FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Domenica Ghanem, [email protected], 202 339 9310
 

Trump’s New Attack on Medicaid Could Harm Millions

On Thursday, Jan. 30, the Trump administration announced new guidance that could gut access to Medicaid, which provides health care to over 70 million low income adults and children. The rules encourage states to create Medicaid block grants, which will cap and eventually choke funding for the essential program, resulting in life-or-death consequences for millions.
Community Change President Dorian Warren said:
“This is a dangerous and deliberate plan that will bring unnecessary harm to far too many people struggling to make ends meet. Too many people are faced with the impossible choice to put food on the table or go to the doctor and Medicaid is an essential lifeline for them. 
We as a country are better than this. We should be expanding Medicaid and focusing on ensuring every child and every person has the resources to thrive, not cutting off essential programs as Trump continues to do. Health care is a right and we will keep fighting to make sure it’s accessible and affordable for all people, no exceptions.”

###

 

 Community Change is a national organization that builds the power of low-income people, especially people of color, to fight for a society where everyone can thrive.

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Visit Community Change’s platform for the stories of real people making real change, featuring the op-eds, videos, photo essays, audio stories, and podcasts of our Communications Fellows, staff, and partners.

Community Change proudly recognizes a staff bargaining unit affiliated with IFPTE Local 70, a union for non-profit workers.

Change Wire

Visit Community Change’s platform for the stories of real people making real change, featuring the op-eds, videos, photo essays, audio stories, and podcasts of our Communications Fellows, staff, and partners.

Community Change proudly recognizes a staff bargaining unit affiliated with IFPTE Local 70, a union for non-profit workers.

This article originally appeared on Latino Rebels.

Is there a more fitting metaphor for the plight of our current political climate than Republicans pushing a vote to take away healthcare from millions of Americans, while they benefit from the best government-funded healthcare available?

After flying back to Washington D.C. from having brain surgery, Senator John McCain delivered a passionate speech from the floor of the senate, blasting the secretive process in which the repeal and replace GOP healthcare bill had been drafted and calling for a return to order and bipartisanship in Congress.

Although initially McCain seemed to not heed his own advice by voting in favor of a motion to proceed with the repeal, putting the well-being of millions of Americans at risk, he ultimately did the right thing, voting no alongside Senators Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski and dooming the proposal.

To put into perspective just how bad the repeal of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) would have been for most Americans, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) analysis has said that the GOP healthcare proposal would have led to 22 million fewer people without insurance while greatly raising premiums on older, low-income Americans. Republicans were so eager to repeal the Affordable Care Act that they attempted to negotiate what they call a “skinny repeal”, a proposal which the CBO estimated would lead to 15 million people without health coverage and a rise of 20 percent on premiums, leading to the death spiral of Obamacare that Trump threatens when he says he will let “Obamacare fail.”

Only 16 percent of Americans approve the GOP-led healthcare repeal of the ACA, but it is not only the American people who overwhelmingly oppose this irresponsible attack on working class families. America’s Health Insurance Plans, the industry’s most influential trade group, sent to Congress a scathing letter warning Republican lawmakers that their proposal would have caused havoc on health insurance markets.

The skinny repeal was nothing more than an attempt by Republicans to sabotage the Affordable Care Act by getting rid of its individual mandate, which is the penalty for people who refuse to get health insurance. Without an incentive for healthy people to sign up for coverage, costs for patients with pre-existing conditions and serious medical conditions would overwhelm the market, causing insurers to raise premiums and further discouraging healthy people from enrolling. This would cause the death spiral of the ACA that Trump often talks about.

The Blue Cross Blue Shield Association issued a similar letter rebuking the GOP repeal plan by saying: “a system that allows people to purchase coverage only when they need it drives up costs for everyone.”

What the Republicans are doing in Congress is truly reprehensible. They attempted to ram through Congress an irresponsible healthcare repeal through a secretive and undemocratic process.

