Our Time PressThe Local Paper with the Global View

By Brandon Ward
The Conceit of Outside Knowledge
One of the most common mistakes made by some of my acquaintances (after I tell them that I work for DOT) is the practice of thinking that I know things about traffic engineering simply because I work for DOT. Certainly as an engineer, I could pontificate giving an outside opinion about traffic engineering by dropping a few technical terms during the course of a conversation. For example, DOT recently re-engineered the lane markings at the intersection of Flatbush Avenue and Empire Boulevard in Brooklyn. The new design does not match my inexperienced idea of how the traffic should be channeled at this intersection. From my driver’s view, reducing the number of lanes from three to two while having to share one of the remaining lanes with a bus stop, a Wendy’s drive- thru entrance/exit and a right turn-only lane is faulty. From my pedestrian view, it seems that the elimination of a buffer zone between the curb lane and pedestrian sidewalk is also faulty.
Here’s the point of the foregoing example. Even though my opinion seems deep and certain, it is nonetheless specious. The opinion is based on outside experience (my experience as a driver, who happens to be an engineer) as opposed to inside experience (the experience of a traffic engineer whose professional training and thinking is traffic management). This common mistake is generally the result of the conceit of outside knowledge. It is a conceit not dissimilar to the common idea that one can write a book simply because one has read so many of them. Or that one can think about things one is not involved with. Like Mayor Bloomberg’s new emergency response plan that puts the Police Department (instead of the Fire Department) initially in charge of emergency scenes where chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear material is suspected.
That said, the seemingly preferred management orthodoxy (outside leadership with outside knowledge) of the administration is troubling. For instance, Mayor Bloomberg appointed a nontraditional chancellor, Joel Klein, to spearhead the reforms of the nation’s largest public school system and Iris Weinshall to improve NYC’s traffic management. Curiously, Mr. Klein’s background as an antitrust lawyer was to breakup companies (i.e., Microsoft) and Ms. Weinshall’s twenty-year career experience with city government has been largely confined to public administration. As Chief Peter Hyden (the city’s highest-ranking fire officer) might say, albeit in the context of the administration’s Citywide Incident Management System (CIMS), “it makes no sense.”
Certainly, I do not write as a detached observer to reality. It’s a reality I have seen with all its demoralizing permutations in my agency, DOT. I daresay, since the Dinkins administration, the agency’s leadership has descended from the perspicacity of Commissioner Lou Riccio, Ph.D. P.E to the imperial hubris of the commissioner de jour Iris Weinshall.
Unfortunately, little attention (in my view) is given to the fact that characteristic to the notion, “to the victor belong the spoils,” is the disturbing reality that political victories sometimes impose clumsy appointments on the professional workforce of city agencies.  Surprisingly, very little discernment is required to notice Commissioner Weinshall’s political strings: she is married to U.S. Senator Charles Schumer. Not surprisingly however, is the fact that since her appointment to the agency and declaration (“to work in government and make it work”), one cannot ignore the good commissioner’s management goal is seemingly to remake the agency according to her liking. After all, five of the agency’s eight deputy commissioners (including the agency’s First Deputy Commissioner) have no professional background in transportation whatsoever.
Truth be told, there is seemingly an unavoidable schizophrenia associated with an abstract noun like “experience” in the context of hiring and promotions in the agency.  In fact, while it is not slanderous for the administration or agency head to choose the person that they deem the “best fit” (a sanitized word of loyalty) for a position, loyalty-driven hiring has undermined the professional and intellectual integrity of mission-critical areas of agencies. Needless to say, the cumulative effect of the “conceit of outside knowledge” on the professional workforce is demoralizing. Examples abound in the Department of Education’s “reforms” to DOT’s failure to provide “central guidance and uniform procedures” for its ferry operations prior to the tragic ferry crash in October 2003.
Certainly, in light of the foregoing facts, one is impelled to ask the question: “How does an agency (or department) go bankrupt (intellectually, that is)? Answer: Using Ernest Hemingway’s response (in his book, The Sun Also Rises); two ways. “Gradually, and then suddenly.”
Brandon L. Ward is president of the NYC Chapter of Blacks In Government. He can be reached at brandonward@nycbig.com.

By Aminisha Black
Goals Still Work
I’ve been noticing that issues don’t seem to get resolved.  Being an issue-oriented society, issues are constantly being raised, debated, given news coverage and protested.   But are we moving forward or keeping busy but getting nowhere? 
