Ferguson’s Threat to Voters Affects All Communities

 

The terror of a military-style attack on Ferguson residents makes Americans worry that all cities are threatened too. Ferguson shows the forces that shatter democracy.

 

Forces besides the obvious denial of legal protests, the attack on neighborhoods as though people are terrorists, and the concentration of power by one group over another. 

 

When we look deeper at Ferguson, voter suppression and forced loss of housing places the African American community at a disadvantage that resulted in the political power held by the White community.

 

Many media sources have shown the shocking stats. Almost seven of ten people in Ferguson are Black, yet 50 of its 53 police officers are White. Of six city council members, five are White. 

 

Ferguson’s election turnout is terrible by design, according to an article by Steve Singiser of Kos Media, in an article dated August 18, 2014.

Kos Media, LLC serves as an online political community with 2.5 million unique visitors per month and a quarter of a million registered users.

 

Ferguson runs an unusual elections calendar, Kos pointed out. Ferguson holds stand-alone elections for local offices in the spring of odd-numbered years when nothing else is on the ballot.

 

Even the Conservative National Review Online calls voter turnout as abysmal. A low of seven percent of Black voters turnout compared to 17 percent of White voters. That figure contrasts with the 54 percent of African Americans who voted in the last presidential election. Even White turnout was up to 55 percent during the presidential race.

 

However, this loss of freedom by design hits most municipalities, according to Kos’ Singiser. Many communities hold local elections apart from the "traditional" electoral calendar for state and federal elections. 

 

The design becomes more devious. Some municipalities manipulate voting by holding elections in November. Yet they also hold them in odd-numbered years where no major issues stand out in state or federal elections.

 

Correcting the design demands money, according to Mike Rhodes from The Community Alliance. The website acts as an independent voice for workers and progressive groups in the Central San Joaquin Valley. 

 

How much money asks Kos’ Singiser. If a campaign has enough money, it can use volunteers, or a paid staff to walk and identify supporters. Those staff people can act in the last couple of days prior to an election to make sure their contacts voted.

 

Tied into all of the designed problems to bringing out voters may also be linked to residents being denied housing. If people worry about where they will live, can they take time out to vote on an usual schedule?

 

Community Alliance warns that developers and financial interests run Fresno because they have design the system work in their best interest. They bring their people out to vote, and manipulate the electoral system by pouring money into the campaigns of their preferred candidate. Such actions take away from the abilities of the poor and working-class voters.

 

Did a lack of housing affect Ferguson? According to Insight News half of Ferguson homes are classified as being underwater or under market value. Insight News started in 1974 as a color-cover magazine serving the Minneapolis' African American north side.

 

Homes deemed as having "negative equity" often become hurt by loan default or foreclosure, according to the recent report, "Underwater America," from the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society at the University of California, Berkeley.

 

Mortgage lenders targeted predominantly Black and Hispanic areas, according to Andre F. Shashaty of New America Media. New America Media represents a national collaboration and advocacy of 3,000 ethnic news organizations that serve over 57 million adults from various ethnicities. 

 

The lenders sought out the Black and Hispanic communities to offer the highest-risk, highest-cost types of mortgage loans. Their tools like the adjustable-rate mortgages and loans with high prepayment penalties led to higher-than-average default rates, according to the Housing Commission established by the Bipartisan Policy Center in Washington, D.C.

 

Depriving residents of housing could lead to the loss of voting rights, which goes beyond Ferguson to other towns. The example leads to a further loss of democracy when military troops back a small elite as residents become enraged at the loss of rights.

 

A lower voting turnout could lead to more voter ID laws. As many as 22 states passed laws stiffening the requirements on identification needed to vote, a move that disproportionately affects poor and minority voters, according to Jotaka Eaddy, the NAACP's voting rights director.

 

The warning calls for action. The Rev. William Barber, an NAACP board member, sounded desperate. "We're in a position to have 2010 all over again unless we do something about it."

