August 7, 2013

Third Circuit Upholds Girls’ Free Speech Rights in School

In September 2011, just before I stepped down as Pennsylvania NOW President, PA NOW along with the Feminist Majority, Legal Momentum, and several other feminist organizations signed onto an amicus brief written by the Women’s Law Project in support of two middle school girls from the Easton Area (PA) School District who participated in a youth breast cancer awareness program by wearing “I ♥ boobies” breast cancer awareness bracelets to school.

"I ♥ Boobies" bracelets made by the Keep a Breast Foundation

Sample “I ♥ Boobies” bracelets that were banned by the Easton Area School District; photo courtesy of Keep a Breast Foundation

Kayla Martinez and Brianna Hawk, then seventh and eighth graders, were suspended for wearing Keep A Breast bracelets on Breast Cancer Awareness Day.  Subsequently the school district instituted a district wide ban on the bracelets because they were supposedly “lewd” statements about women’s bodies.  These young women, citing 1st Amendment rights, refused to take them off and then filed suit through their parents after the district-wide ban was instituted.

On August 5, 2013, the 14-member 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals, in a 9-5 en banc decision, upheld the District Court injunction against this ban on educational free speech.  They looked at the question of whether or not speech about women’s bodies and their health “could [be] interpret[ed] as lewd, vulgar, profane, or offensive [when that] speech could also plausibly be interpreted as commenting on a political or social issue.”  The court decided that breast cancer is a social issue exception and thus protected speech.  This means that talk about breasts and breast cancer is protected speech in schools throughout Pennsylvania, Delaware, and New Jersey, the three states that fall under the jurisdiction of the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals.

According to the Keep A Breast Foundation, the makers of this bracelet, the 3rd Circuit Courts decision

“[M]arks the first time a federal court of appeals has ruled that the First Amendment protects student speech that is plausibly understood as commenting on political or social issues.”

The Court’s bottom-line statement in its en banc decision, I believe, says it all:

“The bracelets are intended to be and they can reasonably be viewed as speech designed to raise awareness of breast cancer and to reduce stigma associated with openly discussing breast health.”

Thanks to Mary Catherine Roper of the ACLU of Pennsylvania  for taking this case to the 3rd Circuit and to Terry Fromson and staff of the Women’s Law Project for working on this issue in support of young women’s free speech rights when talking and taking a stand on their bodies and their health!

July 27, 2013

I’m 16 and I’m a Clinic Defender

Sarah Roberts is one of Laurie Bertram Robert’s daughters.  They live in Jackson, MS. Laurie is President of Mississippi NOW and serves with me on the National NOW Board of Directors. Sarah’s blog focuses on her experiences surrounding the bullying and harassment of women seeking services at the only remaining abortion clinic in Mississippi. Sarah, her sister, and her mother all serve as clinic escorts at Jackson Women’s Health Organization. The story about how she reacts to this harassment is empowering. Thanks for the work all three of you — and all other clinic escorts across the country — do for women’s reproductive justice and health.

thelastabortionclinic's avatarDefending The Last Abortion Clinic

By Sarah Roberts

I’m Sarah, I’m 16 and I am a escort/clinic defender at Jackson Women’s Health Organization. I first started escorting after my mom, Laurie, told me about how women were harassed while trying to come in and out of the clinic. At first, I just wanted to see if it was really true and how bad it was. When I saw it for myself, I knew I had to stay and help.

My mom actually didn’t want me to escort because of the possibility of violence and the aggressiveness of protesters. My sister and I said if you go, WE GO. We also reminded her that she had always taught us about the role of children in the civil rights movement. If children could march, get beaten and sprayed with hoses for our rights why can’t we help women and defend our rights now? My sister and I…

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July 25, 2013

King’s Dream in 2013: Interlocking Destinies

It’s been 50 years since Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his iconic “I Have a Dream” speech in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. One of his colleagues at that event was the Rev. Jessie Jackson, Sr.  Rev. Jackson has continued speaking and advocating for that dream of “uniting people on common ground across race, culture, class, gender, and belief.”  This idea of interlocking destinies was presented during his plenary speech at the National NOW Conference held in Chicago on July 5, 2013.

I was in the room during Rev. Jackson’s speech and took several video clips with my smart phone.  One of them came out clear enough to post on this blog.  So after getting back home, participating in a family reunion, and then spending a week and a half looking for a replacement car for our 253,000+ mile vehicle, I was able to upload the video and present it to you.

