Detroit Selected for 2010 U.S. Social Forum

After a final round of visits and discussions with grassroots groups and national organizers, Detroit has been selected as the site for the next U.S. Social Forum (USSF) in 2010! Other potential host cities were El Paso, TX, and New Orleans, LA.

Five local grassroots organizations were also selected to serve as local anchors for the planning process. They are: Centro Obrero de Detroit, Detroiters Working for Environmental Justice, East Michigan Environmental Action Council, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization and South Eastern Michigan Jobs With Justice. Read the Detroit Greens blog post for more details.

MWRO is honored and pleased to be among one of the selected organizers for this national event! We participated in the first USSF in Atlanta, GA, and took a busload of MWRO members, local Detroit residents, students, seniors, and activists. It was a marvelous learning experience and we shared many stories about the water crisis, economic problems, housing foreclosures and more, with thousands of national and international comrades.

The 2010 USSF will be a major rallying cry for people all over this country (and beyond) to come together and plan for what we need, what we can do, and how we will change our communities. Read the USSF 2010 NPC Vision. Stay posted to get involved and participate. And start saving your pennies to get to Detroit in Summer 2010!

(Image courtesy of the U.S. Social Forum)

Seniors and the poor freeze to death in a country gone awry!

Dying a slow, painful, horrible death, a Bay City, Michigan, elderly man was discovered January 17th frozen to death in his home. It happened a few days after the local utility company, Bay City Electric Light & Power installed a "limiter"--which limits the flow of electricity--outside his home for failing to pay his electric bill but neglected to show the senior citizen how it worked. Neighbors found the war veteran alone and wrapped in several layers of clothing in his bed.

Further south in Detroit, another man was found frozen solid in an abandoned warehouse. It took two days after the initial reporting for firefighters to show up and saw the man out of the ice. Authorities say he may have been there several months. And across town, scrap metal hunters found a 67 year old man sitting frozen in the front seat of his pickup truck. It's suspected that he may have suffered a heart attack. The door was wide open and he was covered in snow.

What in the world is going on?!

Senior citizens and poor people dying all around us in the bitter cold. It's no surprise that every winter snow and freezing temperatures are going to make it difficult to stay warm. But it's also everyone's responsibility to look after their neighbor, and to stop ignoring other vulnerable people in our neighborhoods and near our jobs.

It's unconscionable that it takes days for us to notice that something may be wrong with our neighbors. Why didn't someone check out sooner the man who regularly sits in his chair by the window? Why didn't neighbors go see why that pickup truck door was open day and night?

It's justifiably right to blame the utility companies for shutoffs, hospitals and clinics for lack of affordable access, and city officials for lack of low-income housing, but what about us? What are we responsible for?

It seems at minimum, we have a responsibility to check on and assist as best we can the vulnerable people around us: the seniors who live next door, the poor women and children across the street, the homeless man on the way to work. Yes, times are hard for all of us but they're harder still for others.

The latest ice storm in the midwestern and eastern states may prevent electricity restoration until mid February. Let's start figuring out what we can do to prevent the loss of anymore precious lives.

(Image from Associated Press)

Eight Years of Hell Come to an End!

By Maureen D. Taylor, MWRO State Chair

Last week, my friend, confidant and great poet Ron Allen and I talked about the "State of the State." I miss Ron who relocated out of the state because, among many other things, he was my dance partner when we would accidentally meet up at this grocery or that department store. Many a time, some Temptation tune or some Bee Gees classic would be blaring out overhead, and we would take off on a serious Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers ballroom dance step or two to the amazement of store on-lookers who always had a smile at our antics.

Ran and I spoke about how silly so many people are who ascribe to our new President's powers as if he was Superman. He is but one human being. As wonderful as we all feel about his being the President and that he has opened the door for us to do great things with him, it is both unfair and unrealistic for people to assume that he will correct all mistakes or reverse all policies.

Whose task is it to work at eliminating poverty across the country? OURS! Whose task is it to help Federal funds get directed to chronically low income persons so that those on the bottom can be encouraged and employed? OURS! Whose task is it to take control of what projects need be instituted in places like Detroit with 50% unemployment in black communities, 60% unemployment in Latino communities, 70% unemployment among Native Americans, and 75% unemployment among youth? OURS!

There is much work to be done in America, as Ron and I discussed. The soul of poetry and cultural creation has been gutted by 8 years of "mob-rule." How long will it take to repair the damage done by the Bush/Cheney Mob? Probably decades. But what matters is that we have to start the process of change now.

We are standing at a crossroad. We all have freedom, or no one does. We all have food to eat, or no one does. We all have places to live, or no one does. Technology has reached a point where there is no need for ANYONE to be hungry, homeless, without health care, uneducated, or without the means to pursue happiness and full equality.

Bush is gone, and a breath of fresh air has moved into the White House. Rush Limbaugh is having a case of the vapors, and the right wing is in absolute misery. So this is the time for us to put our best foot forward and get busy. All help and support must be directed to those at the bottom because to help them means lifting all ships. Low income people and Welfare mothers - let's give 'em something to talk about.

(Photo courtesy: Flickr Creative Commons)

An Open Letter from Call'em-Out!!

