Month: October 2014

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News The Fly-By

U of M May Raise Minimum Wage to $10.10 Per Hour

After working as a custodian at the University of Memphis for eight years, 61-year-old Thelma Rimmer only makes $8.94 an hour.

“I can hardly make it,” Rimmer said. “I’ve been up there eight years. I guess they’ve given me a dollar a year. When I first started, I was making $7.25. There are people who’ve been there 20 years that are not even making $10 an hour. Most people there have to work two or three jobs [to maintain a living].”

Rimmer is one of approximately 110 workers at the U of M who could receive a pay raise if the Tennessee Board of Regents (TBR) approves the university’s proposal to raise its hourly wage to $10.10 for regular, benefits-eligible employees.

The proposal will be considered at TBR’s December board meeting. If approved, the increase would be implemented in January 2015. It would mainly impact custodial workers, grounds workers, parking assistants, and clerks.

Thelma Rimmer

According to the U of M, the lowest minimum wage for employees in benefits-eligible positions is $8.75 per hour. Currently, the lowest wage paid for that position at the university is $8.88 per hour.

U of M president M. David Rudd said he’s been determined to raise salaries for the university’s lowest paid workers since being appointed in May.

“We value our employees and believe that raising the salaries of our lowest paid employees is the right thing to do,” Rudd said. “We have been working towards this for several years, and our human resources department identified initiatives that created sufficient savings to make this increase possible. It’s a critical issue for the University of Memphis and certainly one of our priorities.”

The fight to raise minimum wages for employees in benefits-eligible positions at the U of M has been ongoing since 2010. The United Campus Workers (UCW), of which Rimmer is vice president, has been on the frontline in the fight. The organization has been pushing to secure better wages for benefits-eligible employees at all state-based institutions.

The UCW has had moderate success with its movement. In 2013, the University of Tennessee at Knoxville raised minimum wages for campus workers to $9.50 in response to the UCW’s campaign.

Tom Anderson, president of the UCW, said although the ultimate goal is a living wage of $15 per hour for all low-paid campus workers, increasing minimum wages to $10.10 is a great start in compensating employees fairly for their labor.

Anderson said the increase could “mean an economic boom for Memphis.”

“Even when you get beyond the initial impact of taking home more money, it means increased stability for people [and] increased buying power,” Anderson said. “And all the people this would affect spend money in the community, so it supports local businesses [and] the city of Memphis, whether it’s house payments or rent or just groceries or getting your car fixed.”

Rimmer said she and her colleagues would appreciate a raise to $10.10 an hour, but they still desire an income that allows them to avoid living paycheck-to-paycheck.

“People have families. They want to be able to have a house, a car, take their kids out and let them go do things,” Rimmer said. “What do you think the common laborer should make? I think $15 per hour would be just fine. For a person to work 22 years, you don’t think they deserve at least $15 to retire? There are a lot of folks at the university that have retired on minimum wage.”

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News The Fly-By

Sierra Club Proposed Alternatives to Shelby Farms Parkway

CREDIT: Courtesy of Sierra Club

Each weekday, rush hour traffic backs up along Walnut Grove and Farm Road inside Shelby Farms Park, turning part of the city’s largest urban green space into a busy and congested thoroughfare.

The proposed $38 million Shelby Farms Parkway, which is currently under review by the Federal Highway Administration, would divert that traffic around the western edge of the park. But members of the local Sierra Club Chickasaw Group say they have a simpler solution that would save the city millions of dollars and solve traffic problems sooner.

The Sierra Club opposes the Shelby Farms Parkway plan because they believe it takes away too much park land and feels too much like an interstate.

Last week, the Sierra Club held a series of public rallies near Shelby Farms to bring some awareness to the alternatives, which were first proposed by national traffic engineering consultant Walter Kulash of the Center for Humans and Nature in Chicago. Kulash was invited to Memphis last year by the Sierra Club to study alternatives to Shelby Farms Parkway.

