Facing South

SOUTHERN BLOC(K): Dixie Dems may pose biggest threat to health reform (ongoing updates)

2010-03-20T18:35:00Z

NOTE: See the bottom of this post for latest updates.

With only 24 hours to go before the big health reform vote, the White House and Dem leaders say they're within striking distance of the magic 216 needed to pass it in the House vote on Sunday.

Making Obama's job a lot harder is the stubborn opposition -- or vacillation -- of Southern Democrats. So far, 13 of the 26 Democrats who are expected to vote against the bill tomorrow hail from Southern states.

And while wavering Dems from other parts of the country have been slowing coming into the "yes" column, key Southern representatives have refused to budge, either solidifying their "nay" stance or refusing to commit.

Here's the latest news on where 20 key members of the Southern delegation stand (bold = most recent updates; "voted" = vote on last year's House health bill):

Representative	Voted	The Latest	The Buzz
Barrow, J (GA)	No	No (AJC, 3/19)	Progs ask: In a Dem-leaning district, why?
Berry, M (AR)	Yes	Undecided (NYT, 3/20)	Hinges on abortion compromise; retirement makes vote easier
Boucher, R (VA)	No	Undecided (T-N, 3/20)	Medicare reimbursement is the sticking point
Bright, B (AL)	No	No (MA, 3/20)	"We cannot afford the massive cost"
Boyd, A (FL)	No	Yes (WaPo, 3/19)	"This is good policy"
Chandler, B (KY)	No	No (LCJ, 3/20)	Won last election by +30 points
Childers, T (MS)	No	No (MCL, 3/20)	"Deeply concerned" about cost; abortion
Cuellar, H (TX)	Yes	Yes (WaPo , 3/20)	Released Sat statement saying "yes"
Davis, A (AL)	No	No (MA, 3/20)	Eyes on guv race; Black Caucus angry
Davis, L (TN)	No	No (Twitter, 3/21)	Various sources saying he's a no
Edwards, C (TX)	No	No (DMN, 3/18)	Worried about his "political future"
Kissell, L (NC)	No	No (WRAL, 3/20)	Netroots favorite now not so popular
Kosmas, S (FL)	No	Yes (WaPo, 3/19)	One of 2 big Fla pickups for White House
Marshall, J (GA)	No	No (AJC, 3/19)	Always a long shot
Mollohan, A (WV)	Yes	Undecided (NYT, 3/19)	Dems hopeful
Nye, G (VA)	No	No (Hill, 3/21)	One of 2 big Saturday defections
Ortiz, S (TX)	Yes	Likely Yes (TM, 3/19)	Not official, but Dems counting on a yes
Perriello, T (VA)	Yes	Yes (WaPo, 3/19)	Another big Friday pick-up
Rahall, N (WV)	Yes	Undecided (CG, 3/19)	Abortion making him a tough get
Tanner, J (TN)	No	No (Twitter, 3/21)	Various sources saying he's a no

For more news, check out The New York Times, The Huffington Post or Firedoglake for the latest whip counts.

UPDATES 3/20: The Hill says it's down to 20 key House votes as of 2:25 pm 3/20. They include: Berry (AR), Boucher (VA), Rahall (WV), ~~Cuellar (TX)~~, Davis (TN), Tanner (TN), Mollohan (WV), Nye (VA), Rodriguez (TX). That's nine Southerners on a list of 20.

* 4pm -- Cuellar is now a "yes.

UPDATES 3/21:

* Glenn Nye is now a "no."

* 1:25pm -- Pelosi says, and everyone agrees, that Dems have the 216 votes. But none of the undecideds -- including the key Southern question marks above -- have officially announced. So who's it going to be? My bets are on Berry, Boucher and Mollohan. We'll see about Davis, Rahall and Tanner.

* 1:50pm -- Tanner and L. Davis now in "no" column -- this makes the abortion/Stupak crew essential, which would influence Mollohan and Rahall.

* 2:09pm -- NYT still not saying L. David of Tenn. a "no," but we hear he is -- that means only 4 Southern Dem votes still in play: Berry (AR), Boucher (VA), Mollohan and Rahall (WV). Stupak/abortion deal key to Berry and Mollohan for sure, probably Rahall. What's the word on Boucher?

Georgia worries about uptick in H1N1 cases

2010-03-18T15:57:18Z

By Anthony D. Avincula, New America Media

ATLANTA -- Contrary to perception in the South and other parts of the country that H1N1 virus has already ebbed in recent months, health department officials here reported an unusual uptick in flu cases and warned that the H1N1 pandemic is far from over.

The last week of February alone saw 36 people hospitalized because of H1N1 and seasonal flu. In the first week of March the number had almost doubled, rising to 63. The victims, at least in DeKalb County, have been mostly people of color and women. As of March 4, there have been 66 seasonal flu and H1N1-related deaths in Georgia.

