I'm Not Racist... Am I?

A month-long community conversation about racism is going to take place in Charlottesville. And it starts Friday, February 9, with the screening of the documentary, I’m Not Racist… Am I?, a 2014 movie following twelve NYC teens on their journey to understand structural racism. The screening is happening, with the filmmakers present, at the Paramount Theater in Charlottesville. Some local schools, universities and libraries are also hosting the film, followed by public conversations about racism with the help of trained facilitators. WMRA’s Marguerite Gallorini has this report.

Listen

Listening...

4:18

[Background music from the movie]

“I’m Not Racist… Am I?”

[CLIP- TEENAGER: That is really hard.]

That’s the name of a movie that follows twelve New York City teenagers taking part in several workshops on structural racism over the course of one year, all the while witnessing their resulting internal struggles. Here’s Elizabeth Shillue, from the grassroots organization Beloved Community Cville.

ELIZABETH SHILLUE: Somehow it struck a deep cord within me; I thought about it for two weeks straight. It wasn’t just the topic that interest me - I’ve been exposed to a lot about racism, as many of us have - it was more the way in which the students in the film interacted with one another and their family members. They were willing to be vulnerable and take risks, and trust, and it resonated with me. They leaned into the discomfort of the conversations and grow as a result. And I immediately wanted to share it with other people in my hometown.

So she organized a first screening at the Paramount in 2015; and now, a second screening will take place there on Friday – which already sold out. Catherine Wigginton Greene, from Point Made Films, directed this movie. The making of the film, she says, also changed her.

CATHERINE GREENE: It really helped me clarify some things in terms of thinking about aspects to power, and the difference in thinking about - just because I have nice feelings about people of other races does not mean that I am doing the work required to dismantle a racist system.

That is one of the aspects addressed in the film.

[CLIP - FACILITATOR: People often connect being guilty with being in action and it’s not. Guilt is a feeling that we have. So, people I heard earlier like “Oh I feel guilty, I didn’t want to say something because I’d feel guilty about making someone cry, I feel guilty for saying this word…” Move past it people. Guilt is a feeling. I was feeling hungry at noon: I fixed it. I don’t think deconstructing racism is a feeling: it calls you to take some action.]

The film features a workshop called ‘Undoing Racism,’ by The People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond. André Robert Lee, the producer of the film, had attended one before doing the movie.

ANDRE ROBERT LEE: I walked out of that room transformed, and I also became more curious about what it means to look at race from a structural point of view. For so long, as a lower income African-American male, I had internalized a lot of blame for my family's circumstances. Then I also felt a sense of dread, "Wow, this is a much bigger problem that I even imagined. If it is a structural problem, what should we begin to do about it?"

Well, starting an actual conversation is a first step – and that’s the goal of this screening. One will also take place at the Curry School of Education later this month. Here’s Martin Block, the Chair of the School’s Diversity Action Committee.

MARTIN BLOCK: We've been doing a year-long dialogue and community building on race and racial issues after what happened in August 11 and 12 in Charlottesville. As part of that theme, when this movie became available we said "this would be a perfect match for us, talking about racial issues." It's difficult to talk about these things so we wanted to have as many opportunities to talk about it as possible.

Joanna Williams, the Chair-elect of the same committee, has even in mind to do a survey to assess the film’s impact on the audience.

JOANNA WILLIAMS: There have been several recent scales that have been developed for use with young people in particular to assess: do they have awareness of structural inequalities that exist, and do they have a sense of agency in terms of being able to engage in them? So I, right now, have a relatively brief survey about 10 to 15 minutes proposed to give to people before they view the film. A couple of weeks after we'll give them the same survey and then we'll wait a couple of months and give them the survey one more time. It doesn’t get at the hows and whys, but we’ll assess whether or not there’s any change.

Change does not happen overnight, of course; it’s a process, says producer André Robert Lee.

ROBERT LEE: We're not going to fix it after one screening; but we are doing the work by engaging in difficult dialogue.

After Friday, the movie will be screened twenty more times in a dozen more venues around Charlottesville and Albemarle county. You can check the list of local screenings on belovedcommunity-cville.com.

This story appeared on WMRA News.

The Citadel of Besançon, Charlottesville's Sister City

The citadel of Besançon was built in the 17th century by military engineer Vauban, working for the Sun King. In 1959, it was purchased by the city for renovations and to set up museums.
Photo: Marguerite Gallorini

Besançon has been Charlottesville’s sister city since 2006. In spite of their cultural differences, Charlottesville and Besançon are set in similar regions, and have similar vibes. There is one tourist attraction that doesn’t have its equal here though: Besançon’s 17th-century military citadel. Marguerite Gallorini was there over the holiday season and paints this picture for WMRA.