Courtesy of Sierra Club

Right: Farm Road with right turn lane added

Those alternatives include: 1) building a longer left turning lane onto Farm Road from eastbound Walnut Grove, 2) building a longer left turning lane for southbound Farm Road traffic turning onto Mullins Station or adding a right turning lane, 3) creating a westbound auxiliary lane from Farm Road to Humphries, 4) extending the northbound merging lane from Farm Road to Walnut Grove, and 5) making adjustments to signal timing.

“When you are headed east on Walnut Grove and you get to Farm Road, that left turn lane is not long enough. It doesn’t hold enough cars, so cars end up waiting to turn left in a lane that should be a travel lane,” said Dennis Lynch, transportation chair for the state and local Sierra Club.

City engineer John Cameron said the Sierra Club’s proposals may provide some short-term relief but that they would only be a “Band-Aid for the situation.” He says traffic counts through the area will rise in the future and that the larger Shelby Farms Parkway project will be needed.

“If the parkway project moves forward, we don’t want to put a whole lot of money into Farm Road. What the Sierra Club is proposing would cost between a half-million and a million dollars just to turn around three to five years later and take it all out,” Cameron said.

Under the Shelby Farms Parkway plan, Farm Road, will be closed to through traffic and used as a pedestrian route. The Memphis City Council delayed a funding match for the parkway plan earlier this year, but Cameron said they’ll be seeking funding from the council again next year. Cameron said the parkway could be fully constructed in three to five years.

Laura Morris, executive director for the Shelby Farms Park Conservancy, said the conservancy is backing the most recent parkway design, which wraps the new road around the western edge of the park. Morris says it does not “damage the park and also relieves traffic.” Morris said she doesn’t oppose the Sierra Club’s ideas, but she doesn’t believe they’ll solve congestion in the future.

“We don’t disagree that temporary fixes like this could relieve some of the pressure right now, but we know that won’t be enough,” Morris said. “It might fix today’s problems but only by a small measure.”

Lynch doesn’t agree.

“We don’t think the parkway is needed and anything that can be done to keep it from being built is a good thing,” Lynch said. “I calculated that the cost to the people stuck in congestion. The value of their time plus the extra gasoline they’re using over five to six years comes to $32 million to $58 million. But it would only cost the city $1 million to make the improvements.”

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News The Fly-By

LGBTQ Radio Show To Air on KWAM 990

Life coach Gwendolyn Clemons and her son Davin are two peas in a pod — they are both gay, both ministers, and both work in the criminal justice system.

And now the pair is collaborating on a new talk radio show for the LGBTQ community. Called “Relationships Unleashed,” the first hour-long episode will air on KWAM 990 on November 22nd at 5 p.m.

“Our topics will range from building healthy relationships to domestic violence issues in the LGBTQ community,” said Gwendolyn, a supervisor in the counseling department at the Shelby County Division of Corrections. “We want to do some AIDS/HIV awareness and bring in guest experts, and we’ll talk about the self-esteem of the community. We just want to offer something to a community that we feel like is being overlooked and not represented.”

Eventually, the show will accept live calls, she said. But for the first month or so, as the mother-son team gets a feel for their audience, they’ll simply discuss topics without taking callers. They will be taking questions to discuss on the show through a suggestion box on their website. They’re also looking for sponsorships, and they’re having a launch party on Saturday, November 1st at No. 2 Vance (325 Wagner) from 7 to 10 p.m.

“We’re seeking sponsors and donors because it’s going to be tough, and there will be people against us,” said Davin, an officer in the Memphis Police Department’s TACT unit and the LGBTQ liaison for the department. “But we’re bringing a whole new listening audience to KWAM 990.”

Gwendolyn said they called the show “Relationships Unleashed” because they hope the show can help some in the LGBTQ community unleash their own voices.

Gwendolyn Clemons and her son Davin

“People have been bound in the closet. You have to hide who you are all the time. You have to hide at work. You have to hide at school,” Gwendolyn said. “I don’t have the privilege that heterosexuals have to walk down the street holding my wife’s hands, and we’re legally married. I’m unleashing myself from these chains that have been placed on me. Our mantra is ‘Don’t be afraid to come out.’ You’re hurting more by hiding.”

Davin founded the Cathedral of Praise Church of Memphis, Inc. with his life partner Pastor Darnell Gooch in August 2012. Gwendolyn is a minister in the LGBT-affirming church.