"The H1N1 is still here," said Dr. Elizabeth S. Ford, district health director of Atlanta's DeKalb County Board of Health, at an ethnic media press conference on March 4. "The local and state health agencies will continue to monitor this trend." The press event was organized by New America Media and sponsored by AIR, a nonprofit social science research organization.

Grappling with budget cuts, a shortage of vaccines, and an insufficient public health workforce, Ford attributed the spike of H1N1 and seasonal flu fatalities in Georgia to its low vaccination rate. In DeKalb County alone, the third most populated county in the Atlanta area, only 7 percent of the population got the vaccine since the 2009 H1N1 outbreak.

"There are 760,000 residents in DeKalb County -- and the population count is more than double during daytime -- but less than 55,000 got vaccinated," said Ford, adding that she was disappointed that the vaccines arrived late.

When the virus hit the country and peaked around June 2009, vaccines ran out and the federal government identified states by priority. While Georgia got the first shipments of H1N1 vaccine in mid-October, many people took the wait-and-see approach, trying to ascertain how the new vaccine affected people before taking it themselves.

"When we get out there, we're really struggling. Everyone in the state is asking the federal government for the same funding," Ford added.

Although no conclusive investigation has made an association between the deaths and race and gender, health officials here believe that minorities and women are considerably more vulnerable and at higher risk due to lack of health insurance and access to better health services.

Amid the enormous challenges in getting a majority of residents vaccinated, DeKalb County health officials have given their H1N1 awareness effort a grade of A, but B for messaging and sending the information out to the public, caregivers and infrastructure partners, and C+ for their mass vaccination effort.

"The economic situation has affected public health tremendously," said Dr. Patrick O'Neal, chief of Emergency Preparedness and Response Division of Georgia Department of Community Health.

Because of the unstable economy, he pointed out that many public health workers are searching for a more stable job by moving to a federal health agency, like the CDC. "Our workforce is essentially lured to a higher pay scale. We've lost a large number of workers to the CDC."

But O'Neal is concerned more about the possible third wave of H1N1 pandemic than the economic constraints. With re-assortment of the virus, which is very likely to happen, as was reported earlier this year in Hong Kong, he said that any genetic mutation of H1N1 is far more dangerous, as the virus could develop a new strain.

"If the case in Hong Kong will be found to be a re-assorted virus, then the global H1N1 pandemic remains very active," O'Neal said after the press briefing. "That creates the next wave of the virus."

The only way that the virus will be curbed, he added, is when 90 percent of the population gets protected through vaccination, or has been exposed to the same H1N1 strain before and thus becomes immune to its ill effects.

Historically, the United States was able to successfully eliminate through vaccination some serious viral illnesses, such as polio and typhoid fever. But many people still believe that the H1N1 virus is very unstable -- and certainly different from a uniform virus that causes polio and typhoid fever. Skeptics also say that H1N1, like any influenza virus, mutates and therefore no one-size-fits-all vaccination can prevent it.

"It is a usual spin for people who have not been vaccinated to ask, 'If H1N1 is more fatal than any other flu virus, then how come nothing really happens to us?' That's the problem right there," said Pam Jones, AIR media associate, adding that many Georgians are still wary of getting the H1N1 vaccine.

"Even though H1N1 may be low and flat right now, come flu season it could rise again," O'Neal said. "It is clear that the virus still exists."

Senators who opposed jobs bill come from states hit hard by unemployment

2010-03-18T13:54:34Z

The U.S. Senate passed a jobs bill yesterday that aims to tackle unemployment by providing tax incentives to businesses that hire jobless workers.

The measure passed with unusually strong Republican support -- but as with the recent Senate vote on extending unemployment benefits, many of those lawmakers who opposed the bill come from states with above-average unemployment rates.

The HIRE Act exempts employers from payroll taxes through this year on new hires who've been unemployed for at least 60 days. It also extends the federal highway construction program and other public building projects. The measure is estimated to cost $13 billion over 10 years and is partly financed by tougher limits on offshore tax havens.

The final vote on the bill was 68-29, with 11 Republicans crossing the aisle to join with their Democratic and Independent colleagues in approving the measure.

The Republicans who voted for the bill were Sens. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, Kit Bond of Missouri, Scott Brown of Massachusetts, Richard Burr of North Carolina, Thad Cochran of Mississippi, Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe of Maine, James Inhofe of Oklahoma, George LeMieux of Florida, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and George Voinovich of Ohio.

"I voted for this bill because, without increasing the federal debt, it permits small businesses to deduct their capital investments from their taxes, which gives them more money to create jobs; provides tax incentives for businesses to hire unemployed workers; and provides needed funds for our highways," Sen. Alexander said in a statement.

Of the 29 Senators who voted against the bill, 11 come from states with official unemployment rates higher than the national average of 10.7% as of January 2010. And of those 11, 10 are from Southern states that have been hit especially hard by unemployment, as seen in this chart:

That follows a pattern similar to what we saw in the Senate vote earlier this month on extending unemployment benefits.

