ReBirth tuba man and co-leader Phil Frazier says he hasn’t really thought about just where he’ll display the coveted Grammy Award that the band won for its 2011 album ReBirth of New Orleans. “I’ll probably wear it around my neck like a chain,” the exuberant Frazier exclaims.

The stars seemed to line up for the ReBirth Brass Band’s 15th release. Once considered the young, upstarts on the streets of New Orleans, the ReBirth now boasts 28 years on the scene. Through that time, its members have gained greater musical dexterity, honed their skills as composers and perfected the marriage of funky street beats with refined musicality. In other words, ReBirth was ready.

The CD, released on the local Basin Street Records label, won the honor in the newly created Best Regional Roots Album division, a category that well-suited ReBirth’s difficult to pigeonhole style. ReBirth of New Orleans also benefited from the wisdom of seasoned engineer and producer Tracey Freeman, a previous Grammy winner who knows his way around New Orleans’ musical eclecticism.

“We were all jumping up and down,” says Frazier describing the scene backstage at the pre-telecast show when it was announced that ReBirth had won. “My dream came true. I had that dream for a long time – since I was 20-something years old. When we started getting good, I said this {music} could probably win a Grammy.

Meanwhile, Basin Street Records owner Mark Samuels and his wife were in the front row. “I had my iPhone running when they said, ‘And the Grammy goes to…’ and you can hear me screaming, particularly loud. It was thrilling.”

For years, the ReBirth Brass Band would be hired to welcome visitors on their arrival at the New Orleans airport. This time, the tables were turned. Trumpeter Kermit Ruffins, the Baby Boyz and Kinfolk brass bands plus others gathered at the airport’s luggage area to great the victors.

“I never thought we’d have a band waiting for us,” Frazier exclaims. “It was a big surprise, a big surprise!”

The happy moment was captured on video as trumpeter Derek Shezbie put down some mean second line steps while using his suitcase as a partner. The smiles all around couldn’t have been bigger.

Frazier realizes the significance of Rebirth winning the Grammy award to young, upcoming musicians like those in the Baby Boyz and Kinfolk.

“ReBirth achieved our goal, so you can reach your goal,” he offers. “Keep playing, never stop. It’s not about bands battling each other, it’s about playing music because you love it. We love it so much and we’re from the streets and the streets took us to a Grammy. It’s a big accomplishment for us.

Naturally, calls came pouring in from all over the country with folks eager to congratulate the band. “There were a lot of numbers in the phone,” says Frazier mentioning a few notables who got through such as actor Ed Anderson and vocalists Erykah Badu and Ani DiFranco. The celebration continued on Tuesday night when the ReBirth performed its first, post-Grammy winning live show at the Maple Leaf. In honor of the occasion, the street in front of the uptown club was closed down to accommodate ReBirth’s ecstatic fans. “It was phenomenal,” Frazier declares of the night.

This was also the first Grammy for Basin Street Records, which did enjoy a nomination once before for Los Hombres Caliente’s release, New Congo Square.

“Now we will always be able to refer to ourselves as a Grammy-winning record label,” says Samuels proudly. “And similarly, the band will always be Grammy winners. It takes a lot of people to win a Grammy award and it starts with the ReBirth Brass Band working their butts off for the last 28 years.

“We put our heart and soul into this album,” says Frazier in moment of calm before bursting back into sheer exuberance. “I’m glad to bring a Grammy – like the Super Bowl – back home to New Orleans. I’m so happy, I’m so happy.”
Dave Bartholomew Honored

Dave Bartholomew, New Orleans legendary trumpeter, composer, producer and bandleader was honored by the Recording Academy with a special Grammy Trustees Award. It is given to those who have made a significant contribution to the field of recording in a non-performing capacity. Previous honorees include such luminaries as Duke Ellington and Motown’s Berry Gordy.

His sons, Ron and Don Bartho­lo­mew accepted the award for their father, who, Ron explained was fine but had a little knee trouble.