“It’s an inclusive ministry. Even my 76-year-old grandmother is a member,” Davin said. “We have regular church service just like everyone else. Every church has gay members, but in some churches, they don’t want to say that. In our church, you can say you’re gay.”

Much like their church, Davin and Gwendolyn want people to know that their new radio show will be inclusive as well.

“This is not a black show or a white show. It’s not a gay show or a straight show,” Davin said. “We’re targeting the LGBTQ community, but we want the larger community to tune in and bridge this gap.”

Categories
News The Fly-By

Fly on the Wall 1340

(F)art Jokes

This new mural painted on the side of Brian’s Grocery in Uptown was created with a grant from Wells Fargo. It celebrates the astonishing level of diversity that exists in Memphis by depicting an adorable one-legged alien couple from the Monopodia Star System. They are happy together inside the glow of their protective force-field, safe from natural terrors of the urban core, like giant interdimensional beings from Planet Yellow.

Neverending Elvis

It seems unlikely that Elvis Presley will ever reclaim his position atop the dead celebrity money-making charts. According to Reuters, the zombie King of Rock remains in second place, earning just under $55 million, well behind undead Pop King Michael Jackson who took in a posthumous $140 million.

Savage Lovers

Memphis playwright/filmmaker Morgan Jon Fox received some exposure in Seattle last week when Savage Love sex columnist/media personality Dan Savage linked a video of Fox’s play Ann Coulter and Dan Savage In an Elevator On Its Way to Hell on his Slog Blog under the headline “Offered Without Comment.” Savage did have one criticism though: “I don’t wear collared shirts on CNN. Or anywhere else.” Except for on MSNBC, apparently.

Categories
Letter From The Editor Opinion

The Ebola “Crisis” Isn’t.

“He sounds kinda gay,” I said to my art director.

It was 1985. I was a young magazine editor living in Pittsburgh. I’d just gotten off the phone with a freelance writer who I’d agreed to meet for lunch. I was a liberal-thinking sort of fellow. I had no problem with gay people, though I didn’t know many back then.

“Lewis” and I had agreed to meet at a small restaurant near my office. It was a quiet place, perfect for conversation. I got there first.

Five minutes later, the front door burst open and a tall, thin, animated man came in and surveyed the room. He was wearing a beret and a long black coat. Around his neck was a six-foot-long scarf of many colors. He spotted me across the room and began to work his way through tables of diners, tossing his scarf over his shoulder as he approached. “THERE YOU ARE!” he boomed. “I’m SORRY I’m late! I’ve been running NIPPLES TO THE WIND all day, and I just can’t seem to catch up.” Heads turned, eyes rolled.

It was a hell of an entrance, and it led to a great friendship. I thought about Lewis again this week, as I read the latest fear-mongering news reports about the Ebola “epidemic.” Through my friendship with Lewis, I saw the horrific effects — second-hand, admittedly — of a real epidemic: AIDS. And there is no comparison.

In the 1980s, getting AIDS was a death sentence. And we had a president who didn’t even utter the name of the disease until five years after it had killed tens of thousands of Americans. I watched Lewis undergo the terrifying ritual of getting “the test,” going to the doctor to find out if he would live or die. He was negative, thankfully, but many of his friends were not. Most of them didn’t live more than a year or so. It was a dark and scary time.

Children who were HIV positive were turned away from school. Doctors who treated AIDS patients were shunned. Gay men were treated as pariahs. It took years for Americans to learn to deal with the epidemic in a rational manner. In the U.S. alone, 636,000 people have died from AIDS. World-wide, the death toll is 37 million, and the disease continues to kill. That’s an epidemic.

Ebola is a horrific disease with a 30 percent survival rate. It is ravaging three African countries with sub-standard medical and health facilities. We should be doing all we can to help stop the spread of the disease. But medical experts in the U.S. have assured us repeatedly that we are in no danger of an epidemic here. There have been four cases in the U.S. One person has died. Can we stop with the absurd over-reaction, please?

And can we please stop using the Ebola “crisis” for political gain? (Actually, I suspect much of the furor about Ebola will subside after the November 4th election. Which is a sad commentary, indeed, on the state of our electoral process.)