Following a controversial filibuster of the benefits extension by Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.), the measure passed by a vote of 78-19. And of the 19 Senators who voted against that bill, eight hailed from states that had jobless rates higher than the national average. And all but one of them -- Sen. Jim Ensign (R-Nev.) -- came from the South.

But not all the Senators who opposed extending jobless benefits voted against the jobs creation bill, and vice versa.

Among Senators from Southern states with higher-than-average unemployment rates, Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) and Georgia Republicans Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson did not oppose extending jobless benefits, but all voted against the job creation bill.

And while Sens. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) and Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) opposed extending unemployment benefits, they supported the job creation bill.

Those lawmakers from states with higher-than-average jobless rates who objected to extending unemployment benefits and the jobs bill? Sens. Ensign, Bunning, Jim DeMint (R-S.C.), Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

TURNING THE LOCK-EM-UP TIDE: State prison populations decline for first time since 1972

2010-03-17T15:40:00Z

Locking people up in jails and prisons is expensive. State officials know this all too well: In a country that puts more people behind bars than any other -- the U.S. has less than 5% of the world's population, but 25% of its prisoners -- over 91% of the incarcerated are under state or local supervision.

The lock-'em-up approach to criminal justice that took off in the 1980s and '90s may have helped a few political careers, but it has crushed state budgets: By 2008, states were spending over $50 billion a year on incarceration.

But as Facing South has been reporting (see here and here), the Great Recession helped change that, pushing states to explore less expensive (and often more effective) options like alternative sentences for non-violent offenders and streamlining probation and parole.

Today, the Pew Center has released a report showing the shift in approach is bearing fruit: For the first time in 38 years, state prison populations are in decline.

In January 2010 there were 5,700 fewer inmates in state prisons than last year, marking "the first year-to-year drop in the nation's state prison population since 1972." And some of the biggest declines have been in states known for hard-line criminal justice systems.

Take the case of Mississippi. In 1995, the get-tough-on-crime Magnolia state enacted a "truth in sentencing" law which required inmates to serve at least 85% of their time before being considered for parole. But two years ago, Mississippi changed course:

Responding to budget constraints and a surge in its prison population -- from about 12,000 inmates in 1995 to more than 22,000 in 2008 -- lawmakers revisited truth in sentencing. They changed the law so nonviolent offenders would be eligible for parole after serving a quarter, not 85 percent, of their sentences. Over the course of the next year, more than 3,000 inmates were released an average of 13 months earlier than they otherwise would have been.

The end result: Mississippi has shed 5.4% of its prison population, one of the sharpest drops in the country.

But not all states are laying down the prison keys. While Pew finds 27 states lowered their prison population -- including five in the South, among them Kentucky, South Carolina and even Texas (!) -- 23 went the other direction and increased their number of prison inmates. Here are the states going against the trend:

STATES WITH INCREASES IN PRISON POPULATION

Indiana: +5.3%
West Virginia: +5.1%
Vermont: +5%
Pennsylvania: +4.3%
Alaska: +3.8%
Louisiana: +3.7%
Alabama: +3.5%
Arkansas: +3.1%

But overall, states are cutting down on incarceration, and Pew makes a point of saying it's not just about cash: Crime is down, prisons are over-crowded and states are re-thinking their approaches to corrections; they're not "simply shedding inmates in a rush to save money."

That's likely true, although money still seems to be the biggest driver. For example, it's notable that the eight states which saw inmates increase by 3% or more all have state budget deficits below the national average. They're still struggling and, as of the end of last month, they all had budgets in the red.

But these states all apparently believe they still have enough cash to burn to spend the roughly $79 a day it costs to keep another inmate behind bars.

A critical look at plans for uranium mining in Virginia

2010-03-17T14:19:25Z

Virginia Energy Resources -- a company formed by last year's merger of Canadian corporation Santoy and Virginia Uranium -- wants to mine and mill uranium on 3,000 acres in Southside Virginia's Pittsylvania County along the North Carolina border.

That would require lifting a ban the state placed on uranium mining back in 1982. The Virginia Commission on Coal and Energy created a subcommittee to study the issue, which is scheduled to be released later this year. Meanwhile, the National Academies of Sciences and Virginia Tech have also agreed to study the potential environmental and public health impacts of the mining plans; that study is expected to be released next year.

The push to open up the state to uranium mining comes as President Obama is promoting the expanded use of commercial nuclear power in the United States. His latest budget would triple taxpayer-backed loan guarantees for new reactors from $18.5 billion to $54 billion.

The Virginia uranium deposit holds an estimated 60,000 tons -- enough radioactive fuel to power all the commercial nuclear plants in the U.S. for about two years.

Last week, the Southern Environmental Law Center, Sierra Club and other groups opposed to uranium mining held a forum in Richmond to discuss the drawbacks associated with the plans. Here in the United States, uranium has traditionally been mined in arid regions of the West; if the Virginia mining plans were approved, they would mark the first time that full-scale uranium mining was done in the wetter climes east of the Mississippi River.

