Police arrest civil rights leaders who took over school board meeting

[zazen]

Source: Raleigh News & Observer

RALEIGH -- Police arrested four civil rights protesters, including state NAACP head Rev. William Barber and author Tim Tyson, after they refused to leave tonight's Wake County school board meeting. The arrests started about an hour-and-a-half after the biracial group disrupted the meeting, speaking and singing to empty seats when the board recessed, then taking over the elective body's own seats.

In addition to Barber and Tyson, author of "Blood Done Sign My Name," police arrested civil rights activist Mary Williams and Pullen Memorial Baptist Church minister Nancy Petty. At this hour, they were being transported to the Wake County jail on misdemeanor trespassing charges.

. . . As Barber, Tyson and other continued their protest, the NAACP's North Carolina chapter issued a statement criticizing the school board's ruling majority decision to "destroy the socio-economic diversity policy" of North Carolina's largest school district. Signed by Barber, Tyson, Petty and others, the statement said protesters were prepared to be arrested to defend the legacy of school desegregation efforts of the past and prevent schools from being resegregated.

"Today we register our legitimate discontent," the statement said. "And like hundreds who have gone before us here in Wake County, we are willing to break a lesser law and accept our punishment, in order to protect the larger law embodied in the federal and state constitutions and to defend the children of our community. If it is necessary that we be locked up to resist policies that will lock down our children in resegregated, high-poverty, and unconstitutional schools, so be it."

Read more: http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/06/15/534690/police-arrest-civil-rights-leaders.html

[zazen]

1. the tea-partiers are using the 11/09 Repub school board win as foothold for more antics

I mention this because the issue of our Congressman Bob Etheridge not being any different (supposedly) than a Republican was raised over the past 24 hours on at least one other thread, and I'd say this is an example of how these days, sadly, party does matter.

The diversity policy of Wake County Schools was actually publicized by a book that came out last year touting it as one of the most progressive in the nation, and then in Nov. 09, the school board was taken over by Republicans.

Now, the old school board made some decisions that were maddening, wholeheartedly embracing various education school fads without thinking about the longterm consequences for parents and municipalities when they did so (like, e.g. shortening Wednesdays by an hour for "professional learning community time," which necessitating a couple of hundred thousand dollars worth of unanticipated changes in school zone speed limit signs and complicated child care arrangements for parents who couldn't afford it. The public was furious.) These harebrained decisions contributed to their being defeated last November. I admit that.

I also think a few of the Republicans who won seats were responding not out of racism or classism but frustration that children in certain neighborhoods had been redistricted several times in as many years because of the county's rapid growth.

But, now that they've been in, they are really being pushed to the far right. They are steamrolling through everything. They seem to get bolder by the day. This isn't what people who were frustrated with some of the old policies wanted, but it seems that moderate Republicans don't stay moderate for very long these days, not if they want to stay (and rise) in office.

We don't seem to be able to get our politicians to move more toward the left, oddly. Well, I guess it's not odd. It's probably about following the money.

[Alcibiades]

2. The people of Wake County need to ask themselves

if this is the kind of place they want to live. Read the comments associated with this article, and you see that some folks in North Carolina have not come as far one would hope. Even though this isn't Jesse Helms' North Carolina anymore, it's clear his people are still here.

[zazen]

3. right-wingers seem to dominate local papers everywhere, it seems

I remember an OP about this on DU here a few weeks back.

The anonymity seems to bring them out. Sadly, I think it's not just restricted to our state.

[Alcibiades]

7. No, it's not just here

I think there are a lot of right wing folks who have nothing but time to post on various sites for TV stations, newspapers, etc. Don't know if they are rich, on disability, retired or stealing time away from the work they ought to be doing at their desks. But what's striking is that it sounds exactly like what "they" (i.e. the very same people) used to say on any and all questions of race relations 30 or 40 years ago. There have been tremendous changes in the Carolinas during that time, but you cannot change what's inside some folk's heads.

[NuttyFluffers]

9. i think it's mostly project Mockingbird w/ scripted LTTEs to cut 'n paste countrywide.

and then there's the whole media conglomerate turning towards wiping out all individual media in smaller markets and thus creating an illusion of isolation. but that's my personal opinion...

[Pavulon]

4. Money. I live in Orange so dont have the same problem

so the problem is if you buy a 400K house in wakefield or some nice N. Raleigh neighborhood, you kids can be shipped off an houreach way to a shitty school no where near where you live in a crap part of town. To hide the fact there is an achievement gap in students wake disperses low performing students, on a basis of income, not race, between schools. Their plan in the past has been to hide the problem.

This has had no impact on graduation rates or other important issues for low income students.

Its all a sham, if you have enough money you send them to Ravenscroft anyway.

[zazen]

5. or if you're lucky, you get into a prestigious, free charter school

I still can't figure out how WCPSS gets income info. Do they look up our tax records or something?

[Pavulon]

6. Free School lunch.. If you are poor, you get it..(nt)

[Alcibiades]

8. Or move to Durham

There's none of the crazy school reassignment nonsense here, just neighborhood schools, so you know what you're getting when you buy your house. Of course, the system is cutting 237 or so teachers because of the budget crisis, but that's another story.