Yes, Ebola is scary, but we need to get a grip. Those of us of a certain age can remember what a real epidemic looks like. And this ain’t it. Not even close.

Categories
Letters To The Editor Opinion

What They Said (October 39, 2014) …

CREDIT: Greg Cravens

Greg Cravens

About Toby Sells’ story, “Confederate Heritage Groups Vow to Fight Park Name Changes” …

Health Sciences Park, Mississippi River Park, and Memphis Park. Good Lord, how about just Tree Park, Grass Park, and Wino Park (let’s be real). Or since the Confederates surrendered Memphis after 15 minutes of battle, how about Slam Bam Thank You Ma’am Park.

CL_Mullins

About Les Smith’s At Large column, “Hot Water” …

Les Smith incorrectly stated that Roland McElrath, MLGW controller, was the man behind the prepared rate hike. Then he continued by criticizing Mr. McElrath’s previous record as a public servant. Smith complained of being blindsided with a rate hike. Smith’s article deserves a response to set the record straight.

Up until mid-September, we at MLGW were confident that we would not need to ask for a rate increase for next year in the electric, gas, and water divisions. Then on September 16th, Cargill announced it would close its plant on President’s Island on January 1, 2015.

Water utility costs reflect 84 percent fixed costs and only 16 percent variable or consumption costs. Since Cargill is by far our largest potable water customer, I knew as soon as Cargill made the closure announcement that MLGW could not sustain the $2 million per year loss of revenues to pay for fixed expenses. Absorbing the loss of Cargill revenues was not an option. I knew a small rate increase would be needed. How small? Thirty-five cents (35 cents) per month for the average residential customer. This represents a 2.3 percent increase.

Despite this increase, MLGW’s water rates will still be the second-lowest of any major city in this country. In fact, MLGW’s combined electric, gas, and water rates will remain the lowest of any major city.

The announcement for the need for this small rate increase was appropriately made during our budget presentation to the MLGW Board on October 9th. Despite our breathtakingly low combined utility rates, MLGW is in excellent financial shape. MLGW has relatively little debt, excellent bond ratings, and a properly funded pension plan.

Our governing principle at MLGW is to always do that which is in the best interest of our customers as a whole. Although this includes keeping our rates low, it sometimes also includes a rate increase. It’s called fiscal responsibility.

Jerry Collins Jr., President & CEO

Memphis Light, Gas & Water

Les Smith incorrectly stated that I was the man behind the proposed rate hike. Then he continued by criticizing my previous record as a public servant by using inaccurate and faulty information to make his point. As the former finance director for the city of Memphis, I am compelled to address the inaccuracies in his article.

According to the city’s June 30, 2012 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR), the city ended its fiscal year 2012 with a $5 million general fund operating surplus, not a $17 million deficit. This surplus was generated even after paying the employee bonuses referred to in Smith’s commentary.  

 There’s also another factual error. 

MLGW’s estimated revenue loss from the closure of the Cargill facility is $2.2 million, not $4 million.

As evidenced by our breathtakingly low combined utility rates, MLGW is committed to providing high quality, reliable service to our customers in the most cost efficient manner possible while also maintaining the financial integrity of the organization.

Roland McElrath, CPA, CMFO

About Jackson Baker’s Politics column, “Alexander, Bell in Heated Senate Race” …

Senator Lamar Alexander is at is again. He would have us forget he was the first secretary of education to suggest common core type standards. He backs the right to work law. He wants to kill Obamacare, but doesn’t say what would happen to the thousands of citizens who would lose their insurance, the ones with pre-existing conditions or the workers whose employers who do not offer health insurance.

Alexander has never voted against a pay raise for himself, but abhors the right of working people to organize. His “unselfish service” to the people of Tennessee has allowed him to become a multi-millionaire. Since entering government, he and his family have never been without a paycheck, vacation time, or health care, yet he is opposed to all those benefits for the poor and middle-class.

