Our Time PressThe Local Paper with the Global View

Mimi Rosenberg interviewed Fred Brewington, the day after Christmas, for the WBAI program, Wakeup Call (99.5FM).  Mr. Brewington is the attorney for John White, recently convicted of manslaughter while defending his family in Suffolk County. White remains free on bail until sentencing, when he could face a prison term of five to 15 years.

If you’ve read the listing of the thousands of African-Americans lynched and murdered by white mobs in the December 16th Our Time Press, then you can put yourself in the place of a man confronted by what Attorney Brewington  describes.  (Also available online at wbai.org, Wakeup Call, Archive, Wednesday, December 26, 8:00am.)
Mr. Brewington: Back in August 9th of 2006, Aaron White, the son of John White, who at that time was 18 years or 19 years of age, was home from college and went out to dinner with a friend of his. After dinner, they decided they were going to look for a party, and they called around and they found out that there was a party at the home of a young man by the name of Craig Martin.
They went to the house and the party had underage drinking going on and people were to a level of inebriation where Aaron testified that people were stumbling around.
He happened to be the only African-American there at that party in Suffolk County. The sister of the host said to her brother and to Daniel Cicciaro, Jr. that she didn’t feel comfortable with Aaron being there. It turns out that one of Aaron’s friends and another young man had done a prank using MySpace to put up a fake MySpace, to put up a fake profile on this young lady’s MySpace indicating that Aaron wanted to do bad things to her in a sexual way. It was not true. Aaron had denied it, and this had happened some 8 months before. For whatever reason, this young lady decided that she wanted some attention, and then made a big stink that Aaron should leave the party and Aaron was asked to leave the party by Daniel Cicciaro and he left.
Mimi: Fred, this posting that you’re talking about was 8 months before the party?
Mr. Brewington: Absolutely. And it was known and clear that it was not Aaron who had written this, it was another individual who claimed to be his friend and did it as a prank. But even so, it still continued to resonate during the party. One of the things that’s important is that this young lady had seen Aaron at least two times before at a shopping mall and at a basketball game and said nothing to anyone about this incident. But apparently, this young lady, who happened to be about 4 years younger than everybody else, either wanted attention or whatever her reasons for this comment. Now you should know that not only was Aaron the only African-American at this party, but the young lady that made this comment was a young white girl.
So anyhow, Aaron was asked to leave the party. He left with no concerns. He did not argue. He said, This is not my home so therefore I will respect your request. He said he didn’t understand why, because he was not told why at the time and went home. Immediately after leaving, apparently the alcohol started taking affect on people and name-calling started to occur. And we know this because one of the people who came to the party with Aaron remained there, a young white man, and he was able to tell Aaron that they were referring to him using the N-word. They were saying that they wanted to kick his behind, using another word of course. And then he called Aaron saying, “Don’t come back to this party  because they’re gonna jump you. They’re going to beat you up. They’re talking about ganging up on you.”
Well, this young man, Daniel Cicciaro, asked for the number of Aaron, was able to get it, called Aaron on the phone and threatened him, telling him that he was going to kill him and how dare he; who did he think he was making these types of comments. And he called, he said she was his sister, even though it really was not his sister, he was now taking on that mantle of protecting this young woman’s virtues against this African-American man.
Two carloads of young men ended up going to the home of Aaron White at 11:30 at night. They drove up and down the cul-de-sac where he lived, roaring their engines using the modern-day muscle cars as though they were horse-drawn wagons, making all types of noise, driving the cars up into the driveway, one of the cars’ headlights beaming onto the house, and called on the phone again and basically told Aaron, “Come out the house. If you don’t come out the house we’re gonna kill you” and a number of comments to that affect.
Well, in the house Aaron was scared to death. He woke his father up. He told his father, John White, that “These guys are coming here, Dad. They’re going to beat me. They’re going to kill me.” And John White was dead asleep, and when he woke his father up and eventually stirred him, John said, “What’s going on?” And he said, “Dad, these guys are coming here to kill me.” And John immediately jumped up, saw lights beaming on his house and went to his closet first to get a shotgun to chase them away. He decided the shotgun was not appropriate. In his testimony, he said that it was just too much. He didn’t want to go out there with a big long gun like that. And then he started to go out the house, and as he was going out he reached on the top shelf in his home, in the garage, for a small handgun to use to chase these gentlemen away.
