LIFE-NET NEWS

by Ret Z.

Covering Poverty Widely in a Net of Many Voices

January 2, 2008	No Profit; No Proceeds
Volume 11 Number 17	All-Volunteer

"Give a family a fish, and they'll eat a meal;  give them a Net, and they'll have fish for Life."

Middle-Class Security Now Elusive in America

"It is becoming increasingly difficult for Americans to enter and remain in the middle class," says a November report by New York-based advocacy group Demos and the Institute on Assets and Social Policy of Brandeis University in Waltham MA.       The report, entitled, "By A Thread," attempts to measure the security of middle-class households -- defined as a family of four earning between $40,000 and $120,000 a year -- by looking at assets, education, housing, budget, and health care, and setting an optimum level for each. Less than a third of middle-class families were solid in three or more of the five categories, the analysis found. Some middle-class families were at risk because of inadequate savings; others lacked health insurance; some had bought more of a house than they could really afford; others were living paycheck to paycheck. If one member of the household suddenly became ill or lost his job, such families could find themselves under water.       "Middle-class security eludes 69% of middle-class American families," said report co-author Jennifer Wheary.       That's no surprise to Debbie Jaquette of Old New Castle DE, who makes a living cleaning houses: "Gas is going up, electric is going up, everything is going up except your paycheck." In May 2006, Delaware residents saw electricity prices spike 59% after rate caps were removed. Gas prices hover around $3 a gallon; in the 1990s, a gallon of gas frequently dipped below $1 and rarely rose above $2. The housing bubble has raised the median home price in Delaware to $232,000, while state median income has inched up to $62,623.       The study shows how a variety of economic problems are converging for families, said Saul Hoffman, chairman of the economics department at the University of Delaware.       A middle-class family on average has an income of $4,898 per month before taxes, and spends $3,360 per month on essential living expenses such as mortgage or rent, insurance, gas and utilities, the report found. Broken down, the top monthly expenses for the average middle-class family are $1,158 per month on housing, about $700 on transportation, $500 on food, and $250 on health care, said Wheary.       That leaves little left over for getting ahead: More than 1 out of 5 middle-class families have less than $100 per week left over after taking care of living expenses. More families are going into debt and saving less: Taken as a whole, middle-class families have a median debt of $3,500 and median net assets of zero.       Source: Wilmington News Journal

Glacier Melts Threaten South America's Water Supply

El Alto, Bolivia, and its sister city La Paz, the world's highest capital, depend on glaciers for at least a third of their water. No other urban sprawl has such a dependency on glaciers, and those glaciers are rapidly melting because of global warming.       Studies show that the melting of Andean equatorial glaciers has accelerated threefold since 1980. Scientists predict that all tropical Andean glaciers will disappear by mid-century. The implications are dire not just for La Paz-El Alto but also for Quito, Ecuador, and Bogota, Colombia. More than 11 million people now live in the teeming cities, and El Alto alone is expanding at 5% a year.       The melting of the glaciers threatens not just drinking water but also crops and the hydroelectric plants on which these cities rely. The affected countries will need hundreds of millions of dollars to build reservoirs, shore up leaky distribution networks, and construct gas or oil-fired plants -- money they simply don't have.       "We're the ones who've contributed the least to global warming and we're getting hit with the biggest bill," laments Edson Ramirez, a Bolivian hydrologist. South America's poorest country, Bolivia is responsible for just 0.03% of the world's carbon dioxide emissions.       President Evo Morales said he would seek legal remedies if rich countries don't agree to pay for the damage they've wreaked on the developing world: "It's not a question of cooperation. It's an obligation."       Starting in 2009, demand for water will outstrip supply in La Paz-El Alto, the government estimates. Without urgent, expensive projects -- only now in initial planning stages -- sustaining even the current population of 1.7 million will be impossible, said Oscar Paz, director of Bolivia's climate change program.       Similar fears are heard in Quito, which gets less than 10% of its water directly from the Antizana and Cotopaxi glaciers but much more from watersheds they feed. The Ecuadorean capital is expected to run short in 2015, even with a battery of projects already under way, including new reservoirs.       So Quito plans to cut a $1.1 billion tunnel through the cordillera and get Amazon basin runoff, says Edgar Ayabaca, director of the city's "Western Rivers" project. He said work on the tunnel needs to begin by 2010 if supply is to keep up with demand.       Bogota's fate is less clear. Bogota gets 70% of its water from alpine paramo, a fragile sponge of soil and vegetation often shrouded in clouds, which could dry up in higher temperatures.       Source: Associated Press

