The Economic Rape Of The African American Community…What can we do about it?
Posted by caclarkfrieson on November 30, 2005
When I introduced our reading public to the Wilkie Clark Memorial Foundation, Inc., I made it known that one of our chief objectives was the economic empowerment of African-Americans.
Well, you may ask, how can your organization help to economically empower black people?
One way we empower black people is by publishing this newspaper weekly, so you can have at your fingertips, the information that YOU NEED, to help you better understand how the system works against us. We can hopefully take this knowledge into account, as we live and meet the challenges of each new day. Other publications are not going to tell you what we will tell you. They present the information they want you to know, and omit the rest. That is how we have been kept in the dark, and oppressed for so long. Just think how far along we might have been if we had had a black weekly paper coming out 50 years ago.
Many of our economic problems arise because of LACK OF KNOWLEDGE. God’s word said it best: “My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge.”
But, I also have NO PROBLEM blaming white America for much of the economic disparity that exists within the black race. They have always managed to stay in control by keeping us down. That has never changed.
It is no secret that we, the African-American race, are the poorest, and most economically oppressed race of people on the face of the earth, and things don’t seem to be getting better for us. We are still the last hired, and first fired; we make less money; have fewer resources; find it more difficult to borrow money. It is just a fact of life if you are black.
One of the few times the State of Alabama made national news was when it came out that Alabama has the lowest hourly wage of any state in the United States; all these things combined keep African-Americans poor and oppressed. But, there are a few other things I want you to know about, that don’t make things any easier for us economically.
A professional colleague of mine, who is not from this area, commented to me: “You have to be extremely careful with those Randolph County folks. They ain’t right. Whenever I travel, I’m very careful not to stop anywhere in Randolph County.” All I could do was to quietly acknowledge her statement.
I want to point out how we are economically raped and victimized by our oppressive municipal and county governments. Those of us who live in Roanoke are consistently charged – almost fined, for being poor or economically oppressed.
First, let’s look at the city utilities. I have never understood how any entity such as the utility board, can charge a $75.00 late fee on utilities in good conscious – let alone the $25.00 that was previously charged before it went up to $75.00.
To make my point clear, I’m going to expose myself: I have a $74,000.00 mortgage on my home. I pay roughly $587.00 a month for my mortgage payment. As with most accounts, you have 10 days grace, to get you payment in. So, if your payment reaches your lender on the 10th day, you’re safe. If it reaches your lender after the 10th day, you incur late fees. My late fee on a $74,000.00 mortgage is a mere $29.00. The good thing is that if you pay early, you get to pay less than the amount of the monthly payment.
Here’s the analogy. If the late fee on a $74,000.00 loan isn’t but $29.00, how does the City Of Roanoke possibly justify a $75.00 charge if your utility bill is late? There is no RATIONAL reason for it. Think about those who may not even owe a $75.00 utility bill, but can’t afford to pay on time! You get NO latitude whatsoever! As a matter of fact, one young lady recently commented to me: “It’s cheaper for me to bounce a check, than to pay late and incur the $75.00 lat charge.” I would be willing to bet that the City is getting real fat and healthy off of the hefty late fees it is charging for utility service. In these tough economic times, and with gas prices rising daily, there have been times when I’ve had to choose between holding off on paying my utility bill, so I can put the fuel that I need to put in my car to get to my job every day.
Out of curiosity, I asked Mayor Robert Finley of LaFayette about their utility fee structure. Just a few miles down the road in LaFayette, Alabama, no citizen is ever charged any more than 10.00 late fee on a utility. The City of LaFayette buys its utilities wholesale — including water and power and provides these services to the residents. In addition, they provide garbage and trash service. The residents are “back-billed” for services, meaning that when they pay their September 1 bill, they will be paying for services used in from July1 – August 1. From the 1st to the 15th there is no late charge. From the 15-20th there is a 2.00 late fee for each utility. Then, from the 20th to the 22nd a $10.00 late notice is sent out. That leaves 2 days to pay your delinquent utility bill. The 25th is the cut-off date.
If a family experiences a water leak, they are given “sewerage credits,” but never made to pay a bill that reflects an excessive amount of water usage.
That’s what I call “government FOR the people.
When I look at my city, I have to ask myself, for all the money we (black folk) have to pay, what is my city doing for me? What improvements have been made in my neighborhood? What money has been spent in my neighborhood? Why are the little black boys taking over my back yard? I looked out of my back door one evening, and the little boys from all over the neighborhood were trying to paint white stripes on my grass to make a football field. I asked myself, Why is that?
It has always been my belief that most rural towns and communities in the south count on African-American passiveness, ignorance and naivite to finance their incompetent management of government. They know that there have always been financial errors in judgment and omissions in the administration of city governments. But instead of being resourceful and creative in financing the city government, they’d rather keep the “Good Old Boy” system, wherein we blacks seem to always be the ones who have to pay for it, through unfair judicial processes and procedures, unreasonable fines, racial profiling and so forth. They keep the courthouses and jails full with African-Americans—our punishment for not having the money to pay the unreasonable fines. They know that we are the poor and oppressed, and they know that it is unreasonable and immoral to place these burdens on our shoulders, but they do it anyway.
