We’ve continued to lean toward justice for all in 2019. This year has seen much happening in Baltimore and beyond (nationally and internationally) around movement building toward equity. We have been bringing healing into our justice spaces as we acknowledge the trauma in our minds and bodies requiring transformation for a transformed world. We talk more about love as the basis for justice calling back to Cornell West’s quote: “Never forget that justice is what love looks like in public”.

In a country that espouses justice in its Constitution, it will remain our work to live into such a nation. The ignorance of the founding fathers assured a limited vision of justice for some. It is therefore our obligation as citizens to embrace our Constitution with wisdom and translate justice for all. So of course this means we accept struggle as our birthright: those whose ancestors did not look like or come from the land-owning race and class, and those who did. This requires us to be radical in love: wise, and more daring to be loving and inclusive than we know.

We also live in a country that has negotiated, through violence, for equal rights. Our violence does not exist only in the more obvious verbal and physical injury to our persons; it exists in all the systems that violate our personhood. These systems are framed in a capitalist economy that violates the rights of human beings to have fair wages, health insurance, adequate housing and education, safe neighborhoods and recreation, and healthy foods. Violation of the environment and all types of beings directly and indirectly feeds this system of greed and injustice. The transformation of these systems and structures built on greed and hatred will require a similar transformation in ourselves.

Concurrently the commander in chief of the country of the past 3 years unleashed a blatant push back toward a conservative nationalism and separatist ideology of white and wealth supremacy. His white wealth and power pulpit makes it more widespread and further entrenches and embodies this value of the nation, particularly in the weak, small-hearted, and ignorant. These last three years then have served to embolden us who seek love inside and outside of ourselves to uncover our hearts and find ways to bridge the separation between differences. Because like Mahatma Ghandi, Mother Theresa, Dr. Martin Luther King, and other peace and spiritual activists have encouraged: it will not be violence that stops violence, but radical love and radical kindness.

Each year we move the pendulum a bit more toward justice by being courageous enough to love beyond our comfort zones, forgive, and see the complexity of ourselves in those we easily dismiss. In a country built on the ideology of exploitation, discrimination, greed, and ignorance what else can we expect but to spend our lives undoing these root causes of injustice: in ourselves and in our systems?  As we step mindfully into the new year, let’s pledge to continue our walk toward freedom. Our steps must be deep and steady enough for the little feet coming after us to safely, confidently, and joyfully step into.

The Baltimore City Office of Civil Rights and Wage Enforcement held its inaugural ‘Civil Rights week’ this past week. It began with a talk by Reverend Jesse Jackson and featured 9 events highlighting civil rights activities in the city. This unique week culminated with an award ceremony on Saturday night. It was great to see this office raise up the necessity of the work of civil rights activists and remind us of the work still needing to be done to assure justice for the oppressed. Roland Martin, the keynote speaker at the ceremony, again reminded us that we are the ones needing to do this work. While I enjoyed participating in the ceremony, as I left the Baltimore Convention Center in my ‘evening attire’ I couldn’t help but wonder if I was doing enough as I passed homeless people sleeping on the sidewalks of Charles Street. Continue reading →

‘We who believe in freedom cannot rest’. Sweet Honey in the Rock

It’s another sad moment in our history of freedom in the US. My heart breaks open again. This violence of deportation is forcing the separation of families in an attempt to save the ‘purity’ of America.