Affordable-Housing Complex Now Eco-Friendly

The Viking Terrace apartment complex in Worthington MN is outwardly unremarkable. Its long two- and three-story buildings, with their banal palette of tans and beiges, blend seamlessly into a neighborhood of cozy ramblers set on well-tended lawns.       What makes Viking Terrace remarkable is what you don’t see. There are no stereotypical signs of "income restricted" housing; no crumbling structures, cracked sidewalks, or unsightly graffiti; and there are no clues that this once decrepit '70s-era complex has been reinvented as an eco-friendly development. Geothermal units that draw the earth’s natural heat or coolness from some 200 feet underground are hidden below blankets of grass. Heavy-duty, superinsulated panes look like run-of-the-mill windows. A carefully planned ventilation system, hidden in the walls, keeps moisture in check.       Viking Terrace's green upgrades, which were completed last summer, bring its low-income and formerly homeless residents into a world commonly reserved for people who can pay extra to go green. Affordable housing developments like this one are springing up across the USA, showing that green homes can and should be built for everyone, not just because they're good for the environment, but also because they're healthier, more comfortable, and -- yes -- more affordable.       "Cold winds don’t blow through the windows anymore, and neither does dust," says Dave Cummings, a physical education and health teacher and 14-year resident. The place is simply cleaner, he says, and the air is healthier.       Property managers Del and Kathy Konakowitz talk about maintenance calls. These days, they’re more likely to hear from a resident who needs a refresher on how to work a dual-flush toilet than from one whose air conditioning has quit.       Jorge Lopez of Southwest Minnesota Housing Partnership, the property's nonprofit developer, marvels at the new gabled metal roof. "It was leakage after leakage after leakage," he recalls of the previous flat roof. "This roof, we know it's going to last 50 years."       Then there are the lower utility bills. Everyone likes those.       Costs, health, and comfort are tangible personal issues that have the potential to appeal beyond the save-the-earth contingent. What's more, addressing one of those issues often helps with the others. It's no wonder that advocates of affordable housing are bringing such synergies to the fore.       Source: Utne Reader

Helping Burundian Refugees Go Back Home

Tens of thousands of Burundian refugees returned home from Tanzania in 2007. The Tanzanian government, however, will miss its target to empty all camps by mid-2008, according to the UN.       "We believe we will end up with a small, resilient, and manageable group" in a single camp by the end of 2008, said Yacoub El Hillo, the representative in Tanzania of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR).       Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete has asked Burundians who fled a 13-year war that killed 300,000 people in their country to return home of their own free will, because there is now peace in the Central African state. He says repatriation will help Burundi rebuild its shattered economy and reduce the burden on his impoverished nation.       Citizens and authorities in Tanzania frequently hold refugees responsible for increasing crime rates, contributing to environmental degradation, burdening health and education services, and slowing national economic development, says a report by the Southern African Human Rights NGO Network (SAHRINGON). Yet their presence has resulted in substantial UN aid which, notes SAHRINGON, has made the country better off.       The UNHCR spent $28.7 million on refugee assistance in 2007 alone thanks to funding from the European Commission, the US, Denmark, Japan, Belgium, Switzerland, the UK, Germany, France, and OPEC. Since 1995, it has invested in hospitals, wells, schools, and roads in and around refugee camps.       Tanzanian citizens near the fenced-in camps are welcome to use some of the services inside them. The UN said it also plans to pass off its infrastructure to the government and to keep up the flow of assistance through UN agencies or NGOs into regions where the camps are shut down.       In the first 11 months of 2007, about 38,000 refugees went back to Burundi of their own accord, while another 5,800 were resettled in first world countries. The introduction in July of a $50 cash incentive and a six-month food package for every refugee that leaves Tanzania, as well as political pressure, sparked the exodus.       El Hillo said the next challenge is to ensure Burundi combines the right blend of domestic policies and international aid to boost growth for its citizens. "The reasons that forced them to flee in 1993 largely have been addressed."       Tanzania is home to half a million refugees. According to El Hillo, this makes Tanzania the second largest host country in Africa after Chad.       Source: Inter Press Service