The Republican Party spent seven years under Mitch McConnell’s leadership doing nothing but obstructing and poisoning American politics, voting dozens of times to repeal the ACA and ultimately giving us the deplorable Presidency of Donald Trump. When given the genuine opportunity to go through with the repeal, Republican senators flinched when faced with the political pressures of leaving millions of people uninsured.

It is fortunate that three Republican senators voted their conscience and went against the insanity of their own party to save healthcare for millions of Americans, but it is unfortunate that most of their colleagues fail to see the irony in voting to take away that healthcare while enjoying taxpayer-funded government healthcare.

***

Thomas Kennedy is a writing fellow for the Center for Community Change Action and the Deputy Political Director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition Votes.

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This article originally appeared on the Huffington Post.

Late in April, approximately 1,000 students in the Upward Bound Program at The University of Maine Presque Isle (UMPI) received notice that their funds would not be continued, due to the line spacing of their funding application. Programs like Upward Bound work to “level the playing field” by allowing students from low-income families entry into higher education, something they might have not otherwise had. Upward Bound, along with Educational Talent Search and McNair Scholars – collectively known as TRIO – are federally funded programs resulting from the 1960’s.

At UMPI, all members of the Upward Bound Program, including first generation students and the staff hired to support them, lost the funding that gave them access to institutions of higher education. But none of that mattered to our new Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, and the Department of Education, who denied the recent application due to formatting errors. And UMPI was not alone. Other colleges were not only denied funding based on small errors but were also told they weren’t allowed to fix them.

The President’s new budget proposes massive cuts to the Department of Education. Amongst the most problematic is a $15 million cut to a program that provides child-care for low-income parents in college. In the early 1990’s, I was one of these parents. Without financial supplements by way of affordable childcare and co-operative opportunities at my community college, post-secondary education would not have been an option.

In the proposed budget, grants to states for career and technical education would lose $168 million; adult basic literacy instruction would lose $96 million. There’s no support allocated to a $400 million student support and academic enrichment fund Congress created this fiscal year by rolling together smaller programs. A product of both the California Community College system and state and private universities, I graduated because of the EOP&S/CARE childcare programs, along with the EOP and Pell Grants available during my upperclassmen years, even as a former high-school dropout.

Perhaps one of the most detrimental changes would be to students who receive financial aid – especially those who receive and rely on the popular Perkins loan and federal work-study programs. My entire education would not have been possible without access to financial aid in all of its various forms. In addition, the loan forgiveness program that serves social workers, public defenders or doctors in rural areas is also on the chopping block. My own combat veteran spouse utilizes such programs.

Without educational programs like TRIO, the world would not have its alumni that contribute to the meaning of excellence. Viola Davis, Academy Award winner and should-be-professional-speaker, is a proud Student Support Services alum. Upward Bound produced John Quinones, Jimmy Jam, and Terry Lewis. TRIO alumni include Oprah Winfrey and are found in the NBA, NFL, NASA, and even the Democratic National Convention.

The Education Department still had not indicated whether or not those denied applications would be reconsidered. During the wait, thousands of students twisted in the wind with concerns of not completing or starting their journey to higher education. Finally, the Department and other officials heard the outcry over the injustice and changed their position.

On May 24th, DeVos announced that the 77 applications previously denied would be reconsidered – largely due to a $50 million spending bill. She stated that Congress’s passing of the 2017 Omnibus spending bill allowed them the affordability to review the affected applications and that bureaucracy should not impede students. DeVos’s statement resembles empathy and can allow those affected to breathe a temporary sigh of relief.

This policy change is the right thing to do. It provides much needed hope after Trump’s plan to butcher the budget. In the proposed $9.2 billion cut—the work of Trump officials with access to the upper echelon of education—the loss of opportunities for all levels of education would be incredibly detrimental. At the very least, this plan’s lack of loan forgiveness would discourage those drawn to work in education.