Ron relays his father’s response to receiving the accolade saying, “The first thing he said was it was the greatest news in the world for him and his family to be recognized. Because when you become 90-plus years old versus being 30 or 40, it’s that much more special. Often when you’re older in age you’re often forgotten about. To be remembered at 91 years old is a blessing.”

Bartholomew was a creator of the New Orleans rhythm and blues sound of the late 1940s and 1950 that evolved into rock ‘n roll. He’s most noted for his collaboration with Fats Domino that led to a string of classic hits like “Blue Monday” and “Ain’t That a Shame” and many, many more. The ReBirth Brass Band tapped into Bartholomew’s treasure chest by including his Latin-flavored “Shrimp & Gumbo” on its Grammy-winning CD, ReBirth of New Orleans. Bartholomew’s music is core to New Orleans and remains vital.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

Thomas Sparks Sr., the Big Chief of the Yellow Jacket Mardi Gras Indian gang, marks two momentous milestones this month. On February 17, 2012, he celebrated his 80th birthday and Carnival Day stands as the 65th anniversary of when he began masking Indian. He again has needle and thread in his calloused hand, sewing his suit for his appearance this Mardi Gras. When the Big Chief steps out with the Yellow Jackets, which he’s led since 1955, he’ll be the oldest Black Indian on the streets.

“I used to follow them when I was a little boy,” Sparks says of his initial interest in the Indians. “When I seen them, I was right behind them.” Also sparking his childhood curiosity in the culture was the fact that his mother was a full-blooded Native American of the Cherokee Nation. “That’s how I got started in it,” he says adding, however, that she didn’t approve. “She couldn’t stop me. I was gone.”

In 1947, the teenaged Sparks became the flagboy of the Bumble Bee Hunters and stayed with the tribe until he went into the military to serve in the Korean War. The gang came out of the 7th Ward and the Chief remembers meeting now-legendary Indians and gangs like Allison “Tootie” Montana’s father, Alfred, who pulled the Monogram Hunters, Black Benny and Brother Tillman.

“It was a different kind of suit back then,” Sparks remembers. “We used jewelery, broken mirrors and cheese cloth.”

When Sparks was discharged from the service in 1953, he joined the Yellow Jacket gang, then under the leadership of Chief Val. He entered as a flagboy and, in a rather unprecedented move, the chief soon jumped him up to the position of chief. “Val put me in front of everybody,” Sparks remarks of becoming Chief of the Yellow Jacket tribe in 1955. He remembers that there was a time that an amazing 90 members hit the street on a Carnival day.

As Sparks works on designing his new suit in his small bedroom in his New Orleans East home, he remembers that his first suit as chief was white, just like this one. “It has a lot of memories in it,” he says. With an air of some dismay, the chief does admit that he has a back-up suit if he “gets into trouble” and doesn’t complete the outfit.

Well-known chiefs in the Mardi Gras Indian Nation have come up under Big Chief Thomas Sparks. They include Lionel Smith of the Carrollton Hunters and notably Sparks’ nephew, Big Chief Little Charles Taylor of the White Cloud Hunters who Sparks describes as like a son to him.

“He taught me since I was two years old – I used to stay with him,” Taylor says of his uncle and mentor who welcomed the toddler into the Yellow Jacket gang at that young age. “He taught me how to thread the needle and to lock down the pearl. He taught me how to sew the material around the apron before you sew the stuff on it. He taught me how to sew neat, how to keep things in line and how to correspond the colors.”

A retired mason and carpenter as well as a master designer and sewer, Big Chief Thomas says he’s not scared to tell anyone that it was Big Chief “Tootie” Montana who taught him the art of three-dimensional design. It’s accomplished by flexing poster board so that it “sets” or “puffs” up. “I’m the kind of person if I don’t know something, I ask somebody,” says Sparks, a man of humble yet competitive spirit. “When Tootie died, I had no competition,” he adds confidently.

Sparks’ competitive nature that can be seen on the streets as he and other the Mardi Gras Indians vie for the honor of being declared the “prettiest” is also realized in his other passion, pigeon racing. Just outside Sparks’ bedroom with its closet full of suits, a stunning, bejeweled Mardi Gras Indian apron and ruler lying on the bed, is an impressive 8×10’ coop housing some 75 homing pigeons. He explains that he’s active in the racing clubs that present two seasons of racing, one in the spring for the “old” birds and another in the fall for the “young” birds.

