| LIFE-NET NEWS |
| by Ret Z. |
| Covering Poverty Widely in a Net of Many Voices |
| October 3, 2007 | No Profit; No Proceeds |
| Volume 11 Number 11 | All-Volunteer |
| "Give a family a fish, and they'll eat a meal; give them a Net, and they'll have fish for Life." |
| A Healthier World is Within Reach |
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Adapted from a piece by Bill Gates:
Last year my wife Melinda and I visited an AIDS clinic in Durban, South Africa. We met women who had walked miles from nearby townships. When they arrived, they were greeted by a well-trained staff. There was an ample supply of antiretroviral drugs, which can help people with AIDS stay healthy for years. Patients were receiving counseling. As we chatted with one of the doctors in the clinic, it struck me: Something was fundamentally different. Nearly a decade ago, when Melinda and I started our foundation, we would go to sub-Saharan Africa or developing countries in other regions and see health workers struggling with broken equipment and empty medicine chests. We walked down dirty hallways packed with exhausted mothers holding sick children. In those days, many took it as inevitable that millions of poor people would die each year from diseases that are preventable, treatable, or no longer present in the developed world. But that's starting to change. Today governments, aid groups, and communities are simply refusing to accept the notion that diseases like malaria and tuberculosis will haunt us forever. The evidence is in: These problems can be solved. The world can point to a number of victories already. Smallpox is gone, of course, and polio nearly so. Thanks to the leadership of the Carter Center, we've virtually eliminated guinea-worm disease, an excruciatingly painful parasite that is ingested with tainted water. There are new treatments available for visceral leishmaniasis, also called black fever, which is second only to malaria as the world's deadliest parasitic killer. Millions of lives have been saved through better financing and delivery of the medical advances available today. The GAVI Alliance has immunized 100 million children, averting some 600,000 deaths last year alone, and a creative approach to the bond markets has raised $1 billion more to buy more vaccines. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria is saving 3,000 lives a day. That clinic we visited in Durban was made possible by an American program: PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. Those lifesaving drugs, the salaries for the staff -- even the prefab building -- were all financed with American tax dollars. Some lifesaving solutions can be extremely simple -- iodized salt to prevent stunted growth, for example, or oral rehydration solutions to fight diarrhea. Other solutions will arise from pioneering research now underway. Governments must now step up to the plate with more money -- wisely targeted -- to expand effective global health programs to reach all those in need. Businesses, community groups, and individuals all play a role as well. I'm now more convinced than ever that we can create a healthier world for everyone. Source: Newsweek |
| To Restore a Camden Oasis |
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Less than six months ago, Northgate Park was an oasis in one of the city's toughest neighborhoods. With its ever-present security and a multitude of educational, recreational, and cultural programs, the gated park on North
6th and Elm streets was a safe haven for neighborhood kids.