A major concern is the impact that uranium mining and milling -- a highly toxic undertaking -- would have on the Roanoke River basin, where the uranium deposit is located. That basin supplies drinking water to tens of thousands of people across a vast region stretching all the way to the tourist community of Virginia Beach and the naval base at Norfolk.

The company says the uranium could be mined safety. However, uranium mining has a well-documented history of causing serious environmental health problems elsewhere, having been linked to chromosome abnormalities, birth defects and cancer in communities from Texas to Germany.

As the debate over the Virginia uranium mining plans continues, the Southern Environmental Law Center has released a short video taking a critical look at the proposal. Watch it here:

In Baton Rouge, more evidence of police misconduct after Hurricane Katrina

2010-03-17T13:23:23Z

By A.C. Thompson, ProPublica

On Sunday, the Baton Rouge Advocate published a damning exposé detailing allegations of misconduct by Baton Rouge police officers in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

After a four-year legal battle, the paper finally got a cache of police department documents describing a pattern of racist and abusive behavior by Baton Rouge officers in the days after the storm ravaged the Gulf coast. The cops are accused of using demeaning language; routinely harassing African Americans; physically abusing citizens; and seeking to "make life rough for New Orleans evacuees so they would leave town," according to the Advocate, which has posted the documents online.

Here's the twist: The accusations were made by other cops, 55 state troopers from New Mexico and Michigan who had been sent to Baton Rouge to assist with post-storm policing. The out-of-state cops were yanked out of Baton Rouge after only two days because of their concerns about misconduct.

The visiting officers said Baton Rouge cops referred to African Americans as "heathens" and "animals" that "needed to be beaten down."

In response to the newspaper's questions, Baton Rouge Police Chief Jeff LeDuff said some of the allegations against his officers were "maybe blown out of proportion." He also said his department had investigated the incidents and dealt with any policy violations uncovered.

Five years after the hurricane, controversy about police tactics in the aftermath of the disaster continues to swirl. In recent weeks, two former New Orleans cops have pleaded guilty to federal charges in connection to high-profile shootings on the Danziger Bridge. Federal agents are investigating four other police shooting incidents from the time period.

We're covering these violent encounters in an ongoing series with the New Orleans Times-Picayune and PBS "Frontline."

Ending North Carolina's dependence on dirty coal

2010-03-16T13:59:19Z

As a state that depends heavily on coal-fired power, North Carolina currently dumps more climate-disrupting carbon dioxide pollution into the environment from burning fossil fuels than 186 nations.

But a new analysis [pdf] by a clean-energy advocacy group finds that it would be relatively easy to break the state's dirty energy dependency -- and eliminate the need for expensive new nuclear reactors to boot.

The N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network will present the findings during this week's N.C. Utilities Commission hearings on how Progress Energy and Duke Energy -- the state's two biggest power providers -- plan to meet customers' energy needs over the next 15 years. The analysis was conducted by John Blackburn, an economics professor emeritus at Duke University and a renewable energy expert.

"We are convinced that North Carolina can now phase out all coal-fired power plants," says N.C. WARN Executive Director Jim Warren.

The analysis finds that this could be done by doing three things:

* Increase efficiency in electricity use at a rate of 1.5% per year over the 15-year planning period;

* Up the state's renewable portfolio standard -- the amount of energy that utilities are obligated to generate from cleaner sources -- from the current 12.5 % to the 20% standard used by 17 other states; and

* Boost the use of combined heat and power or cogeneration facilities that utilize waste heat produced during electricity production for heating buildings.

This latest analysis by Blackburn comes on the heels of another released last week that showed North Carolina's need for backup power generation would be modest if it were to switch to an energy system based largely on solar and wind power combined with efficiency, hydroelectric power and other renewable sources like landfill gas.

It also comes as the state's utilities are planning to build costly and polluting new coal and nuclear facilities to meet customers' power needs.

Duke Energy -- which in its own filing with the commission dismisses Blackburn's analysis as "so flawed as to be completely unreliable" -- is currently about halfway through building a controversial new coal-fired unit at its existing Cliffside facility in western North Carolina, a project for which the company has budgeted some $1.8 billion. But in another filing submitted to state regulators earlier this month, the company reported that it "is experiencing cost and schedule pressure related to construction."

And soaring costs are not a problem limited to Cliffside -- or to new coal plants. The construction cost estimate for the two new nuclear reactors Duke Energy is planning to to build at its Lee Station in Cherokee County, S.C. near Charlotte has more than doubled from an initial estimate of between $4 billion and $6 billion to about $11 billion. Meanwhile, Progress Energy has also doubled the construction cost estimate for the two new reactors planned for its Harris plant near Raleigh, N.C. from about $4.4 billion to more than $9.3 billion.

"We think our plans are cheaper and more feasible than new nuclear reactors," says Blackburn.

