An important story on extraction industry devastation by Jonathan Thompson.   This article was originally published on The River of Lost Souls and is reproduced here (High Country News) with permission. 

The past few weeks has seen a drastic escalation in violence on the streets of Hong Kong. On Tuesday night, a police officer aimed a shotgun at protesters who had gathered outside a police station, while a car launched fireworks into the crowd. 
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Days earlier, the police fired rubber bullets and tear gas at protesters trying to reach the Chinese government’s office. 

​And the week before, following a protest of 430,000 people, vigilante thugs, dressed in white and carrying bamboo sticks, beat up democracy protesters at a train station.  

The rest here:  A smart piece by former IAF organizer Amanda Tattersall on Hong Kong protests.

 New York’s Public Housing Isn’t Getting Better
Reports from a federal monitor and residents suggest the city needs a new approach to fixing a crisis for hundreds of thousands of residents.  NY Times Editorial with key quote by Metro IAF leader Bernard Smith here.
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• “Stark! Cologne” goes after gyms that discriminate and empty city apartments

               Mon Jul 29, 2019 -DICO

• Summer Action of the Berlin Community Organizations: Important Victories, Challenge to the Politicians to Build Housing in Berlin
  Mon Jul 29, 2019 -DICO
• GCC Action Walks Neighborhood to Identify Blighted Properties
  Mon Jul 29, 2019 -Greater Cleveland Congregations
• Community Health Worker Poster Wins People’s Choice Award
  Thu Jun 27, 2019 -BUILD

After word spread that Sister Christine Stephens had passed away, I tried explaining who she was to a friend who had never met her.  Words tumbled out - “formidable, smart, compassionate, thoughtful, a towering figure, someone who had to be reckoned with by friend and foe, impossible to ignore, zeroed in on what mattered".  

“She was all that,” I said, “and more.”  “She relished a fight, and even picked some, but never with the intent of humiliating an adversary much less punching down to weakness.”

IAF Organizer Broderick Bagert on Sr. Christine:
We got word yesterday that Sister Christine Stephens has died from complications from a head injury.
She was a colleague, a mentor, a sparring partner and -- though the official record may never reflect it -- one of the greatest organizers in the history of the tradition.

"They live on in others" often seem like mere comfort words, among the arsenal of phrases we keep around to employ at times of loss.
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Today, those words seem like an empirical description of reality.

In my work and training, I cannot go 5 minutes without hearing, as the originating voice of my own voice in that moment, the lilting drawl of Sister Christine -- as full of life there as it was a week ago.
But how I will miss that voice.
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​Sisters of Divine Providence in Sister Christine Stephens from March 22, 2016 - "Training and Developing Leaders"
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“We defend the right of the nation to make sure its borders are secure, but we also defend the right of people to be treated honestly, justly, and fairly as children of God.”  NPR interview with  Father Bruce Lewandowski in Patheos here.
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Housing advocates like Durham CAN (Congregations, Associations and Neighborhoods) have pushed city and county leaders for years to use downtown land for affordable housing.
 
About seven months ago, commissioners voted to make affordable housing part of the East Main Street properties’ redevelopment plan. Then came retail.
Read more here: https://www.newsobserver.com/news/local/article232438554.html#storylink=cpy

Keisha Krumm speaks at a news conference at City Hall in 2015 at which Nationstar Mortgage announced it would contribute $30.5 million to help Sherman Park homeowners recover from the foreclosure crisis. Photo courtesy of Common Ground.
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Milwaukee is a city that does not strengthen the hand of the poor. It seems, instead, to be satisfied with kind gestures of charity toward the symptoms of unfairness. Pope Pius XI said, “Charity will never be true charity unless it takes justice into account…. Let no one attempt with small gifts of charity to exempt themselves from the great duties imposed by justice.”

My over eight years in Milwaukee as Common Ground’s Executive Director and Lead Organizer has been dedicated to building justice with and for those left behind in this city. Common Ground has created controversy and tension, including pushing big banks and billionaires to recalculate their civic interest in broader terms. I am proud that we have had the moral courage to demand more than just charity for neighborhoods, education, health care, and housing.    Keisha Krumm's Full Op Ed in Urban Milwaukee here.
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Keisha Krumm has been organizing over 17 years with the IAF, including 8.5 years as the Lead Organizer for Common Ground, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. She can be reached kmkrumm@gmail.com
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Developers and community groups are monitoring these parcels closely. To show activists the projects under development or soon to be, the Washington Interfaith Network ran several bus tours this year. Tour guides noted potential conflicts as the city seeks to reap new tax revenue while requiring developers to include socially desirable, if less profitable, features.

“At some point, you realize there’s just a machine that’s running,” said the Rev. Frankey Grayton, pastor of Edgewood Baptist Church in Washington and a prominent activist with WIN. “The development is happening at an alarming rate.”  Read the rest of the story in the NY Times here.
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From the Washington Post:
One person who recognizes this disparity is Mike Gecan, senior organizer at Metro Industrial Areas Foundation based in Chicago. In something of a unique social experiment, Gecan is attempting to address obstacles faced by populations who are disadvantaged by residing in far-off areas of the map.  Opinion piece here.
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