Now a portion of the chain-link fence facing the Molina School playground across the street has been torn down. The trailer that once served as an office for the park's security and management staff stands empty, covered in graffiti. The swings are gone, the slide broken. A basketball rim is missing its hoop and the ground is littered with trash, broken bottles, empty beer cans, hypodermic needle wrappers and the occasional used syringe. Neighbors say the park began deteriorating when Fair Share Housing Development Inc, the Cherry Hill private nonprofit that built the park 16 years ago, notified the city this year it no longer had the funds to continue operating it. "This was the safest park in the city of Camden," said Grace Lutheran Church Pastor Margaret Herz-Lane. "In the past three months or so, it has become just as dangerous as anywhere else in the city." The church is one of several neighborhood groups that have come together to take back the park before the damage becomes irreversible. Their effort started with a September 20 community meeting at City Hall to discuss the problem, followed by a Saturday morning cleanup of the neighborhood around the park. City Council president Angel Fuentes was at the meeting, and on the following Saturday morning he joined the roughly 30 volunteers who didn't let rain stop them from showing up to fill their trash bags. But the group could not get permission from the city to clean the park itself because the public works department wasn't able to have anyone there to ensure safety. When Fair Share, which also manages the nearby Northgate II low-income housing high rise, quit managing the park in April, the responsibility for its care fell to the city, said city public works director Patrick Keating. With 32 employees and a budget of $133,000 to care for the city's 51 parks, he said, it is financially impossible for the city to provide the same services Fair Share did. Herz-Lane said there is no shortage of neighborhood groups willing to take responsibility by emulating Fair Share's management style. The Rutgers Center for the Arts is one of those groups. The center wants to bring its Community and Artists program to Northgate Park. Project manager Carmen Pendleton said, "We already have been working with the community there for three years." The center has brought artists to help neighborhood youth and seniors beautify a park on 2nd and Elm streets that is managed by Respond, another nearby nonprofit. Last summer, the group designed and installed mosaic seats throughout the park. Keating estimates that about $500,000 is needed to repair Northgate Park. "The problem is that it needs a lot of capital work." "We have to start with the restoration," said Angel Osorio, who represents the Camden County Prosecutor's Office in the District Council Collaborative Board, a task force of city, law enforcement, and community members. "They want the neighborhood to own it," Osorio said. "That park means so much to them." Source: Courier-Post |
| African Floods Augment Climate-Change Anxieties |
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More than a million people have been hit by some of the worst floods in Africa in a generation, fueling concerns over the continent’s exposure to extreme weather events
linked to climate change. Experts from the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned in a report on September 18 that the consequences of rising temperatures are already being felt around the world. They
named Africa as one of the areas most affected.
West Africa has suffered some of its worst floods in a decade, with more than 300,000 people forced to flee by rising waters in northern Ghana alone: "The scale of the flood in northern Ghana is unprecedented in contemporary times," said George Isaac Amoo, national coordinator of Ghana’s National Disaster Management Organization. "Villages have been wiped off the map." Hundreds of thousands more people across Uganda, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Kenya in the east of the continent have also been hit. Dozens of people died as rising water swept away bridges, homes, and roads in more than 20 African countries in recent weeks. In Niger, which is normally more prone to drought, UN officials have warned of the risk of locusts that could cause further damage to the staple millet. However, the strong rains have in some areas boosted production, for example, in Mali. The World Food Program says the overall effect of the floods on production is still unclear in many countries. Africa has few resources to invest in flood management techniques such as regrowing forests or building barriers and canals, so scientists fear what will happen if such occurrences grow in number. Jon Finch, of the Center for Ecology and Hydrology, said, "There will be more energy in the system. Under a changed climate, you will tend to see exceptional events become more common." Source: Financial Times |
| Friday Backpacks Prevent Weekend Hunger |
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Every Friday, more than 50,000 children are taking backpacks full of food home from school in programs that have quietly swept the nation. Each backpack contains several pounds of healthful foods such as fruit cups,
bread, milk, juice, crackers, beef stew, and peanut butter. The goal is to keep needy kids and their families from going hungry on weekends.
More than 120 food banks are distributing backpacks at 1,200 sites -- mostly schools -- in 40 states, up from about 30 food banks in a handful of states three years ago, according to Maura Daly of America's Second Harvest, a network of food banks. Funding for the BackPack Program has come from individuals, civic groups, churches, and companies, including Wal-Mart. Hilary Duff, 19, TV's Lizzie McGuire, worked with a hunger-relief group, USA Harvest, to launch Blessings in a Backpack. Begun in July 2005 at two schools in Louisville, it serves eight schools in four states. Duff funds weekend meals for about 1,000 kids at a Los Angeles grade school. "Healthy eating is really important for school-age children," says John Cook, a professor at Boston University Medical Center. Without it, he says, they can be grumpy and have trouble paying attention; they act out more and get lower grades. The number of low-income students receiving free lunches at school has increased from less than 3 million in 1969, when record-keeping began, to nearly 15 million last year. Those meals feed kids during the week, but teachers noticed some students hoarding food on Friday and coming to school lethargic and hungry on Monday. Source: USA Today |
| Tobacco and Poverty |
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Together, tobacco and poverty create a vicious circle. In most countries, tobacco use tends to be higher among the poor. Poor families, in turn, spend a larger proportion of their income on tobacco. Money spent on tobacco cannot be spent on basic human needs such as food, shelter, education, and health care.