Unbeknownst to him, Aaron had also picked up the shotgun and went behind him and as he went down the driveway he noticed that Aaron was standing behind him. Aaron indicated that he did not want his father to go out alone, he claims because he was old and skinny and was afraid that these boys would hurt him. The situation then went to the point where when they walked down the driveway of their home, that these young men began to holler and scream racial epithets, referring to Mr. White using the N-word saying that they were going to kill him, that they were going to rape him and his wife, telling Aaron that he was an f___ing n and other types of things, threatening them physically. Mr. White continually said “Leave.” These young boys told Mr. White, who at that time was some 53 years of age, “Who the hell do you think you are?” And they gave him no respect. They gave him no indication that they recognized that he was an adult figure. Mr. White eventually was able to view this as being something that he was going to wait for the police to come because as he had left the house he asked his wife Sonya to call the police. She, unfortunately, was in such a state of mind that she was so afraid she says that she did not hear him say that, although Aaron, who was in the house at that time, did hear him. So as he turned to go back in the house, this young man, Daniel Cicciaro, who was screaming and hollering and apparently was the flashpoint for this situation, was the instigator of everything, began to stalk Mr. White as he went up the driveway, reached for the gun, tried to grab it out of Mr. White’s hand as it was pointed down toward the ground and when he pulled it back toward him the bullet was ejected from the gun hitting Cicciaro in his left cheek and the bullet went up and lodged into his brain slightly above the right ear.
It’s a very unfortunate, tragic situation. But in this situation, Mr. White, who had a history in his family of people being lynched and the Ku Klux Klan coming to the home to burn people out, really thought that in the isolated situation that he feels on Miller Place in Suffolk County, that he and his family were in danger. And the jury failed to recognize any aspect of that. His history, his knowledge, his feelings, his concern for his family were of no importance to them because they essentially just wiped out 400 years of history.
Mimi: How can people be supportive of Mr. White and his family?
Mr. Brewington: Well, two things: One, I think that people should know that John White has enormous expenses in terms of buying transcripts; in terms of dealing with the costs involved with this. So there is a defense fund: The John White Legal Defense Fund, or John White LDF, and they’re accepting contributions. Anybody who would like to do that can mail it to my office and I will get it to the accountant who is overseeing the legal defense fund. My office and my name is Fred Brewington. The address is 50 Clinton Street, Suite 501, Hempstead, NY 11550.

The good news is that African-American Brooklynite architect/businessman Carlton Brown of Full Spectrum, was named developer of the $85 million Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) cultural district’s residential tower and dance space in Downtown Brooklyn on land owned by NYC.  Full Spectrum’s Brown has crossed the real estate divide, which has excluded NYC’s  people of color from big-league real estate development participation. This is a quantum leap!  Construction of the BAM tower begins next spring.
Last month’s landmark announcement about the Brown/BAM project had lots of chefs stirring the pot:  the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, the Brooklyn Academy of Music, NYC Housing Preservation and Development,  NYC Councilwoman Letitia James  and a constellation of Brooklyn groups advocating for a Brooklynite developer as opposed to Manhattan moguls who monopolize most big  NYC real estate deals.  The history of the  $300 million Downtown Brooklyn renovation is long and rife with political undertones and bureaucratic stagnation. The announcement begs more than a few questions. Who is Carlton Brown? What is Full Spectrum? How did Brown’s Full Spectrum team, whose original proposal was rejected in 2006, eclipsed the competition.
Co-founded in 1988  by Carlton Brown, COO, and Walter Edwards, CEO, Full Spectrum is a Harlem-based, African-American-owned sustainable real estate company which focuses on the development of mixed-use, mixed-income green buildings in emerging urban markets.  Brown, architect and green leader, says,  “Full Spectrum’s two Harlem condominium buildings, at 1400 Fifth Avenue and the Kalahari Harlem, on West 116th Street, under construction, exemplify our mission.” He adds: “1400 Fifth,  which was first occupied in 2004, is our flagship mixed-income residential green building,  and it gave us lots of national visibility to do something different and helped broaden our client business base, which now includes Jackson, Mississippi, where Full Spectrum has an office, and where it is developing 4500 homes and in New Orleans, Louisiana, where we will  develop 275 hotel rooms, 200 condos and 200 homes.  Our out-of-town business is directly related to our philosophy and strategic approach to work, something to which  municipal leaders across the country resonate.  All  of our buildings will be green and cost-effective.”
