Category: Economic equity

Civil Rights, Economic equity, race relations, social enterprise

When Will It Stop?

Do your part to end Systemic Racism

 

In the year 1921, 100 years ago this weekend, May 31st through June 2nd became days that marked a turning point in the neighborhood of Greenwood, a section of the city of Tulsa, OK. By now, I’m sure (I hope) that you are aware of the horrific toll of death and destruction that the white residents of Tulsa perpetrated against the black residents and business owners of Greenwood.

Many recent print articles, books, documentaries, and radio broadcasts have been created to bring this incredibly vicious attack combining murder, arson, beatings, and looting to light. So, I won’t attempt to add to that. Instead, I want to point out one phrase that has been repeated often in the coverage of this horrendous event. It goes something like this as stated on the NPR program “All Things Considered” of 5/28/21

“The Tulsa Race Massacre was one of the worst incidents of racial violence in U.S. history.”

Let’s think about that statement for a second…not “the first” or “the last” or “the one and only”  but “ONE OF THE WORST” incidents of racial violence! This is a statement of comparison. Expanded it might read, “of the many incidents of racial violence in the U.S. against black folk carried out by white folk, the Tulsa Massacre ranks as one of the worst when compared with numerous similar incidents before or after this date in 1921.”

I bring the above consideration to your attention with the hope that you will allow yourself more than a few minutes to ponder the question, 

“WHEN WILL IT STOP”????

When will hate-filled incidents stop being a mainstay of our culture? Some are startling in their size, scope, and duration. Other events are the daily minutiae of discrimination. The claim that racism is not a deep-rooted, all-encompassing part of our society, is to deny the following:

  • the harassment and killing of black men because we assume they’re up to no good
  •  on-going voter suppression
  • “redlining”
  • the deliberate placement of toxic industries adjacent to minority neighborhoods
  • underfunded urban schools
  • rampant health care disparities between the poor and the affluent
  • the many causes of mass incarceration

The issues listed are just in the past 100 years! As if this long list wasn’t bad enough, we continue government-led destruction of poor, minority neighborhoods. We just cloak the devastation in the shroud of highway construction and “urban renewal.”

How much longer do African American communities in our country have to wait for this to end before we take real, sustainable action???

Not coming to terms with the fact that racism permeates our society, from our daily thoughts to government policies, will prevent us from replying

“today…it will stop today, even if it just stops with me.”

Photo by Clay Banks on Unsplash

Civil Rights, Economic equity, Frederick Douglass, race relations, social enrepreneur, social enterprise

Who is Independence Day For?

As white, middle-class folk usually do, we think that everything is about us. We also forget that everyone else may not live as we do, with all of the rights and priveledges we are accustomed to. It’s so easy to go about our daily lives, gliding from one hour to the next on a cushion of assumed understandings about what life should be like.

We live in a different society now. We cannot go back to the way things were, nor should we want to. We are called to re-examine our normal behaviors, our assumptions, our thoughts, and what lies beneath them. So, in honor of today, July 4th, 2020, our country’s 244th birthday, I ask, who is Independence Day for?

Instead of proffering my opinion on this question, may I offer an excerpt from one of Frederick Douglass’ most famous speeches, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July.” Mr. Douglass gave this speech on July 5, 1852, to an abolitionist group in Rochester, NY. I found the excerpt at tolerance.org, a website for educators. The entire speech can be read here.

Below the text is a link to a short video in which Mr. Douglass’ descendants recite selected passages from the speech and offer their thoughts on our current situation. I also include several links to my past blog posts on related social issues.

“…Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?

Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to these questions! …

But such is not the state of the case. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. I am not included within the pale of this glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. The rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth [of] July is yours, not mine.

Continue reading “Who is Independence Day For?” →

apparel design, Economic equity, social enterprise

United Sewing and Design 2019 Social Enterprise Report

United Sewing and DesignEach year in CT, social enterprises are required to report their progress toward fulfilling their social impact goals for the previous year. (Click on 2018 last year’s report to see how far we’ve come.) This post is the United Sewing and Design report for 2019 about our progress toward meeting our business goals which are:

  • hiring individuals who have barriers to getting and keeping well-paid employment and,
  • diverting materials from the waste stream into our business and preventing materials from our manufacturing processes from entering the waste stream

Goal 1:  Hiring individuals who have barriers to getting and keeping well-paid employment