With analysis in hand, N.C. WARN plans to expand its ongoing organizing effort to halt construction of the new Cliffside plant and call for closing down all coal-fired power plants in North Carolina over the next 15 years. Citing scientific experts including James Hansen of NASA's Goddard Institute and Rajendra Pachauri of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Warren says ending coal burning is urgent to prevent runaway climate disruption.

The utilities themselves are already taking steps away from coal: Progress Energy recently announced plans to shut down 11 coal-fired units at four plants in the eastern part of the state by 2017 and replace some of that generation capacity with natural gas, which emits less carbon dioxide than coal. And as part of its Cliffside construction plans, Duke Energy is shutting down four older, heavily-polluting coal-fired units at that facility -- though the new high-tech coal unit would still emit over 6 million tons of carbon dioxide annually.

North Carolina currently has 67 operating coal-fired units at 25 locations totaling 13,279 megawatts of capacity, putting it in ninth place nationally in terms of dependence on coal power.

CENSUS WATCH: Rights groups ask ICE to stop raids for Census

2010-03-15T13:59:05Z

By Jacob Simas, New America Media

Immigrant rights advocates have sent a letter to President Barack Obama and Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Janet Napolitano asking them to immediately suspend all immigration enforcement activities through the end of the year in order to decrease fear within immigrant communities and encourage their participation in the 2010 Census.

Questionnaires for the 2010 Census are due to arrive in the mailbox of every U.S. household between now and April 1.

"We are genuinely concerned that the climate of fear will seriously impact the census form return rate of immigrant households -- and if people do not return the form, they will be reluctant to open the door to a follow-up visit from a census worker," said Catherine Tactaquin, director of National Network for Immigrant and Refugee Rights (NNIRR). "We really need the leadership of the administration right now to make a difference in the success of the census among our diverse immigrant populations."

The letter, which was signed by more than 200 organizations nationwide, calls for the suspension of more than a dozen specific enforcement activities operated through DHS, including immigration raids on homes and workplaces.

ICE Responds

ICE spokesperson Lori Haley told NAM she was unaware of the immigrant advocates' letter. In a prepared statement, the agency said that ICE "fully supports an accurate count of the U.S. population," and would prioritize enforcing laws "on those dangerous criminal aliens who present the greatest risk to the security of our communities, not sweeps or raids to target undocumented immigrants indiscriminately."

The problem, according to Arnoldo Garcia, a program director at NNIRR in Oakland, is that ICE raids result in only 2 percent of the roughly 500,000 deportations of immigrants that occur each year in the United States. "It would not be enough for Napolitano or congress to just say, 'Okay, let's suspend raids.' That would be a gross injustice," he said.

Even if ICE were to de-emphasize immigration raids, said Garcia, the majority of people being picked up and deported are a result of less visible strategies, like those arising from 287(g) agreements.

Such agreements allow local police and county sheriff departments to be trained by ICE in identifying potential "criminal aliens." The result, said Garcia, is an increase in deportations and a growing mistrust of government and law-enforcement agencies within immigrant communities, including among legal permanent residents.

"Most people don't realize that law enforcement is also deporting legal residents on criminal charges," he said. "If you're not a U.S. citizen, even if you are a legal permanent resident, you can still be subjected to deportation."

Garcia says the organizations are simply asking the Obama administration and DHS to follow historical precedent. According to the letter, the federal government eased immigration enforcement activities during at least the last two decennial census campaigns.

Historical Precedent

The letter references a quote from Rep. Sylvestre Reyes, a Democrat from Texas, who told Fox News last year that when he was working for the Border Patrol during the lead-up to the 1990 census, he received orders to suspend some enforcement efforts.

There is other documentation that would suggest that the INS changed some of its operations during the 1990 census. For example, the INS commissioner sent a fax on Feb. 15, 1990 to all field offices, outlining guidelines for enforcement operations conducted while the census was being carried out, with the intention of deterring INS employees from "engaging in any conduct that is intended to inhibit or deter any person or group of persons from the fullest possible participation in the upcoming 1990 Census."

The document goes on to state:

In keeping with an agreement between the Service and the Bureau of the Census, news releases or public announcements made by the Service with regard to Service enforcement activities will be temporarily discontinued during the period starting February 11, 1990 and ending July 31, 1990.

It is unclear from the commissioner's fax whether the INS actually suspended activities, or simply stopped reporting them to the public.

Doris Meissner, who was head of INS during the 2000 Census, told the Orange County Register in January that she did in fact order suspension of "routine operations and enforcement activities" during the two weeks leading up to Census day, while allowing more serious enforcement involving criminal activities to continue unabated.

However, Meissner said that the likelihood of the Obama administration allowing even that to happen again is slim, considering how much the political landscape has changed since 2000.

"We definitely went further than what I'm hearing from this administration thus far," she told the Register. "I think politically they feel more vulnerable and they may even believe that by going any further they would send signals that would embolden serious criminals and possibly terrorists."

Census Bureau Promises Hands-Off Approach to Immigration

Regardless of what has occurred in the past, Census Bureau spokesperson Sonny Le says the bureau is taking a hands-off approach to the question of immigration enforcement in 2010. "We don"t request or interfere with other departments," said Le. "Any decisions are going to have to come from Congress or the president."