Looking over notes from a sensitivity training held with middle school teachers in 1992, I was impressed by the collective goals they shared.  Among them was to have fully functional, literate students; to have students gain a sense of self-worth, appreciate themselves, appreciate differences and appreciate all living things; to teach success through teamwork; to develop appropriate social attitudes; to teach students to take more responsibility for their actions; to have students feel secure about themselves – have self- control; to convey to students a sense of morality, generosity and a value system.  To bring a maternal/paternal presence as well as a teacher presence. 
Reading these today, the goals are still relevant and while educators generated them, these should be the goals of parents as well.  Goals give direction, focus and meaning to our lives.  They keep us on purpose and allow for a means to evaluate progress and register an ongoing sense of accomplishment.   I was recently reminded of the importance of writing goals and reviewing them on a regular basis.  While I have been writing goals for years, I must admit that after posting them on a bulletin board I rarely looked at them.   How many of us who are parents, teachers or care providers have specific written goals for our interactions with young people?
At a later session of the 1992 training, teachers were asked to share what they saw as obstacles to accomplishing the prior stated goals.  I read the 1992 obstacles to current teachers in Middle Schools to see if they experienced these obstacles today.  Out of the 16 cited in 1992, today’s teachers said that 15 of those still existed.
Obstacles included: class sizes too large for the one-on-one instruction required in some classes, shortage of materials and state-of-the-art equipment, need to integrate minor subjects with majors, teaching in isolation – lack of collaboration among teachers, unmotivated students, discipline problems which reduce amount of time spent on class work, need for culturally conscious materials, need for teachers to have profiles of students in class (in cases where circumstances are unusual), students coming to school unprepared, lack of quality teacher development, culture shock – coming from places where teachers are respected, need for acknowledgement and appreciation of one another and teachers receive no training in discipline or class management for  handling large classes.
One of today’s teachers shared that professional development is nonexistent in the areas of class management, instead focuses on instruction.  The rationale for this is if there is quality instruction, there will be no behavioral problems.  This warrants further research to see if the professional development in instruction is accommodating different learning styles.  We must not forget the multiple intelligence theory missing from our educational system because the goal of discovering our children’s genius guides us.
 We know that some issues vary from school to school, district to district and region to region.  However, the fact that so many of the issues stated by teachers in 1992 are still issues 13 years later points to some changes needed in the way we do things.
I suggest we start with doing some soul-searching and come up with a different way of doing things.  After all, to keep doing the same thing over and over and expect different results has been labeled insanity.
Setting, writing and reviewing goals will probably go a long way towards resolving issues.  Issues have a way of arousing anger, much of which is probably from some other confrontation and another unresolved issue.  With the drama and venting taking center stage, goals just might get overlooked.  After all, goals have a different energy than accusations, demands and defenses, a bit difficult to combine them in the same setting.
Goals aren’t limited to schools or places of employment.  As parents, we need to establish goals in all areas of our lives: raising our children, our relationships, our work, our health, our spiritual growth.  Without goals, there’s no way of measuring progress, leaving us with uncertainty and without a sense of fulfillment.  We need a sense of fulfillment in order to pass it along to the future generations.

By Danielle Douglass
On April 11, 2005, the Supreme Court of the New York Appellate Division handed down a ruling overturning a previous judgment favoring Community Board 2 in a case brought against them by their former District Manager, Olanike Alabi. Alabi sued the board, which serves the Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, Brooklyn Heights, DUMBO and downtown Brooklyn areas, for wrongful termination in July of 2003. Originally, the Kings County Supreme Court sided with the Community Board, which voted 23-16 in favor of dismissing Alabi, after citing a number of charges of incompetence.
Alabi filed an Article 78 proceeding, a lawsuit to challenge the action of a governmental body, stating that the vote was not reached by the majority of the board’s 49 members. According to CB2’s bylaws, the removal of a district manager requires a majority vote of the entire board. With the appellate court’s decision to overturn the original ruling because of the board’s failure to meet its own requirements, Alabi must now wait for the Supreme Court to rule in accordance with the appellate’s decision. “We are looking to have Ms. Alabi reinstated and to receive her back pay from the board,” says Alabi’s attorney, Roosevelt Seymour. The board can still appeal the latest decision, but they have not thus far.