Full Spectrum, along with a variety of partners, is becoming a household word, which  has developed  both residential and commercial real estate properties from a facility upgrade at the UN Plaza Hotel to project management at Jacobi Hospital and at the Trenton Town Center in New Jersey. We were a consultant to  The Solarium in Battery Park City, Manhattan, best  known as one of the nation’s first environmentally sustainable residential buildings.
The Full Spectrum’s management philosophy and practices are indistinguishable from Carlton Brown’s. An affable, scholarly, pragmatic manager, Brown is the ultimate multitasker who can conduct an in-office interview while teleconferencing in another city and mapping real estate strategies for yet another city.  A 30-year-plus Brooklyn resident who is married with children, Brown is a member in good standing within  the borough’s  rich, vibrant African-American cultural community. He chairs the nonprofit ARTS 651, a local organization which focuses on art produced  by descendants of  enslaved Africans, lectures at Pratt Institute, and in 1990 led  a multidisciplinary group which developed an approach for sustainable development projects for Cape Verde, a West African nation.
Born in Charlotte, NC, Brown  was raised in  Jackson, Mississippi, where his parents were professors who taught chemistry and choreography at Jackson State University, an HBCU and  who were active in the civil rights movement.  “Our family engaged in the world of ideas beyond the reality of  Mississippi in the 50s and 60s,” says Brown. He graduated from Princeton, where he majored in Architecture and city planning and wrote a thesis on “Neo-African Architecture,” about the historic impact of 400 years of European dominance of African  peoples and Black architecture imperatives, which should be more African referential and less duplicative of Western influences.
In 1976,  ATT hired Brown as a district manager for its NY real estate group, where he acquired experience in  corporate planning, site acquisition, facilities development, project design and leasing for high-performance labs, data centers and office facilities. During his decade-long  ATT tenure, he directed the development and construction of more than $2 billion in real estate property for the corporation. He also studied real estate finance at NYU.
When Carlton Brown, former American Institute of Architects board member, starts talking about architecture, he gets an adrenalin rush. He defines himself by his Africanness, saying, “That’s who I am and that’s how I process words.”  He insists that most people misunderstand architects.  “Architecture,” he concedes,  “is about the power of the elite and the ruling classes and their ability to finance buildings and erect monuments to themselves.” He laments that Blacks in general do not enjoy that access. He says:  “Architects are not just designers, as some conjecture who are on steroids, we are the stewards of the earth’s resources, stewards of environmental health,” which would explain his attraction to greening. He admits that architecture is about pattern, color, shape and texture. “For the  Kalahari Harlem, we hired African-American architect John Travis who deftly introduced numerous African references to the design model such as Adrinka and southern African symbols. He enthuses, “We wanted a distinctive building which would introduce pattern and color in a way unusual for NYC.”
Brown  is ecstatic about being named developer of the “jewel in the crown” portion of   the rejuvenated BAM  cultural district project, its residential tower,  which encompasses 187 units of mixed-income housing, half of which are designated for low-to moderate-income tenants. Full Spectrum will work with two architectural groups on the BAM residential tower, the Germany-based Behnisch Architects and the New York-based Studio MDA. In explaining the  tower’s architectural  design scheme, he recommends “envisioning Downtown Brooklyn as a horizontal community turned on its end, 5 cantilevered blocks of apartments which allows natural light and abundant air to circulate.”  He adds, “We haven’t  determined which African design scheme will interplay with the basics.”   Brown’s  big challenge is securing financing for the behemoth  Downtown Brooklyn real estate project.  He allows, tongue in cheek,  that being named developer was the easy part, phase one of a multilayered process.
It appears that Full Spectrum has much to celebrate as it approaches 2008, its  20th Anniversary!

(Editors Note: For a future issue, Our Time Press will be asking many downtown Brooklyn developers, how their contractor/workforce profile measures against the local standard of the Community Benefits Agreement with Forest City Ratner.)