This doesn’t have to be our reality. If the citizens of the United States have forgiven and can continue to forgive our government when they make a mistake—even a grammatical one—our government should return the favor. Here in America we call this access, and it is one of our treasured values that has always made us great.

Sharisse Tracey is a writing fellow for the Center for Community Change.

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This article originally appeared on the Huffington Post.

In an era of polarized politics, heightened activism, and the rise of the “resistance,” the conversation often turns to the actions and attitudes of youth. The infamous millennials are framed as lazy and unengaged (though research tells a different story), and their younger cohort is criticized for its dependence on technology and social media. In the wake of the 2016 election, countless organizations examined and interrogated the youth vote, and activists continue to ask themselves how to get young people more engaged in today’s movements.

As a token millennial who is passionate about youth activism, I have a significant stake in my peers’ engagement level. I am asked by professors, organizers — even my supervisor here at the Center for Community Change, where I am an intern this summer — how do we make young people care? I reflect on my own journey toward feminism and activism: how did I get from my socially conservative beliefs in high school to organizing phone banks for Planned Parenthood and writing for progressive outlets now, at 21? The turning point, for me, was access to articles and op-eds online, followed by serious study of social critique at a liberal arts college. The more I read — the more perspectives I encountered — the more I came to understand my role in society as an agent of change. If we seriously want youth to care about politics and social issues (and to vote regularly), we need to take them seriously.

In the 2016 election cycle, I was glad to see some news outlets (albeit very few) taking their youth readers seriously. Teen Vogue, in particular, stands out for their dual coverage of political events and fashion trends. Writer Lauren Duca publishes her weekly column, “Thigh-High Politics,” bringing issues such as gaslighting in Trump’s campaign, health-care, and sexism to Teen Vogue’s young readers. Duca’s work is proof that political issues are pop culture, and that girls can simultaneously care about makeup and reproductive health care. However, youth engagement can — and should — go even further when we create a platform for youth voices themselves to be broadcasted.

As a volunteer with Hardy Girls Healthy Women, a organization based in Central Maine, I meet weekly with middle school girls to discuss media literacy and social activism. When given the tools and confidence, these girls are more than capable of analyzing current events and connecting them to injustices in their own lives. For example, our group discussed the media’s double standard of coverage on Hillary Clinton, and the girls made the connection to the double standard within their small school’s dress code. Lyn Mikel Brown, a co-founder of Hardy Girls and professor at Colby College, has a career’s worth of such experiences, so she decided to create a platform to elevate girls’ voices.

In October 2010, adult educators, researchers, and activists hosted the first SPARK Summit conference in New York City, where they met with hundreds of young activists. The summit launched the creation of SPARK Movement, which serves as an online home for young women around the world to write about and organize around social justice. Today, in addition to organizing feminist trainings, the organization maintains a blog, Powered by Girl (PBG), with more than 700 pieces by youth activists, with topics ranging from the sexualization of girls in the media to youth political involvement.

Two SPARK activists, Sophia Simon-Bashall and Molly Mantle, recently participated in a conference panel entitled “The Revolution will be Blogged,” then took some time to discuss their conversation with me. Sophia is a 20 year old blogger for PBG who writes about the intersection of feminism and mental health. (Sophia identifies with they/them gender pronouns.) After developing an interest in feminism, they felt the need to share online when they “started to connect certain challenges [they had] faced personally to a wider context.” Molly (she/her), meanwhile, has used an online platform to spread her campaign Ban Conversion Therapy UK. Molly, 16, gathered 35000 signatures for her petition. Her advice for fostering such activism? “Don’t underestimate us!”

Sharing your opinion online is easier today than ever, leading many to dismiss blogs and tumblrs as feminist rants. However, we cannot discount the value of youth voices, especially in areas that directly affect youth. “We have voices and we have opinions about [injustice] because we live through it,” Sophia explains. We need to trust youth not just to understand current events but also to have a critical opinion of them. Blogging is a low-barrier tool for traditionally undervalued voices to access such critique and to formulate opinions.

