Hunger, Homelessness & Poverty Task Force – SRRT/ALA
Social Responsibilities Round Table of the American Library Association
To date, Chicago Public Library (CPL) is the largest library system in the country to go fine-free. Starting October 1, CPL will eliminate overdue fines on all CPL-owned items currently in circulation, which it said will remove barriers to basic library access, especially for youth and low-income patrons.
“We’re moving away from a punishment model to a more positive model,” said Carla Powers, Duluth Public Library manager. “The public library is not only for people who can always remember to return things. It’s not only for people who have the capacity to pay an overdue fine.”
Howard County Library System (HCLS) is offering an interactive exhibit called, Undesign the Redline. “This exhibit explores the history of structural racism and classism, how these designs compounded each other from redlining maps until today, and how we can come together to undesign these systems with intentionality.”
“Taking food away from a child in front of their peers, or limiting their access to school activities or athletics over meal debt, is downright wrong — not to mention mean,” said Cassellius.
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“It’s like if you don’t go into an area that’s poor, you don’t understand or appreciate the area that’s poor,” City Councilman John Garland, a native Roanoker, said during the kickoff meeting at the Jackson Park Library in Southeast Roanoke.
In light of the escalating number of Americans living in poverty, and as a continuation of Tavis Smiley’s leading efforts on this issue, the Tavis Smiley Foundation’s new four-year initiative, Ending Poverty: America’s Silent Spaces, is partnering with the national anti-poverty organization RESULTS, to discuss the state of poverty as the country moves towards mid-term elections, and what actions the public can take to help address poverty including influencing public policy in local communities through their vote.
WHO:
Tavis Smiley, national broadcaster, author, and advocate
Dr. Joanne Carter, Executive Director, RESULTS
Marianne Williamson, author and RESULTS Board member
Angela Sutton, participant and Advisory Board Co-Chair of Witness to Hunger
WHEN:
April 29, 2014, 8 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. CT / 5 p.m. PT
To register and join the conversation: https://engage.vevent.com/rt/results~042914
Source: Business Insider
Over 5,000 books were seized when police cleared Occupy Wall Streeters from Zuccotti Park. To counter that move, protesters created OccupyEducated, an online reading list central to the movement.
There has been little media coverage of the mass protest on Wall Street. Started by the New York City General Assembly, the movement works for economic justice.
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Boston’s new anti-poverty program is producing positive results. It’s called Family Independence Initiative, or FII, a non-profit that started in San Francisco. “What we’re trying to do, is to say, ‘For the last 60 years, there’s been a war on poverty, and things have only gotten worse,’” Jesus Gerena, head of the Boston FII office, said. “So what can we do different and what did people do prior to be able to get people out, and help them to get out?”
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