Newspapers / Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.) / Nov. 3, 1983, edition 1 / Page 4
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19H3 Wiiiston-Salem Ctir'oriicle Founded 1974 ERNEST H. PITT, NDUBISI EGEMONYE Cri-Founder ALLEN JOHNSON Executive Editor ELAINE L. PITT O/ftce Manager JOHN SLADE Assistant Editor The Bonds Jobs and education. No one will dispute the fact that Winston-Salem can use generous measures of both. Neither will many argue that, if this city is to finally claim at least a degree of economic independence from R.J. Reynolds, it had better get a move on. When, however, you broach the subject of how to create new jobs and bring new industry to town, you’re in for a long debate. Before we join the fray on one means to boost Winston’s economy - the Nov. 8 city-county bond referendum that will present an ambitious $35 million package to the electorate for approval — some points of clarification: •Many proponents of the bond package have over simplified the scenario. If you’re against the bonds, they say, you’re against progress in Winston-Salem. Such rhetoric is ill-advised and misinformed. What local residents in their right minds would not want progress in Winston-Salem? Where the pro and con factions actually differ is how much the bonds will effect progress in our city and whether they will bring progress for all of us or some of us. •The black leadership is divided on the issue. Aldermen Virginia Newell and Vivian Burke, for instance, are pro bond while Aldermen Larry Womble and Larry Little are not. So what? Since when are all black people supposed to think alike? White people certainly don’t. •Two major opponents of the bond package, the NAACP and the Black Leadership Roundtable, are not Johnny- come-latelies who have waited until the last minute to com plain about the bonds. They, in fact, held repeated and un publicized meetings with city officials during the late sum mer and early fall to voice what they perceived as vaguenesses and inequities in the package - and to offer sug gestions on how to address those problems. Those sugges tions went largely unheeded. •The daily media have adhered to tradition by distorting the issue shamefully - or perhaps “shamelessly” is a better word. As has been their wont in elections past, our com petitors have not-so-skillfully maneuvered past the nuts-and- bolts issues in attempts to divide the black community and the community at large with innuendo and half-truths. For instance, though some white communities have gone on fecord as opposing the bonds, that fact has been downplayed in the daily papers, so that the referendum appears to be more of a black-white issue. Moreover, our city’s dailies have wreaked havoc on even the mo.st rudimentary facts when it comes to covering the black perspective. For example, their reporters repeatedly have called the Baptist Ministers Conference and Associates the “Black Ministers Alliance” or the “Black Ministers Con ference And Associates.” Such sloppy journalism may not be malicious, but it does appear to show some lack of regard for accurate reporting where the black community is con cerned. We urge you to bear that in mind as you survey the facts. As for our views on the matter, we agree that Winston- Salem needs to move forward economically and educational ly. But we are bothered that the pro-bond forces have shown almost blatant disregard for the black and poor com munities’ needs while satisfying so many other special in terests. For instance, the school board has made extraordinary concessions to predominantly white and affluent com munities in its reorganization plan, including the addition of an eighth high school in Kernersville that is not needed and will cost $2.3 million to expand and renovate. But it had the gall, at the same time, to close all elementary schools in the black community and place an unfair burden of the busing load on black students. Moreover, a closer examination of the bond package reveals that the most concrete proposals involve the white and business communities. An expanded convention center (which the Winston Plaza Hotel needs desperately to ensure its survival) is tangible. So is the expansion of Forsyth Technical In.stitute, whose affirmative-action record is not encouraging. A proposed industrial park adjacent to 1-40 and Winston- Salem State University is not. We are told in promotional literature that the park “could” create as many as 4,000 new jobs. In other North Carolina communities in which similar promises were made, the most lucrative positions went to outsiders, and the few local jobs that were created were low- paying with poor working conditions. No more symbolic an example of how the mere presence of industry in a community doesn’t guarantee jobs is the sight of the unemployed sitting on tenement front porches in the shadow of R.J. Reynolds’ tobacco factories. There need to be concrete guidelines on minority hiring, the types of industry recruited into the park and a healthy, reciprocal working relationship with Winston-Salem State University - in writing. No oral promises, please. The city’s reservoir of good faith is running low and we grow tired of the double talk. A community’s schools, we are told, are a major selling point for new industry and attrac ting professionals who would work for those industries into oar eommunities. At the same time, our school board