For those still doubting the effectiveness of youth bloggers, SPARK is responsible for significant feminist activism with tangible consequences. In 2012, the bloggers launched a petition demanding that Seventeen magazine use unaltered photography to combat the culture of eating disorders and negative self-esteem that photoshop encourages. With over 86,000 signatures, SPARK activists successfully convinced the magazine not to photoshop their models.

More subtle, but much more far-reaching, is youth blogging’s ability to break through access barriers. My own feminism has been influenced by the online writing of my peers. Through Sophia’s blogs, they have changed the opinions of many friends who “don’t get the whole ‘feminism thing.’” The same behavior that causes older generations to label teens as media-obsessed allows today’s millenials and younger to learn about social issues from different perspectives.

As educators, parents, and advocates struggle to support youth in a politically volatile climate — especially one that disadvantages youth that are queer, immigrant, and/or of color — these young bloggers would recommend handing over the keyboard to the young people themselves. To encourage young activists in your life, consider the following:

  • Help them create an account on an easy-to-use blog platform, such as WordPress or Medium.
  • Follow and share youth blogs, such as Feministing or Powered by Girl.
  • Engage in serious conversations with the youth in your life! Ask them what they think of the news, and encourage them to disagree.

The most powerful tools we have for justice are our lived experiences; why should we limit these tools to adults? Sophia explains the power of blogs: “For people who are continuously denied access to a platform in traditional media, people who are not taken seriously – teenage girls, people of color, working class folk – [blogging] is an opportunity to put something out there and say ‘I deserve to be heard’.”

If we want to turnout the youth vote, we need to provide tools of civic engagement far before kids turn 18. As soon as a young feminist can read and write, with access to the internet, they can blog.

Adrienne Carmack is a communications intern at the Center for Community Change. She is also a rising senior at Colby College.

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Community Change proudly recognizes a staff bargaining unit affiliated with IFPTE Local 70, a union for non-profit workers.

This article originally appeared in the Huffington Post.

By Paige DeLoach

When I visited home for the first time after the 2016 election, my mother spoke to me in a voice I had never heard her use before. Her heart was heavy, she said. Her heart was like stone. She stammered through the conversation, quietly working to find words to express the horror she felt, the astonishment, the shame, the rage. My mother—a woman who protected me, gave me all she had to give, honored me with her love—broke down. I could count on one hand the number of times I had seen her break down. But on that day, my mother no longer felt safe or welcome in her own home.

At 20 years old, I’m not ashamed to say I panicked. I didn’t want to believe that my mom could be vulnerable to anything. I didn’t want to face that truth: that my parents are still prey to the system they try to protect me from. I didn’t want to believe that after all they’ve done, after all the sacrifice and the courage they cultivated to raise children of color in this country—Donald Trump became president.

The effects of this election have been economic, social, political, personal. You can look at today’s vote by the GOP as a first step to repeal Obamacare to know that many black and brown families will be hurt.

This election made us all look at each other differently. I had to reflect on the relationships in my life; I had to really analyze the bonds I’d made over the years. The most important of those bonds were the bonds of family. I looked around, and in one way or another, I saw families falling apart. In concrete ways and in insidious, intangible ways, I saw Black and brown families being torn apart. A father was arrested by ICE after dropping his daughter off at school. A father was killed, by the police, in his car with his family watching from the backseat. Everyday a daughter loses a father, a grandmother is separated from her grandkids, a family is destroyed.

The future of Black and brown families in this country is unsure. Too many families face destruction and disunion. The state of this country is creating fissures in the foundation of families of color nationwide. This country is trying to tear us apart.

