Promising start for Eagles of East -See Page BIO Hundreds BfHVBCTSSTQ pray ?See Pane HI The Chronicle Volume41,Number3 WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. THURSDAY, September 25, 2014 Employees want a proactive boss BY T. KEVIN WALKER THE CHRONICLE Employees of the Forsyth County Department of Social Services took full advantage of the opportunity to provide input into the search for the agency's next executive director, calling for a leader who will be open to sugges tions and criticism and will knock down barriers within DSS and build bridges outside of it. The Forsyth County DSS Board, whose five members are expected to hire the new ED by the end of the year, held four forums this month to get feedback from agency employees and the general public. Board Chair Evelyn Terry, a Democrat who represents the coun ty's 71st District in the General Assembly, said the two staff-only forums on Sept. 11 were well attended. Staffers also made up the bulk of attendees at the two public forums on Sept. 18, which, com bined, drew about 25 people. The board had also solicited input via an online survey that officials say had been filled out by about 200 people before it was taken down last week. "We have had very good feed back," said Terry. Reginald D. McCaskill of the Northwest Piedmont Council of Government was seemingly the only non-DSS employee at last Thursday's evening forum. He said the next executive director should push employees to be more active in the community. Earlier in the day, he had attended a training ses sion for social services providers and said DSS was conspicuous in its absence. "Connect to the community ... to the people they serve!" he urged. Veterans of the agency liked McCaskill's sugg'eslton. One long time employee said the -agency was visible in the community 15 to 20 years ago, but that directive had somehow changed in the last 10 years. Another employee suggested that the next executive director needs to launch a one-person pub lic relations campaign to disabuse the public of long-held notions of those who receive DSS services. She said the myth that able-bodied DSS clients stay home all day watching television is long overdue for correction. See DSS on A 7 Terry A Place at the Table Ministers want to engage community in talks about Ferguson and other topics BY T KEVIN WALKER rtffi CHRONICLE The Ministers' Conference of Winston-Salem and Vicinity will kick off a series of town hall forums with one about police and community relations - a timely topic in the wake of the events that roiled Ferguson, Mo. "Can (Ferguson) happen here? Sadly, of course it can," Ministers' Conference President Rev. Willard Bass, assistant pastor at Green Street Church, told members of the media Tuesday at Emmanuel Baptist Bass Church. "The Ministers' Conference of Winston-Salem and Vicinity believes it is time to be Sec Ministers on A3 Robert Cohen/St. I ouis Post-Di^patch/MC'I Family members touch Michael Brown's copper-top vault during his burial at St. Peter's Cemetery in Normandy, Mo. Photos b> Todd l uck Winston-Salem's own Patrick Douthit, aka 9th Wonder, gives a lecture at Wake Forest University last week. Below: WFU's Interim Director Office of Multicultural Affairs Wesley Harris sports a 'The Hip-Hop Fellow' t-shirt. 1 Hip-hop scholar drops knowledge at Wake BY TODD LUCK I Hi CHRONKX1 Patrick Douthit, aka 9th Wonder, offered locals a taste of what it was like to teach hip-hop at Ivy League Harvard University. The Winston-Salem native returned home on Sept. 12 to lec ture and screen "The Hip-Hop Fellow," a documentary about the time he spent teaching at Harvard in 2012. Filmmaker Kenneth Price was also on hand. "The Hip-Hop Fellow" - Douthit's actual title at Harvard - is Price's second film about 9th Wonder. His first, the 2011 fea ture-length documentary "The Wonder Year," let viewers "see what makes (Douthit) tick and what his world is like." "He was just a real dynamic renaissance man, and I've always been a fan of his music," Price said. It was during a screening of "The Wonder Year" at Harvard that Douthit was approached to be the Hip-Hop Archive and Research Fellow, a position with Harvard's W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at the Hutchins Center for African and African American Studies. The Institute is headed by Henry Louis Gates Jr., whom Douthit described as "probably one of the greatest intellectuals of our time." Douthit has taught at Duke and is now teaching "Hip-Hop in Context" and leading the Hip Hop Institute at N.C. Central, a university he attended. He said college students are the same everywhere, but some things set Harvard students apart. "The thing about Harvard is it's the mecca of thinking. It is arguably one of the number one places on the planet to learn," he said. It's the number one place on the planet to create a job. Most people go to school to get a job; Harvard students go to school to create a new job or to be the CEO of the job." After graduating from Glenn High School. Douthit headed to NCCll with the intentions of studying to become a history teacher. His love for hip-hop led him to leave College early and devote himself to music. He became the producer of the group Little Brother, which gained him critical acclaim for See Douthit on 48 -r < II Ihii ? i Son of the Godfather has his say Photo by Kevin Walker D a r y I Brown signs a book for a local reader. BY T. KEVIN WALKER THE CHRONICLE The James Brown biopic "Get on Up" is a modest hit. Tens of thousands of people have seen it, helping the film gross slightly more than its $30 million budget. Daryl Brown, the son of The Godfather of Soul, has yet to buy a ticket and likely won't even cough up a few bucks to rent it. "For what ?" he asked with a tinge of indignation. See Brown on \2 [^^^SiSiljIJAjoURED IlJI ? ? STORAGE | of Winston-Salem, LLC A L m ? f a? n r 111 1111 ?? D vc