Jack Bishop

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We Recommend We Recommend

Booksigning for graphic novel Bethany’s Song

Donald Juengling has been immersed in comic book culture for most of his life. He started working in a comic book shop when he was in junior high. Today he manages Memphis Comics & Collectables and was the driving force behind the successful launch of the Memphis Comics Expo earlier this year. This week he’s hosting a different kind of signing event, showcasing a slate of area artists who collaborated on the Juengling-penned graphic novel Bethany’s Song, a multigenerational fairy tale about love, loss, talking trees, heroic woodland creatures, greedy despots, and duplicitous crows.

Juengling started working on the self-published title Bethany’s Song four years ago when he heard himself complaining about comics a little too much.

Bethany’s Song

“I love superhero comics, but the medium is capable of so much more,” he says. “I told myself so many times, ‘Oh, I can do better than that; I can do better than a lot of this.’ At some point I heard myself saying that and had to call my bluff.” Inspired by comic book contrarian Warren Ellis to be the change he wanted to see in illustrated storytelling, he enlisted the aid of area artists and sent out copies of the text. Slowly, pages starting coming back, bringing Juengling’s fantasy to life from different visual points of view. 

On Saturday, comic book fans can meet the author and have books signed by artists Anthony Max, Jean Holmgren, and Adam Shaw.

In addition to making and selling comics, Juengling has been busy planning round two of the Memphis Comic Expo. The event that focuses on bringing fans and comic creators together returns in June.

“We’ve got some even bigger names coming in this year,” he says, although he’s not quite ready to make an announcement.

Categories
Book Features Books

“Memphis Reads”

Dinaw Mengestu was 2 years old when he moved, along with his mother and sister, from war-torn Ethiopia to join his father in America. That was nearly three decades ago. Mengestu has since graduated from Georgetown University, earned his MFA in fiction from Columbia University, and published his debut — and semi-autobiographical — novel, The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears (2007). That book was followed by another novel, How To Read the Air, which was excerpted in The New Yorker (the same magazine that named Mengestu to its “20 Under 40” writers of 2010). And earlier this year saw the publication of a third novel, All Our Names. All three novels examine issues of identity and displacement and questions of the individual in relation to country and culture, politics and race. But those issues, in this author’s hands, apply not only to immigrants to the U.S. As Mengestu shows in All Our Names, the same issues operate in the lives of the native-born and all-American.

In 2012, Mengestu, who today teaches at Georgetown, was awarded the Ernest J. Gaines Award for Literary Excellence. That same year, he was named a MacArthur Foundation fellow. And on Tuesday, November 4th,

Memphians have a chance to meet him as guest of the Benjamin L. Hooks Central Library and Christian Brothers University. In a way, many Memphians have met him already.

That’s because The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears is the inaugural title for “Memphis Reads,” which was launched on October 1st. The program is a citywide initiative of the Memphis Public Library and Information Center, and its aim is a straightforward one: promoting literacy. It’s an aim that’s had Mayor Wharton’s enthusiastic support. It’s a program affiliated with “Fresh Reads” at CBU, which has partnered with the Memphis Public Library for “Memphis Reads.”

“Fresh Reads” is part of CBU’s First Year Experience. All incoming freshmen read one title (this year, The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears), then they discuss it, then they write about it in the context of their own lives. The Central Library has published the top 10 student essays on its “Memphis Reads” blog.

According to Karen B. Golightly, associate professor of English at CBU and director of “Fresh Reads,” it was the Memphis Public Library’s adult services coordinator, Wang-Ying Glasgow, who suggested Mengestu’s book — and for good reason.

“In partnering with the library to form ‘Memphis Reads,'” Golightly says, “we wanted to choose a book that people would not only want to read but a book that would engage them on more than just the plot level. We hoped to introduce a book — and a common reading experience — that might break down some of the walls that separate us. If the people who read The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears can see each other as individuals, as humans, rather than as teachers, government workers, administrators, homeless people, immigrants, black, white, Asian, Democrats, Republicans, etc., then the spaces between us could be bridged.

“I know, it’s a lofty idea. But it’s one that we hope to achieve,” Golightly adds. “One book, one person at a time.”