Trump wants to make America white again, fearing the projections of the US Census bureau showing an increase in mixed-race Americans and more than 25% of the US population being Latinx/Hispanic by 2060. This translates to a co-occurring decrease in non-hispanic white Americans which diminishes the ‘purity’ of America, something that has been the bedrock of a white-supremacist America. The ‘send them back’ chants of Trump’s constituents are the manifestations of the fear of an ‘impure’ America. This is no different from the sentiments and actions of Americans in 1942 when more than 120,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly displaced from their homes and incarcerated in camps. Then there was also the chant of ‘one-drop of Japanese blood’ being sufficient for incarceration, the impurity of America. Continue reading →

Some of the neighborhoods targeted for increased policing, through the Johns Hopkins Private Police force being considered before the Maryland

Five Baltimore city police officers ‘arresting’ one man, North Avenue.

general assembly this Friday February 22 2019, are communities of increased fragmentation and abandonment. These neighborhoods are prone to increased police violence and health inequity. This is not new news… that certain populations: homeless, black and brown people, transgendered people, drug users, those who appear to be poor, those who appear to be immigrants… the marginalized people without power- are targeted by police. (1,2,3,4)

We know also that Baltimore’s police department is currently under a consent decree due to excessive police violence.

We know also that the city of Baltimore has a problem with crime. That neighborhoods with increased fragmentation when violently policed results in stress and poor health contributing to the severe health inequities in our city. These are often neighborhoods with increased poverty,  decreased household income, increased boarded housing and decreased investment and housing inspectors, decreased employment, and increased crime. Continue reading →

‘Giving an intoxicated person the keys to a car is contrary to the safety of all those in their path, and to themselves. This is analogous to allowing the Johns Hopkins institutions to have police powers.’

The Johns Hopkins institutions in the city of Baltimore wants to have its own police force. It proposed legislation for police powers to the Maryland legislation last year 2018, with no success. It spent the time since and leading up to the 2019 legislative season ‘working’ on its game plan. The president, staff, and supporters such as BUILD (Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development) held community meetings to ‘invite’ in neighborhood voices. In the meantime, it has again demonized the communities surrounding its institutions and offered itself as a police power as the solution, the savior. But as one East Baltimore resident said of the meeting convened by the university president Ron Daniels: ‘this is not about us, about this community…this is about the new community they built, the Hopkins staff, and students, their people’. Continue reading →

Baltimore has yet to enter into innovative or courageous community rebuilding. Its community development processes and outcomes continue to gentrify neighborhoods, craving a larger population of the so called ‘creative class’ to right itself. It’s intention is not focused deeply enough on remedying the social and economic situation of its distressed neighborhood. Yes it wants to ‘get rid of them’ but it wants to get rid of the people in them not figure out how to assure that people living in these abandoned neighborhoods are able to participate in the rebuilt areas, better yet own part of the development. And this is where Baltimore continues to lack innovation and courage. Continue reading →

Several weeks ago, I posted about non-violence in our movements of the past and asked how does this look in our movements today. Sometimes, we need to remind each other, as activists, organizers, and advocates, that we too must adhere to principles of justice inside ourselves and within our movements, as we look outward. We can only manifest healing and justice outside if we ourselves are healing and justice. Check out this call to our activists’ community at change.org and join us as we support each other in finding justice inside and outside! Continue reading →

Baltimore! We have it all, like any city in America. Artscape is happening this weekend. One of the few times when all of Baltimore co-mingles: the white L and the black butterfly come together. Also happening this weekend is the continued corrupt arm of government trying to sequester any transparent and accountable process around policing. The Baltimore Police Civilian Review Board refused to sign a confidentially agreement imposed by the city solicitor’s office, after said office confiscated their rights to be an independent board by bringing them under their wings. So we celebrate by enjoying the diverse and amazing art of Baltimore with one hand and with the other we continue to cover and hide accountability regarding police misconduct. This is it folks, suffering and enlightenment together. Continue reading →

Building collectives may be one way out of the mostly fragmented, abandoned and often chaotic communities in low income Black Baltimore and beyond. These collectives can be hubs that co-create communities with the intention to share something beyond money and a profit motive. We can envision collectives that include housing and business interests planning to anchor blocks by living and working with the existing community in the community. These collective businesses would include for profit and non-profits willing to work on the challenging issues facing Baltimore in all its sectors. They would not attempt to make a profit off the problems of the community. They would partner with existing residents and businesses and collectively vision a way to assure that any wealth that is gained from rebuilding the community, is equally shared by those who have lived, worked and learned in these communities over the years.