Tobacco can also worsen poverty through added health costs and lost earnings due to tobacco-related diseases. And, although the tobacco industry provides jobs for thousands of people, the vast majority employed in the tobacco sector earn very little, while the big tobacco companies reap enormous profits.
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| Foster Care Funds Don't Cover Parents' Costs |
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Most states pay foster parents far less than what middle-income families spend to raise their children. So says a report out today by University of Maryland researchers.
"Foster parents should receive the funds they need," says co-author Julie Farber, director of policy at Children's Rights, a New York-based advocacy group. Too often, she says, they either stop taking in foster kids or dig into their own pockets to pay for prom dresses and Boy Scout uniforms. The report estimates the national average for monthly costs for healthy foster kids at $629 for a 2-year-old, $721 for a 9-year-old, and $790 for a 16-year-old. Only Arizona and the District of Columbia paid more for each age group, and most states paid far less, according to the report. Nebraska had the lowest monthly rate: $226 for a 2-year-old. Families taking kids with disabilities receive higher "therapeutic" rates. The report, citing the wide range of state payments, recommends a uniform rate that can be adjusted to account for varying costs of living. Its proposed rate is based on expenses reported by middle-income families in a Labor Department survey, plus a 22% increase for extra food and other things needed by foster kids who may have been malnourished or abused. Most state rates fall far short of real costs, says Diane DePanfilis, co-author of the report and director of the Ruth H Young Center for Families and Children at the University of Maryland School of Social Work. Farber says the low rates make it difficult to sign up foster parents. "That's not what we're hearing," says Susan Orr, associate commissioner of the US Children's Bureau at the Department of Health and Human Services. She says foster parents tell the bureau they are more concerned about how much they must do, such as attend court hearings, than what they are paid. "Mandating formulas has not been an effective tool," Orr says. She says states ought to decide rates and get greater flexibility in how they spend federal funds. Source: USA Today |
| Chinatowns Move to the 'Burbs |
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"What is gentrification?" a community organizer asks Manhattan teenager Yi Lian Zheng.
"It is when low-income tenants experience extremely high rents and are unable to pay," Zheng responds and moves ahead five spaces on a human-sized game board in the city's Columbus Park. The game is called "Rent: The Game" and was organized by the Chinatown Tenants Union to educate students about the sky-high rents that are forcing Chinatown residents to relocate, reports Manhattan's Downtown Express. Even as local organizations like the Chinatown Tenants Union try to mobilize residents and lessen the blow of gentrification, Chinese communities around the country are being squeezed out of downtown areas en masse. Many are finding new life in the suburbs. Recent research suggests that members of these Chinese communities aren't getting dispersed and lost in the 'burbs. Rather, they're "reconstituting" their Chinatowns in suburban settings, reports Adam Meagher for the Next American City. Meagher points to Quincy MA as an example of the trend. When high rents forced Boston's Chinatown residents to relocate, they found a new, affordable home in suburban Quincy, only a short train ride from work in the city. Quincy's slumping economy allowed the urban Chinatown exiles to purchase homes and punch their ticket into the American middle-class. The demographic shift also gave Quincy a much-needed economic shot in the arm. Meagher notes that after a Wal-Mart put a local strip mall out of business, the Chinese community revitalized the abandoned property with a new Chinatown hub that boasts the largest Asian grocery store in the state. Towns like Quincy and Los Angeles' Monterey Park have become "ethnoburbs." The word was coined by geographer Wei Li to denote communities vastly altered by immigrants with global economic connections. Source: Information Week |
| Permafrost Seed Bank Protects Vital Species |
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Not much grows in the high Arctic, and what does ekes out a meager living during the short summer just a few hundred miles from the North Pole. A set of vaults sunk into the permafrost in the Svalbard Archipelago, Norway, contains samples of the world's most important seeds, protecting the world's biodiversity -- especially the plants we're most dependent on for food -- in the event of a major disaster.