Listen

Listening...

4:02

Welcome to Besançon, Charlottesville’s French sister city. It is situated in the region of Franche-Comté, in the east of France - close to both the German and Swiss borders. The region is somewhat similar to Central Virginia from the start, with predominant wide green patches of fields and forests. Both regions rely heavily on agriculture, and both also produce wine.

[People on the downtown mall]

Like Charlottesville, one of the focal points of Besançon is its university, and a renowned teaching hospital. And like Charlottesville, Besançon has a pedestrian downtown mall, where people like to gather to meet for coffee or for a stroll. Here’s Antoine Naas, an English teacher in the area who’s lived here.

ANTOINE NAAS: I've studied in Besançon for about five years, and it's a beautiful place. Besançon is not a very big city, but there's still a few things to do around, and I really like the look of it with all the white stones.

Unlike Charlottesville, Besançon has its own citadel, a fortress that was built to protect the city. It occupies a strategic position that even Julius Caesar recognized more than two thousand years ago. You may access it by car, or if you’re up for an adventure, by climbing up the stone stairs of the hill on which it rests.

[Walking sounds]

Walking through the main gate, one stumbles upon ostriches and vicunas, small relatives of llamas. A zoo isn’t a usual feature for a citadel, but a popular one, says the site’s heritage interpreter Hermine Chapron.

HERMINE CHAPRON (voiced by Emily Richardson-Lorente): The big hit is obviously the zoo. We do have rare species: Asian lions…

[Roar of the lion]

CHAPRON: Siberian tigers, monkeys from Madagascar...

[Monkeys chirping]

CHAPRON: A lot of people come for the Natural History Museum, and then they discover that it is a rich site with lots of other things to do, so they come back. One day is really not enough to see it all!

The citadel offers three museums – the Natural History Museum, with the zoo; a museum on the history of the region and its traditions; and a Museum of French Deportation and Resistance. There is also an extra room dedicated to the fortifications.

CHAPRON: The citadel was built in the 17th century. It is the work of a military engineer named Vauban who worked for King Louis XIV. The purpose of Besançon's citadel was to protect the city but also to keep watch, because it was a brand new conquest from the Sun King because the region had belonged to the Kingdom of Spain up to then.

Now, since 2008, the citadel is a World Heritage Site. With more than 250,000 visitors each year, it is the most visited site of the region. A lot of them are locals with yearly subscriptions, coming to enjoy the many cultural events organized there or simply to take advantage of the serenity of the place.

Besides locals, 10 to 15% of visitors are foreigners, mainly from neighboring countries such as Switzerland, the Netherlands or Germany. Here’s visitor Lina Hilgert.

LINA HILGERT: Hi, I’m from Germany, and I just came here to visit a friend. I didn't know a lot about this region before, but now I visited the museum with my friend and I read all about how it was constructed, about the wars going on in the area and everything.

Some of that history is still recent: the citadel was occupied by Nazi Germany during the Second World War, and 100 Resistance fighters were executed there. After the war, the site was used to house more than 6,000 German prisoners until 1948. It is only in 1959 that the city of Besançon purchased the Citadel to start renovations and set up the museums. And more projects are planned.

CHAPRON: We are toying with the idea of creating an Escape Game at the Citadel. Another ongoing project is an app to visit the monument, as well as family investigation games; the idea is to develop other paths to discover all the other areas of interest of the place.

And, how about taking more advantage of the sister city relationship with Charlottesville?

CHAPRON: I think it could be interesting to do more things with our sister city; I know I'd be interested in receiving an American group, for sure!

Thanks to Emily Richardson-Lorente for providing the voice translation for Hermine Chapron.

This story appeared on WMRA News.

Charlottesville Police Foundation

The Charlottesville Police Foundation is a local non-profit organization that has been helping officers in the City since 2004. They do that through a variety of programs - from extra training, to partnerships through grants and various community events, as well as housing assistance. WMRA's Marguerite Gallorini talked with the foundation's Executive Director, Mindy Goodall.

Listen

Listening...

1:15

The Foundation’s primary mission, says Executive Director Mindy Goodall, is to attract and retain officers in the community. One of the issues this solves is a quick, efficient response to emergencies.

MINDY GOODALL: Let's say that they need to call in the reinforcements and if they have 45 minutes to drive to get to this area, that's a problem.

But it also helps officers and citizens bond.