Another example is in the Municipal court system, where a startling majority of those answering charges is black, and where our people are made to pay out of their rear end – money they need to live, to put food on their tables, to get back and forth to work. They are like parasites, scavengers and vultures, sucking the economic life out of poor people. My son recently told me, “If you have to go to court, you better have $300.00 or you’re going to jail! And do you think that they credit time served in jail? No. You may do jail time, but you still have to pay the whole fine.” A lot of people don’t even make that in a week. ECONOMIC RAPE!
A young man approached me and said, “Ms. Charlotte, you ought to just go up there and see how they carry on at City court. Don’t nobody be up there but us blacks, and all they want is money.” Everybody is guilty, no matter what, the court appointed attorney don’t work for you. The only thing they do is tell you to cop a plea, and pay the fine. ECONOMIC RAPE!
What can jail time do for us, other than squeeze us out of the job market?
Making us even more economically oppressed and disadvantaged? ECONOMIC RAPE!
Open your eyes black people. Things don’t have to be that way. We as a race of people have already given to this country 400 years of FREE LABOR! During slavery. We have already been unfairly brutalized, unfairly prosecuted, executed, abused. How much more do we have to take?
Several years ago, I attended Municipal Court in the City of Atlanta, and the environment was totally different from anything I’d ever experienced in Randolph County: it was one of the most dignified experiences I ever witnessed. Upon disposal of their cases, every individual summoned to court was graciously “thanked” by the judge, for coming to municipal court. And not everybody who had charges against them was fined either! And some of them were even “guilty” but they were given an opportunity to keep their record clean, and escape being fined. There were several courtrooms, all of which I visited, and understanding and compassionate judges, who listened attentively to the cases that came before them. These was a racially balanced racial mixture of judges, black, white and other; and the cases were processed quickly, efficiently, and people weren’t subjected to the humiliation of having to sit in one room packed like sardines keeping them tied up and detained for hours at a time. Likewise there was a balanced racial mixture of offenders being tried, black, white and other.
In a previous issue of The People’s Voice, Tony Malone wrote an editorial in which he talked about how we as black people get “pimped,” by so-called black leaders. Well, what about getting “pimped” by these Political leaders in city and county government who don’t give a rusty nickel about how hard it may be for the widowed, the poor, the disabled, those on fixed incomes, and other economically oppressed people? These oppressive late fees and charges, unreasonable fines, and unfair processes and procedures are nothing more than the hammer that helps to drive the last nail in the economic coffins of African-Americans. It shows that we are still being blamed for all of the ills of society, and we are being over charged and often fined just for being poor. I can think of no other name to call it other than ECONOMIC RAPE!!
The real tragedy of all of this is that every day, in my classroom, I lie to my Civics students about our government being a government of, for and by the people. I tell them daily that when our constitution was written, the Statesmen’s purpose was to establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to themselves and their posterity, and this included all of us who are here today. I explain to them that promoting the general welfare meant that the government was set up to ensure that its citizens would be “free from hardship.” I lied to them. In the case of Roanoke, Alabama, and many other municipalities in the Southeast, that is not their purpose. Their purpose is to impose as many fines, unreasonable fees, injustice, unfairness and hardship as they possibly can. African-American people are defenseless, and without the protection supposedly guaranteed under the U.S. constitution. They are subjected to unreasonable fines, cruel and unusual punishments. But, it’s a lie that I tell every day in the classroom. I can’t tell them my true thoughts.
Well, you may now ask, what can we do about it? The answer is there is a lot we can do. We can start right now, getting registered to vote. Making sure that we are prepared, with our id cards, or whatever is needed so we don’t get barred from voting at the polls.
We need to demand that our cities and counties look for and adopt creative and resourceful ways to finance the city operations, instead of keeping us on edge all the time, wondering when we’ll be stopped and jailed and hit with a big fat fine of some kind.
We need to make sure we insist that every governing body in our respective communities issue resolutions reauthorizing the voting rights act. We must make sure that every time one of our children turns 18 years old, they get to the registrar’s office and register to vote, and VOTE.
Then, finally the most important think we can do is to remain aware that our black dollars count, because green is the color of money. We need to put our black dollars where our mouths are, and teach our dollars some sense by being discriminating about the places we spend our money, and make sure we spend our money with those who understand, favor and support our political and social progress.
Copyright 2005 by Charlotte A. Clark-Frieson
This article was composed and written by Charlotte A. Clark-Frieson, and appeared in the The People’s Voice African American Weekly News (http://www.peoplesvoiceonline.com/). This article may be reprinted with permission from the author:
Charlotte A. Clark-Frieson
email: caclarkfrieson@msn.com
322 Wilkie Clark Drive
Roanoke, Alabama 36274
334-863-4885
334-338-1149