For many people in my generation, this was the first time we were able to vote in a Presidential election. This was our first opportunity to feel, first hand, what it is to choose the leader of our country, of our home. It is obvious now that my generation is not as progressive as previously thought. It is obvious now that no matter your age, we all make the same mistakes. We are not so different that we can’t understand the issue here. We are not so different that we can’t understand that this is an issue that belongs to all of us. The issue of families—specifically, the future, the continuation, of families. Families are being separated as a direct result of the man sitting in the Oval Office.

Perhaps the most distressing fact is that this is not unfamiliar territory. For Black people, slavery dissolved the notion of ancestry and visible roots, of inherited culture and language. Slavery and its legacy disconnected Black people from their ancestors and destroyed their visible connection to human history. But this disconnect, this forced lapse in memory cannot—could never—destroy that which was. In a way, this disconnect tells the story of the ways in which those others went first, and how forgetting could never stop them from coming back. This disconnect tells the story of the struggle, the love, that brought me to life.

And this—this is my comfort. In a time when so many families face destruction, when the law stands in opposition to families, the fact that we are here today is hope enough. So many have already lost, and so many will lose in the future. But we are here today, and we have to do something with that.

My mom goes to rallies now. Maybe this is something she always did and I just never noticed, or she never felt like she had to until now. Either way, my mom, firmly in her 50s, made posters for the Women’s March; protested for environmental awareness and action; reads the news everyday, so she can stay informed. She is fighting. She is not giving up on herself, or on us. And I stand with her. I’ll fight for her and for my family in the ways that I can. Because above all, this election has shown that we always have to fight for what we have. We have to defend our world and the bonds we make in it, because they cannot survive on their own. We have the power to make our world whatever we want it to be.

Paige DeLoach is a summer intern with the Center for Community Change.

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Community Change proudly recognizes a staff bargaining unit affiliated with IFPTE Local 70, a union for non-profit workers.

This article originally appeared on the Huffington Post.

Although for now, the Affordable Care Act (ACA) has escaped the wrath of Republicans, they are still intent on making good on their promise to repeal and replace it. I’ve watched with worry and fear for the families that may lose their health care under the proposed GOP bill. I know firsthand what it means to face a moment when you need a doctor the most and might not have access to one. When I was 19 years old, I was almost ready to give birth to my first child and had no health insurance.

The value of affordable health care wasn’t lost on me because I grew up with a sick parent who spent his life in and out of emergency rooms and hospital beds. I worried what lack of proper prenatal care would do to my unborn child. The thought of labor and delivery without any coverage added to my stress levels after learning the cost of what they called, “cash births,” at the local hospitals. A pregnant woman needed to make down payments to secure a safe place for birth and those balances had to be paid off prior to a due date. If you somehow were allowed to give birth, without coverage, you would be discharged with astronomical hospital charges and harassed until full payment was received. My first trimester was fraught with fear, anxiety and uncertainty—none of it was good for the baby growing inside of me.

My husband and I hadn’t planned the pregnancy, and as a newly married couple, we didn’t have money saved. He worked as a waiter while I was working full-time as a receptionist for a real estate company. They promised health insurance when I was hired but didn’t give it. We worked feverishly to downsize our expenses, including selling our car and curbed spending. But none of that was enough. The mental anguish made me physically sick. By my second trimester I had to get on Medi-Cal—California’s state funded insurance for low-income families.

Medi-Cal offered hope for my unborn baby and me. The doctors were pleasant and provided monthly prenatal checkups, which in my case included frequent additional testing due to our families’ medical histories. All the staff and medical providers were highly skilled and knowledgeable offering such referrals to programs like Women Infants and Children (WIC), a special supplemental nutrition program that educated new mothers on nutrition, breastfeeding and family wellness. Every doctor was patient, kind, caring and attentive and provided us with the best possible care. All of this gave me a little peace at a time that was very nerve-wracking and scary for a 19-year-old.

