Pomp and Circumstance played over the loud speaker as more than 500 young people from across the country walked down the aisle in the Lower Senate Park overlooking the nation's Capitol- however, this was not your typical graduation. It was a call to legislators and the Administration to pass the DREAM Act, which would allow young undocumented immigrants to adjust their status after meeting certain requirements and attending either 2 years of college or military service.

The National Dream Graduation organized by the United We Dream Coalition celebrated the accomplishments of undocumented youth despite the enormous barriers to higher education they face because of their status. At the same time it symbolized the unfulfilled possibilities of 65,000 immigrant high school students that graduate each year but are not able to continue their studies and pursue their dreams. Among those present, Paula, dressed in her purple Hunter College gown from her own graduation this June, listened to the speeches of fellow DREAMers who are now facing deportation proceedings. Born in Peru and a New York resident since the age of 2, Paula is only one of the many students, advocates and allies who visited their representatives, urging them to pass the DREAM Act this year.

Exclusive Commentary from Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity:

"Poor Measurement: Time for a Comprehensive New Poverty Measure"
By John Quinterno, primary author of "Making Ends Meet on Low Wages: The 2008 North Carolina Living Income Standard"

After years of inaction, there appears to be growing interest in updating the poverty measure. Unfortunately, these important debates largely have occurred as technocratic, inside-the-beltway ones that seemingly have paid little attention to the pragmatic implications of a switch. Four practical questions in particular merit consideration:

First, Will the benefits be worth the effort?
Second, will the new state-level results be plausible?
Third, will a new measure change the debate about poverty?
Fourth, is an opportunity being missed?

Click here to read the full analysis.

Click here to read more about the WOCPN's Pass the Measuring American Poverty Act 2009 Campaign.

The University of Southern California's Program for Environmental and Regional Equity. Researchers found deep socioeconomic and racial disparities in the impacts of climate change, from disproportionate health risks in extreme weather events to the burden of rising energy costs, detailed in a new report on "The Climate Gap". The report concludes:

Ignoring the climate gap could reinforce and amplify current as well as future socioeconomic and racial disparities. On the other hand, policymakers can work to close the climate gap through strategies that address the regressive economic and health impacts of climate change, and that lift all boats by ensuring that everyone shares equally in the benefits of climate solutions, and no one is left bearing more than their fair share of the burdens.

Read the full report here.

Irasema Garza, Affiliate Practitioner of the WOCPN and President of women's rights organization Legal Momentum, blogs on the Huffington Post about the failures of TANF and welfare reform to service those people in need.

"Fifteen years after the "end of welfare as we know it," ever increasing numbers of mothers, children, and families are facing exactly that bleak landscape. Welfare reform has been "successful" in reducing the number of people receiving welfare. But this "success" is not because of a corresponding reduction in the number of families who are poor and in desperate need of these benefits and services; not because of a reduction in the number of families who are eligible to receive these benefits; and certainly not because there is an increase in employment for the women who single-handedly head these poor households. At its inception in 1996, TANF served 84 percent of eligible families; now, the program only reaches 40 percent of these very vulnerable women, children and families."

Continue reading here.

Legal Momentum released a report examining the causes and  details of welfare reform today. Read the full report here.

Listen to a radio interview with Associate Director Diana Salas by CBC Toronto Metro Morning guest host Matt Galloway

Click here and then on "Non-Citizen Votes? (runs 5:49)" for a Windows Media Player audio file

The New York Times reports today on Atlanta's plan to demolish all its public housing projects:

"In 1936, Atlanta built Techwood Homes, the nation's first housing project.Now, Atlanta is nearing a very different record: becoming the first major city to knock them all down. By next June, officials here plan to demolish the city's last remaining housing project, fulfilling a long and divisive campaign to reduce poverty by decentralizing it. Mixed-income developments oriented toward families, with trendy shops, golf courses and Y.M.C.A.'s are emerging where bleak, uniform towers once stood. Displaced residents are receiving vouchers to move to private housing. And a landmark experiment in housing the urban poor in large government-run facilities that began under the New Deal is being undone."