The staff of Bedford Academy High School reveals that its successful formula-which earned the school the honor of being only one of two schools in the City to receive an A marking-consists of a commitment to each student’s academic success and personal enrichment.
For Principal George Leonard, the passion for helping each child to succeed also stems from the lack of nurturing that he received in school.  “I attribute [the way the school is run] to the way that I was miseducated in school,” he said.  “I resented that the other kids knew more than I did and that their hands were always up.”  He was also displeased with the lack of concern that his teachers in Harlem exhibited.  “They didn’t realize that encouragement was important,” he said.  “I made sure that I didn’t make the same mistakes.”
Thus far, he certainly has not made the same mistakes.  In its five years of existence, Bedford Academy touts a Regents passing rate of approximately 95 percent.  Additionally, the 96 graduates of the 2005 class received a combined total of 202 college acceptance letters.  In part, this high success rate is due to the high standards that the students are required to meet.  Leonard said that 65 was an acceptable grade when he was in school, but he makes it clear that more is expected of Bedford Academy students.  “We want to see 80 to 100 for classes, report cards, and the Regents,” he said.  “Failure is not an option.”
Although Leonard is proud of the school’s accomplishments, he made sure to note that he is not solely responsible for them.  “I couldn’t have accomplished it by myself,” he said.  He gives the credit to his Bedford Academy staff, who also shares his vision of academic success.  Yet, Assistant Principal Niaka Gaston acknowledges that productivity in school goes beyond classroom lessons.  “Schools tend to forget the human factor,” Gaston said.  “You can’t treat them [students] like robots.  You have to know their uniqueness in order to meet their needs.”
Bedford Academy taps into the students’ uniqueness through the family groups, which are overseen by the faculty and administrative staff.  The faculty and staff also pinpoint and work with the students’ individualities by teaching them study skills.  Leonard emphasizes rewriting lecture notes and Science Chairperson Bev Thompson tells the students that the information in textbooks is someone else’s interpretation.  He advises the students to “make it personal to you” and “find someone of your like mind.”
However, the Bedford Academy staff does not limit its good works to its student body of 343.  Each Saturday, the staff tutors non-Bedford Academy students in addition to its own students.
In terms of furthering Bedford Academy’s success, Thompson would like to service a larger student population and have a larger school budget.  Leonard would like the school to encompass grades K through 12, as well as offer additional courses (African-American History, Black and Hispanic History, College Now, etc.).  Gaston wants to do “nothing short of revolutionizing education.”  With its track record, Bedford Academy is doing just that.

By Erma Williams
The inclusion of Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama into the 2008 Presidential Election has sparked wonder about what their bids for the presidency means for African-Americans.
According to the Chicago Tribune’s article titled ABlack Voters Focus on Clinton, Obama (November 28, 2007), African-American voters are primarily focused on Clinton and Obama.  “African-American voters are really only looking at two candidates,” said David Bositis, a senior analyst at the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies.  “There is Hillary Clinton and there is Barack Obama.  Really, none of the other candidates exist in the realm that Clinton and Obama occupy.”
The results of a survey that was conducted by the center shows that Clinton is viewed favorably by 83 percent of Black voters, compared to Obama’s 74 percent.  In the survey, there was a small gender gap as African-American women chose Clinton as the favorite with positive ratings of 86 percent.  Bositis said that Clinton’s lead may be due in part to the economic success African-Americans experienced during her husband’s time in the White House.  According to the Census Bureau, the Black population’s annual median household income increased by $5,000 during President Bill Clinton’s second term.
Experience is another factor that is working in Clinton’s favor especially among Black women.  During National Public Radio’s broadcast titled, Black Women Face Quandary in Democratic Race (April 9, 2007), Linda Wortheimer visited the Women’s Center at Morgan State University, a historically Black institution, to get Black women’s opinion on the candidates.  Philosophy major Sarah McMillan said that she is leaning toward Clinton because of her experience.  “Obama has passion but not experience,” she said.  “Candidates need experience because they need to know how to influence others properly to get the desired results.”
Other women, like renowned poet Maya Angelou, are endorsing Clinton because she is a woman, wife and mother.  “I know what kind of president Hillary Clinton will be because I know who she is,” says Angelou on advertisements that are being broadcast on Southern radio stations.