After the horrifying prospect of labor and delivery without insurance, I was relieved and grateful for the state funded assistance that provided my coverage and the doctors who cared for me. When labor came, a few weeks early, I was as prepared as any young mother could be. My child and I were in the best possible hands with the added bonus of delivering in a safe, clean and secure hospital. The staff was pleasant, empathetic, and accommodating to my husband and me. My positive delivery experience was possible due to the state funded insurance that was afforded to me.

I am incredibly grateful and proud to say my family is healthier and better for the assistance we had at a great time of need. Instead of trying to scrap Medicaid altogether, Republicans should work to strengthen it and consider hiring those who have utilized these services successfully. It appears that at least for now, some Republicans understand what a disaster their proposed bill would be to the American people leaving millions without healthcare and our most in need at further risk.

Had it not been for programs such as Medicaid, I would not have been able to afford having my first child. Having quality access to healthcare helped give me the fortitude to keep going as a young mother and eventually obtain insurance on my own, which ultimately relieved me from needing any further assistance at all. With any luck, the current efforts to eliminate the only healthcare option millions of Americans have, will continue to weaken and hopefully disseminate. For now, we can celebrate this small victory in the war on maintaining the ACA and know that our efforts to protect our most vulnerable Americans are not in vain.

Sharisse Tracey is a Communications Fellow with the Center for Community Change Action. She is also an Army wife in upstate New York, mother of four, educator and writer whose work has appeared in many publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Salon and Essence.Her life story has been featured in an off Broadway play, NOT SOMEONE LIKE ME, which chronicles five stories of sexual assault survivors. She’s is an activist focused on domestic violence, sexual assault, autism awareness, military families and equality in education. You can follow Sharisse on Twitter @SharisseTracey, and on Facebook.

Change Wire

Visit Community Change’s platform for the stories of real people making real change, featuring the op-eds, videos, photo essays, audio stories, and podcasts of our Communications Fellows, staff, and partners.

Community Change proudly recognizes a staff bargaining unit affiliated with IFPTE Local 70, a union for non-profit workers.

This article originally appeared in the Missoulian.

Jamison Hill hasn’t been able to get out of bed in two and a half years.

For 18 months, Jamison was too sick to tolerate clothing, eating, daylight, or too much movement or sound. When I met with him last fall, he sat up with the help of pillows and could tolerate limited amounts of light. We took a few pictures together, momentarily lighting the room with the flash.

The next afternoon, I found him in a crooked, flattened fetal position, with his face on the mattress, in what most people with myalgic encephalomyelitis (also known as chronic fatigue syndrome) call a “crash.” I knelt by the bed, and as I put my cheek on his hand, he whispered, “I’m so sick of this.”

I hoped and prayed that when the Senate revised its health care bill that they would think of people like the warm, funny and kind man I have known since my youth. That they would rethink their ideas to cut the essential services he needs that are provided by Medicaid. Instead, the Senate swung even more to the right in their latest iteration of their bill to take health care away from millions of Americans.

They added $45 billion to help those addicted to opioids, a veil to hide the fact that they still will cut millions from Medicaid, phase out the Medicaid expansion and deny a lifeline to desperately ill people. What is even more galling is that these devastating cuts — as much as $880 billion over the next decade — will be used to bankroll massive tax breaks to the rich.

And if U.S. Sen. Steve Daines and Senate Republicans pass this revised bill, people like my dear friend will bear the brunt of this cruelty and greed.

The Senate health care bill would cut funding for Medicaid’s In-Home Support Services (IHSS) program, which helps people like Jamison afford caregivers who can assist with daily living tasks, such as bathing and eating, and ensure that people with chronic illnesses or disabilities can live at home with their families. Jamison’s mother, Kathy, raised him on her own and he has lived with her since he became too ill to live independently several years ago. Jamison’s caregivers work 48 hours a week, so that Kathy can work and earn an income.

Although he writes eloquently, Jamison cannot speak more than uttering a word or two through a clenched jaw. Even chewing is too painful. Yet he perseveres and advocates for more research into the disease that has taken his livelihood as a former physical trainer, model and weight lifter. Now his attention has turned to advocating for health care.

