op n
By NATHANI L COTT
SI!D'� r
DBTRorr-Tue day, October
1 w the day tbat the Big Star
1beater, believed to be the state'
only Black-owned movie theatre,
opened at 1540 Woodward
Avenue.
'The r, which expe to
nge features every 10 to 14
o ned with "Boyz N The
Hood"
Big Star w nted to open with
the recently-released "Ricochet; H
but the Warner Brothers wanted
S5,OOO down and the theater's
funds were getting low. Conse­
quently, Big Star came to terms
with Columbia Pictures and as
their capital grows, so will their
ability to purchase fir t-run
releases.
Columbu
By GWEN cKiNNEY
NNPA N..,.,. S.nle.
Discovery or Invasion?
'That's the question being asked
from varied quarters as the world
gear up to mark the SOOth
anniversary of Columbus' voyage 'to
the Americas. It is a debate that h
heated up this Columbus Day and
will continue through 1992. For
some, C.mbus Day is being
marked with celebration, For others,
it signals' a reevaluation of the
-, plunder and pillage of people of
color in the Americas and beyond.
"There can be no celebration."
says Rev. Art Cribbs of the United
Church of Christ, one the 200
organizations planning
counter-events to official
cool
IGEL
e the di triet n to 10 e, but
al 0 to ret in cultural dive ity in
d trict Ire dy 60 percent BI
We. t Bloomfield cboo
than 10 percent BI c .
"The more it become one
popul tion, th le good it i for our
children, " Gra g ide Robert
Docking, uperintendent of Bloom­
field Hill hool, . d he opposes
the transfer be e it ould hurt
Ponti c financi lly t a time when
the di trict need to improve i
educational offerin. The local
o kland Intermediate School Board
turned down the requ t in Junc.
Th tate bo rd i et to hear the
appeal in January.
Pan I
Viol nc
r
on
e any
on your
bloc , deterior ting your
ighborhood, rcpresentin
d r to cbil a potential
hiding pI ce for child
mol te and ra , or even
ibl crack house?
The Detroit City Planning
Commis ion held a wor hop
S turd y, October 5
explaining how i ui
Abatement Ordinance can be
used to a110 com uni ty
residen to rehab uch bo
CIH'Nspolt4
Tho who have been removed
from General i tance and other
disadvantaged people may h ve one
dvantage i getting a jOb-the
federal T ted Jo Tax Credit Pro-
m. ,
If someone has been receivin
General Assi lance or ADC or at
I t 30 ys or hired 30 days er
leaving social service, the employer
can get tax credits of 40� of the first
$6,000 of their e ming the first year
of the job. The maximum amount an
employer can get is $2,400.
An employee must be employed
90 days or work at least 120 hours.
Thi is meant to be an incentive
for' employers to hire disadvantaged
S CREDIT, B-2
I c
fo r 0 kl nd County pro ecutor
to rep nt th m t n upcoming
tate Bo rd of Edu tion h ring on
their t fer req 1.
"Thi i prob bly th mo t
united I've n thi neighborhood, "
re ident D vid Shippy told the
Detroit Free P in Mond y edi­
tio . Shippy chipped in to hire the
form r pro cutor even though hi
kids are grown and gon .
Only 15 of th 123 home in the
neighborhood have children, but I t
M Y about 95 percent of the property
own rs igned a petition to begin the
property transfer reque 1.
"Prob bly what motiv ted us
w that four familie had their
home up for ale, " aid Lynnette
McBride, a p rent who I unched the
campaign.
Th tate allow homeowners to
transfer chool districts if they can
how their children need pecial
programs only offered in the other
di trict or if a chool in the requested
di trict is closer.
The ne re t Bloomfield Hill
chool is clo r by a couple miles,
but neighbors more often point to
poor educational quality nd
depre ed property v I in their
neighborhood a the re 0 for
eking a c nge. .
0ak1 nd unty'
di tricl, onlia ran
chi Ed tio J ment
Program te t core. Bloomfield
Hill ranks econd. LaBarbara
Gragg, Pontiac schools uperinten­
dent, defended her y tern.
She aid te t core don't measure
individual achievement and many
individual studen are able to excel
in the district.