Dear Detroiter:

Some of the first “water department takeover” attempt maneuvers have been made to snatch control of the Detroit Water and Sewage Department. The plan appears to start with selling of pieces of our system. This is nothing less than another assault on our City and the people. We must turn back the continued dismantling of the City of Detroit. The people must lead on the water issue, then our elected officials must follow.

Ken Cockrel, interim/temporary/stand-in mayor and mayoral candidate, picked up this plan once Kwame Kilpatrick was jailed. Dave Bing, a candidate for mayor, was on the negotiating team for this agreement which continues the dismantling of our city. Their behavior must be considered an act of treason. The people must respond with a resounding “NO.”

We are asking you to sound the alert to all within the sound of your voice in churches, schools, union and community organizations meetings, wherever and whenever you may speak. Please speak on “The Dismantling Of Our Detroit Water and Sewage Department” at every opportunity. Please join with us in this mighty and righteous effort.

An informational “Water Takeover Resistance” forum is planned for the people of the city of Detroit. All citizens, community leaders, ministers, mayoral candidates, union leaders, city council members, federal and state legislators and all other stakeholders in Detroit must take a public stand on this issue. This meeting will be held on Wednesday, January 28, 2009 in Eastern Market @ Bert’s Warehouse Theater, 5:30PM, 2727 Russell Street @ Division, Detroit, Michigan.

It will take all of us to repel this assault. If you would like to be added as a sponsor or supporter of this cause, please contact Agnes Hitchcock @ 313-874-2792 or email callemout@aol.com to have your name added.

Sincerely,
Agnes Hitchcock

Sponsors & Supporters:
MWRO
Maureen Taylor
Marian Kramer
Call'em-Out
Agnes Hitchcock
John Riehl, President AFSCME - Local 207

Videos of Call'em Out's Detroit Mayoral Forum

A community website called Detroit IP TV has posted three video sections of the Detroit Mayoral Forum hosted by Call'em Out on January 6, 2009. Hear what the candidates and residents have to say for themselves. Check them out!

Residents Pack Detroit Mayoral Forum

Photo by William Archie/Detroit Free Press


By Gwendolyn Gaines and Sylvia Orduno

Nearly 300 Detroit residents packed the Northwest Community Center for the second part of the Call'em Out's mayoral forums. The event was a follow-up to the November 2008 mayoral listening forum where candidates could only listen to residents' concerns and ask clarification questions.

Ten of the 12 candidates attended--Donald Bradley, Stanley Christmas, Warren Evans, Freeman Hendrix , Joseph Holt, Nick Hood, Duane Montgomery, Coleman A. Young Jr, Sharon McPhail, Jarroll Sanders. Missing (again!) were Dave Bing and Interim Detroit Mayor Ken Cockrell, Jr. Dave Bing is a member of a business group urging the sale of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Dept.

Following the first mayoral listening forum, each candidate was asked to respond to questions and concerns by regular residents--not business leaders or other high profile, elite groups. All attendees signed in and received a score sheet so they could rate the answers from each candidate on a variety of issues such as: home foreclosures, ownership of the Detroit Water and Sewerage Dept (DWSD), bulk trash pickup, eliminating the $300 garbage fee, and more. See the Detroit Free Press coverage of the event.

The forum was moderated by Agnes Hitchcock, Chair of Call 'em Out. NHK News reporter, Takurna Yoshioka, from Japan was a special guest covering the evening's event along with other grassroots issues in Detroit. John Riehl, President of the water workers' AFSCME Local 207, spoke on the efforts to takeover the DWSD. His union local is calling for a demonstration January 7, 2009 at 4:30pm in front of the Detroit City-County Bldg.

January is Poverty in America Awareness Month

We're back! After a few days of taking our own needed rest, Michigan Welfare Rights Organization is back online reporting the latest poverty news, welfare rights reports, and issues related to low-income people in Michigan and beyond.

Fittingly, January is “Poverty in America Awareness Month,” a designation by the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD). During this month, allied groups and organizations will be working to educate the public on the breadth and depth of poverty-related problems, encouraging the media to report on poverty issues, and promoting a greater respect for and sensitivity to the needs of those in poverty.

The CCHD's poverty tour discusses what life is like for the 37 million Americans living below the poverty line. A family of four living on a budget of $20,614 must find ways to survive on similar measly incomes and make ends meet. Here's the CCHD poverty budget example:

$20,614 family budget
-5,756 basic housing
-2,656 utilities
-5,330 transportation w/ a used car, maintenance and gas
-4,064 food (hopefully, supplemented with food stamps)
-2,339 health and medical expenses
--------
479 subtotal
-2,600 child care (even w/ child care subsidies)
--------
-2,121 over budget and there are needs still to be met

So, what gets cut? Utilities? Medications? Education? School supplies? Clothes? Shoes? Furnishings? Toiletries? Entertainment? Birthdays?

No one in this world should be living in such subsistence and worried about how their family will live and survive. Push your local, regional, and national representatives to alleviate poverty once and for all by voting for living wages, national single payer healthcare, better child care subsidies, low-income affordable housing and utilities ordinances, and overall quality of life and human rights policies.