Nevertheless, NNIRR is optimistic that the Obama administration will recognize that the long-term benefits of an enforcement suspension outweigh any short-term political backlash.

"Having an accurate count of the immigrant population is not only good for immigrants," said Garcia. "There has been a demographic revolution in this country over the last 10 years, and in those communities where there has been a big demographic change, if immigrants are undercounted, the whole community will be shooting itself in the foot."

Applying Hurricane Katrina's lessons to help post-quake Haiti

2010-03-12T17:18:18Z

Organizations and individuals that were involved in the Hurricane Katrina recovery effort in New Orleans are now applying the lessons they learned following that disaster to help the people of earthquake-stricken Haiti.

Launched shortly after the Jan. 12 earthquake that devastated the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince and surrounding region, the effort was initially called the Haiti Emergency Village Project but has since changed its name to the Louisiana/Haiti Sustainable Village Project. It involves more than 40 disaster recovery and urban infrastructure professionals who are working to build an emergency village in Haiti to provide housing, infrastructure and other services as an alternative to camps.

The project was launched by Jacques Morial, co-director of the Louisiana Justice Institute, and Charles Allen III, director of New Orleans' Center for Sustainable Engagement and Development and chair of that city's Holy Cross Neighborhood Association. Also involved in the project's founding were Dr. Austin Allen, a landscape architect and professor who's been involved in recovery efforts in New Orleans' Lower Ninth Ward, and Tim Duggan of the Make It Right Foundation, LJI's Justice Roars blog reports:

"While we can't imagine the epic scale of devastation and death, we've learned some painful lessons in our own struggle to recover from the floods that followed Katrina, and it's our spiritual responsibility and moral obligation to offer the benefit of our experience, understanding and capacity to help the Haitian people in any way they find useful and appropriate," said Jacques Morial.

The project has already airlifted more than six tons of supplies to medical teams in Haiti, and its New Orleans to Haiti Barge Initiative delivered by sea some 100,000 tons of donated medical supplies, tents, household good and food to the Haitian port of Jacmel earlier this month.

Contributions to the Louisiana/Haiti Sustainable Village Project can be made online through the Louisiana Disaster Recovery Foundation.

INSTITUTE INDEX: Civil rights in the classroom

2010-03-12T15:06:36Z

Date on which U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan delivered a speech at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Ala. calling for stepped up civil rights enforcement in schools: 3/8/2010

Number of years earlier that the infamous "Bloody Sunday" civil rights confrontation took place there, an event that Duncan's speech commemorated: 45

Number of civil rights investigations that Duncan's department plans to open this year: 38

Number of states in which the department plans to examine school districts' disciplinary practices: 5

Since 1980, percentage by which the staff in the Education Department's civil rights unit has been reduced: 50

Number of times by which white students are more likely than black students to be college-ready in biology at the end of high school: 6

Number of times by which white students are more likely than black students to be prepared for college algebra: 4

Number of times by which black students with disabilities are more likely than their white counterparts to be expelled or suspended: more than 2

Number of times by which black students without disabilities are more likely than white students to be expelled: more than 3

Percentage by which students from low-income families who graduated in the top testing quartile are more likely to attend college than the lowest-scoring students from wealthy families: 0

Percentage of U.S. high schools that produce half of all U.S. dropouts: 12

Percentage of African-American and Latino students who come from those schools: 75

Percentage of teachers who had been let go and had trouble finding another job who were placed in high-poverty schools, according to one newspaper investigation: 75

(Click on the figure to go to the original source.)

(Photo of Secretary Duncan speaking in Selma from the U.S. Department of Education's website.)

Who are the 6 Democratic senators poised to kill student loan reform?

2010-03-11T16:05:00Z

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Graduating from college is a great feeling. Not so great: being saddled with $23,200 in student loans, the average debt owed by graduates of the class of 2008, according to the Project on Student Debt.

Reforming the for-profit student loan system, which allows finance giants like Virginia-based Sallie Mae to make virtually risk-free returns thanks to government subsidies, was a top priority of President Obama. His idea, supported by most Democrats, was to take out the middle-man: Instead of subsidizing private lenders, the feds would completely take over origination of student loans.

The result: The Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act, which the Office of Management and Budget estimated would save over $80 billion over 10 years (critics point out the number is inflated, because it didn't include money lost from defaults; but that's neither here nor there, because the government currently absorbs private losses anyway). Savings would be plowed back into Pell Grants -- much easier on students in the long-term -- and other higher education initiatives.

But as The New York Times writes today, this week six senate Democrats have threatened to derail the Act, writing in a letter to senate majority leader Harry Reid that "provisions of contemplated student lending reform that could put jobs at risk."

The letter was signed by Democratic Senators Thomas R. Carper (DE), Blanche Lincoln (AR), Ben Nelson (NE), Bill Nelson (FL), Mark Warner (VA) and Jim Webb (VA).