From the beginning, this case has been mired in controversy because of the political implications of Alabi’s dismissal. Alabi, who was elected district manager in 2000, was a surprising choice to many because she was in her early twenties and was not politically connected. According to sources, who prefer to remain anonymous, Alabi was not the preferred choice of then-district Councilwoman Mary Pinkett, who wielded considerable power on the board as she appointed many of its members. In fact, Pinkett appointed Shirley McRae, the current chair, to the board in the early 90’s. Upon the ousting of former chair Robert Evans, who Alabi served under, McRae, then vice chair, automatically became the acting chairperson. When McRae was later elected to her present position, rumors began circulating that McRae owed her success to Pinkett, and in exchange returned the favor by proceeding to fire Alabi who Pinkett saw as a holdover from Evans’ administration. Suspicions arose when McRae requested an audit without the assistance of the New York State Comptroller; sources claim that the audit was merely an attempt to find dirt on Alabi. Soon after, the board’s finance, personnel and executive committees voted to seek Alabi’s dismissal. According to Seymour, some of the charges brought against Alabi included improper use of city property, allowing a friend to use the board’s copy machine, as well as leaving meetings early. McRae declined to comment on any of the allegations as well as the pending case.
Robert Evan’s, McRae’s predecessor, disagrees with the board’s assessment of Alabi, stating that she did an “excellent job” and followed his instructions while he was chair. Although Evans supports Alabi, he questions whether returning to the board is the best decision for her. “With her skills, her background, and her knowledge she can certainly do better than being the district manager for Community Board 2. Anybody who steps into that job is going to have an uphill battle trying to capture any degree of credibility,” says Evans. He went on to say that the board is no longer a credible entity because they are “completely out of the loop on all of the major discussions and issues in the community” as a result of the current leadership. In fact, many residents served by Community Board 2 have been posting fliers indicating their distrust and disapproval of the board’s leadership.
Members of the board remain deeply divided on the issue of Alabi as well as the present state of the Community Board. Edward Carter, who has been a member of the board for over 30 years says, “[Alabi] was a young and intelligent African American woman that should have been given a chance. She was learning her way through and I don’t think that they gave her much of a chance to get started.” Carter believes that the dismissal was politically motivated. “If you don’t buy into the plans of those who are politically endowed, then you run the risk of getting ostracized.” He went on to say that McRae’s administration has brought about division and political upheaval within the board. “The planning board was a state-of-the-art board where people got along in harmony, but [now] there are too many newcomers who have started to move for power plays. The older people who helped guide this board to the point of being a premier planning board, are now looked down upon, pushed aside and disregarded.”
However, not everyone shares Carter’s perspective; John Quint, who has served on the board for 15 years, praises the current leadership and supports Alabi’s removal. “I think Shirley has done a better job of focusing the board than Bob [Evans]. We are covering a lot more ground; I think we are better informed and our committees are more focused,” says Quint. As for Alabi, Quint believes that “the evidence was enough to justify her removal.” He feels that she will not be welcomed back if she is reinstated because of things he refused to go into that she said about the board during the judicial proceedings. Besides, Quint believes the current district manager, Robert Perris, is doing a wonderful job; Quint noted that Perris was almost unanimously elected by the board, whereas Alabi won by polarity not majority.
Regardless of opinions and this recent decision, Alabi’s case is still pending. Even if the Supreme Court decides to award her restitution and rule to reinstate her, she may have to be voted back in by the Community Board. Notably within recent months, the board has decided to add a new clause to their bylaws amending the process for dismissing a district manager. Perris, the current district manager, says, “We are trying to avoid similar situations in the future.”

by  Stanley Kinard
81%
These past few weeks, the news media has made several disparaging reports relative to the failure of the Department of Education.  Firs, it was reported in all the major daily newspapers that 81% of students failed the citywide history exam which represents a substantial drop since last year.  Overall, students are already below average in reading, science and math.  There is no subject area in which the majority of schools in the Black and Latino community are on par.  81% failing, however, is just absolutely outrageous and speaks to the overall failure of the policies of this new administration and mayoral control of schools.  They have spent millions on new curriculum and a Principal’s Institute; however, our children continue to fail at an even more alarming rate than ever before. 
It was also reported this week that the Department of Education is abandoning its effort to address the historical inequalities in school budget allocations.  They had attempted over the past 2 years to give more money to poor and failing schools by taking it from other school districts.  The mayor is now placing the blame for the inequality on the governor and the state.  It is true that the state Supreme Court mandated that billions of dollars in additional school aid be given to city schools and the governor has thus far refused to release the money.  The city administration, however, still has a responsibility to address this inequality by providing more resources for the communities that have been historically discriminated against.  While we need to put pressure on the governor, we must also put pressure on the mayor and chancellor to come up with other creative formulas to generate more revenue for these schools.  If we do nothing, we are only contributing to our children’s continued failure.