Read the rest of the article here


Poverty in America discusses:

"There's the standard chestnut about the exponential problems of concentrated poverty, without any acknowledgment that the reason warehousing poor people has become so problematic is because we stopped sufficiently investing in their housing and social service needs a long time ago. There's the true statement that most residents support "relocation" - but this reality is distanced from the equal realities that only about 20% of public housing residents qualify for the new units, and the rest end up living in the poorest neighborhoods of Atlanta, where opportunities are not much better.

If you can weather relocation and stringent eligibility requirements, then you should really benefit from a new unit in a refurbished neighborhood with more amenities.  If a disability, age, language barriers, economic hardship, or any other issue should disqualify you from the new place or make multiple moves hard on you, then you're likely to be cast out on your own into the market, with only a voucher in hand.  This may be the freedom of choice we Americans so cherish, but it also leaves the most vulnerable among the poorest of poor people of color worse off in an insecure, overcrowded, unaffordable housing market."

After graduating from the University of Vermont last spring, twenty-two year old Kesha Ram ran and won a campaign to become the youngest member of the Vermont House of Representatives, and its only person of color.

Read her interview with Wiretap Magazine here

From the Wall Street Journal:

"Welfare rolls, which were slow to rise and actually fell in many states early in the recession, now are climbing across the country for the first time since President Bill Clinton signed legislation pledging "to end welfare as we know it" more than a decade ago."

"Twenty-three of the 30 largest states, which account for more than 88% of the nation's total population, see welfare caseloads above year-ago levels, according to a survey conducted by The Wall Street Journal and the National Conference of State Legislatures."

This increased use of welfare is also the "first real test" of TANF. "Although the TANF program seems to be accommodating increased need, it is doing so at a slower rate than another government initiative: the food-stamp program. The number of food-stamp recipients has risen in every state and was 19% higher in March than a year ago, a much bigger increase than the number of welfare cases." This may point to a need to reconsider the government's current poverty measure (Read about our Measuring American Poverty campaign).


Read the rest of the article on the WSJ here

The City of Toronto is examining the possibility of offering municipal voting rights for permanent residents - regardless of citizenship. The Women of Color Policy Network, through associate director Diana Salas, participated in a forum held last week to discuss ways of offering a more inclusive environment to all residents. South Asian Focus, "the voice of Brampton's South Asian community," discusses the forum here.

The panel, made up of Astrid de Vries, Diana Salas and Alan Broadbent, argued that residency, not citizenship, should be the only criterion for eligibility to vote municipally.
Diana Salas, associate director, Women of Color Policy Network, Wagner School of Public Service, New York University, and a member of the New York Coalition to Expand Voting Rights, said extensive community outreach and polling efforts in New York City showed the primary concerns of non-citizens such as transportation, education and jobs were similar to those of voting citizens.

More coverage of the Toronto forum:

- Posted Toronto: "Mayor wants to let non-citizens vote"

Diana Salas, an activist described efforts to give non-citizens voting rights in New York City, where council can decide on its own to change the electoral rules.

The original concept of extending the vote to all residents of the city, including illegal immigrants, had to be scaled back in order to win favour with councillors to help move it forward, she said.
New York activists have adopted the historic rallying cry of the American Revolution, said Ms. Salas which is "no taxation without representation."

- The Brampton Guardian: Voting rights ahead for non-citizen residents?

- InsideToronto.com: Ground support needed to change municipal voting laws

- EyeWeekly.com: Best Idea Ever: Everybody Votes!

"No taxation without representation." The anti-colonial slogan is something like 250 years old, but when it comes up during Diana Salas' presentation this past Wednesday -- during the public forum on municipal voting rights for permanent residents -- it makes more sense than ever.

- Canada.com: Open Toronto Voting to Non-Citizens, Miller urges

- American Renaissance News: Open Toronto Voting to Non-Citizens, Miller urges

- Novae Res Urbis Toronto: Municipal Voting Forum (PDF)
NRU.June12.pdf

"Under the economic recovery plan, laid-off workers have seen a $25 weekly bump in their unemployment checks as part of a broad expansion of benefits for the poor. But the law did not raise the income cap for food stamp eligibility, so the extra money has pushed some people over the limit.

Laid-off workers and state officials are only now realizing the quirk, a consequence of pushing a $787 billion, 400-page bill through Congress and into law in three weeks."

