“If you are white, you enjoy freedom, rights and all the privileges that come with it, Richards said to a group of young people as he canvassed for votes in the neighborhood. “But if you are Black, you have to struggle daily to gain your freedom, rights and justice in this country. The current protests across are a testimony that blacks in the US are still not free,” he said. 

Richards is one of nine candidates running for District 49. 

Richards moved to Staten Island over 20 years ago after graduating from high school in Africa. His father is Liberian and his mother is Ghanaian.  As a child he spent time in a refugee camp in Ghana. He later studied law and has been a public defender attorney for almost a decade in the borough 

Richards said, since declaring his intention to run for office, he has been a  victim of a hate crime.

Through his public defender job he has seen and heard first hand how police have been unfairly treating African Americans in Staten Island. 

“There is a relationship between low education and crime,” he said. “Most of the crimes committed like drugs consumption, gang violence, drunk driving are committed more by high school dropouts. This means, the more educated a Black man is, the less likely for him or her to commit these crimes in the community.”

As he knocked on doors, searching for votes, Richards told African American and African residents that over policing is impacting negatively the community.

“Due to the over policing of black communities, cops will see more crimes in those communities than in the white majority neighborhoods whose population is more than the blacks,” he said. “That’s why my agenda is to reform the criminal justice system and push for the rights of minorities in decision making processes.”

In a 2019 Center survey conducted by Pew research center,  84% of Black adults said they believe that they are treated less fairly.

Richards said African Americans  are also disproportionately affected by the coronavirus.

“Blacks are frontline workers more than other races,” he said.”They are the less privileged and those suffering from poverty and unemployment than all others.”

Richards urged the community to think critically about the next election as the fate of Black America is at stake.

“We can protest from January to December, but if we don’t vote for the right people in the election, our suffering will stay the same,” he said.  

Voter Lassanah Gray, said that Staten Island needs a selfless representative that will be able to deliver the high expectations of  the borough’s African Americans. 

He said he is supporting Richards because of his work in the community defending poor black people in conflict with the law. 

The post Staten Island city council candidate canvasses the black community on eve of Independence Day appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

Already living in communities disproportionately burdened by chronic poverty, high rates of underlying medical conditions, coupled with poor access to quality healthcare, the coronavirus crisis now suddenly adds a whole new layer of suffering to the black US population.

All across the country – in the dense urban areas of Chicago, Detroit, New Orleans, New York – emerging data show an alarming trend: Blacks are dying at rates of up to 3,4, 5 or 6 times that of other races.

Black people are not inherently susceptible to the Covid-19 disease itself.  Systemic inequalities resulting from ongoing racism are the true culprits here. Living in a society where the status quo has relegated generations of blacks to substandard housing, especially in large metro areas – cramped, poorly maintained, children growing up with asthma – and neighborhoods devoid of healthy choices in food and education, create the perfect storm of vulnerable: unhealthy, underemployed and disconnected from mainstream advantages. This is where the coronavirus has landed.

President Donald Trump and his coronavirus task force are taking notice.

“Why is it three or four times more so for the black community as opposed to other people?” Trump asked at a recent White House briefing. 

The incoming data showing the virus’ especially devastating impact on black communities was “troublesome”, President Trump said, and “doesn’t make sense”. He said the task force is studying the data further to come up with appropriate recommendations.

A person walks along a virtually empty 2nd ave in the East Village. Photo by Thomas Hengge

The preliminary findings seem to make more sense to the nation’s top infectious-disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, however.

“Health disparities have always existed for the African American community,” Fauci said, speaking at a White House press briefing. “With the crisis, it’s shining a bright light on how unacceptable that is. They are suffering disproportionately.”

The coronavirus disease, Covid-19, attacks the upper respiratory tract of potential hosts, causing only mild flu-like symptoms in most individuals, but often proving deadly to the elderly and those with underlying, chronic health conditions such as diabetes, hypertension or cardiovascular disease. 

A large number of African Americans fall into the latter group. The death rates keep outpacing the rest of the population.