Family has always been an important aspect of the Yellow Jackets. At one point or another, all of Sparks’ children—six girls and one boy—masked Indian. His wife, Barbara, reigned as Big Queen of the Yellow Jacket gang, a position she played with such flair that she gained a great recognition in the Indian nation. She passed in 2008.

“She always had my back,” Sparks declares adding that she often manned a sewing machine in the creation of their suits rather than hand sewing the tiny beads and sequins of the design.

In the past, Chief Sparks recalls getting up at 4 a.m. on Fat Tuesday and traveling with his gang all the way uptown and back down. In the early 1960s, he’d even head to the French Quarter and was welcomed into the world-famous Pat O’Brien’s Bar. At 6 p.m., the Mardi Gras Indians were forced off the street and onto the sidewalk. Sparks says that procedure, which remains controversial today, was not a city law but a rule made up by the police.

This year, he and the Yellow Jackets, a gang of six that will include his son-in-law and grandchildren, will hop in a van and start their march at 10 a.m. on the corner of North Claiborne and St. Bernard avenues. They’ll head up Claiborne to St. Philip and make their way into the Tremé and stop at the Backstreet Cultural Museum before going back to their starting point. There Sparks and members of his family, many of whom are coming to town for the dual occasions, will celebrate his birthday.

“It’s good to have somebody of that age masking because it keeps part of the old customs going,” says Sylvester Francis, the director of the Backstreet Cultural Museum. “He really doesn’t have to be out there. He paid his dues. He’s out there for the love.”

Sparks’ guidance gave his nephew, Charles Taylor, the tools to become a chief. Big Chief Little Charles, who’s renowned as a vocalist, formed his own gang, the White Cloud Hunters, in 1982.

“I would tell somebody that he’s a guy who explains stuff to you about being an Indian,” says Taylor, 57. “He’ll show you how to dress it up. He just takes and guides you. He took me to the Indian practices and I would hear him singing and I used to try to sing and I got good at it.”

Big Chief Thomas Sparks has spent a lifetime masking Indian. The decades working that needle and thread have not diminished his enthusiasm and creativity. Sparks, who performed at the first Jazz Fest at the Fair Grounds and has traveled to Europe, eagerly demonstrates how the sequins are properly sewn on the decorative “patches” and tells how he always wears suspenders to hold up his beautiful aprons.

“I’ll meet the gangs I see,” Sparks says with a twinkle in his eye of his travels on Mardi Gras Day. “I like to dance—I’ll dance with all of the chiefs.”

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

In 1908, John L. Metoyer and members of a New Orleans Mutual aid society called “The Tramps,” attended a vaudevillian comedy show called, “There Never Was and Never Will Be a King Like Me.” The musical comedy performed by the “Smart Set” at the Pythian Temple Theater on the corner of Gravier and Saratoga in New Orleans, included a skit where the characters wore grass skirts and dressed in blackface. Metoyer became inspired by the skit and reorganized his marching troupe from baggy-pant-wearing tramps to a new group called the “Zulus.” In 1909, Metoyer and the first Zulu king, William Story, wore a lard-can crown and carried a banana stalk as a scepter. Six years later in 1915, the first decorated platform was constructed with dry goods boxes on a spring wagon. The King’s float was decorated with tree moss and palmetto leaves.

In 1916, the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club became incorporated where the organization’s bylaws were established as well as its social mission and dedication to benevolence and goodwill.

In 1933, the Lady Zulu Auxiliary was formed by the wives of Zulu members, and in 1948, Edwina Robertson became the first Queen of Zulu making the club the first to feature a queen in a parade.