NJ Families Re-Unify After Foster Care

7,737 children left foster care in New Jersey in 2006, and the majority of them returned home, according to the NJ Department of Children and Families (DCF). Children who enter foster care at 8 years of age typically spend about 11 months in out-of-home placements. They are most often removed from their homes because of neglect.       "Reunification will always be the goal as long as it's possible," said Kate Bernyk, a DCF spokeswoman. The agency co-hosted "Home for the Holidays" parties in Glassboro and South Orange attended by 42 families reunited in 2007.       DCF pays agencies like Robins' Nest in Glassboro and Family Connections in Essex County to provide pre- and post-reunification services to children and parents. Those services include parenting classes, counseling, and supervised visits; making sure children have pediatricians and medical insurance; linking parents to services such as welfare, food stamps, and Medicaid; and ensuring adequate housing.       "We move from fully supervised visits to partially supervised visits to overnights and weekends," said Marlene Seamans-Conn, program director of Family Ties, a component of Robins' Nest. "We gradually shift the parenting responsibilities back to the parent. It's a nice transition over the course of several months, with the goal being total unification."       Family Connections maintains a remodeled house in South Orange, called Reunity House, where parents and children can interact in a home setting during supervised visits while the children are still in foster care, said house manager Jennifer Kerr. She said Family Connections stays in contact with its clients for "at least a year" after reunification.       "This sends out a powerful message," Seamans-Conn said, "that parents really can reconnect with their children if they work hard on their issues."       Source: Associated Press

US Immigration Policy Vs International Norms

When people cross the border into the US, many human, civil, and economic rights go with them under international and US law regardless of immigration status. Human rights conventions associated with the UN, the International Labor Organization, and the Organization of American States (OAS) guarantee basic human rights to all people, citizens or not, in member countries. But when these rights are not respected, and international law is disdained, remedies to protect the newcomers can be elusive. The relationship between international agreements and US law is a frequent point of contention.       Steven Camarota of the Center for Immigration Studies, which favors restricting immigration, said, "In general I think illegals must always be dealt with in a humane way when they are apprehended and deported. As for the UN or other international agencies, I would say I can't think of any role for them to help. Who we allow into our country is a domestic matter."       Jennifer Gordon, professor of law at Fordham University, proposed two basic arguments for recognizing the human rights of undocumented workers: "One is about human dignity: If you give up your labor, you're benefiting the country that you're in, so you deserve to be treated with respect and paid fairly.       "But there's also an instrumental argument. We must protect these most vulnerable workers if any worker in the United States is to have any protection. If you deny undocumented immigrants the protection of laws such as the minimum wage and health and safety standards, you increase the incentive for employers to hire them, thus lowering the floor for all workers."       Treatment of immigrants in the US has attracted the attention of international organizations. Early in 2007, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants, Jorge A Bustamante, visited several US cities to take testimony on violations of immigrants' human rights. He found problems including arbitrary detention in substandard conditions, separation of families, lack of centralized information on detained migrants, and inadequate legal representation for deportees. He also noted concerns about racial and ethnic discrimination and violations of children's and women's rights.       In 2003, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, part of the OAS, issued an advisory opinion that labor laws that discriminate against undocumented workers violate international law.       "The US views itself as a beacon of human rights in the world," said Rebecca Smith of the National Employment Law Project. "As the largest migrant-receiving nation in the world, what message do we send to our international partners if we tolerate the worst kinds of abuses of our most vulnerable workers?"       Source: Inter Press Service

Opportunity and Obstacles in Millville

The problems that face the preacher often face the executive director, too. The Rev Charles E Wilkins Sr is pastor at Bethel AME Church, Millville NJ, and head of the church's social services arm, the Bethel Development Corp. Wilkins, an Illinois transplant, said recently that the church, the nonprofit arm, and Millville are at critical stages in their development. A case in point is the New Jersey Motorsports Park, a racing-themed entertainment site at Millville Airport that would be the largest economic development project in Cumberland County's history. Wilkins referred to the project as a "godsend."       While the project means opportunities for the poor, Wilkins also sees good reason to doubt that the poor can seize them. And that could be a long-term catastrophe for the city, he fears: "The truth of the matter is our belief that if we don't train enough people from the community, we could see another Atlantic City evolve."       "And as an outsider, I saw Atlantic City as a great idea," he said. "But it had to stink for the people who live [there] and didn't have any education. How many people are you going to hire to clean bathrooms?"       Wilkins said the county's least employed and least employable are set up for failure because of their lack of job and social skills. That's why education is a top goal for Bethel Development. "We're training people now to take housecleaning positions, maintenance positions -- basically entry-level positions." For 2008, the organization hopes to begin channelling people into Cumberland County College.       When Wilkins arrived in Millville a decade ago, one of the first things he did was get acquainted with his neighborhood. The area's poverty was manifest. "We decided to see what would happen if we gave people a meal -- a free meal, a hot meal," Wilkins said. "People were lined up around the church."       In three to five years from now, Bethel Development hopes to move into a new facility that can accommodate a seven-day-a-week soup kitchen. The current kitchen, operating three days a week, serves 1,600 to 1,800 meals every month. An alarming trend there is the growing number of younger people, including young mothers:       "We see such an increase in these young girls, who can't be more than 14, 15, 16, who have dropped out of school. And they bring their babies there, and they eat all they get. And then they get the services they need next door."       Source: Vineland Daily Journal