Video of Jessie Jackson at the 2013 National NOW Conference in Chicago, IL

The following quotes, along with the time tags are some of the best comments, IMHO, that Jessie Jackson made during this speech discussing the intersection between the women’s movement and the civil rights movement, which at 13:59 into this video, Jackson calls a “sharing of interlocking destinies.” He started off by discussing these Interlocking Destinies and shared rights.

3:10 Fifty years after the “I Have a Dream” speech, we still need the ERA [Equal Rights Amendment].

3:52 The right to vote should not be a state right. It’s a constitutional right for everyone.

4:10 Every child should have access to have access to high-quality public education.

4:20 No matter if you are in Mississippi, Maine, or in California, we live under one flag; you should have equal protection under the law.

5:52 Our goal is to learn to live together.

6:20 Civil rights cannot be another word for “black” and NOW cannot be another word for “white women.”  Black women, in big numbers, should be members of NOW now!

7:00 We must pull down the walls [of cultural resistance] that leave us in the shadow of fear…. When the walls come down, we can all grow bigger, better, stronger with greater productivity.  When the walls come down.

9:00 There’s a new South today that can have the Super Bowl, CNN, high-tech universities [showing that we are] learning to live together.  Yet…

At this point, Rev. Jackson starts talking about some of the interlocking issues of racism and sexism still present that need to be addressed in the United States:

9:56 It’s interesting to me that during the Republican Primary, in my [home] state [South Carolina] with an open primary, not one candidate went to a single school or church of the black community.  Not one! 33% black.  Not only did they not go, the media did not challenge them to go.  This instance [of the] reinforcement of apartheid was natural because it’s [still] normal.

Jackson then spends a bit of time framing these interlocking destinies and the problem of economics and access to justice.  He gave several examples of this framework.  The one that resonated with me was the one about the automobile industry, considering that my car had died the weekend before the conference and knowing that I would soon be car shopping. He said,

12:38 What does it mean that there are 21,000 automobile dealerships? 200 black-owned. Almost no women. Pepsi: one black franchise. Coke: zero. When you go get educated. You get your masters and PhD degrees. Business people, you cannot buy one of these franchises, by the way, because they were sold under the laws of perpetuity. Those that got the territories [back in the day] have the territory eternally.  So it’s not about getting on the ball field.  If you get on the ball field, there are no balls left…. Even money can’t buy them.

And finally, just as the battery in my smart phone died, he ended on a high note using history to look towards the future. He said that as in the past, we have not and can never be at loss for continuing to advocate for reform.  This is what I caught on the video as it beeped “bye-bye:”

13:59 The agenda of race and gender equality are inextricably bound.  We share interlocking destinies.  African-Americans won the right to vote in 1879 – 15th Amendment. Women in 1920 – 19th Amendment. We [finally] got the right for blacks to vote in the Deep South in 1965 [with the Voting Rights Act] while women got the right to serve on juries in 1967 – 2 years later [as a result of the US Supreme Court decision in Taylor v. Louisiana].  Eighteen year olds got the right to vote in 1970; [before that] those [young people] serving in Vietnam could not vote…

July 11, 2013

Perry an Example of Conservatives

trp2011's avatarNel's New Day

What’s worse than cutting the amount of food stamp funding from the farm bill? Eliminating them entirely. And that’s what the GOP House members did this afternoon in a 216-208 vote—no Democrats for the bill and 12 Republicans voting against it. The farm will has always been a total package: subsidies and benefits to farmers and nutritional programs such as SNAP to the poor, but House GOP leaders hope that separating them will entirely get rid of this help for hungry people.

Rep. Peter Welch (D-VT) pointed out that the bad policy ignored the bipartisan policy of the House Agriculture Committee. The farm bill that the House passed is for five years, but the food stamps would be on an annual basis if it could even pass, which is most unlikely. The biggest cuts to food stamps in history came in 1996 when then Speaker Newt Gingrich proposed turning the…

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July 3, 2013

Save Centre Crest: A Public Nursing Home and Long-Term Care Facility

Here in Centre County, we have a county-run nursing home facility.  It is located in the county seat of Bellefonte, PA.  Centre Crest Nursing Home in Bellefonte has been county-owned and operated for 73 years. On June 18, Commissioners Steve Dershem (R) and Chris Exarchos (R) called for a surprise and unannounced vote (which may have violated Pennsylvania’s Sunshine Law) to transfer the facility to a private organization to be run as a non-profit.  If the transfer goes through:

  • We, citizens of Centre Co., will lose our say in the operation and funding of Centre Crest;
  • Our tax investments could be subsidizing a private company through a rent-free agreement, yet we’d have no say in how Centre Crest would be run;
  • Current Centre Crest employees will have their benefits and pensions cut;
  • The Bellefonte community would lose over $1 million when employees lose benefits and when jobs involving payroll, purchasing, and benefit administration services are outsourced to a private company based in outside of Centre County; and
  • We expect that costs will rise for the residents, most of who are lower-income and cannot afford any of the very expensive private nursing home care that is elsewhere available in the county.