“It’s not that [blacks] are getting infected more often,” Dr. Fauci said. “It’s that when they do get infected, their underlying medical conditions – the diabetes, the hypertension, the obesity, the asthma – those are the kind of things that wind them up in the ICU and ultimately give them a higher death rate.”

As of  today, the world-wide pandemic has infected over 1.9 million people, with close to 120,000 lives lost. Within the US, the number of positive cases was at 587,357, with the virus  snatching over 23,649 lives on its relentless, destructive path. 

In New York, the state currently with the highest number of confirmed infections of 195,031, the death toll stands at 10,056 victims.

The New York Department of Health on Wednesday released its first breakdown of fatalities of the disease based on race and ethnicity. The data shows blacks and Hispanics dying at the highest rates. 

People wait on line for Whole Foods, April 4, 2020. Photo by Thomas Hengge

Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, along with Brooklyn’s Borough President Eric Adams, have joined the chorus of voices demanding more stringent study of the virus’ impact on communities of color and immediate remedies to mitigate the disproportionate trajectory.

Echoing the observation that untreated chronic health problems predisposes communities of color to suffer more fatalities from the virus than other ethnicities, governor Cuomo added that this population was also dominated by people who work on the front lines who are unable to work from home. 

They don’t have a choice but “to go out there everyday and drive the bus and drive the train and show up for work and wind up subjecting themselves to, in this case, the virus,” Cuomo said. 

While the governor has ordered more testing to immediately take place in black and Hispanic communities to identify, and attempt to slow the spread of the virus, transit workers in New York are dying and being sickened at escalating rates.

A worker waits for the downtown 6 train at 14th Street Union Square. Photo by Thomas Hengge

To date, 50 Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) workers – mostly subway workers – have died from coronavirus. Throughout the MTA system – NYC subway and bus transit system with its large minority workforce, Metro North and the Long Island Railroad – about 1900 more workers have tested positive with 5,200 in quarantine. 

“Racial disparity has never been more evident,” says Eric Adams. “The subways are filled with black and brown people” going to “essential jobs” in transportation, food service, hospitality and retail. Many without the necessary protective equipment to work safely or financial means to stop working and shelter-at-home.

Speaking at a recent press conference, Mayor de Blasio said the economic and health disparity in poorer communities of color was nothing new. 

“The disparities that have plagued this city, this nation, that are all about fundamental inequality, are once again causing such pain, and causing innocent people to lose their lives,” he said. “It’s sick. It’s troubling. It’s wrong. And we’re going to fight back with everything we got [to right the inequities].”

In Louisiana, governor John Bel Edwards, said the data coming in shows that 70 percent of the deaths statewide were of African Americans who were only 32 percent of the population.

CNN commentator Van Jones commented on the New Orleans rapid spread and the role early misinformation and inconsistent official information played to further compounded the Covid-19 challenges in black neighborhoods.

“We got off on the wrong foot here,” Jones said. “From a media point of view, and from a community point of view. Everybody started saying, in the black community, ‘this is a white folks’ thing. In fact, a rumor got started that black people were literally immune to this disease. That was all over the Internet – started off as a joke – people took it seriously.”

Jones appealed to the black community and anyone who had friends and family who were not properly informed, to recognize the seriousness of the crisis and to follow the social-distancing guidelines and other mandates from local and federal governments. 

People wait on line to enter the Dollar Tree in Harlem, April 4, 2020. Photo by Thomas Hengge

Producer, writer and actor, Tyler Perry, speaking at a recent CBS interview, also spoke of early disinformation circulating online that the disease was not an issue black people should be concerned about. 

Perry said he saw “too many things online saying, ‘oh, we don’t get this,’ or ‘Black people don’t travel abroad, so it’s not going to come to our community’.” But “that is a ridiculous thought,” he said. “It is coming to-it has come to our community, and it’s devastating us in disproportionate numbers.”

In Chicago and Detroit, now seeing rapid spikes  in coronavirus infections, the trend continues: blacks being the minority in the state, but the cities grappling with their skyrocketing, death tolls that could rise as high as 8 times that of the other residents.