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About half of the world's economic growth is accounted for by Brazil, Russia, India and China. China is by far the most powerful engine of growth -- more so than the US, the Eurozone, and Japan combined. The resulting insatiable Chinese demand for oil, copper, zinc, nickel, and the other raw materials of industrialization is pushing the prices of those commodities to ever-higher peaks. The burgeoning middle classes, overcompensating for China's malnourished past, have made the country a net food importer as they turn to a more Western style of eating. The world is seeing some dairy prices up 200%, the cost of wheat up 100%, and pork up 50%; freakish weather conditions worldwide and the switch to biofuels add to this inflation. The $100 barrel of oil could be just an early sign of a long rise in commodity prices -- bad news for the West, and worse for poorer peoples. Everywhere, especially in the least-developed regions, because food takes up a much larger percentage of a poor family's budget, there will be a redistribution of income from the very poorest to the relatively well off. (The Independent) The handful of grain Abiye Omar clutches in her skinny hand has travelled a long way from the fertile fields of America's Midwest to the desolate coastal Somali town where she lives. It has sailed on a relief ship through seas plagued by pirates and sharks, then been carried ashore by porters into the hands of aid workers who have to contend with bandits, arsonists, insurgents, and even the Somali government's own forces to get it to the hungry. "Somalia is without a doubt one of the toughest places for us to work in the world," said World Food Program spokesperson Marcus Prior. The UN says Somalia faces Africa's worst humanitarian crisis. The harvest has failed in the Shabelle region, traditionally the breadbasket of the country, after the worst drought in 13 years. (Sapa-AP) In spite of public pressure and Congressional warnings, the Federal Communications Commission on December 18 voted, 3-2 along party lines, to remove the longstanding newspaper/broadcast cross-ownership ban that prohibits a local newspaper from owning a broadcast station in the same market. "For many years, the underpinnings of the Commission’s public interest analysis with regard to media have been to promote localism, competition, and diversity. Yet it is clear from the record that this decision undermines all of these goals," said dissenting Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein. "As a result of newspaper-broadcast cross-ownership, there is less local news in the market as a whole, and there is less competition for stories and ideas since two competing entities become one. There is also less diversity, as a voice in the market is lost, and broadcast outlets are taken even further out of reach of women and people of color." Opponents of the ban's removal, who view this decision as a fat holiday gift to Big Media, have not given up. (Free Press Blog)

Life-Net News Extras

Mother Teresa's Inner Darkness

Adapted from a piece by author Becky Garrison:       When I went to check my post office box after Thanksgiving, among the pile of mail waiting for me were review copies of Dinesh D'Souza's What's So Great about Christianity and Mother Teresa: Come Be My Light.       I first picked up D'Souza's bestseller. Throughout this book, he seems to possess an amazing self-confidence that all the world's problems could be solved if only we would just become Christians. I have to admit that a side of me wished that I still possessed that absolute certainty about my faith.       When I picked up Mother Teresa, I discovered a stark honesty that caught me off guard. Mother Teresa was not the woman the world thought we knew. As Shane Claiborne noted when I interviewed him for The Wittenburg Door, whenever people ask him about his trip to Calcutta, "they say, 'Oh, you met Mother Teresa,' like she glows in the dark or something."       While the rest of the world put her on a pious pedestal, this seemingly simple nun from Calcutta spent most of her ministry wandering in the wilderness. She pours out her personal pain in private letters that she penned to her spiritual director and others in her life. These letters indicate that ever since she began her ministry to the poor, the voice of Jesus that guided her to start this work became silent. This silence continued throughout her entire ministry. She describes the darkness with a piercing honesty that brought me to tears:       "Pray for me -- for within me everything is icy cold -- it is only that blind faith that carries me through, for in reality to me all is darkness. As long as our Lord has all the pleasure -- I really do not count."       Mother Teresa knew that just because God was absent from her heart, that didn't mean God had abandoned her. She learned to embrace this darkness as a part of her ministry:       "Let Him do with me whatever He wants, as He wants, for as long as He wants. If my darkness is to light some soul -- even if it be nothing to nobody -- I am perfectly happy -- to be God's flower of the field."       Shane Claiborne arrived in New York City on the first Sunday of Advent. During my interview with him, he remarked, "Someone asked me after she died, 'Is her work going to live on?' I actually think Mother Teresa died a long time ago when she submitted herself to Christ, and the thing that everyone loves about her was her work, that's Jesus. That's going to live forever. I've been to Calcutta since Mother Teresa died, and there were more people there than were ever there when she was alive. She's sort of like the seed that dies, and fruit is born."       Source: God's Politics Blog