con- i.niies to phase out schools in black neighborhoods. There’s Please see page A 5 M\1LU0R$ fAA,RC^\N6 ^eWklST OUR IN euRope GOT OUR NvNRlUes TRKPPED IN LeB^W0W Chronicle Letters An Open Letter To Sen. Helms To The Editor: 'Ne’RG &9TTIV1& N0\NI\6RE IN CeNTR^U ^^AER^C^ . n\ ‘This Is Where Tony Brown Is’ By TONY BROWN Syndicated Columnist The CIA and the KGB do a lot of it. Both intelligence agencies of the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. practice the art of dis-information, planting phony documents and falsified facts to discredit others. I understand that’s their game -- and both clandestine bodies are ex pected to carry on their “dirty tricks.” But why would Julian Bond resort to such tactics? In his column, the Georgia state senator and professional Democrat boy wonder asked: “Black Conser vatives, Where Are They?” He then identified, from among 150 people, three black Republicans and me. Ac cording to Bond, our “finest hour came in December 1980 when over 150 black business executives and educators met in San Francisco.” It was a time of bloated boasts and conservative rhetoric, he said. Now these misled blacks are “still where they were three years ago,” Bond continued, “because they didn’t get administration jobs.” And, he ex plains, we persist in our ideology of “peculiar” views. Bond, the demagogue, while ben ding the truth and lumping apples and oranges, rewrites history while projecting his own political frustra tions on me in particular. It must be his psychological defense mechanism of projection because I don’t fit any of his neat categories. I did not and do not support Ronald Reagan, and neither am I a Democrat. As far as black aspirations are concerned, both parties stink. I am independent of both parties and am hardly trusted by the left-wing Democratic Party black socialists or the hard-line conservatives. And Bond knows this because he has a copy of those San Francisco pro ceedings called “The Fairmont Papers” which contains my speech. Percy Sutton, staunch supporter of Democratic Tony Brown causes and impeccable in his loyalty to liberal causes, was also at the con ference and also delivered his standard philosophy. Chuck Stone, black jour nalist extra ordinaire and Adam Clayton Powell’s administrative ‘assistnat, among many non-Republicans, was there and made a presentation. But before I quote myself so you can decide if Bond is correct, let me examine his motives and take a look at where he is three years later. Bond and I are both on the lecture circuit. We both know that you receive invitations to speakto diverse groups with varying philosophies. It would be as unfair to him as his guilt by association is to me to accuse him of holding a group’s beliefs simply because he addresses it. For example, when Bond is in the company of homosexuals or prisoners, that does not make him gay or a convicted felon. But some of his political frustrations and stalled career options seem to have found daylight. After a series of failed pro jects " television shows and a bid for Congress, along with, according to the Washington Post, a stalled political career as a Georgia state senator — there may be a wee bit of envy of those who show some pro gress. And Bond’s buffoon act some years back on “Saturday Night Live” " replete with zoot suit, wig and shades -- had many wondering about his judgment, political and otherwise. Either his judgment or his eyesight is poor when he asks where 1 am. And I certainly do not know why he ex pected me to expect a job from Reagan. I’ve got about five jobs already. Besides, I don’t want a job from Reagan - ^or, any^pther politi- cian. Perhaps that kind of thinking is difficult for Bond to understand, considering the fact that his old Georgia pal Jimmy Carter never in vited him to Washington. Another job — as executive director of the NAACP " also got away from him. I’m not calling Julian a loser, but I am saying that the near 50-year-old boy wonder is running out of time if Please see page A 5 Bonds, Progress And Black Folk By CLIFTON GRA VES Chronicle Columnist ‘Tf there is no struggle there will be no progress ... Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground ... Power concedes nothing without a demand; it never has and it never will ... If there is no struggle, there will be no progress. ” — Frederick Douglass Evans and others, who are bond sup porters. The above preface is necessary to dispel the notion, lie, or whatever, that animosity exists among black proponents and opponents of the bond. Further, it is imperative to let the white media, the white communi ty and, yes, the black community know that there is no “power play’ “Progress: noun; a forward or on ward movement; a gradual better ment. ” - Webster's Dictionary “We are not against progress; rather, we are for progress for everyone — not just a select few. ” - Black Leadership Roundtable At the outset, let me state for the record that I have -- and will continue to have — the utmost love and respect for Mrs. Louise Wilson, co chairperson of the Citizens’ Commit tee for Jobs and Education Referen dum championing the Nov. 8 bond referendum. Indeed, that same senti ment holds true for most of the black persons of influence, such as Chancellor Douglas Covington, Dr. Virginia Newell, Mr. Tom Elijah, Mrs. Velma Hopkins, Ms. Mutter un folding be tween the ‘‘young turks” and the “old guard” in the African- American