Most of the citizens in the county are opposed to this transfer.  Some oppose the transfer because of the inability for citizens to have a continued say in how the nursing home should be run.  Some oppose the transfer for fear that their loved ones will no longer be able to afford the care and will be forced to move.  Some oppose the transfer because of the expected loss of benefits, including a defined pension plan, should the nursing home be turned into either a non-profit or for-profit nursing home. And some oppose the transfer due to the costs involved.

In 2012, the cost to the average household (not taxpayer, but household) to operate Centre Crest was $25 (5.6% of the county taxes) and it was less than that in each of the four years before that.  The third commissioner, Commissioner Michael Pipe (D) spent several months doing a cost-benefit analysis of either keeping Centre Crest as a fully county-run facility or selling it off.  The cost of Commissioners Pipe’s proposal to upgrade facilities at Centre Crest is less than $11.50 for the average household.  The cost of a suggested subsidy to the county to turn it into a nonprofit is $3 million.  In addition, the proposed plan involves this non-profit receiving the current and proposed new site rent free.  Should the facility be moved, the county could incur an additional cost of $700,000 to $900,000 to acquire the suggested new location (Bellefonte Armory) with no reimbursement from the non-profit.

The current set up, according to Commissioner Pike is a win-win for the county and for seniors.  As he argued before the vote, keeping Centre Crest as an upgraded county-run facility is both an “excellent use of our investments (taxes)” and “provides a home and medical care to our most vulnerable citizens–our seniors.”

The transfer is NOT A DONE DEAL.  Although the initial vote was taken to transfer the home, none of the legal paperwork has yet to be signed and there are some legal actions that are being considered to stop what has happened so far.

There is a better alternative.  Commissioner Pipe presented a plan to keep Centre Crest county owned and upgrade the facility for only $11.50 per year for the average household.

Together we can make this alternative happen.

If you live in Centre County, PA; have family in Centre County; or are concerned about the idea of profit over compassionate care for vulnerable seniors, then you can help stop this decision from coming to fruition.

  1. If you live in Centre County, attend the County Commissioners’ meetings.  They occur at 10:00 am every Tuesday morning. Voice your objection to the transfer during the public comment session at the beginning of each meeting;
  2. No matter where you live, you can donate $5 or $50 to “Centre County Citizens for Fiscal Responsibility.” Mail to: 148 Thornton Rd., State College. PA  16801;
  3. Write a letter to the editor. The local papers include the Centre Daily Times, Voices of Central PA, the Lock Haven Express, the Progress News, and the Centre County Gazette;
  4. Contact the Commissioners directly:
    • Via Letter*: Commissioners Steve Dershem, Chris Exarchos, and Michael Pipe, 420 Holmes St., Bellefonte, PA  16823
    • Email*:  BOC@centrecountypa.gov
    • Phone*:  814-355-6700
  5. Go to http://saveCentreCrest.org, click on “petition,” download, print and then sign it.  You can then, if you desire, you can gather more signatures.  Once your petition is complete, mail it to: Save Centre Crest, P.O. Box 262, Bellefonte, PA  16823

You can also obtain more information and background on Centre Crest, what’s happening, and what you can do by visiting the Save Centre Crest website.

July 1, 2013

Art and Preservation Need Your Help in Central PA

Besides being a civil rights activist, I am a strong supporter of historic preservation and the arts. So I’m putting on a different hat today to talk about a pending crisis in my home town that can be averted if we have people like you who are willing to assist us by the end of August. Here’s the story…

I have, on and off for almost two decades, been a member of the Bellefonte Historical and Cultural Association (BHCA). BHCA’s mission, in part is to:

[I]ncrease the awareness of the significance of Bellefonte’s cultural heritage and the value of its preservation; foster the economic development and maintenance of downtown Bellefonte; promote tourism and tourism development; and provide a much needed venue for local artists and friends of the arts.