Being Poor is a Lot of Work

Adapted from a piece by urban minister Bart Campolo:       Until very recently, I had no idea how hard it is for some of our friends just to find somewhere to lay themselves down to sleep at night. I knew that inner-city families moved around a lot, but I didn't realize how much heartache and humiliation goes before and after most of those moves, both for the families and for the neighborhoods they come and go from in search of better space.       Part of the problem is low incomes, of course, which leave almost everyone around here one minor setback away from missing rent. But beyond that, there are often rats and roaches and bedbugs to contend with, along with those normal, everyday conflicts with neighbors that, in this environment, can quickly become unacceptably dangerous. There are broken pipes and broken heaters and, as often as not, broken promises from landlords who live in a very different world.       Of course, the broken promises go both ways. Every day we see neighbors say and do things that would rattle almost any property owner; and we have learned the hard way not to immediately take any story of mistreatment at face value. Still, there is no denying that lots of money -- much of it taxpayers' money -- flows through neighborhoods like ours into the pockets of people who care too little about those they are supposed to shelter.       Last week our friend Helen and I spent the better part of three days driving all over town tracking down birth certificates, proofs of custody, income statements, and police background checks, hoping to qualify her for a HUD-subsidized apartment near enough that her grandson David could stay at his school and that both of them could stay in our fellowship. Helen's recently deceased mother had been paying the rent for all of them with her Social Security, but all they have now is the paycheck from Helen's part-time home health care job and David's food stamps.       Without my car, my computer, my money at certain offices, and my white male privilege at others, the whole endeavor would have been utterly impossible for Helen -- who is herself in need of some home health care. Even with my help, we needed a few kind folks to bend a few silly rules in our favor. By the time we got everything squared away, I was worn out and cranky. Being poor is an awful lot of work.       Thank God there is a whole bunch of us here, living together and loving our neighbors as a team. While Helen and I were jumping through HUD hoops, Karen and Donna were tracking down furniture for her and three other families in the fellowship whose living spaces are nearly empty, and our newest partner, Mark Leeman, was tracking down donors who want to invest in some rental properties we can fix up and manage right, right here in the neighborhood.       We know we can't house everyone, but the more we see what's going on around us, the more bound and determined we are to take care of the handful of neighbors we feel God has given to be our closest friends. After all, there is no way to build the kind of close-knit community we keep dreaming of without first making sure that all of us are safe and sound.       Source: God's Politics Blog

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"If slavery was the price that a modern American's ancestors had to pay in order to make one an American, one should get down on one's knees every single day and thank the Lord that such price was paid," said New Jersey Assemblyman Michael Patrick Carroll (R-Morris) during this legislative session's debate over whether to make NJ the first northern state to apologize for slavery -- a resolution that would not be useable in reparations litigation. Carroll said his ancestors came from Ireland around the 1850s, fleeing the potato famine he said was worsened by British indifference. "Far from holding it against the modern British, I delight in the cruelty of their forbearers. Without same, I might be hanging around in Inisfree [on an Irish island]. ... To the extent that America -- or New Jersey -- ever owed any kind of debt to anyone, that debt was more than repaid through the blood and suffering of 650,000 federal soldiers who died or were wounded during the war provoked by slavery." (Associated Press) A union representing workers who clean 450 buildings around New Jersey says it has reached tentative agreement on a new four-year contract. The deal will provide pay increases and expanded health care benefits to about 7,000 workers. Local 32BJ of the Service Employees International Union and about 50 cleaning companies had been negotiating since October. The union had threatened to call a strike if a new contract was not in place by the new year. The union says the majority of New Jersey office cleaners will reach $12 an hour over the course of the new agreement -- an increase of between 14% and 22%. (Associated Press) Bethel New Life, a faith-based community development corporation on Chicago's west side, built a "smart, green building" at a major transit stop in the community, cutting energy usage in half with a green roof, solar panels, super insulation, etc. Bethel recently received the GOLD LEED rating for environmental excellence, a first in a low-income community. The building, connected to the transit platform, houses a day care center, employment services, a community-focused bank, and community owned businesses -- a coffee shop and sandwich shop, among others. This development had been a long and tortuous effort -- in assembling the funds, acquiring building permits, and finding contractors who could do things differently. (God's Politics Blog)

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