The senators' back-stepping, which likely scuttles the possibility of passing the Act with the filibuster-proof appropriations bill, comes after over a year of aggressive lobbying by heavyweights in the corporate loan industry. Sallie Mae alone spent $3.48 million on lobbying last year leading an all-out assault by industry reps claiming up to 35,000 jobs would be lost.

But proponents of reform have steadily hacked away at the bank's claims. First, it turns out the total jobs in student loans is closer to 30,000. But most importantly, the part of the industry the bill affects -- loan origination -- employs the fewest workers. According to Ben Miller at The Quick and the Ed (via Jane Hamsher):

Loan origination in its most basic form is the process of obtaining the money for student loans and transferring those funds to borrowers or to their institutions. This is a very inexpensive activity. According to information from the U.S. Department of Education, its complete cost of originating a Direct Loan last year was around $5.50. That figure includes around $1.50 in administrative and other expenses.

Sallie Mae and the big loan companies would still be able to service the loans, which is where most of the money -- and jobs -- are. Nelnet, Sen. Nelson of Nebraska's biggest contributor, saw their servicing revenues go up 13% last year after getting a contract through the Department of Education.

Why are the senators doing this? The first place to look for answers is the political muscle and deep pockets of the student loan industry. Between 2005 and 2010, Nebraska-based Nelnet has shoveled $63,100 to Sen. Nelson's campaigns.

Virginia senators Warner and Webb have to worry about Sallie Mae based in Reston, which employs 8,000 workers in Reston and has shown its willingness to play political hardball. Florida is also home to several leading student loan operations in the primary and secondary markets, and Sen. Carper's Delaware is ground zero for financial services outside of New York.

The more puzzling case is Sen. Lincoln of Arkansas. Her position on the Senate Finance Committee has made her a magnet for banking and finance campaign dollars ($246,700 for the 2010 cycle). But a search of her campaign contributions show no special ties to the student lending industry.

So how is siding with big lenders driving students into debt going to help her back home in Arkansas, which ranks in the bottom 15 states nationally for number of college-age youth getting a university degree?

Second figure charged in post-Katrina police shootings

2010-03-11T13:44:19Z

By A.C. Thompson, ProPublica

A second former New Orleans Police Department officer has been charged in federal court in connection with the Sept. 4, 2005 shootings on the Danziger Bridge. Jeffrey Lehrmann, who left the NOPD to work for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, was charged last month with concealing a crime, according to court documents unsealed Tuesday and obtained by our partners at the New Orleans Times-Picayune.

Late last year, ProPublica, PBS "Frontline" and the Times-Picayune teamed up to examine a string of violent encounters between police and civilians that occurred in New Orleans during the week after Hurricane Katrina made landfall.

The bridge incident was particularly notorious. Police officers shot six citizens, killing two. Lehrmann, tasked with investigating what happened on the bridge, "participated in the creation of false reports" and provided "false information to investigating agents," according to the bill of information filed by the U.S. Department of Justice.

As the Times-Picayune noted, Lehrmann also plays a central role in another ongoing controversy: While working as an NOPD detective he helped build the case against Michael Anderson, whose murder conviction was overturned recently when a judge found that prosecutors had failed to turn over key evidence to defense lawyers.

Last month, former NOPD Lt. Michael Lohman pleaded guilty to conspiring to obstruct justice in connection with the bridge shootings.

Down in the South: New jobs numbers show Southern states suffering

2010-03-10T17:17:08Z

As I noted in my piece yesterday on why Obama and Democrats need to get serious about job creation if they want to improve their fortunes in the South, today the government released its new state-based jobs numbers.

What does the data tell us? It's pretty much the same story as last month: Southern states are hurting more.

Same as last month, eight out of 13 Southern states have higher unemployment rates than the national average:

What's also striking is how much unemployment has risen. While slightly down from December 2009, every Southern state has seen its jobless rate increase over the last year.

The one-year increase has been bigger than the national average in seven Southern states, including West Virginia which saw an increase of +3.5, or 24,000 more people out of work.

Florida had the single-biggest yearly increase in the nation, with the number of unemployed growing by 303,200 between January 2009 and January 2010.

The state of chronic joblessness many Southern states are facing has lots of political implications, from the fight in Congress over unemployment benefits to the long-term need for a real national jobs strategy.

Citizens gather in Washington to end 'mountain bombing' of Appalachia

2010-03-10T14:40:39Z

More than 200 citizen lobbyists from across the nation gathered in Washington, D.C. this week to urge Congress to pass legislation curbing mountaintop removal. This especially destructive form of coal mining involves blasting off the tops of Appalachian mountains and dumping the waste into headwater streams below, a practice known as "valley fills."

The activists taking part in Alliance for Appalachia's fifth annual End Mountaintop Removal Week are pressing for passage of two bills -- the Clean Water Protection Act (H.R. 1310) and the Appalachia Restoration Act (S.696) -- that would reinstate a long-standing regulation under the federal Clean Water Act prohibiting industries from burying streams and other waterways under waste.