Daines says he’s still “undecided” about this cruel bill – a bill that would put 75,000 Montanans at risk, including children, seniors and the disabled.

For Jamison – and so many others – we can’t let this bill become law.

***

Stephanie Land is a writing fellow for the Center for Community Change and author of the forthcoming memoir, MAID. She lives in Missoula.

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This article originally appeared on MLK50.

On Sunday, organizers will gather at Tom Lee Park to mark the anniversary of the July 10, 2016 protest that shut down the Hernando-Desoto bridge over the Mississippi River.

From 4 p.m. to 10 p.m., the Coalition of Concerned Citizens will honor “the heroines and heroes who shut down the I-40 Bridge last year and re-energized true activism in ‘Our’ city,” according to the Facebook event.

“During this celebration The Coalition will be presenting different versions of ‘Street Theater’ outlining and highlighting the Real Obscenities of the Construct. So get your group together to present your ‘teachable moments’ to share and raise awareness of the atrocities of the money hoarders and power brokers.”

“Who Will Watch the Watchers” compiled this video of the May Operation Oink street theater by the Coalition of Concerned Citizens.

In May, the coalition brought its first edition of street theater, titled Operation Oink, to Overton Square, a site chosen because of the developers’ family connection to wealth and political power.

Run by brothers Bob and Lou Loeb, Loeb Properties developed and managed Overton Square, a collection of restaurants, bars and businesses.

They are the nephews of mayor Henry Loeb, the anti-union, segregationist mayor when Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in Memphis in 1968. Loeb ’s refusal to negotiate with sanitation workers brought King to town.

On the backs of underpaid laundry workers, the Loebs built their family fortune. One historian determined that the Loeb Laundries chain didn’t give employees a raise for 25 years.

The wealth accumulated through the laundries, which have since been sold off, financed the Loebs’ real estate ventures.

The Loeb name garnered some unwelcome attention earlier this year, with the release of a racist, elitist rant allegedly made by Lauren Loeb, a granddaughter of Mayor Loeb. While on vacation in Turks and Caicos, Lauren Loeb allegedly called black restaurant workers n*ggers and told them to go back to Africa. In the next breath, she bragged about her wealth, as captured on a recording released in April.

In the coalition’s May street theater event at the intersection of Madison and Cooper, the actors staged several scenes to call attention to Memphis Police Department’s backlog of untested rape kits, the lack of a free homeless shelter, laws that criminalize homelessness, police brutality and the exploitation of black labor.

“The real obscenity is that well after a century after chattel slavery was abolished, black people are still working for substandard wages while rich white money hoarders exploit their labor to get richer,” coalition member Keedran Franklin shouts into a megaphone.

“It is our duty to fight for freedom. It is our duty to win,” the actors chant. “We must love and support one another. We have nothing to lose but our chains.”

Sunday’s event at Tom Lee Park on Riverside Drive is free and open to the public. Donations will be accepted via Paypal. See the Facebook event post for more information.


Where Do We Go From Here?

Read more from MLK50 on the bridge protest

Friday: “Take It To The Bridge,” The changes the bridge protest brought and the ones it didn’t, by MLK50 founder Wendi C. Thomas

Also Friday: When A City Fails To Hear, a photo essay by photographer Andrea Morales

Saturday: Policing the protesters, a look at police-community relations by MLK50 contributor Micaela Watts

Also Saturday: Sunday rally planned for anniversary of bridge protest by MLK50 founder Wendi C. Thomas

Coming Sunday: In Their Voices, a multimedia presentation by MLK50 contributor Molly Mulroy

Coming Monday: MLK50’s coverage of the Coalition of Concerned Citizens’ anniversary event

Change Wire

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Community Change proudly recognizes a staff bargaining unit affiliated with IFPTE Local 70, a union for non-profit workers.