Categories
Music Music Features

The Soundtrack to Indie Memphis

CREDIT: Todd V. Wolfson

This week, the Indie Memphis Film Festival kicks off with a long weekend full of interesting programming. Especially noteworthy is the lineup on Thursday, October 30th — the festival’s opening night — which features two films and a showcase with a focus on Memphis music.

For the past few years, the festival has worked hard to integrate local musicians into the proceedings via a partnership with the Memphis Music Foundation. So far, that partnership has yielded a series of Memphis music sampler CDs that were distributed to festival participants. There have also been appearances by several prominent music supervisors at panel discussions on music in film. But this year, the festival is kicking it up a notch by staging a showcase event at the newly reopened Lafayette’s Music Room for several of the city’s best local acts: the Memphis Dawls, Marcella and Her Lovers, John Paul Keith, Amy LaVere, Mark Edgar Stuart, and the North Mississippi All-Stars.

According to Indie Memphis head honcho Erik Jambor, the selection of Lafayette’s as the venue was obvious. “Lafayette’s is in the middle of our festival footprint, with the Playhouse, Circuit, and Hattiloo on one side, and the Studio on the Square on the other,” he says. “It is the perfect fit for our pedestrian-friendly event, and its return couldn’t have happened at a better time for us.”

The programming of the showcase was initially built around The 78 Project, a movie appearing at the festival that features artists recording live, direct-to-acetate and in one take, to a 1930s-era Presto recorder. The results are spontaneous and engaging, with big time singer-songwriters like Marshall Crenshaw and Loudon Wainwright III mixing it up on screen with prominent locals like Keith, Rev. John Wilkins, and the Bo-Keys featuring Percy Wiggins. (Other Memphis-area acts such LaVere, Valerie June, the All-Stars’ Luther Dickinson, and Sid and Steve Selvidge have participated in the project but do not appear in the film.)

“Of course we were drawn to Memphis because of its incredibly rich musical tradition,” says Lavinia Wright, producer of The 78 Project. “Also, Alex (Steyermark, director) had recently directed a feature film there, and knew some of the fantastic musicians who then participated in the web series and movie.”

Once The 78 Project participants LaVere and Keith were confirmed for the showcase, other up-and-coming local artists were then selected to fill out the bill.

“This year we built around a number of different artists who we felt represented a regionally rooted side of the Memphis music scene and had albums out in the last year or so, or projects on the way,” says showcase organizer John Miller, of the Memphis Music Foundation. “Since The 78 Project film was showing and those folks had already recorded a number of local musicians, it made sense thematically and would help tie into something so that festival attendees would have a frame of reference. I also probably picked some of the artists because, selfishly, I’d love to see and hear them record for The 78 Project in the future too, but none of that has been discussed and only exists in my head.”

The North Mississippi All-Stars, who have a film of their own in the festival entitled World Boogie Is Coming the Movie, will headline the showcase. The concert film — directed by the group’s drummer Cody Dickinson and shot by local production team Piano Man Pictures — was filmed last year at the All-Stars’ annual Thanksgiving reunion show at Minglewood Hall and features guest artists such as Kenny Brown, Alvin Youngblood Hart, and Duwayne Burnside sitting in with the band.

“We’re thrilled that Luther and Cody agreed to do a midnight set. It will certainly be a night to remember,” says Jambor.

Aside from just putting on a dynamite show, both Miller and Jambor have higher goals in mind for putting together this showcase.

“It’s clear through their year-round work that everyone at Indie Memphis has a heart for this city’s creative community,” says Miller.  “Since music and film are inextricably linked, it seemed to us like a no-brainer to pair artists and film creatives during the festival for a party with the idea that it could open doors for future joint efforts. If we encourage opportunities for music supervisors and producers to find original, quality stuff here, then hopefully we can add a niche factor to this film festival and provide new collaborative and financially beneficial opportunities for Memphians. It’s also just a good chance to put some of our best local talent on display when we’ve got guests in town.”

“We want to expose visiting filmmakers and industry professionals to the current, living Memphis music scene,” adds Jambor. “Hopefully connections will be made that leads to these artists being featured in film and television. But, at the very least, we get to show off some amazing artists to people who will talk about the show when they get home to Los Angeles or New York or wherever they’re visiting from.”