GOODALL: We want officers to stay in our community because you get to know the people that you're serving. You start to put down roots. You understand the neighborhoods. You understand the different idiosyncrasies of an area.

That’s why they try to help officers settle in the city.

GOODALL: We have a program - Officer Housing Program - where officers can apply for a $20,000 grant towards the down payment of a home inside the City of Charlottesville or three driving miles outside of the city.

Applicants should have a household income below 150% of Charlottesville’s annual median income.

GOODALL: We try to fund about two to three of these per year. I don’t think we’ve ever had to turn down a police officer.

But, Goodall says, the main obstacle remains that of available affordable housing to begin with. And so the Charlottesville Affordable Housing Fund will commit $2.5 million towards affordable housing in the City in 2018 - the highest allocated amount since its inception in 2007.

This story appeared on WMRA News.

Affordable Housing 101

Photo: Fumigene / Flickr

Charlottesville is undergoing an affordable housing crisis. So the non-profit organization IMPACT (Interfaith Movement Promoting Action by Congregations Together) invited Dave Leibson, the Vice President of Alliance for Housing Solution in Arlington to provide an “Affordable Housing 101” crash course at the Church of the Incarnation in Charlottesville.  WMRA's Marguerite Gallorini reports.

Listen

Listening...

1:16

Dave Leibson has been managing and supporting affordable housing in the U.S. and abroad for 40 years, so he knows why it matters.

LEIBSON: If you're concerned about education: the success of our children - very much wrapped up in the housing, in the neighborhoods they live in.

About 40 people came to listen carefully to his talk. The goal: to provide the community with some tools to be effective advocates for affordable housing. He underlined the importance of partnerships and government help.

LEIBSON: You're going to need help, whether you're trying to develop something or whether you're just advocating on policies. You can't do affordable housing without government help. The numbers just don't work.

He also underlined the importance of negotiations when planning new affordable housing projects.

LEIBSON: Just to illustrate for example in Arlington, people who manage the budget don't want to do a bond for housing. But, what if they did a bond to do some of the infrastructure that's required for the housing? Suddenly I can take some of the cost off that project, the finance people don't have to say the taxpayers were doing housing finance: win-win.

And it’s not just about the current crisis: it’s also about the future.

LEIBSON: Twenty years from now, you're going to be as dense as Arlington is, I know it, and you should be planning and building your tools for that now.

This story appeared on WMRA News.

Digging Into Virginia's History of Sterilization

Lulu Miller / Photo: Kristen Finn

Lulu Miller, former Radiolab producer and co-founder and co-host of Invisibilia on NPR, is currently a fellow at the Virginia Foundation for the Humanities to write her book: Why Fish Don’t Exist,looking at how we categorize the world.  Virginia performed the second-highest number of forced sterilizations in the country, and a chapter in her book focuses on the not-so-old practice of eugenics. WMRA’s Marguerite Gallorini reports.

Listen

Listening...

1:59

In the 20th century, eugenics included the forced sterilization of people deemed “unfit” by the State – which could mean mental illness but also promiscuity, homosexuality, or even swearing. It was legalized after a Supreme Court ruling following a case in Virginia in the 1930s, and has never been overturned since. Lulu Miller recounts how Mark Bold, while he was a law student at Liberty University, started asking questions about this law.

LULU MILLER: What everybody told him was that it was actually technically in this weird purgatory where it's legal at the Constitutional level, never been overturned, but on a state-by-state basis, every single state had repealed it. So you couldn't really get sterilized because it's not legal at your state - you know.

But he dug further. And then he saw it wasn’t really dead, like in West Virginia for instance. Note that this happened in 2010:

MILLER: He wondered if that might be one of these weird arcane laws that no one actually obeys. So he decided that he would call the circuit clerk's office in Charleston, West Virginia. He invented a fictional daughter who is 22 years-old - so above the age of 21 - and he imagined that she was promiscuous and that she had intellectual disabilities. He took a deep breath, he called them up, and he said he was the father wanting to get her sterilized.

The clerk on the other end of the phone said that he just had to file a motion for sterilization and that the judge would most likely agree to it because, in her words, "they know it needs to be done."

MILLER: He was just shocked and chilled by her tone, just how regular it was.

Mark Bold now runs the Justice for Sterilization Victims Project. Today, many victims are still living. The State of Virginia officially apologized to the victims in 2002, and in 2015 the General Assembly set aside  25,000 dollars for each of them.

This story appeared on WMRA News.