The two major functions of BHCA–arts and historic preservation–have come together in a project to save the Garman Opera House (or Theatre) and turn it into a regional community arts center. The Garman Theatre was constructed in 1890 across a side street from the Centre County, PA Courthouse. Some of its historic claims to fame:

  1. The song, “After the Ball is Over” was first sung publicly at the Garman in the 1890’s soon after it opened;
  2. The Garman hosted many famous acts over the years, including George Burns and Gracie Allen, Houdini, the Flora Dora Girls, and a myriad of Wild West and one-act shows; and
  3. In the 1900s it started showing films, first silent and then talking. This continued until 1961.
Picture of the Garman Opera House

Bellefonte’s Historic”Anchor:” The Garman Opera House Theatre, c. 1961. Built in 1890.

The Garman, after several years of use as a furniture store warehouse, was restored in the 1990s as a stage performance center and then turned back into a combination theatre and performance center. Unfortunately, it was damaged by fire on September 9, 2012 when the building next door was destroyed due to arson. The Bellefonte Borough took over the Garman Theatre as a “blighted and abandoned” property under Pennsylvania’s Conservatorship Act and gave it to a conservator, the Bellefonte Area Industrial Development Authority (IDA), to dispose of it.

The conservator asked for proposals as to what to do with the property. Only two showed any interest in this property:

  1. The Progress Development Group, LLC, who wants to raze it and build a new building to be a part of 32 high-density housing project in downtown Bellefonte; and
  2. BHCA, who wants to save and restore the Garman to its historical function in keeping with a “restrictive land covenant” which is attached to the property deed.

BHCA became involved in April 2013 after hiring a structural engineer who confirmed our suspicions that the Garman was still structurally sound, despite the damage caused by the fire. And we later found out that the Bellefonte IDA had made the same structural-integrity assessment. Yet the IDA decided to go ahead with the destruction of the Garman and told the court of their decision. We decided to contest that decision as allowed under the Pennsylvania Conservatorship Act.

Both parties went to court last month and made their cases before the judge. On June 28, Centre County Judge Thomas Kistler granted a reprieve to the destruction of the historic Garman Opera House and Theatre here in Bellefonte. So we have 60 days to come up with a detailed plan, including financing, to save the Garman and turn it into an art and cultural center for the town.

We want to do what the Wellsboro, PA community did a couple of years ago when they saved a historic building destined for destruction; they turned that building into the award-winning (see page 6 this PDF file for info on this award) regional arts center now known as the Deane Center for the Performing Arts.

Here’s where you come in. YOU can help us to save the Garman by making a donation to BHCA. Here’s the message from Keith Koch, President of BHCA calling for donations:

NOTE: We now can take PLEDGES and $$$ contributions. We are a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization which means any donation is 100% tax-deductible for the donor as we are not providing any “goods or services” to the donor.

Checks can be made out to “BHCA” and noted as “Garman.” They can be sent to BHCA, PO Box 141, Bellefonte, PA 16823.

We would be honored if you would make a donation to BHCA to help save what I deeply believe is truly a historical, architectural gem? And please spread the word. Thank you for your support!

June 28, 2013

Honoree, Distinguished Worldwide Humanitarian Award

Three days ago I got a call asking if I would accept a Distinguished Worldwide Humanitarian Award from Worldwide Who’s Who. I said yes. This is their announcement.

June 27, 2013

DOMA and LGBTQ Rights in PA

I just finished reading an article in PhillyNOW, a weekly blog that touts itself as an alternative to the mainstream press in Philadelphia to “bring you news and politics with an attitude, whether you like it or not.”  This article, in light of yesterday’s Supreme Court decision in UNITED STATES v. WINDSOR overturning the definition of marriage as described in Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), calls on the Democratic Party at both the state and national levels to “stand up on LGBT rights.”

I would go even further. Not only should Democrats step forward, but Republicans need to step of to the plate of equal access as well.

It doesn’t matter what party you belong to.

The Declaration of Independence says,

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men [sic] are created equal, that they are endowed … with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

The  5th amendment to the Constitution, in part says,

“No person…shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law…”

(FYI, It was this constitutional “due process” amendment that was used to overturn DOMA in yesterday’s majority opinion).

That means equality for all. Including in marriage and an end to hate and discrimination for all, gay or straight.

Our laws need to be changed here in Pennsylvania to live up to the Declaration of Independence and our Constitutional right to democracy and freedom for all. That includes, but are not limited to:

  1. revoking Pennsylvania’s DOMA law;
  2. passing marriage equality;
  3. adding sexual orientation and gender identity, as well as gender, disability, and ancestry (click here and here for current bills) back into PA’s hate crimes law;
  4. adding sexual orientation and gender identity (bill not yet introduced into the PA General Assembly) into PA’s Human Relations Act;
  5. passing the proposed the Pennsylvania Safe Schools (PASS) Act that focuses on bullying and harassment in public schools; and
  6. changing state inheritance tax laws to give the same exemptions to the tax that heterosexual couples have (as far as I can tell, there is no pending legislation in the PA General Assembly to do this).