Carved into a mountain on the island of Spitsbergen is the entrance to a seed bank. At the end of a tunnel blasted out of frozen rock, three giant vaults are taking shape. It's permafrost here, so you can store the seeds in minus 40 degrees Celsius. Temperatures will never rise beyond it. The island is neutral. No one can come here except by plane or by boat, which filters out unidentified visitors. Many countries keep stores of important seeds in case disease or drought wipes out key crops. The idea here is to build a backup vault, a kind of Fort Knox for crops, where other seed banks can make deposits, whether it's wheat, cassava, or cabbage. It's a long-planned-for endeavor given new impetus by the threat of climate change to plants. The seed bank opens next February. Each vault can store 1.5 million different seeds. Space is at a premium. There are 100,000 varieties of rice alone. Source: Online NewsHour |
| # LNN # Small # Hauls # |
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| Life-Net News Extras |
| Instead of a Little to Many, a Lot to One |
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A one-person poverty reduction project began Saturday based on this idea:
Giving a couple of drops of water to thousands of thirsty plants is not going to help. Those plants will either die or be sustained in their miserable life; a bit like life support for the terminally ill. I offer you another solution: Collect all those drops of water in a bucket and pour all the collected water on one plant only, and watch it grow out of its miserable state of being. Then collect another bucket of water, and pour the water on the next suffering plant. Continue this way until you have a field of beautiful, healthy plants. This is the idea upon which cherubia.com is based: Helping one human being at a time! History has clearly shown that the "dividing the cake" philosophy doesn’t help. If it did, we wouldn’t still have poor people in the world after 60 years of massive first aid. There is no "we" in cherubia.com. The website is only operated by one person. Why? Well, how many does it take to help one person? One, of course! So, I have set up a website to collect money. Once the bucket is full, I am going to get on an airplane to Africa, India, or somewhere else. I will find somebody who needs help and set him or her up with a continuous income for the rest of his or her life. Then I am going to start all over again and collect another "bucket" of money and help one more person to get a better life. For each person, at least $1,000,000 will be deposited in a bank account. The interest rate will be paid out every year to a Third World citizen for the rest of his or her life. An interest rate of at least 3% is realistic, which means that the Third World citizen will receive at least $30,000 per year. This is the idea for now, at least. If you have a better suggestion I invite you to email it to me. The main objective is to provide help for the less fortunate in a quick, reliable, transparent, and effective way. Source: Cherubia: Healing the World E-Mail: info@cherubia.com |
| New Jersey Legislators Tackle Housing Troubles |
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New Jersey has the nation's highest property taxes and housing costs that have been 50% higher than the national average. Recent national problems with subprime mortgages have added to such woes.