community. Rather, what is hap pening is simply Clifton Graves an honest divergence of opinion on some complex issues, an honest dif ference of opinion as to how progress will be defined in the local black com munity, an honest difference of opi nion as to whether black folk should continue to have “faith” in the same select group of white folk who has sold us down the river in the past. As you most certainy know by now, the Nov. 8 city-county bond package consists of $7.5 million to help finance the reorganization of the city-county schools, $4.5 million to expand facilities and services of For syth Technical Institute, and $23 million for center-city economic development -- with the lion’s share, $15 million, earmarked for a 100 per cent expansion of the downtown con vention center. Total cost: $35 million. On paper, the package appears in nocuous and exciting. Add to that a commendable public relations cam paign urging the local citizenry to vote for “jobs and education,” “pro gress,” and “not to let Winston- Salem become a ghost town” and you have in place a strategy designed to have mass appeal, which is a prere quisite if the bonds are to succeed. Unfortunately, once beyond the flowery rhetoric and superficial pro mises, the astute among you should and will see that this entire bond package is a crock of crap, a slick ploy to perpetuate the stuatus quo, a smokescreen to concentrate further the city’s wealth in the hands of a few, a continuation of the “same old, same old,” with the white community in general, and, as the Rev. Carlton Eversley accurately assesses, “big white folks” getting the gold, while black folks once again get the shaft. For you see, brothers and sisters, the Nov. 8 bonds have little to do Please see page A 5 (The following is an open letter to Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C.) My Dear Sen. Heims, I cannot resist thanking you publicly for the time you spent desperately seeking to slanderize the name of the late Dr. Martin Luther King. While I initially thought that on ly a national observance on a Sun day was sufficient, I was never theless with a strong view that our own country should receive the credit for progress made toward making our proclaimed democratic society a reality -- spearheaded by Dr. King. But your unrelenting remarks implying that Dr. King was motivated by communists had me become instilled with hopes that any day of observance was satisfactory — so long as America received due credit for one of its own citizens activating democratic principles. Your persistency in crediting the communists is similar to ex periences encountered by too many Americans. Though our govern ment “affiliates” with communists daily, and even uses the occur rences in Russia as a measuring rod to develop and govern our own policies and standards (defense, education, etc.), the minute citizens or group of citizens ex perience progress toward making the democratic way of life a reali ty, racists accuse them of having “communist affiliation.” Such ac cusations leave one with the am biguous idea that an effective way to activate democracy is to have “communist affiliation.” And one cannot overlook the fact that any white-skinned person that’s born and bred in communist territory is welcomed to America on a level that no born and bred black American has ever yet experienced. Ah! sweet mystery of life. Sen. Helms, didn’t it ever occur to you that if the late J. Edgar ^ Hoover — as head of the FBI-- had even a minute amount of informa tion about Dr. King that would link him as being a traitor to our country, he would have used it to the nth degree to persecute Dr. King. After all. Hoover was af flicted with the disease of racism as much as you are, if not more. The only reason Hoover was tapping wires, tracing, following, sneaking and otherwise meddling with Dr. King was to try to find something that was worse than he was doing “ and obviously he failed. No doubt records are sealed not to protect Dr. King and his family but those who werevoraciously in volved in trying to put an end to his most effective work. One assumes that in 35 years those who were involved will not be alive to face the embarrassment of also having pledged allegiance to our flag and upholding the Constitu tion dictating the existence of a democratic way of life. When all is said and done, you have unwaryingly rendered a great service to America by “putting your foot in your mouth.” Because this is America, and for tunately you will have much free time after the next election, you can redeem yourself just as did George Wallace and several other leading racists. Any one of them can assure you that it is a good feeling to accept all human beings as God’s children -- just as you are one. God loves you and I’m trying to. Yours with pity, J. Kimble Winston-Salem Good Coverage To The Editor: Thank you for a job well-done. Please offer my gratitude to the young lady who covered our Col- Please see page A5 j ^ELCONK lb GOVeRVlMjBtf SERVICE UNDER The NEW REAfeXU SUlDeuNES HERE 1$ k UfEUkie CthScCSHlP heREENEm FOR 'haUTO Sl&N... KUO K UTTL6 Booklet on 0I)C U£ DETECTOR TESTW6 PRObRAVA OVICE vou've SETTLED IN, WE UXK '■ Forward to UEARiue wr feauk . AMD HONEST OPINIONS !
Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.)
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Nov. 3, 1983, edition 1
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