In the 1960s, membership dwindled as a result of social pressures from civil rights activists. The protesters advertised in The Louisiana Weekly stating:

“We, the Negroes of New Orleans, are in the midst of a fight for our rights and for a recognition of our human dignity which underlies those rights. Therefore, we resent and repudiate the Zulu Parade, in which Negroes are paid by white merchants to wander through the city drinking to excess, dressed as uncivilized savages and throwing cocoanuts like monkeys. This caricature does not represent Us. Rather, it represents a warped picture against us. Therefore, we petition all citizens of New Orleans to boycott the Zulu Parade. If we want respect from others, we must first demand it from ourselves.” “

The krewe, with support of the mayor and police chief, refused to fall from pressures and continued to parade, but gave up blackfacing, wearing grass skirts, and kept the identity of the king secret. Due to continued pressures, by 1965, there were only 15 Zulu members remaining. The membership of local civil rights leaders Ernest J. Wright and Morris F.X. Jeff, Sr. into Zulu, eventually lifted tensions and membership started to increase and the krewe resumed their old traditions including blackface.

In 1973, Roy E. “Glap” Glapion, Jr., Zulu president from 1973 TO 1988, started recruiting professionals, educators, and prominent businessmen from all ethnic backgrounds to fill its membership — making Zulu the first parading organization to racially integrate.

The Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club is well-known to parade goers for throwing coconuts, called the “Golden Nugget,” to the crowd. In the early 1900s, other parading organizations threw fancy glass necklaces that were handmade and expensive. The working men of Zulu could not afford expensive treats, but still wanted to give a special prize to lucky parade goers. The men decided to purchase coconuts from the French Market because they were unique and inexpensive. Painted and adorned coconuts became popular with the club starting in the late 1940s. In 1987, the organization was unable to renew its insurance coverage. Mounting lawsuits stemming from coconut-related injuries, forced a halt to the longstanding tradition of throwing coconuts. In 1988, Governor Edwin W. Edwards signed Louisiana State Bill #SB188, the “Coconut Bill,” into law removing liability from injuries resulting from a coconut — paving the way for the tradition to resume.

King Zulu-elect 2012 is attorney Elroy A. James and Queen Zulu-select 2012 is James’ childhood friend Dr. Tanyanika Phillips, M.D., who reportedly was told by James as a youth that one day he would make her his queen.

Elroy Anthony James is a native of New Orleans, La., and the youngest child of Mary L. James of Kentwood, La.. His siblings are Reginald A. Lee of Opelousas , Louisiana and Shannon T. James of Dallas, Texas. He is a product of the New Orleans Public School System having attended Paul Lawrence Dunbar, Stuart R. Bradley, P.A. Capdau and John F. Kennedy public schools. Bro. James is an alumnus of Southern University Agricultural and Mechanical College, where he earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting. He is an alumnus of the Southern University Law Center, where he earned his Juris Doctorate and was associate editor of the Southern University Law Review. He is also an alumnus of Georgetown University Law Center , where he earned a Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Taxation with a Certificate in Employee Benefits. Bro. Elroy is a member of the Fifth African Baptist Church, pastored by Dale Jay Sanders, Sr.

James is a tax policy attorney with the Louisiana Department of Revenue, Office of Legal Affairs. His primary practice is corporation income and franchise tax. However, he routinely litigates tax cases for the State of Louisiana. He frequently lectures on recent developments in both federal and state and local taxation. He serves on the adjunct faculty at Southern University Law Center and Southern University and A&M College, where he teaches Fundamentals of Federal Taxation and Principal of Accounting; respectively.

This June will mark 20 years of Zulu membership for Elroy James, who has reportedly earned a reputation as one of the organization’s sharpest dressers and hardest workers. Those qualities have served him well in his personal life and professional life,

Bro. James, 38, has been an active member of the Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club Incorporated since June 1992. He served as the Assistant Chairman of Finance and member of the Board of Directors in 2004, before being elected to the office of Chairman of Finance. Bro. James has served as Chairman of Finance since July 2006. Bro. James’ nearly two decades of dedication to Zulu includes participation on various committees including; Zulu Ensemble, Picnic, Souvenir Booklet, Public Relations, Anniversary, Budget and Finance and Lundi Gras Committees. Through service and unselfish devotion of time and talents to the Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club Incorporated, he has also enjoyed the tradition, merriment and pageantry of this historic organization. Bro. James is a former float rider and member of the Tribal Chief Krewe, African Merry Makers Krewe, Zulu Governor’s Krewe, Witch Doctor Krewe, Zulu Mayor’s Krewe and the Tramps Walking Group. For many years Elroy served as a Coronation Duke during the annual Zulu Coronation Ball. He was a Duke to King Zulu 1998, a Duke to Queen Zulu 1994 and Charge d’ Affaires to Queen Zulu 2002.