African Americans make up about 14 percent of Michigan’s population, one third of its confirmed cases and 40 percent of its deaths. The city of Detroit makes up 75 percent of coronavirus deaths.

Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot said statistics showing blacks in Chicago dying at almost 6 times the rate of other racial groups just “takes your breath away”.

Lightfoot said the numbers were the most “shocking things” she has seen as a mayor. 

Dr. Fauci said “when this is over, there will still be health disparities” that “really need to be addressed in the African American community.”

The post Black Americans are Dying at Disproportionately High Rates in the Coronavirus Outbreak appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

On the 18th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, minorities in New York City remembered the day that changed their lives as Americans forever. 

Aamer Alam, a 24-year-old Brooklyn native who grew up in a Muslim family, recalled how his father, who was a first-hand witness of the 9/11 attacks, came home as a completely different person that very night.

“He was just not the same person anymore. I guess it might be PTSD, but he never got it checked out,” he said. “He used to be quite a caring dad, but afterwards he had extremely bad anger management issues and would often lash out at us.”

Alam and his brother both faced bullying at school.

“My brother’s teacher would refer to terrorists as my brother’s people,” he said. “My brother used to be a diligent student, but after regularly being picked on by his teacher, he didn’t want to stand out anymore and his grades became quite average, the bullying really affected him.” 

When he was in the sixth grade, Alam got into a fight with a classmate who called him Osama.

“It made me angry,” he said. “I didn’t want to be treated in the same way my brother was being treated. I knew it was wrong.”

His experiences were far too common. According to a report published in 2014 by the Sikh Coalition, more than 50% of Muslim children are bullied at schools, with the number rising to 67% for children who wear turbans. 

Alam said Muslim women in his community, including his mother, were afraid of wearing their Hijab out in public for years after 9/11. 

“We heard a lot about people forcefully taking Hijabs off women on the street, so my mum stopped wearing a Hijab to work,” he said. “She didn’t wear a hijab to job interviews just so that she could be taken more seriously. Even now, she would wear a hijab on the way to work, but not at work.”

Sandra Cabal, who has lived in New York for more than 32 years, remembered the reaction of her boyfriend at the time immediately after 9/11.

 “He wanted to join the Army, ‘We have to kill the people who killed us,’ he told me. I just couldn’t believe what he was saying,” she said. “Before 9/11 there was a stigma, but that was more towards Arabic people, but because people who attacked the World Trade Center did it in the name of a religion, it has bought the believers down with them.” 

Cabal said post-9/11 racial discrimination became more obvious to her. 

“Back in Colombia, where I am from, people think you’re extremely educated if you know a second language, but here it is not the case. If you speak two languages it is almost as if people see you as a lesser person,” she said.  “I live in the Bronx. I’ve lived there for 12 years now. Before that I lived in Brooklyn for 20 years, yet so many people still ask me where I am from because I look different and speak with an accent. But I am an American; I am a New Yorker.”

Cabal said discrimination is motivated by fear.

“People are afraid of people who are not like them, but I like being around different people because once you actually get to know them, you realize that everyone is much like one another.” 

Frank Kraemer, a 24-year-old African American man who grew up in Long Island,  said despite racism that still exists in the United States, things have improved. 

“I think [racism] comes from a place of misrepresentation or misunderstanding of another person’s religion and culture. It may not be an everyday thing, but it is common and it happens,” he said. “Honestly, I think it has become a lot better over the years.”

The post A different reality for the city’s minorities after 9/11 appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

Four generations of the Lettsome family holds up the flag of the US Virgin Islands at the 2013 Inauguration. Photo by Breana Jones

WASHINGTON,D.C.-Amoya Lettsome will not remember this morning. She won’t remember the cold, the technical difficulties, or seeing President Obama sworn into office for his second term. At barely a year old, she won’t remember anything at all but her mother Stacy Lettsome, 40, of Atlanta, Ga. still wanted her to be present for the 2013 Inauguration.

“I will take the pictures and show her she is apart of history,” said Stacy Lettsome, “I was here four years ago so I’m honored to be back. It’s a great celebration and it happened on a perfect day, MLK day.”