The mayor has boycotted all UFT events and forums and refuses to grant teachers a new contract.  This is the second year that teachers have functioned without a contract.  Teachers are also frustrated with all the new curriculum changes and feel very unappreciated.  They are forced to embrace methods of teaching that are unproven and to abandon methods that they know can work.  All this because of dictates from a chancellor that has absolutely no experience as an educator.   Teachers’ threats of a strike – as the mayor continues to resist efforts to negotiate – become more of a possibility.  Teachers could play a vital role in determining who the next mayor will be.  I trust that they will see that the current mayor is not a friend of education and is really not equipped to run the school system.  A good time to hold a strike is at the start of the new school year and right before the general election in November.
There has been a series of incidents this year regarding inappropriate sexual behavior between teachers and students.  There is also a growing number of elementary school-aged children engaging in inappropriate sexual behavior.  This past week, I was contacted by a mother whose 2nd- grade daughter was forcibly touched in her genital area by a male student in her class.  On several other occasions her daughter had been victimized by this same student as were other female students in their class.  I attended a meeting at the school because the mother didn’t feel she was receiving adequate support from the school regarding her daughter’s victimization.  It had been suggested that she had the option of transferring her daughter out of the school as a possible solution.  Rev.  Herbert Daughtry, along with several other parents attended this meeting.  What took place over the span of two hours was an in-depth discussion regarding the definition of sexual abuse.  The school felt that the child’s actions should not be labeled as sexual abuse but rather inappropriate behavior.  They explained that children go through a period of exploration and playful touching.  The mother of the daughter was resolute that to hit her 7-year-old’s genital area was an assault.  The grandmother of the young boy in question brought a semblance of order to the discussion when she expressed her deep pain.  She offered both an apology and support to the mother of the daughter.  The confidentiality of all parties involved must be protected, however, this kind of inappropriate sexual activity is a new phenomenon in our elementary schools.  We can blame TV, lack of parenting or sexually explicit music as the cause.  The fact remains: we have a problem that must be addressed.  We can’t cover this one up and act like it doesn’t exist.  New chancellor regulation, enforcement and mass parent education around this issue are required. 
The UFT has just released a chancellor’s report card to be graded by parents and  the community.  The categories to be graded involved his promise to reduce class size, improve school safety, alleviate overcrowding, encourage parent involvement, raise awareness of public education and negotiate a new contract.  I add to the list implementation of the Underground Railroad Curriculum. How do you grade the chancellor, A to F, in these categories?

By Mark McClellan, MD PhD
Administrator, Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services

You may be surprised to know that colorectal cancer-cancer of the colon, rectum, anus, and appendix-is the third leading cause of cancer deaths among African-American men and women in the United States. In fact, the American Cancer Society reports that colorectal cancer is expected to kill an estimated 7,080 African-Americans in 2005. Factors that increase your risk for colorectal cancer include obesity and cigarette smoking.
The good news is that more than 33 percent of deaths from colorectal cancer could be avoided through regular screening tests. Routine screening tests can help prevent colorectal cancer and can detect the disease in its early stages, when it is more easily treated. Because African Americans appear to be more likely to suffer from this disease than other populations, it is especially important for African-American men and women to understand colorectal cancer prevention.
What tests are covered by Medicare?
Medicare covers colorectal screening tests to help find pre-cancerous polyps (growths in the colon) so they can be removed before they turn into cancer. Medicare covers four screening tests for colorectal cancer:
 Fecal Occult Blood Test-Once every 12 months
 Flexible Sigmoidoscopy-Once every 48 months (or, once every 10 years after a screening colonoscopy)
 Screening Colonoscopy-Once every 24 months (if you’re at high risk). Once every 10 years, but not within 48 months of a screening sigmoidoscopy (if you’re not at high risk)
 Barium Enema-Your doctor can decide to use this test instead of a flexible sigmoidoscopy or colonoscopy. This test is covered every 24 months if you are at high risk for colorectal cancer and every 48 months if you aren’t at high risk.
Who should get tested for colorectal cancer?
Colorectal cancer is usually found in people age 50 or older, and the risk of getting it increases with age. Medicare covers colorectal screening tests for all people with Medicare age 50 and older, except there is no minimum age for having a screening colonoscopy. Risk for colorectal cancer increases if you or a close relative have had colorectal polyps or colorectal cancer, or if you have inflammatory bowel disease (like ulcerative colitis or Crohn’s disease).
For more specific information about these benefits and other Medicare preventive services, including Medicare’s upcoming prescription drug coverage in January 2006, visit us at www.medicare.gov on the Web, or call 1-800-MEDICARE (1-800-633-4227). TTY users should call 1-877-486-2048.