Let’s do it sooner rather than later. Let’s come together.

June 26, 2013

SCOTUS Awards LGBT Rights; Davis Fights for Women’s Rights

A great summary of what’s happened in Texas and Washington, DC today. Like my blog on Senator Wendy Davis this morning, Nel’s New Day highlights two successes within 24 hours – one for women and one of all loving, committed same-sex couples who have had their relationships legally recognized as marriage in now 13 states as well as several countries around the world (since the US Government recognizes marriages that are conducted as a legal marriage in a different country). This has been a day of celebration in the War on Women and against homophobia. THANKS to everyone who made this happen.

trp2011's avatarNel's New Day

Forty years ago, homosexuals were mentally ill. Ten years ago gays and lesbians were criminals. Today LGBT people can legally marry the people they love. Yesterday was the day that my partner and I celebrate as our anniversary because marriage equality is illegal in Oregon. It was our 44th anniversary. Without the same Social Security benefits that legally married people receive, my partner has lost well over $100,000. We don’t know how much we have lost in other benefits because of the discrimination against same-sex couples.

The Stonewall riots, hailed as the dawning of the gay rights movement, started in New York’s Greenwich Village on June 29, 1963, also 44 years ago. But today is a new day because the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the 1996 federal statute defining marriage as between one woman and one man.

Listening to the U.S. Supreme Court as they dribbled out their rulings…

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June 26, 2013

Update on Wendy Davis’ Filibuster in TX

Late last night, I reblogged a bio of Texas Senator Wendy Davis.  She is the woman who filibustered Texas’s proposed TRAP law – SB 5.  This bill would have contained several burdensome restrictions on a woman’s constitutional right to seek a safe, legal abortion, including:

  • Limit[ing] most abortions to the first 20 weeks of a pregnancy.
  • Requir[ing] that doctors performing abortions have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles.
  • Requir[ing] abortion clinics to meet the standards of an ambulatory surgery center.
  • Put[ting] new rules [into place] around abortion-inducing medications, including requiring that women take such medicines in the presence of a doctor.

Along with over 180,000 people, I watched in real-time the YouTube streaming of the filibuster, parliamentary procedures, and the eruption of voices in the gallery until 1 am Central time (2 am my time here in Pennsylvania) when the YouTube feed was shut down.

NPR has a good report on what happened.

Apparently votes are electronically recorded and time stamped into the legislative journal.  Reporters took pictures of these records immediately after the vote.  The initial record had a time stamp of “June 26, 2013,” which was after the constitutionally mandated shut-down of a special legislative session.

Then a few minutes later, the time stamp mysteriously changed from “June 26, 2013” to “June 25, 2013.” Republicans allegedly changed the time stamp for the SB5 abortion bill vote. Behold the magic from Becca Aarronson, reporter at the Texas Tribune that shows this doctored document.

Picture of the Texas legislative journal on SB 5 before and after time-stamp change.

Texas legislative journal on SB 5 before and after someone doctored the time stamp.

So why did the Lt. Governor and the radical right-wing concede?  Because of the excellent work of reporters in Texas who were able to show that the recorded vote occurred after midnight.

There was chaos on the floor and outrage when the Lieutenant Governor said that the bill had passed before the midnight deadline.  The Democrats continued to contest the Lt. Governor’s ruling, noting that the voting ended after midnight.  Which was documented  by the automatic time stamp and noticed by the press.

Because the vote actually occurred at 12:02 am on Wednesday rather than before the Tuesday midnight deadline, the Republicans finally conceded that they had lost this fight a little after 4 am Central time when Texas Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst said,

“Regrettably, the constitutional time for the first called session of the 83rd Legislature has expired. Senate Bill 5 cannot be signed in the presence of the Senate at this time. Therefore, it cannot be enrolled. It’s been fun, but seeya soon.

Thank you everyone, especially Senators Wendy Davis (D-Fort Worth) for her filibuster and Senator John Whitmire (D-Houston) for his knowledge of parliamentary procedures.  They helped create this much-needed victory on the war on women in Texas.

Meanwhile, I hope there is an investigation of this attempted tampering of the record in order to circumvent Texas’ Constitution!

And here’s my thank you to Senator Davis:

red heard surrounding Senator Davis' tweet thanking the public for the support of her fillibuster.

My home-made meme to express my heartfelt thanks for Senator Davis’ successful filibustering.