Five other members of their family joined Stacy and Amoya Lettsome at the National Mall.  The Afro-Caribbean family was one of more than an estimated 700,000 present for the Inauguration. The crowd was nowhere near the size of the 1.8 million that gathered in 2009, and the majority of the crowd was black. The strong presence proved the significance of the President’s two term hasn’t been lost on the black community.

Amoya, 1, was the youngest and at 71, her great-great-aunt Lynn Igwemadu made four generations present. Tracy Lettsome, her sister, brought her children back for a second time, hoping they’d gain more understanding four years later.

“They’re in middle school now, so I want to discuss how we got here, why it’s so important,” said Tracy Lettsome, “and that because he’s in the White House, he might be dealing with a lot more challenges than presidents in the past because of who he is and where he is from.”

For Clarence Davis, 56, having so many generations of his family together was a special moment for the Virgin Islander, who said as an Afro-Caribbean seeing a black man sworn into the presidential office twice was a strong moment for him.

Stacy Lettsome said while she is happy her baby will grow up in a time where a black president is a reality instead of a lofty goal, she will be sure to teach her the history it took to get here.

“I want to make sure she lives to her full potential, that’s number one, and this is just another example of that history that she can reach any goal she wants,” said Stacy Lettsome.

“We’ve had a new addition since the last Inauguration,” said Davis. “The minute Obama won back in November we decided we were coming back to bring baby Amoya.”

Lynn Igwemadu, 71, came to the United States in the 1970’s to work for the US Virgin Islands’ first delegate in the House of Representatives Ron de Lugo. Working on Capitol Hill for so long, she said she’s seen a lot of inaugurations over the years but this one was the most important because President Obama was re-elected.

“This is history and we are writing history right here,” said Igwemadu, “I missed the first one but I wasn’t going to miss this one. The change is so phenomenal. I’ve seen so many changes, good things and bad over the years. To be here with my family, it is a pleasure and a joy.”

The post Four generations witness Inauguration appeared first on Pavement Pieces.

Voter Education and Registration Program at Rikers Island Prison, 2008.”
Source: Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law

Glenn Martin lost the right to vote when he went to prison for six years for a felony. Under New York State law, he regained that right once he finished parole. But the Board of Elections turned him away in 2004.

Across the country, 5.8 million felons and ex-felons will be barred from voting in the Nov. 6 elections, and African Americans make up 38 percent of the disenfranchised, according to the Sentencing Project, an advocacy group. The US Elections project estimates that 219 million Americans are eligible to vote in the election.

Disenfranchisement of felons is a polarizing issue, especially in an election year. Some advocates for the rights of ex-offenders say Republicans block those rights because they think ex-felons would vote Democratic. But opponents of enfranchisement say letting ex-offenders vote would undermine democracy.

Four states (Iowa, Florida, Kentucky and Virginia) deny the right to vote not only to those in prison but also to those who have completed parole. New York is one of 41 states where the law enables ex-offenders to regain their voting rights. But these rights can be difficult to exercise.

Martin, now vice-president of development and public affairs at the Fortune Society, a prisoner reentry program based in New York City, says that denying ex-offenders the right to vote makes it harder for them to reintegrate in society.

“There is no better way to have people end up reoffending than (to) have them feel alienated from the rest of society,” he said. “Taking away people’s voting rights and keeping them from the polls is just another way of having folks with criminal records feel marginalized. We should be doing more to have them become part of the fabric of the community. Denying them the right to vote or creating huge hurdles for them to get over just exacerbates the problem of recidivism.”

In New York State, felons cannot vote while in prison or on probation. People convicted of misdemeanors and those who have completed probation are allowed to vote, according to the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University.

Martin said that most people do not understand the nuances of New York’s law on regaining voting rights. The result, he added, is a policy with “such a chilling effect that hundreds of thousands of people end up disenfranchised even if they aren’t disenfranchised by the law.”

Roger Clegg is a staunch opponent of enfranchisement even for those who have completed their sentences. As president of the conservative think-tank, Center for Equal Opportunity, based in Virginia, he says granting the right to vote to felons or ex-felons is not fair to the rest of society because those people have shown themselves to be irresponsible.