Moving forward, the hope is that the relationship between Indie Memphis and the Memphis Music Foundation can continue to bear fruit for both filmmakers and musicians alike, as well as help strengthen the brand of Memphis music to a wider audience.

“One of the major goals would be to see Indie Memphis become a film festival that is known by music supervisors as the best opportunity to see films with great music components and also catch shows from the current groups from Memphis that haven’t necessarily been discovered and used already in films by the vast majority of their colleagues,” says Miller. “In the future, I’d love to see us continue the showcase and maybe expand to a few different dates and locations with more acts throughout the weekend. It’d be great to include a music and film panel during the conference portion of the festival and find ways to encourage more dialogue that leads to meaningful work on music documentaries, scoring, licensing, etc.

“We’ll always look for opportunities within the festival weekend that make sense to promote great original Memphis music, augment the festival’s programming and partner with other groups that want to support Memphis artists.”

Categories
Opinion Viewpoint

Memphis’ Truancy “Crisis”

Call me skeptical, but I think it’s really time for Memphis to move on from the Ebola “crisis” to issues that are more based in reality. We are very unlikely to be hit by an epidemic of what is no doubt a dreadful disease if you’re living in or have visited three countries in West Africa recently.

But the one lone Ebola-related story I’ve covered did open my eyes to the precautions the Shelby County Health Department and the Office of Preparedness have been taking to assure the safety of our citizens. Since the 9-11 attacks, local government agencies have worked diligently to organize a program of preparedness to deal with catastrophic natural disasters and health epidemics — from swine flu to SARS to the one-in-a-million possibility of an Ebola outbreak in the Bluff City. Such advance planning should be commended.

But it’s time to bring the same level of attention to a more relevant crisis — student truancy — and the direct connection it has to our problems with youth violence.

As Shelby County Schools Superintendent Dorsey Hopson asserted two weeks ago in an interview with Fox 13, he stands prepared to tackle the truancy issue by withholding financial benefits from parents who have consistently failed to meet their responsibilities in getting their children to school. He admitted punitive action is not a road he wants to go down, but he’s also realistic enough to know he’s got to have the legal backing and the political will of those in government to take a proactive stance.

Within the past two weeks, SCS has finally begun getting a numerical grasp on the atrocious situation of children not showing up in the classroom this year. They estimated the number, peaking at the start of the school year in August, to be around 9,000 students. By late September, nearly 4,000 students had met or exceeded the five-day threshold of unexcused absences. If reported to the district attorney’s office, parents of these children could presumably face fines and possible jail time. So far, only one person has been prosecuted under that standard, but it’s not like student truancy is a new problem.

Just two years ago, the legacy Memphis City Schools system was lauded for creating truancy assessment centers where truants were picked up by police and, together with their parents, made to work with school officials to find ways of getting them back to school. Because of budget cuts, that program no longer exists. Perhaps, if the city of Memphis, as cash-strapped as it may be, could start paying on the $57 million that two court rulings have explicitly made clear is owed to SCS, there would be enough money to restart and expand that now-defunct program.

Here’s where we get back to that idea of “preparedness.” We have for a decade and beyond known this city and county have a propensity for failing to meet the minimal educational needs of all its students. We have never had the foresight to devise a comprehensive plan that puts more money into all aspects of education than we consistently put into the penal system or into security measures aimed at dealing with possible health epidemics and natural catastrophes. Yet, there seems to be no concerted effort to address and follow through on tough choices that could bring real results in saving generations of children who continue to fall through the cracks in our educational system.

It may well be time to get behind Hopson’s idea of making parents financially accountable for not meeting their responsibilities, time to stand behind the line he wants to draw in the sand. Instead of pitying those parents for their negligence, because they’re not informed about the avenues of help available to them, we should insist and demand they take the time to find out for themselves. We should insist they show up at a parent/teacher conference, a PTA meeting, or even a school board meeting. They owe it to the future of their own families to do so, just like every other forward-thinking person in this country. I’ll predict right now nobody in Memphis is going to die from Ebola. But, there’s a good chance we’ll perish from the disease of neglecting the education of our children.