Unfortunately, this "quirk" could have a strong impact on the day-to-day lives of people who use food stamps, many of which are women of color.

Read more here.

This month, the National Council of Negro Women in partnership with the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, released a new report detailing the experiences of minority women in the subprime lending market titled "Assessing the Double Burden: Examining Racial and Gender Disparities in Mortgage Lending."

Dr. Avis Jones-DeWeever, WOCPN Affiliate Scholar and Director of the Research, Public Policy, and Information Center for African American Women at the NCNW, adds, "In an era of change, this report shows that there is still much more work to be done.Given the importance of homeownership to families and entire communities, it becomes clear that we simply cannot rest until every person, regardless of race or gender, is treated fairly at every stage of the mortgage lending process.  Results like those uncovered by this study make it painfully clear that for far too many, fair treatment in mortgage lending remains an elusive and still unfulfilled goal." (link)

Read the full report here.

C. Nicole Mason, Executive Director of the WOCPN, comments on the shortcomings of the traditional poverty measure and the possibilities of the Measuring American Poverty Act recently introduced by Representative Jim McDermott (D-WA) and Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT).

Continue reading here...

Learn more about the Measuring American Poverty Act of 2009.

Women and Work: Feminists in Solidarity with Domestic Workers

Working with filmmaker Basia Winograd, the Barnard Center for Research on Women produced this documentary featuring women leaders from across the country raising their voices to support the work being done on behalf of domestic workers in the US. Participants include our own Executive Director Nicole Mason, along with Carol Jenkins, Maria Hinojosa, Liz Abzug, Amy Richards, Barbara Smith, Gloria Steinem, Yolanda Wu, Jennifer Baumgardner, and the Guerrilla Girls.

Watch video here or after the jump

Today, in taped remarks to the 2009 National Congress of American Indians Mid-Year Conference, President Barack Obama announced the appointment of Kimberly Teehee as Senior Policy Advisor for Native American Affairs.  As a member of the Domestic Policy Council, Teehee will advise the President on issues impacting Indian Country.

Since January of 1998, Teehee has served as a Senior Advisor to the House of Representatives Native American Caucus Co-Chair, Congressman Dale Kildee (D-MI).   A member of the Cherokee Nation, she has also served as the Director of Native American Outreach for the Presidential Inaugural Committee for President Clinton's second Inauguration.  Prior to that, Teehee was the Deputy Director of Native American Outreach at the Democratic National Committee.  She has also held various positions with the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma, including serving as a Law Clerk in the Division of Law and Justice.  Teehee received her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Northeastern State University and her Juris Doctor from the University of Iowa, College of Law.  While in law school, Teehee was honored with the Bureau of National Affairs Award and served in leadership positions in the National Native American Law Student Association and the Iowa Native American Law Student Association. 

Read the full press release here.

Elissa Strauss, freelance journalist for The American Prospect, wrote one in a four-part series of articles about women and work titled The Invisible Workers. The article discusses the lack of protection and regulation provided for domestic workers in the U.S., a field composed mostly of immigrant women of color, and the attempts of various local organizations to secure rights.

Click here to read the article.

Despite consistent increases in spending, disparities among demographic groups persist. With the recession and unemployment on the rise, the disparities already apparent among these groups will continue to increase. In light of the proposed health care reform, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recently released a new report titled Health Disparities: A Case for Closing the Gap that demonstrates the need for special attention to communities of color. This report focuses on the higher rates of disease, reduced acces to care and lack of preventive care among low-income and minority populations.

Click here to view the full report (PDF)

If I attend a Black Church and tithe once a week, does that make me a racist? How about if I donate my time to an organization committed to ensuring young black men avoid prison, would that make me a racist? Probably not. For Sotomayor, however, Republicans and Newt Gingrich would like us to believe that these actions alone make one a racist.

Whatever happened to the good old-fashioned definition of a racist, where one had to believe in ideas of racial superiority and use those beliefs to discriminate or cause harm to other groups deemed inferior? This so-called new definition of racism, where attempting to right historic and present-day discrimination or having pride in your racial or ethnic background makes an individual racist, has me a little confused.

To read the rest of the article, click here.