“We don’t let children vote, we don’t let non-citizens vote, we don’t let people who are mentally incompetent vote and we don’t let criminals vote,” Clegg said. “The common denominator there is that we have certain minimum objective standards of responsibility and commitment to the law and trustworthiness before we allow people to participate in a solemn enterprise of self-government, and people who have committed serious crimes against their fellow citizens don’t meet those minimum objective standards.”

Burt Neuborne, founding legal director at the Brennan Center for Justice, has been fighting against felony disenfranchisement for 15 years. He says opponents of voting rights for ex-felons are driven by political motives.

“The real reason that the opponents don’t want them to vote is that the opponents are almost all Republicans and they see this as a potential Democratic vote base,” Neuborne said. “It’s no coincidence that it is Virginia and Florida where the fight is going on the most. Both of those are very closely divided swing states, where the introduction of another 25,000 Democratic votes could swing the state.”

Clegg says that his position on felon disenfranchisement is non-partisan.

“I don’t know very much about the partisan impact of felon disenfranchisement because it doesn’t really matter. It shouldn’t be part of the equation one way or the other,” Clegg said. “I don’t deny that allowing felons to vote could change the election outcomes. Obviously, felons tend to vote for one party rather then the other and then of course there is potential it could change some elections but it doesn’t change whether they should vote or not.”

Twenty-three states across the country have made major reforms since 1997 to expand voter eligibility for felons and persons with criminal records, according to a report by The Sentencing Project called “Expanding the Vote.”

Some of these changes include amending lifetime disenfranchisement laws, expanding voting rights to persons on parole or probation, and easing restoration processes for persons seeking rights to vote after completing their sentences. Today, Maine and Vermont are the only two states that allow felons to vote during incarceration. Iowa, Virginia, Kentucky and Florida impose lifelong denials to vote for people with past felony convictions.

Neuborne says there are racial as well as partisan aspects to disenfranchisement.

“Because the criminal justice system itself is so biased against black people,” he said, “a disproportionately large number of people in the system are black or Hispanic, and that means that a disproportionately large number of people who are black or Hispanic have to serve their time and get out and then can’t vote.”

The Census Bureau does not include felons and ex-felons as a demographic category in its breakdown of voter turnout. However, Martin says that hundreds of felons and ex-felons in New York State do not turn up to vote even though they can. He adds that, in 2004, the Board of Elections created obstacles to his regaining his right to vote.

“I sent in an application and, instead of sending me back a voter registration card, they send me back a letter saying you need a letter from your parole officer,” he said. “Anyone who knows anything about parole knows how hard it is to get a letter when you’re on parole much less when you’re done with parole.”

Neuborne says that, because the laws differ from state to state, many ex-felons are confused about their rights, creating another disincentive to vote.

“The trouble is that state rules are not uniform, so although you’ve made progress on them, you wind up with a checkerboard quilt and it’s so hard to advise people what they have to do in various jurisdictions,” he said.

The Brennan Center supports a bill called the Democracy Restoration Act that would restore voting rights in federal elections to disenfranchised Americans who have been released from prison and are living in the community.

“It would establish uniform rules throughout the United States and it would trump the few remaining states, like Florida and Virginia, that are hold-outs and that continue to make it hard for felons to vote,” Neuborne said. “Uniform rules would be so important because then you could really do serious organizing drives among that community and get them interested in voting and not have to have it be so complicated. It’s hard enough to get them to vote without that kind of additional complication.”

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Cindy Pratt slowly walked to the counter of Magic Soul Food and paid $8.75 for a hardy portion of chicken smothered in barbecue sauce, two ice cream scoops of macaroni and cheese, and wild rice. She gestured to the worker to open the white take-out tray so she could examine her meal.

Pratt grabbed a fork from the overflowing, nearby utensil bin and poked at the dripping leg and thigh to ensure they were not too small. Pratt shook her head up and down to illustrate her satisfaction and grabbed her meal to go. But it’s the roughly 1,200 calorie meals like this one that are stealing the lives of so many black people each year.