This year we began to focus on adding formerly incarcerated individuals to our pool of collaborators. We connected directly with the Department of Corrections Correctional Enterprises of Connecticut system that manages commercial enterprises within the Osborn Correctional Institution in Enfield, CT and the York Correctional facility in Niantic. The apparel manufacturing facility at Enfield includes a very well developed system of managing inventory, workflow and output. It includes patterning, plotting, automated cutting, sewing, packaging and shipping. Inmates are also employed in a computerized embroidery shop with the capacity to digitize patterns and render them on patches, apparel and hats. The female inmates at York sew mostly flat goods including sheets, towels and laundry bags using a variety of equipment. These activities greatly enhance the capabilities of the individuals making them highly skilled candidates for employment once they transition into society. Read my blog post about why you should employ formerly incarcerated folks here.

In 2019 our pay to independent contractors M.I. in Middlesex County and J.T. in Hartford County increased by 49% over 2018. Our work at the moment is mostly developing, prototyping and manufacturing small runs of patented products for individual designers including pet products, sporting gear and apparel. These designers also include an exciting group of inspired, urban designers in the Hartford area. We are actively involved in growing a vertically integrated apparel industry in CT along with groups such as Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner. Our efforts also include creating connections between designers, producers of textiles, trims and yarn and providers of services such as knitting, dyeing and embroidery in the region.

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Economic equity, Fair Wage, manufacturing, repurposed material, social enrepreneur, social enterprise

United Sewing and Design 2018 Social Enterprise Report

United Sewing and DesignEach year in CT, social enterprises are required to report their progress toward fulfilling their social impact goals for the previous year. This post is the United Sewing and Design report for 2018 about our progress toward meeting our business goals which are:

  • hiring individuals who have barriers to getting and keeping well-paid employment and,
  • diverting materials from the waste stream into our business and preventing materials from our manufacturing processes from entering the waste stream

Goal 1:  Hiring individuals who have barriers to getting and keeping well-paid employment

Our independent contractors have included individuals with social and emotional disabilities, and full time caregivers for individuals who need intensive support in daily life. I work with social service agencies and non-profits to identify individuals who are trustworthy and dependable, know how to sew, have the appropriate workspace and equipment, and are experiencing barriers to getting and keeping well paid work.

This year we added formerly incarcerated individuals to our pool of collaborators. I connected with the Wesleyan University Center for Prison Education to identify ladies who were placed at the York Correctional Institution in Niantic. This was an important goal for us because the inmates at York sew a variety of products including t shirts, prison uniforms and bed linens so they are already trained for the manufacturing skills we need.

In 2018, our pay to contractors increased 527% over 2017. United Sewing and Design paid contract labor wages to independent contractor “M.I.” from Middlesex County. (I do not name my contractors to preserve their privacy.) Although this increase is significant, we consider it essential to grow sustainably and look forward to steady growth for the rest of 2019. I interviewed two new contractors, L.A. from Hartford County and L.M. from New Haven County, both of whom were referred by the Weselyan CPE, who will be working with me in 2019. Much of our work at the moment is geared towards developing and prototyping  patented products for individual designers. I anticipate that these contracts will grow into steady manufacturing work for our contractors.

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business ownership, Economic equity, race relations, social enrepreneur, social enterprise

White Colonialism to the Rescue?

As a representative of white, middle class Liberalism in the United States, I have to come to terms with the fact that I have been raised in a certain way which affects my behavior. More specifically, I am a WASP, White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant. I am not from Connecticut. I was born and raised in Virginia up to age 21 and then chose to live in the northern reaches of our country; for the last 20 years in Connecticut. Having lived on both sides of the Mason Dixon Line, I feel that I am constantly balancing the viewpoints of a southerner and a New Englander on a false assumption.

The assumption is that white, middle class, well educated folks know what’s best for our fellow citizens who happen to be brown or black. I maintain that the attitudes and thoughts which engendered the white colonialism that founded our country, that subjugated and enslaved humans from indigenous societies here and on the African continent, still exist, 200 years later, in the heads of well meaning, white, liberal, middle class business owners in our country today.

Coming to terms with my heritage and upbringing has caused me to examine my thought processes, conclusions and behaviors, as well as those of the people around me, in great detail, especially since President Obama was elected in 2008. (I hope that many of you are also engaging in the same examinations.) Since his election, many facets of race relations in our Country have become the point of much thought and action by white folks who want to make a difference. To take the best course of action to grow my social enterprise, I am thinking about the following questions during the process of scaling up.

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