Virginia's Teacher Shortage

Some experts say the teacher shortage in Virginia is now a crisis. And not only is there a downward trend in enrollment in teaching curriculums overall, but the lack of African-Americans in that field is even more alarming at a time when diversity in classrooms is becoming increasingly necessary. WMRA’s Marguerite Gallorini has this overview.

Listen

Listening...

5:08

Crowded classrooms and less one-on-one attention for students, overworked teachers who also have to serve  as social workers and psychologists, plus mountains of paperwork… The situation in Virginia schools has gotten worse.

STEVEN STAPLES: I think we're approaching what we would call "crisis proportions."

Steven Staples is the State Superintendent of Public Instruction at the Virginia Department of Education.

STAPLES: As of last year, there were over 1,000 vacant positions in October of the school year when obviously students were already back in school. So that's a pretty serious problem I think for all school divisions.

Mathematics, Special Education and Science are the areas with the most need – but the problem is reaching across the entire curriculum spectrum. That includes teaching jobs in elementary schools, which used to be the easier positions to fill. Part of the problem is a shrinking pool of teaching students in the pipeline.

JIM LIVINGSTON: To make problems worse, since 2008, there's been a drop of 30% in the number of college students enrolling in teacher preparation programs in the Commonwealth.

That’s Jim Livingston, President of the Virginia Education Association.

LIVINGSTON: What's happening is our teacher pipeline is literally drying up at a time when we are seeing a spike in retirements.

Everyone agrees on a number of factors: there is pay…

LIVINGSTON: Currently, at the end of last year, Virginia now ranks 32nd in average teacher salary: almost $8,000 behind the national average.

There is the cost of training…

STAPLES: Many universities ended up moving to a five-year program where students would need to stay to get a master’s in order to get licensed, not what it previously been undergraduate. And what we're hearing from some colleges and universities is that kids were willing to stay and get a four-year degree and come out and teach, but that fifth year was costly, and they thought that impacted it.

Also, the profession has lost respect over the years.

DIAS: I can talk with older mentors in the community who can tell me stories about when they were growing up, teachers were kind of on the same level as doctors and lawyers, and now teaching doesn't get that same respect.

That’s Tamara Dias. A former Spanish teacher, she is now the Executive Director of African-American Teaching Fellows, an organization in Charlottesville working to develop and retain African-American teachers to support the schools in Albemarle County and Charlottesville City. She mentions another factor: the high test requirements to become a teacher in Virginia.

DIAS: I've had colleagues that wanted to be teachers and are now teachers in North Carolina or in Maryland because of one test or one score. I also have teachers who I'm friends with in Virginia who took a test four times. And so you're thinking about playing $100-plus four times just to become a teacher in a field where you already don't make a lot of money. [laughs]

House Delegate David Toscano says he is well aware of the issue.

DAVID TOSCANO: In this next budget, I think the governor will have more money for teachers and I am going to be fully supportive of that; and we'll try to be working on some new regulations that will make it easier for teachers to want to stay in the profession. We can pass some laws to do that, and we can pass some budgetary amendments that will change the salary schedule for teachers.

But there’s something else: parallel to the general trend, African-American students are even less likely to enroll in teacher preparation programs.

DIAS: I have other students who would say "I'm a first-generation college student and I have to make it and I have to be able to come back and help my family. I can't help my family on a teaching salary. 

According to the Virginia Department of Education, nearly  half of students in public Virginia schools are minority students, while only 16% of teachers are non-white. In Albemarle County, a third of the student body is non-white, but  only 8% of their teachers are non-white. And Dias says that’s important.

DIAS: For the nation to be so diverse, for this to be such a diverse community, and to have students say that "I've never had a teacher who looks like me:" that is impactful.

So what can be done? Statewide measures could encourage more student teachers, whether it be in the form of grants, by taking down some barriers to licensure through loan forgiveness or reverting to an undergraduate degree.

STAPLES: I think you'll see some of those percolating through policy decisions either on the General Assembly side or the State Board of Education side over the next few months.

As for teachers of color, the Virginia Department of Education partnered with the Virginia Education Association to set up a Virginia Minority Educator Recruitment Summit back in February - another one is planned for the spring.

DIAS: We actually offered six of our fellows the chance - we took them down to Richmond for the Summit. A lot of our fellows - because we’re still trying to increase diversity - are the only teachers of color in their schools. So for them to attend a professional conference where they can meet other teachers of color was a great opportunity. They kind of got to see role models because they saw people who are in the 40s, 50s, 60s, and in education so they could see "This is what I could do in 15 or 20 years, here's how I could still impact education."

