findings along with rising home prices mean that consumers who want to buy their first home, face tremendous hurdles,” concluded Corbett. “It is time to make mortgage access more available and more equal.”

Charlene Crowell is a communications manager with the Center for Responsible Lending. She can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. .

September 03, 2015

By Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. 

NNPA Columnist 

The more things change, the more they stay the same. Racially motivated murder of young Black Americans across the United States is not a new or rare phenomenon. For too long this brutally fatal manifestation of the madness of American racism has persisted in the face of public horror and disgust.

August 28 marked the 60th anniversary of the death of 14-year-old Emmett Louis Till, who was abducted, beaten and murdered near Money, Miss. for allegedly whistling at a White woman.

At the time, Mississippi led the nation in the number of lynchings, according to records kept by the Chicago Tribune. The brutal death of the teenager visiting from Chicago served as  inspiration for the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which began in December 1955, four months after Till’s death.

The current Black Lives Matter movement that continues to gain momentum and support throughout the nation also engenders vivid memories from the past. The anniversary of Emmett Till’s murder and the subsequent not guilty verdicts that were given to Till’s confessed White killers stand as a painful reminder that systemic racial injustice in the U.S. has been a long-term reality for Black America.

We have to credit the raw courage of Emmett Till’s beloved mother, Mamie Till Mobley, for not allowing her son’s murder to go unnoticed throughout the nation and world. Sister Mobley was a strong mother and she refused in the face of enormous pressure to keep her son’s casket closed at his funeral in Chicago.

Mamie Till Mobley resisted the advice of the funeral director and insisted that the casket carrying the badly mutilated body of her son remain open for public viewing.  She said, “I wanted the world to see what they did to my baby.” And that is exactly what happened.  Jet magazine and hundreds of Black-owned newspapers across the country put the horrible picture of Emmett Till’s crushed face on the front page of their publications. Millions of Black Americans and others responded with calls and demands for justice for Emmett Till and his family.

I had the opportunity on several occasions over the years to speak and meet with Mamie Till Mobley in Chicago and in New York City before she died in 2003.  Sister Mobley was also a staunch civil rights activists and leader.  I remember that she once said to me, “We have to keep on fighting for freedom no matter what obstacles that may put in our path.  We have suffered too much to let anything or anyone take us backwards as a people.”  Her words are still true and relevant today.

As we are now preparing for the 20th anniversary of the Million Man March: Justice Or Else! on October 10 in Washington, D.C., the legacy of Emmett Till and the piercing truth of the long life and struggle of Mamie Till Mobley still scream out to this day to demand justice and equality for Black America and all those who have been victimized and oppressed by racism and injustice.

Recently, at Emmett Till’s gravesite in the Burr Oak Cemetery near Chicago, there was a memorial service organized by the Mamie Till Mobley Memorial Foundation. Airickca Gordon-Taylor, co-founder of the foundation and a relative of Till, stated, “I see many parallels with what happened to Emmett, you can connect the dots…. Our family, we had dealt with injustice for 60 years. We never had justice for Emmett Till's murder.”

Yes, the dots are being connected. The Black Lives Matter is growing and the memory of what happened to Emmett Till serves as an important reminder.  Geneva Reed-Veal, the mother of Sandra Bland, the young Black American woman who was arrested in Texas and found hanged in a jail cell just a few weeks ago, was also at the Till’s gravesite memorial. The pain that the Till family still feels is the pain that the Bland family feels.  This is pain that Black America feels.

Each generation of Black Americans has had to endure this pain, but at the same time continue to demand and struggle for racial justice, freedom and equality. Black Lives Matter. Emmett Till’s life still matters. 

Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr. is the President and CEO of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA) and can be reached for national advertisement sales and partnership proposals at: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ; and for lectures and other professional consultations at: http://drbenjaminfchavisjr.wix.com/drbfc

August 20, 2015

By Marian Wright Edelman 

NNPA Columnist 

What’s on the minds of many high school students these days—the start of a new school year, getting a driver’s license, worrying whether they’ll make the team, perhaps daydreaming about college and sweating over SAT exams? But that’s not what three Black male high school students told a Children’s Defense Fund audience this summer they’re thinking and worrying about.