Although Clinton is ahead of Obama in the polls, she has only a 10 percent edge over him in regards to the Iraq War.  Along with health care and the economy, African-Americans name the Iraq War as the most pressing issue facing America.  During the NPR broadcast, “Obama and Clinton Seek Edge for Black Vote” (March 8, 2007), NPR correspondent Juan Williams pointed out the disparities between Clinton and Obama regarding the Iraq War.  “From the start, Obama has opposed the Iraq War,” Williams said.  “Clinton voted for the war but won’t say that her original vote was a mistake.  She just says that she voted on the best available information.”
Shelly Hoston, who was also interviewed by Wortheimer, expressed her disapproval of both the war and Clinton.  “We were given a snow job about what this war was about,” Hoston said.  “She’s [Clinton] saying ‘no’ [about the war] now, but she voted ‘yes’ at first.”
Aside from the war issue, many African-American women are siding with Obama because they feel that he has African-Americans’ best interests at heart.  Gayle Carter, another of Wortheimer’s interviewees, says that his compassion makes him the best candidate for the job.  “He has the compassion of being African-American that will stay with him,” she said.  “Folks will always see him as African-American, but they’re taken aback when they hear him open his mouth because he has a broader outlook on the world.”
A student at Morgan State University, says the election is about race.  “The hierarchy is white man, white woman, Black man, Black woman,” she said.  “I’m a woman, but I’m like two doors down from her.  She’s not thinking about us, and I know Barack is thinking about us.”
There are other women, like Nelly Montaine, who supports Obama but does not feel that he would be elected because he is Black.  “Some people will vote for Barack Obama because he’s Black, but this is still White America,” Montaine said.  “When the majority of America, which is white, looks at Obama, they don’t see someone with mixed racial heritage.  They see a Black man.  The reality is that he’s going to have a struggle.”
Then there is the group, which consists of women like Janice Stuart, who wants Obama to win because she wants to see a change in America.  “We’ve given the white man all these years to get it right, and it’s about time to make a change,” she said.  “Let someone else try and see what they can do.”
No one knows what the end result of the 2008 election will be at this point, but all of these perspectives make one thing clear: This historic election will always be remembered.

By Mary Alice Miller
Its official! The road to the 2008 Democratic nomination for President of the United States is no longer a coronation pageant for Queen Hillary. Barack Obama and to a lesser degree John Edwards have become formidable challengers.
There has been a lot of buzz regarding the Black female vote and who it leans toward- Obama or Hillary? The Black female vote may be a decisive force in choosing the next Democratic nominee for President of the United States because North Carolina’s Jan. 8th Primary and several of the large Super Tuesday states, including California and New York, have large blocks of Black female voters.
Hillary Clinton was  presumed to have both the Black vote and the women’s vote in  her hip pocket. The assumption of control of the Black vote is a legacy of her husband’s popularity among Black Democrats. The women’s vote may be because Hillary’s goal is to become the first female president of the United States.
Most political campaigns focus their get-out-the-vote efforts on Black females. The 2008 presidential campaign is no exception.  Common knowledge is that Black females vote more than Black males. Some Black men are known to voluntarily give up their vote because of apathy and distrust of the system. Others have their vote involuntarily taken away because of contact with the criminal justice system at some point in their lives.
The debate over the Black female vote is heightening lately with Obama closing the polling numbers gap between his and Hillary’s campaigns. Interviews with Black female voters reveal allegiances with both Obama and Hillary for obvious reasons- Obama because he is Black, Hillary because she is female. Little focus has been paid to the sexual politics underlying specific leanings.
Hillary has definitively tied her campaign to her husband’s years in office. Black folks supposed love of Bill began with his saxophone performance on the “Arsenio Hall Show.” In 1998, Toni Morrison, Princeton professor and Nobel laureate, called Bill “our first Black president.”
The relationship between Bill and Hill resonates emotionally with Black females, many of whom know what it feels like when  their man has repeatedly embarrassed them in public. While ignoring her husband’s history of taking advantage of vulnerable women from Jennifer Flowers to Monica Lewinsky, Hillary is touting her non elected position as First Lady in the White House as qualification for the office of president. Bill Clinton’s presidency was filled with unintended consequences. Welfare reform, free, not fair, trade agreements that accelerated the exodus of outsourced blue- and white-collar jobs, extreme sentencing guidelines for crack as opposed to cocaine, and the NAFTA program that devastated the economy on the Mexican side of the U.S. border, leading to the largest illegal immigrant surge since the Puritans, have all had devastating effects on Black women and the Black community as a whole.