James is a life-member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity Incorporated; member of the Louisiana State Bar Association; American Bar Asso­ciation; Federal Bar Association and the New Orleans and Baton Rouge Bar Associations. He has also served on the boards of Young Leadership Council and AIDS law. He volunteers with the Leona Tate Foundation for Change Incorporated, where he provides legal advice to those individuals who have made the pursuit for social justice their life works.

As an undergraduate at Southern, James served as drum major for the Human Jukebox, the university’s marching band which is widely considered among HBCU marching band aficionados to be “the baddest band in the land.”

James, who played the trumpet in junior high and high school, listed playing the piano and listening to music among his current hobbies.

This distinction of reigning as the 97th King of Zulu will forever rank among one of his highest honors. More importantly, Bro. James is esteemed in sharing this experience with those members of the Zulu Social Aid and Pleasure Club Incorporated responsible for much of his educational and professional accomplishments.

When asked by myNewOr­leans.com why he joined Zulu, James said, “When I was a child, I remember being really impressed with what I saw in the Zulu parade, and was particularly mesmerized by the man in front of the float – which I found out later was the king.

“What Zulu has meant to me has evolved,” James continued. “Over time I learned that the members come from very diverse backgrounds – some less fortunate, others businessmen – and they all work together to make it the best organization it can be.”

“I’m having a special King’s bead made, as well as a very special throw,” James said when asked about his signature offering for parade-goers. “I commissioned a bronze-based, engraved coin made with my image on one side and my symbol for the parade, an Aker (an Egyptian symbol that represents yesterday and tomorrow) on the other. I only had 300 made.”

The Egyptian symbol has special meaning for James, who says his slogan is “Zulu of yesterday, Zulu of tomorrow, King for today.”

Dr. Tanyanika Phillips is a New Orleans native. She is the oldest child of Letha Elaine Penn Miller and Leon Miller Sr. and older sister to Leon Miller Jr. She proudly completed her primary and secondary education through the Catholic Schools of the Arch­diocese of New Orleans. She attended St. Joan of Arc and St. Paul the Apostle elementary schools. She finished Xavier University Preparatory as valedictorian with excellence in science and math; and among many awards of distinction received the Alton Ochsner Future Physicians Award which served as a prelude to her career in medicine. She is an alumnus of Xavier University of Louisiana, where she earned a Bachelors of Science in Bio­logy/Pre-Med and graduated magna cum laude with honors in English and Biology. She is an alumnus of the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry where she earned a Doctorate of Medicine. She is also an alumnus of Vanderbilt University where she later earned a Masters of Public Health and of Case Western University Weat­her­head School of Manage­ment where she received a Certificate in Project Leadership.

Dr. Phillips is a board-certified medical oncologist. She has completed specialty clinical training and research in aging and cancer at Ochsner Medical Center, Vanderbilt University Medical Center, and Johns Hopkins Sidney Kimmel Cancer Center. She is a former Assistant Pro­fessor of Case Western Univ­ersity in Cleveland Ohio where she also served as Director of Health Equity in Cancer. Dr. Phillips has been recognized for her excellence in science and medicine with published scientific work in the Journal of Geriatrics, national speaking engagements on advanced lung cancer and vulnerable populations with cancer, a grant recipient of the John Hartford Foun­dation as a Young Investigator in Oncology, an inductee of the Ohio Kaleid­oscope 40 Young Leaders under 40, the University Hospitals of Case Western Faculty Award recipient, and Case Western Reserve PREP Scholar. She recently became one of the founding medical oncology physician partners of a tertiary care hospital owned oncology practice in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