This story appeared on WMRA News.

Limiting Weapons at Rallies

A petition, a state lawsuit and a bill proposal from Charlottesville all aim to address the issue of violence at public rallies such as that experienced on August 12. / Photo: Marguerite Gallorini

The aftermath of August 12 in Charlottesville prompted many responses, including a report that was released on Friday [Dec. 1] citing multiple problems with the police response to the white supremacists that rallied over the summer.  But there have also been calls for more regulation of weapons and private militias in the city. WMRA’s Marguerite Gallorini has this overview of those proposals.

Listen

Listening...

4:58

[Crowd demonstrating]

One thing that comes up regularly in conversations about August 12 is the frightening display of heavy weaponry in the city’s streets that day. It was a wake-up call, and some citizens responded.

DAVID SWANSON: I started up a petition asking the City of Charlottesville to prevent anyone from bringing weapons - guns, knives, sticks - to rallies in public places with public permits, and I have gotten no reply whatsoever regarding knives or sticks.

That’s David Swanson, an author and anti-war activist from Charlottesville.

SWANSON: But there is a law that has a list of several cities and counties in Virginia where supposedly you are allowed to ban at least certain kinds of guns, and Richmond is on that list, and Charlottesville isn't - and this is what I've been told by folks here in Charlottesville and by our Delegate in government in Richmond, is that you have to be on that list.

To address this, Democratic House Minority Leader David Toscano is proposing changes during the next General Assembly session starting in January.

DAVID TOSCANO: I predict that there will be many gun safety measures introduced in this General Assembly session. As to Charlottesville and Albemarle, we want to put in a bill that will allow us as a locality to regulate weapons in public spaces like ten other localities are already allowed to do in Virginia.

At the last City Council meeting [November 20] Lisa Robertson, Chief Deputy City Attorney for Charlottesville, cited the example of a similar bill in Tennessee.

LISA ROBERTSON: It's exactly what we need: Tennesse is a Dillon's Rule State, they're a State that allows open-carry of weapons without a permit and conceal-carry of firearms with a permit. They're very similar to us. And as of July 1st, they adopted a bill that allows localities the same authority as the governor has given State agencies at the local level to regulate these things in public spaces. What they've said is that if you have a large event that's taking place for instance in a park, if you take certain steps to manage the area and to control the entrances and to do searches of people on the way in and to post the area's been one that during that event, you're not allowed to have firearms in that area, you can do things a certain way.

SWANSON: A bill through the Virginia legislature that would make very clear that every locality has the right to ban weapons at its own discretion I think would be an excellent step. The next step would be for the State of Virginia to ban or at least restrict weapons statewide.

While not about weapons specifically, there is now a state lawsuit against private militias. Philip Zelikow, attorney and White Burkett Miller Professor of History at the University of Virginia, recalled a case that can provide a precedent for Charlottesville.

PHILIP ZELIKOW: I remembered, from my own experience in litigation against right-wing extremist groups in the 1980s, back in Texas, that Texas, like most states, has laws that prohibit private armies. They prohibit paramilitary groups arming themselves and coming to political confrontations. They prohibit self-appointed peacekeepers. These are old laws; some of them go back to the very founding of the Republic. So Virginia, like most states, also has these laws in the books.

Drawing from this, the City Council of Charlottesville joined the Georgetown Law’s Institute for Constitutional Advocacy and Protection in filing a state lawsuit asking “to prohibit key “Unite the Right” organizers and an array of participating private paramilitary groups and their commanders from coming back to Virginia to conduct illegal paramilitary activity.”  But what about the Second Amendment? Here’s Professor Zelikow again.

ZELIKOW: Whatever you think about the right to bear arms for individual self-defense, this is not a right that then allows you to elbow aside the local sheriff and make yourself the sheriff of your county, and organize twenty of your friends with assault weapons to set up a private militia. That's not what the Second Amendment was meant to protect. The Second Amendment explicitly says that militias are to be "well-regulated," of course, by the State. Then they meant the States, that individual States each had the job of keeping the peace and organizing the militias. If everybody could organize their own militias and everybody could organize their own police, democratic government would disappear.

Regarding the lawsuit, motions to dismiss are pending in the state court. As for the petition, David Swanson hasn’t heard back from City Council members, but he said he would check in with allies, like the local Amnesty International or the Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice, to see how they could press City Council to act. Indeed, Jason Kessler recently announced he applied to hold another rally to protest against “government civil rights abuse” at an anniversary rally in Emancipation Park on Aug. 11-12 of next year.

This story appeared on WMRA News.