 

Alternatives to Ferguson's Verdict

Justice is the word that comes most to mind when thinking about an alternative to the verdict in Ferguson.

 

Justice is not served when prosecutor McCulloch presents information to make jurors think a reasonable doubt exists for the police. That is the role of policeman Wilson’s attorney.

 

Justice is not served when the emphasis of the questioning relied on Michael Brown. That should have been Wilson’s attorney.

 

 

Usually a prosecutor frames the information to benefit his client. McCulloch’s client was the family of the victim Michael Brown.

 

Justice is not served when the jury has a three to one representation of White people who do not reflect the makeup of Ferguson. Justice is served by a jury of peers.

 

Justice is not served when martial law uses tear gas immediately on protestors awaiting the verdict upon hearing the decision. Did the riots hit because of the tear gas or because the people saw no justice.

 

Justice is not served when police fail to followup usual crime activity in African American neighborhoods. Or when the detective decides not to fully investigate because they want a quick finish for the case. Or when the dollar determines who has access to information during trial.

 

 

 

And when Freedom Riders were attacked, the legal system protected the attackers. Yet the Justice Department under Attorney General Robert Kennedy expanded the idea of justice to move against states rights.

 

 

 

Let’s have a real alternative to Ferguson. President Obama should cry against the misuse of Justice rather than appeal to people to stand down. 

 

"The opposite of poverty is not wealth - it is justice." Leonardo Boff.

 

 

Violence is never good, but maybe the real violence comes from a police state that treats citizens as an occupied country.

 

A real alternative would be to have the Justice Department move immediately to investigate the local decision makers and the power structure.

 

Fights for Voting Rights

 

Voting changes drawing local residents don’t need violence. When you check out the US Human Rights Network (USHRN) website, you'll find a group  that builds grassroots organizations by educating voters.

 

The Coordinating Center staff from USHRN includes interns and volunteers based in Atlanta and New York. Of the many projects run by the group, the Week Seven of the #UDHR Campaign takes a closer look at supporting political voices from residents against policies that eliminate voters.

 

In one example, the group called the Coalition for the People's Agenda ran a Citizenship Education Program to empower people for the future. The group’s Voter Registration Program stressed education throughout the state and offered to set up campaigns, town hall meetings, and hand out evaluation sheets to motivate voters in Georgia.

 

In another example, The League of Young Voters empowers young people nationwide to participate in the democratic process. The league creates progressive political changes on the local, state and national levels.  

 

In three years, local leagues have stirred recognition in their communities, according to USHRN. They are respected as serious players on the political scene who are able to move large numbers of young people from low-income youth and people of color.”

 

While the youth are learning, they organize coalitions, attract media, and lobby for legislation. As one technique, the League is known for meeting young people with edgy humor as a creativity to push issues.

 

Voting Changes Shown in Fiction

 

If you watched the PBS mini-series, The Amazing Mrs. Pritchard from 2006, you might have seen a complete transformation of voting results. The work of fiction could shed light on how activists plan to regain rights in reality.

 

The head of state changed from the old-boys-club person to a female open to new ideas. The cabinet chairs found women and average people who resembled more of a college dorm sit-in group than corporate interests. And the policies drew in voters by encouraging the use of the Net. The changes also protected people by using new energy plans for the environment. In the process, the new leaders threw out the traditional image of Whitehall to bring government closer to people.

 

Rosemund ‘Ros’ Pritchard’s change to bring more voters into government occurred because she spoke a direct language with specifics to the potential voter.

 

She framed a message that attracted a Conservative leader to join her banner. And she showed a wealthy business woman how the new shape of voters could help businesses.

 

She entered the political mire because local candidates engaged in a shouting match in front of the supermarket where she served as a supervisor. She defied them to speak to the real issues. When they couldn’t, they found her in a race where she gathered support from around the country, enough to build a party and win Parliament.