In addition to the many national and international scientific memberships held by Dr. Phillips, she is also a proud member of Sigma Gamma Rho Sorority and the American Association of Univ­ersity Women. Dr. Phillips has served as the Advisory Council Co-Chair for the Office of Minority Health of the Cleveland Depart­ment of Public Health and a lay leader in the Greater Cleveland Congregations Delegation at Olivet Institutional Baptist Church. She currently serves as an executive board member for Minority Women with Breast Cancer Uniting (MWBCU) and a medical advisory board member of the Karen E. Mumford Cancer Foundation. Dr. Phillips was named the 2011 Unsung Hero for her commitment to eliminating health disparities in Cleveland Ohio by the North Coast Nurses Coalition.

She enjoys her life commitment to caring for patients with cancer but one of her greatest joys and accomplishments is being a mother to her precious daughter Sophia Elaine Phillips.

Zulu’s 2012 Carnival Characters are Big Shot Terry Williams, Witch Doctor Jason B. Horne, Ambas­sador Lester Washington, Mayor Larry Barabino Jr., Province Prince Gregory Rattler, Governor Will Montgomery Jr. and Mr. Big Stuff Michael Alexander.

At press time, Zulu members were gearing up for Friday night’s Zulu Ball at the Ernest N. Morial Contention Center, whose entertainment guests included legendary R&B group Cameo and legendary singer Charlie Wilson.

On Monday, the krewe will celebrate Lundi Gras with a family festival along the Mississippi River at Woldenberg Park.

Performers at the 2012 Zulu Lundi Gras Festival on Feb. 20 will include James Andrews, Dee-1, Rockin’ Dopsie, Jeff Floyd, Parker Shy and Shytown, and Ed Perkins.

While last year’s Lundi Gras festival ended at 5 p.m., the hours are being extended this year until 8:00 p.m. Honorary grand marshals for Zulu 2012 are former New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial and former congressman and U.S. Ambas­sador to the United Nations and former Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young, both of whom are proud New Orleans natives.

“As a true son of New Orleans, Mardi Gras is dear to my heart, and to celebrate with such an esteemed and storied krewe as the Zulus is truly an honor,” Morial said. “ It’s in large part due to the spirit of the city—expressed so exuberantly by the Zulus on Mardi Gras—that I’m very excited to be bringing the National Urban League Annual Conference to my hometown in July.”

Morial will be joined on the float Tuesday by his wife, Michelle Miller, a CBS news correspondent and former morning anchor and correspondent for New Orleans’ WWL-TV.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

New Orleans city officials are aggressively pushing back against a “devastating” proposed $15 million cut to inpatient mental health and substance abuse services now being offered at LSU Interim Hospital.

The cuts were included in Gov. Bobby Jindal’s recent budget, and they are part of an effort to close a $251 million state budget shortfall this year. The plan includes a $34 million hit on hospitals statewide.

The proposed cuts at LSU’s operations in New Orleans include:
• at least 110 employees,
• the hospital’s twenty-bed, inpatient detox unit,
• nine of 38 beds in the psychiatric unit, and
• half of the 20 mental-health emergency room beds.
The Criminal Justice Committee of the City Council met Wed­nesday afternoon to talk about the cuts and their potential impacts on New Orleans’ most vulnerable populations, most of who are not criminals. But many mentally ill people end up in jail when services are slashed.

And a city in crisis “can’t go forward” unless critical services kept in place, Councilwoman Susan Guidry said.

Speaking as part of a panel addressing the committee, Muni­cipal Court Chief Judge Paul Sens said it was already “staggering, the amount of money that is being wasted by not giving these people the services they need.”

Sens reported that over a recent 16-month period, he and his colleagues ordered 246 psychiatric evaluations for mentally ill people who came before the court.

“One hundred and sixty of those people were found to be incompetent,” he said. “Normally in that situation, they are referred to University Hospital, they stay there three days, and are cycled back into the system.”

Twenty-three of those 160, he said, “cycled back through the system 75 times.”

“This system is never going to change,” without inpatient clinical care, he said.

Paying for that care is another matter in an era of Medicaid cuts from Washington.