Barack Obama also resonates with the Black female voter. When Julianne Malveaux asked, “Is Obama Black enough?”, no one in polite society said what many thought- “Of course he is Black; his father abandoned the family!” Too many Black women know what that feels like. Obama, however, is not to be blamed for the sins of his father. In fact, Obama made a conscious decision to be a better man than his father: he acquired a quality education, chose to work with his people, married Michelle, a Black woman, and remains married while raising their two daughters.
What, exactly, does Jesse Jackson mean when he asserts Barack Obama is not Black enough? Does Jackson really believe Obama should follow the example of some old-guard civil rights leaders (and too many men in the Black community), go outside of his marriage and have out-of-wedlock children? Would Obama be Black enough then? Two generations, post-civil rights, have lived this social dysfunction. Many grew up watching their mothers mistreated and the children abandoned. We all see the devastating effects of this value system on the social fabric of Black America. Post-civil rights generations want something different in our lives and in the White House.
Former Ambassador Andrew Young revealed his disrespect for the Black female vote by “joking” on national television that “Bill is every bit as Black as Barack. He’s probably gone with more Black women than Barack.” No one can contest that Bill prowled quite a bit during his marriage, but with Black women? And why should Young think sexual prowess with Black women is a barometer of anything? Emotional abuse of Black women should not be used to give Bill a third term as president by proxy.
Young also demonstrated his lack of knowledge of the U. S. Constitution when he said: “It’s not a matter of being inexperienced. It’s a matter of being young.” Stating he wants “Barack Obama to be president in 2016.” Article II of the Constitution states a president must be a citizen of the United States, 35 years old and a resident for 14 years. Obama qualifies on all counts. Young’s wish that Obama wait until 2016 sounds like the argument the Old South gave when resisting civil rights for African-Americans.
Hillary has been accusing Obama of lacking experience for the office of president. But eight years of Hill discussing federal policy during pillow talk with her husband, the elected president, is not experience. Hill accuses Obama of being calculating, and uses Obama’s kindergarten essay, “I want to be President”, as an example of his lifelong ambition. Hill’s carpetbagger move to NY in order to become U.S. Senator on her way back to the White House apparently does not count as being either calculating or overly ambitious.
If Obama is overly ambitious, so too is Oprah, the most popular woman in television. Oprah’s weekend of campaigning for Obama in Iowa, North Carolina and New Hampshire brought out record crowds. Yes, many came out just  to see Oprah. Her endorsement did what it was expected to do- garner attention for Obama. Oprah was not expected to get votes for Obama. He must do that for himself.
The Clinton campaign has prematurely declared Hill the presumptive Democratic nominee, despite Obama’s competitive poll numbers and fund-raising.  Hill does not seem to notice the palpable hatred of her by many segments across the country that began during her husband’s first term in office when Bill campaigned by offering “two for the price of one”. No one voted for Hillary to be anything during her husband’s two terms. Hillary’s failed “health care reform” as First Lady does not help.  Conservatives are salivating at the mouth, waiting for her to become the nominee.
Since Oprah’s campaign weekend with Obama, Hillary has brought out her big guns- a now-fired campaign manager who insinuated Obama sold drugs as a teen, and Bill wh asserts an Obama nomination is a “roll-of-the-dice”.
Susan B. Anthony was very angry when after the Civil War, Black men got the right to vote before white women did with the passage of   the 19th Amendment. Anthony spewed her vitriol in spite of the participation of Sojourner Truth and Frederick Douglass in the First (white) Women’s Convention at Seneca Falls, NY. If Hill is upset now at Obama’s competitive popularity in the poll’s among Black and white prospective voters, will she become ungraciously unhinged if and/or when Obama officially becomes the Democratic nominee?  Time will tell. The Iowa Caucus is Jan. 3rd. The New Hampshire and North Carolina Primaries are Jan. 8. Super Tuesday is Feb. 5th.