Gragg said he will fight Pine
Lake's transfer not only to preserve
an estimated $300,000 in annual
•
•
Di
coveri n9 the truth
KAl.AMAZOO- Vi 0 Ie nee in
America should urpri noone
and ociety hould witch foc
from violence committed by in­
dividuals to violence committed
by the y tern, government and
corporations, aid members of a
panel when the K lamazoo
YWCA ponsored a forum on
violence Monday, September
30th.
Panel members were
Reverend Otha Gilyard, Mr. Zion
Baptist Church; Dr. Ron ld
Kramer, Sociology, We tern
Michigan University (WMU);
Davidson Loehr, PhD., Minister,
People's Church; Dr. Richard
Pulaski, Profe or of Philosophy,
WMU; and Susan Weaver
ACSW, Westside P ychological
Services. Ralph Chandler,
WMU, Public Affairs and Ad­
ministration, moderated the
event.
"We should not be surprl at
contemporary violence Yen our
history," Gilyard began. "Our
ociety has always been relatively
violent. Lynching is completely
American, I don't know of
another place that practiced it.
The arms of violence are very
long, able to reach into any com­
munity. We are a gun culture, we
can't have liberty unle we have
S SQUATTERS, A-8
-
I' d
.U
m ric
, . (AP)- Riden
of n upper-middle cl neighbor­
hood in 0 and County y they
like wh re they live, but not wh re
- tbeir children up ed to ttend
public boo.
eighbo in a W t Bloom eld
Township ubdiv ion have banded
together in n effort to secede from
the poor predominantly Blac
Pontiac bool di trict.
They w nt their neighborhood in
the richer and largely whi e Bloom­
field HiH district.
Paren of the neighborhood' 19
children Ire dy pend up to $5,000
per child a year in tuition at vario
private school. In July parents and
other neighbo together hired a
in Motown
Tax credit can
h Ip x GA'
9 t Job
By RON SEIGEL
Cribbs maintains that the
Columbus hi tory recorded as a
noble explorer seeking great
frontierS in the "New World" was, in
fact, a ruthless mercenary who
ushered in five centries of
exploitation of Indians, Afri� and
the people of Latin America.
FOR THE INDIANS,
Columbus and the Europeans that
followed him brought genocide and
annihilation. For, Africans he
brought Slavery. And for Latin
Americans the "discovery"
transformed their language, culture
and legacy.
" America' rediscovery of
Columbus would be a fitting tribute
See TRUTH, A·10
•
•
Ho ever, .
there' ttoday'
violence. Tbose bo perpetrate
violence hould be held 'account­
able. Two ways in which we can
deal with rampant violence are
being ympathic to victims of
violence, pointing out how cer­
tain policie promote violence.
Also, confronting th who per­
pertrate violent crime against
"
The next Ieatvre will be
"Freddy's Dead: The Final
NightmtJl't!." It is lated to open
Friday, October 11.
However, all is not well with
thi new Black venture, ccord­
ing to Muhamm d Abdullah, one
of the the ter' inve to .
..
�TIlErnn�'�����t y
are I j wi th the option to bu ,
notdra .
that will allo them to continue
bringing movie into the
downtown area indefinitely, Ab­
dullah said. As of the October 5,
they had had a total of 106 paying
customers.
The reason for the low turn­
out is not clear to Abdullah and he
understands the importance of
, Se BIG STAR, A-10
celebrations. The church, whose
members
number 1.6
million,
recently
convened a
conference in
Chicago to
examine
Columbu '
legacy and the
colonialism
that followed
him.
"Each of
us who
a t ie n d e d
elementary
school
learned to recite the jingle, 'In
fourteen-hundred 'ninety-two,
Columbus
sailed the
o c e a n
blue ... ,'"
not e d
Cribbs, the
principal
organizer of
the Chicago
meeting.
"The phrase
was cute,
catchy and
effective in
,', ':"- ingraining
,..l in our
memory a
seemingly
innocent historical point n
o FERING TWO defini­
tions of violence, Kramer said
violence is that which inflicts in­
jury and death on human beings.
"A more far-reaching definition .
any voidable impediment to If
realization, to personal growth."
He id there are two kin of
S VIOLENCE, A-10
CALVIN MCCLAI : "By
making it er for people 10 get
jo . You]lave to haYC three
pieces of LD. to get a job no .
Tbat' crazy."
, I
'4
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