H.R. 1310's primary sponsor is Rep. Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), and the measure has more than 160 co-sponsors to date. S. 696's primary sponsor is Sen. Benjamin Cardin (D-Md.), and it has 9 co-sponsors. They include Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), whose state does not allow valley fills.

Mountaintop removal mining became widely used across Appalachia in the 1970s as a cheaper and less labor-intensive way of extracting coal than traditional underground mining. Today the practice is most common in West Virginia and eastern Kentucky, with utilities in North Carolina and Georgia the nation's top consumers of mountaintop removal coal.

The citizen lobbyists heard presentations from a number of activists working to end mountaintop removal. They included Mickey McCoy with Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, who said:

"They have a lot of soft words for what they're doing. Like 'pond' for slurry. We're talkin' 72 acres! That's a lake. And 'spill.' 'Spill' is what happens when your son reaches over the table and spills his sister's milk. These are floods. Even mountaintop removal doesn't sound too bad if you say it real fast. They should really be calling it 'mountain bombing.'"

The D.C. gathering comes as the Obama administration -- which has promised to take "unprecedented steps" to curb damages from mountaintop removal -- announced that it was delaying the release of guidelines for mining companies seeking valley-fill permits. Originally scheduled for release this week, the guidelines are reportedly going to come out next week, the Charleston Gazette reports.

In a question-and-answer session following a speech she delivered on Monday at the National Press Club, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson noted that while her agency does not have the authority to regulate mining practices, it does have authority over how those practices affect water quality.

The same day as Jackson's speech, a group of anti-mountaintop removal activists including Upper Watauga Riverkeeper Donna Marie Lisenby with North Carolina-based Appalachian Voices met with EPA staff at the agency's headquarters. The activists came bearing gifts: black water from Appalachian streams poisoned by coal mining.

Here's a video from iLoveMountains.org with more information about this week's action:

(Photo from iLoveMountains.org.)

Women's Day march in San Antonio says 'Ya Basta' to abusive treatment of workers

2010-03-09T18:33:38Z

By Chris Kutalik, Labor Notes

Much like its storied sibling, International Labor Day (May 1), International Women's Day often gets short shrift in the United States, its place of birth.

But for 20 straight years women's groups and allies in San Antonio, Texas have been raising the profile of Women's Day -- and a little hell -- by taking to the streets. The march has grown steadily over the years, and close to 2,000 marched this Saturday, making it the largest and arguably the rowdiest such event in the country.

The varied messages of the annual event reflect the broad coalition of groups that come together to plan it over several months of weekly women-only meetings. Women from the worker-run seamstress collective Fuerza Unida rub shoulders with younger Chicana feminists from the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center and women from a local university's social work association and the Martinez Street Women's Center. Banners bearing the Virgin of Guadalupe mix with signs showing old-time Latina labor leader Emma Tenayuca and those bearing slogans like "End NAFTA: Stop the Femicide in Juarez" (a reference to the many violent deaths stemming from the drug trade in that border city).

Starting this year in front of downtown San Antonio's massive 1,000-room Grand Hyatt, this wide-ranging group placed the fight for women in the workplace center stage. For over a year now, a tight rank-and-file UNITE HERE-affiliated organizing committee has been plugging away at rallies, worker-community delegations, creative street actions, neighborhood outreach, and member-to-member organizing in an effort to get the hotel to back down from its aggressively anti-union campaign locally -- and provide a neutral process for the workers to choose a union.

Many of the committee's stalwarts are women workers in the hotel's housekeeping and laundry departments. And many of them are just plain tired and angry about their grinding workload.

Iola Scott, a Grand Hyatt laundry worker and Katrina survivor, addressed the cheering crowd in front of the hotel: "Sometimes I work the [laundry] chute, pulling many pounds of filthy, contaminated linens, moving them and sorting them. The work is hard and heavy. I have pain when I'm working and I have pain when I'm home...and I have the medicine cabinet to prove it.

"I'm proud of myself and my co-workers, because we are not just victims," said Scott, referring to the committee's linking its local fight to national efforts around hotel job injuries and lifting standards in the industry. "We are not afraid to fight back," she said. "We are leaders in a campaign across the country to force companies like Hyatt to stop abusing and hurting women. And we invite all women to join in this struggle, because our fight is a fight for all women."

Chants of "Hyatt, Hyatt, What do you say? Stop abusing your workers today" echoed back from the towering hotel as the three-block-long march swung out into the wide street in front of it. Hotel workers waved from upstairs windows and cars and buses honked their horns in support as the march moved through downtown to Plaza del Zacate, a historic meeting spot in Milam Park for the city's various protest movements.

Chris Kutalik is a Labor Notes Policy Committee member who is helping organize UNITE HERE's community unionism project in San Antonio. He can be reached at kutalik@gmail.com.

(Photo by Chris Kutalik)