The rebuilding that has been going on in communities like East Baltimore do not attempt to build wealth for the people who have been living, working, praying, and learning there. The buying, rehabbing, and selling by speculators have benefited developers not from the area; or benefited local organizations supported by investment from capital not interested in sharing in rebuilding the wealth of the existing community. This is how gentrification occurs. When the wealth of the existing residents and businesses does not increase with the increase in the cost of the new amenities and housing, someone has to go. As long as we follow the capitalist market equation for exploitation of those without for a gain of those with, gentrification will continue in the way redevelopment is occurring in communities like East Baltimore and our city. The financing for development in these communities is sparse and when present, the interest rate is greater than standard loans. While we understand the story of ‘high risk’ communities, there is still a hefty profit margin for the community-minded investor. There is still the distinction of ‘their’ community and ‘our’ community. The separation still exists.

Baltimore city programs like Vacants to Value invites in small developers who can afford to rebuild a half a block. The city sells city-owned property for cheap and minimize the paper work and the permits for the developer. Because they have not been willing to work with individual residents, the One House at a Time program went into effect more than a year ago to do just that: work with individuals who could only afford to buy and rehab one house at a time. These rehabs are still more speculation than personal rehab (person buys, rehab, and lives/work in the building) and seldom work with existing community in a collective arrangement.

Rebuilding with a mindset of co-operatives and collectives still require a profit to survive, but are not motivated by the profit incentive; this is not its primary objective. There is a different set of values and ethics they bring into their work. Collectives  such as VOLAR (Village of Love and Resistance) aim to do this. It’s mission is to co-create a cooperative community in East Baltimore owned by Black and Brown people to create opportunities for historical residents to acquire, rehab, and sell/rent property to build wealth. Residents can become the speculators in their own community, selling to friend, family or stranger. Low income people who have been historically exploited to build wealth for those with resources can become landowners and use their land to build wealth. This recipe of small and large developer coming into communities with little or no social capital, buying and rehabbing and selling and gaining profit needs to end. The ethic of VOLAR  assures that affordable housing will be available, along with moderate income homes and that this speculation by local residents/businesses  bring profit back to the individual resident and businesses. If residents/businesses are in the community, their capital will turn around in the community and slowly rebuild the economy of their community [with outside speculation the majority of the profit gets redistributed outside of the community in which the profit is made].  Building market rate homes would not fit into such a model because those able to afford a market rate house often desire market-rate amenities. When the area then builds an economy appeasing the desire of this group, displacement of people who cannot afford these amenities occur. In order for this not to occur, it requires a fairly narrow range of housing cost, attracting a similar set of amenity cost. This model allows capital to stay in and grow the existing community.

Collectives require relationships and trust-building between members. Whether it’s a residential or business collective, the different cooperative arrangements rest in a framework of trust and the principle that ‘we’re in this together’, ‘we share risk and we share gain’. This type of value framework distinguishes and resists a type of rebuilding present in the speculative way community redevelopment is occurring and has occurred, specifically in abandoned communities.

We need alternatives to the current ways we are rebuilding our abandoned communities that engage our affordable housing crisis. Not models that turn currently affordable housing complexes into mixed-income housing and displacing low income residents. We require models that are based in a different ethic than the current profit-driven one that drives development based on separate and unequal, divide and conquer, principles. Alternative models like community land trust also offer us alternative ways to rebuild-it keeps the wealth in the community and grows the existing community allowing historic residents to stay if they choose. In Baltimore we are still waiting on the city government to get on board with this model and financially support alternatives. Without alternative like this and VOLAR, everything remains rhetoric about rebuilding community for its residents while low income Black Baltimore continue to be displaced because they cannot afford to stay and participate in the ongoing changes across the city.

                … justice is really love in calculation. Justice is love correcting that which revolts against love.

                                                                                 Dr. Martin Luther King