Amid those worries, Assembly Speaker Joe Roberts (D-Camden) said housing will be a major focus when legislators return to action after November's elections. But while several legislators are already proposing action, state affordable housing advocates are worried plans by Gov Jon S Corzine to build 100,000 new homes in the next 10 years for low-income families haven't moved fast enough. Corzine on Sept 14 said his housing plan could cost as much as $300 million per year and questioned whether the state could pay for it: "Unfortunately, I don't know if we would be able to afford it." The nonprofit Housing & Community Development Network of New Jersey last week sent a letter to the governor saying it was "extremely disappointed" with that statement. The new director of Homes for New Jersey, a coalition of 270 builders, bankers, religious groups, real estate companies, advocacy groups, and social service providers, Alison Badgett, said, "We're clearly at a critical juncture for the state of affordable housing development. New Jersey is experiencing a housing affordability crisis, from the homeless who can't afford even moderate rents to the middle-income employee priced out of even a starter home." Corzine, though, said he's not backing away from his campaign promise. Sen Ronald Rice (D-Essex), meanwhile, said he plans to host an Oct 17 forum in Newark so residents can meet with financial entities that can help with credit and mortgage issues. "Home ownership provides societal benefits by reducing crime and combatting the problems of blighted neighborhoods. Unfortunately, the increase in home ownership was fueled by a rise in nontraditional mortgages." He said foreclosures don't just hurt a family. "They can destroy entire communities. Widespread foreclosures in an area will depress already low housing prices, making it harder for others in that area to get loans or refinancing." Sen Shirley K Turner has proposed outlawing foreclosure consultants who she said often advertise with fliers stuck on telephone poles, then lure homeowners into turning over deeds to their homes with false promises of later being able to buy them back. Roberts has proposed banning regional contribution agreements, under which suburban towns typically pay struggling cities to take care of their state-mandated affordable housing requirements. Source: Associated Press |
| Humanitarian 'Nightmare' Already Grips Iraq |
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In a televised address to the nation, President Bush warned that a pullout of US forces from Iraq could cause a "humanitarian nightmare." This nightmare arrived a good while ago.
When the US and its allies launched the "shock and awe" invasion in March 2003, the population of Iraq was about 26 million. The flaming horror unleashed by the invasion has since forced 2.2 million of those Iraqis, nearly a tenth of the population, to flee the country. Many of those who left were professionals marked for death -- doctors, lawyers, academics, the very people with the skills necessary to build a viable society. The Iraq Ministry of Health reported that 102 doctors and 164 nurses were killed from April 2003 to May 2006. It is believed that nearly half of Iraq’s doctors have fled. The exodus of health care professionals in a country hemorrhaging from the worst kinds of violence pretty much qualifies as nightmarish. While more than two million Iraqis have fled to other countries, another two million have been displaced internally. According to the Global Policy Forum, a group that monitors international developments, "Most of these internally displaced persons, or IDPs, have sought refuge with relatives, or in mosques, empty public buildings, or tent camps. ... IDPs live in very poor conditions. Public buildings are particularly unsanitary, often overcrowded, without access to clean water, proper sanitation, and basic services, in conditions especially conducive to infectious diseases." Iraqis are enduring most of their suffering out of the sight of the rest of the world. International relief organizations and most of the news media are largely kept at a distance by the insane levels of violence. Access to safe drinking water is a problem in much of the country. The World Health Organization was asked to help with a recent outbreak of cholera in parts of Kurdistan that is believed to have been caused by polluted water. Sanitation facilities are routinely crippled by violence and sabotage. The economy, like the country’s infrastructure, is in shambles. The worst aspect of the nightmare, of course, is the rain of death that has been falling on Iraq since the invasion. Controversy has surrounded virtually all attempts to estimate the number of civilian casualties, but no one disputes that the toll is staggering. As for the number of wounded and disabled Iraqis -- men, women and children who have lost limbs, or been paralyzed or otherwise maimed in air, rocket, and bomb attacks -- no one has a real grasp of the size of the problem. "Just considering the number of the dead and the number of displaced, this is probably the biggest humanitarian crisis in the world," said Global Policy Forum executive director James Paul. "This is the biggest displacement of people in the Middle East in a very long time." The effect on children of the carnage, the dislocations, and the deteriorating quality of daily life has been profound. Conditions in Iraq were dire for children even before the war. One in eight died before the age of 5, many from the effects of malnutrition, polluted water, and unsanitary conditions. Now, more than four years after the invasion, huge numbers of Iraqi children are finding themselves orphaned, homeless, malnourished, and worse. According to UNICEF, "Many children are separated from their families or on the streets, where they are extremely vulnerable to abuse and exploitation. Most children have experienced trauma but few receive the care and support they need to help them cope with so much chaos, anxiety, and loss." Source: New York Times |
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