 

Ros’ language hit home with the average person because she didn’t hold herself back from the fear of alienating one group or another in the political mix. She used language that connected with the community. She asked whether the position of either party would help the neighborhood in specific ways. 

 

The traditional campaign avoided specifics. The use of specifics pose political problems if real estate developers want certain tax advantages. So a candidate skirts an answer about where money goes. Specifics about how one housing unit or business can develop informs people. The information connects the average person with details about how the community will change from a policy.

 

Voting changes can happen when people stand for a higher morally despite the seeming need to compromise. Ros’ strategy aimed to support equality for women despite the power structure of the Old-Boys-Club.

 

Yet that determined stand brought unexpected allies. The series shows how the character of Catherine Walker, a prominent Conservative leader switched her party when she saw the morality of Ros. Walker realized the Old-Boys-Club had been placating her, and thought Ros could be an agent of change. 

 

The message is that a link to the moral high ground can win support from the other side. Not every member of the opposition feels happy with the status quo.

 

Voting changes can erupt when the changers empower the public. Ros’ campaign challenged the voters to raise their concerns at the local levels. She used national television to motivate the local voters. That act brought the public into a new political party that grew to turn her candidacy into a national one.

 

Activists wanting to correct the political imbalance of Ferguson-like towns could use Ros Pritchard as a model. Show potential voters the moral high ground. That draws attention of people in the middle between the oppressed and the oppressor. Use specific language directed to correcting a local problem. That directs the voter’s attention to a common barrier. Empower the voter by turning their voice into action.

 

Ros might have been fiction, but her barriers came from the real world. Her solutions can blossom from the sights of a mini series into the political makeup of a city council.

 

Community Developers Affect Voting

 

Voters lose rights by design also when developers fail to support homeownership. As early as July, 2008, CBS News pointed to election officials who worried that the state's home foreclosure problem would hurt voters still registered at their former address.

 

Voters with outdated addresses could be challenged in pre-election procedures. Those voters are also more likely to cast provisional ballots that might not be counted. 

 

CBS News cited Daniel Tokaji, an Ohio State University law professor, specializing in elections, who suggested that foreclosures could explain the increasing percentages of provisional votes cast in Ohio. Seeking housing creates other voting barriers. Losing a home and finding another means people are on the move.

 

The number of voters moving can be exemplified by the Franklin County Board of Election’s action to send notices to about 27,000 residents who filed change-of-address forms but failed to update their voter registrations.

 

Home losses could set up problems of representation in Ferguson and other towns. The Black-White gap in homeownership rates has reached historic proportions, according to Harvard's report, "The State of the Nation's Housing 2013." The report was issued by Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies. A stat of African American home ownership plummeted to 43.9 percent in 2012 from a height of 49 percent in 2004. On the other hand, homeownership of White households dropped, but remained at 73.5 percent.

 

A housing crunch has also sent a powerful after shock to property owners who never had a problem making their mortgage payments. But they owned property near people who did, according to Andre F. Shashaty of New America Media. New America Media represents a national collaboration and advocacy of 3,000 ethnic news organizations that serve over 57 million adults from various ethnicities.

 

In minority neighborhoods, the average decline in home prices between 2006 and 2013 stood at 26 percent, according to Harvard's 2014 report. Such a figure overshadows the White neighborhoods by almost three times.

 

Local activists and developers can help the community. Find ways for businesses or banks to reinvest in the neighborhood. The effort helps the real estate broker as well as the activist.

 

 "In some communities with many foreclosed properties, the crisis threatens to doom the entire neighborhood to a cycle of disinvestment and decay," according to Chicago's Business and Professional People for the Public Interest.

 

A cluster of vacant properties can destabilize a block and troubled blocks can threaten an entire neighborhood.

 

Failing to work on such a problem, despite the cost, keeps the community in a downward slide. Such a slide with poverty and despair leads to anger and a loss of hope, whether the town is Ferguson or another place.