Pratt, like 1.3 million other black people, has diabetes — the seventh largest killer of blacks. The 43-year-old has been diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes when she was 33, although this type usually only affects people older than 40. Pratt was raised on soul food, and she thinks this has had a major effect on her health.

“I have been eating fried chicken, macaroni and cheese, and sweet potatoes ever since I can remember,” Pratt said. “And you wonder why I look like this?”

Pratt weighs in at 212 pounds at 5 foot 6 inches tall. She says she is very overweight, unhealthy and uncomfortable.

Soul food is stereotypically classified as most foods that black people cook and eat.

NYU journalism professor Pamela Newkirk, who has written and edited several books about the black community, said economics has always played a large role in the consumption of soul food.

“During slavery, the slaves were given the food that was discarded by their masters,” Newkirk said. “That’s how things like chitlins became food items.”

Chitlins, or chitterlings, are the intestines of a pig. They are often consumed in broth with a side of hot sauce or just eaten by themselves. Chitlins are about 375 calories per cup.

In most predominately black communities, there are soul-food restaurants on nearly every block. Bed-Stuy, which has the largest black population in Brooklyn, has dozens of soul food restaurants.

Magic Soul Food, on the corner of Decatur Street and Malcolm X Boulevard, is the same popular soul-food joint at which Pratt enjoys a meal no less than twice a week.

“We get anywhere from 200 to 300 orders a day,” restaurant owner John Sales said. “It helps that our customers are very loyal. Once you come here once, you’re hooked.”

Sales admitted that his food is very unhealthy, but complained that when he tried to provide more diverse options, the food went unsold.

“I tried to sell salads and low-carb burgers and stuff, but no one bought the stuff,” he said.

Magic Soul Food cooks their food in Crisco, which is hydrogenated vegetable oil, or pure trans fat.

Most soul-food restaurants still use products with trans fat because hydrogenated oil lasts long and gives the food flavor, but customers such as Pratt suffer because they get addicted to the taste.

In New York City, there has been a recent push to eliminate the unhealthiest foods when the trans-fat ban was passed in 2008. It gave restaurants until the summer of 2008 to eliminate artifical trans fats, but Magic Soul Food still uses some of the worst artery-clogging culprits.

Newkirk said people such as Pratt suffer from health problems because they were never exposed to healthy, good-tasting food because it is too expensive.

“Many African-Americans who eat soul food don’t eat it all the time, but poorer people do because it’s cheaper,” Newkirk said.

Although Pratt has been working as a nurse for more than a decade, she still struggles to feed her family of four.

When Pratt was a child, her mother cooked soul food for her all the time. Sunday dinner was a big deal in their household, and this is typically where the unhealthy eating took place.

“On Sundays, we had anything you could ever imagine!” Pratt said. “Mac and cheese, cornbread, yams, greens, fried chicken and fish. My mouth is watering just thinking about it all. Man, I miss those dinners, and I miss her, too.”

Pratt’s mother passed away just a few years ago of heart failure. Pratt is unsure whether her mother’s health was affected negatively by soul food, but she believes it’s possible.

“Each time my mother fed us, she ate, too, so I am sure all that bad food did something to her,” she said.

The phrase “soul-food diseases” is a running joke in the black community, but most people like Pratt say they are unsure whether the soul foods they eat have a direct, negative correlation to their health.

“I know that I have diabetes,” Pratt said. “But I haven’t been to the doctor in nearly a half a year because I do not know what else I have nor do I want to know.”

Newkirk believes that “soul-food diseases” can affect anyone who cannot afford healthy food or just choose to eat soul food, but it is not limited to black people.

“How people eat is not only determined by culture, but also (by) economics,” Newkirk said. “I think most poor people have to eat these types of foods. Fresh vegetables are expensive. It comes down to what you can buy to feed your entire family. And let’s face it — soul food is good. Everyone likes it, not just black people.”

Soul food has been a kind of comfort food for centuries and is now something Pratt cannot live without.

“I don’t think I can live without soul food or fried foods in general,” Pratt said. “I mean, I tried to eat healthy, but everything else just tastes nasty.”

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