Aijalon “AJ” Morris is beginning his senior year at Pearl-Cohn Entertainment Magnet High School in Nashville, Tenn., said: “I have no friends that I grew up with. I have lost five this year and I have lost three to prison . . . I was in fifth grade and I lost my [first] friend. He got killed. Seventh grade, my friend killed somebody, and he’s in jail for life . . . From my freshman year to now, I have been to 12 to 13 funerals. And I grew up with everybody that I went to those funerals with, and now they’re gone. It’s hard to cope with it. It’s hard to – sometimes I cry all night, you know, and I ask God why.”

In middle school, AJ was a star athlete. By eighth grade he was already receiving offers to play football in college but after he was sidelined by injuries his sophomore year, everything changed. “I lost hope. I stopped going to school. And during those times I was going through a lot with my family. I was homeless. I didn’t have anything to wear, didn’t have anything to wear to school, you know, nothing like that. I didn’t even know where I was going to get my next meal. And everything was gone.” No one seemed to care. “I remember a whole month – a whole month we ate bread. We ate toast for a whole month.”

E’Darrius Smith, a budding and talented artist, is also a rising senior at Pearl-Cohn. “I had a good friend that I grew up with . . . He ended up dying because he was robbed and he tried to fight back and they ended up shooting him in the chest. So they ended up killing him. And when I found this out, you know, I almost cried, but at the same time [you’ve] seen so many classmates and so many people …you just sort of say, ‘Man, I sort of knew that was going to happen.’”

Jermaine Simmons, a junior at Pearl-Cohn: “We live in the worst conditions where nobody helps you. And we live in a condition where you’ve got to watch your back every 30 seconds. You know, you don’t know when you’re going to get robbed, you don’t know [when] you’re going to get shot, you don’t know [when] you’re going to get stabbed . . . For some of us that is our reality.”

These three teens are very lucky that they have a mentor in Rev. Damien Durr, a gifted teacher-preacher, they can rely on. Damien is a member of the Children’s Defense Fund’s Nashville organizing team but also is a social and emotional counselor at Pearl-Cohn High with a special focus on helping Black male students stay out of the cradle-to-prison pipeline. AJ now dreams of becoming a kinesiologist, Jermaine — a social studies teacher, and E’Darrius — a freelance artist, one of whose fine paintings I look at every day when I step out of CDF’s national headquarters elevator.

Where are the other neighborhood, community, school, and faith congregation mentors and role models? And where are those calling for common sense gun laws so that walking down the streets or to school is not like a showdown at the OK Corral? Where are the outreach workers from community agencies to knock on doors from time to time and see who’s there and what children’s needs might be??

The violence, poverty, and trauma these young people face would be unthinkable for anybody – and yet we leave countless children to cope with death and fear daily and often all alone. What are our responsibilities to our children and youths to offer them respect and hope and education and jobs and open up rather than close doors to a positive future?

E’Darrius said Damien Durr has been an invaluable mentor because he taught him he can’t wallow in self-pity about the circumstances he comes from—he must rise up.

But countless other youths need but lack a Damien in their lives to help them overcome the overwhelming odds threatening to drag them down. They need parents and grandparents. They need caring teachers and principals and social workers and health care workers. They need faith communities whose doors are open to compete with the drug and gun dealers. They need positive alternatives to the streets and the gangs and sadly too often to the police and law enforcement agencies entrusted to protect them. They need positive role models who have experienced many of their struggles and show them that they can overcome them with perseverance.

Marian Wright Edelman is president of the Children’s Defense Fund whose Leave No Child Behind® mission is to ensure every child a Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start and a Moral Start in life and successful passage to adulthood with the help of caring families and communities. For more information go to www.childrensdefense.org