Dr. Roxanne Townsend, chief executive officer of LSU Interim Hospital, told the committee that the hospital has already seen its budget shrink by some $150 million since 2009, down from $955 million to $804 million.

“This is the first time we have had to touch behavioral-health services,” she said. “We do anticipate that there will be an overflow into the emergency room.”

Unfortunately, the emergency room is slated to lose four beds as well.

“These [proposed] cuts are happening to a system that has been on a road to improvement, but it is fragile,” said New Orleans Health Commissioner Dr. Karen De­Salvo.

She cited the “extremely short timeline and somewhat arbitrary nature of the cuts,” and noted that the city does not “have room to absorb these cuts,” given the various and ongoing post-traumatic disorders and social ills that continue to befall New Orleans.

The Jindal administration has maintained that it did not request or require any specific cuts to mental health or substance abuse programs at LSU Interim Hospital, a point echoed Wednesday by Dr. Tony Speier, an assistant secretary at the state Department of Health and Hospitals.

Speier defended Jindal, who he said heard the “cry for assistance for mental health services” coming out of New Orleans in 2008, and has worked with local mental-health providers to expand the service base for its citizens.

Jindal critics at the Advocates for Louisiana Public Healthcare maintain that the governor essentially raided $50 million in Medicaid money generated at LSU Interim and gave it to his Department of Health and Hospitals to shore up that department’s $489 million shortfall.

Those critics argue that Jindal has consistently tipped the scales in favor of reimbursing private Medicaid providers over public and charity hospitals such as LSU Interim.

Councilman Jon Johnson said he invited Jindal to speak at the council’s upcoming city Housing and Human Needs Committee meeting. Johnson said he’ll urge Jindal to reconsider the cuts.

“This is nothing new for the state,” he said. “The state administration has always looked at health care as an area that they will go into and cut because, frankly and honestly, it is one of the areas where the state has the latitude to go in and make cuts. It should not happen… Those mental health beds that were taken out of the city of New Orleans need to be returned to the city of New Orleans!”

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

Editor’s Note: The following was written under a MetLife Foun­da­tion Journalists on Aging Fellow­ship in partnership with New America Media and the Geron­tological Society of America.

PALO ALTO, Calif. (New America Media/San Jose Mercury News)

As Daniel Shaine approaches the end of his battle with terminal cancer, he is no longer surprised to find a troop of young doctors, some with pregnant bellies or sparkling engagement rings, at his side at the Palo Alto Veterans Administration (VA) hospital.

“Sometimes I muse to myself, ‘I’m old enough to be this person’s father,’” said Shaine, 67. “I try to push that away.”

Increasingly, patients at the end of their lives are talking about end-of-life decisions and do-not-resuscitate orders with doctors on the brink of giving birth. These freshly minted physicians are among a new wave of specialists in the growing field of palliative medicine.

Specialty Created in 2008

Since medical boards only started recognizing the treatment of pain and end-of-life care as an official subspecialty four years ago, and new rules effectively bar older physicians from getting certified, the cohort of doctors spearheading palliative-care departments across the country are increasingly in their early- to mid-30s.

The stark generational differences are showing up at hospitals across the country.

“We acknowledge that we are young, and we only have the wisdom that comes with our thirty-something years,” said Kavitha Ramchandran, 34, an attending physician in the Hospice and Palliative Medicine unit at Stanford Hospital. “I think there’s a steep learning curve in this.”

Palliative care doctors manage pain, gauging symptoms and prescribing pain medicines that don’t conflict with the patient’s other medications. But even more so, they spend a lot of time talking with patients and their families about the dying process, discussing end-of-life decisions and coordinating care with other doctors.

Early research shows the generation gap can interfere with delivering the best care, according to Joanne Lynn, principal investigator of the SUPPORT study, the largest study on end-of-life care. Her research showed that elderly patients were unlikely to disclose important medical information to young doctors, especially sensitive conditions like incontinence or depression.

“We found that patients did not tell interviewers about certain things until the interviewers were older—that is, past 60,” she said. “So, young doctors are going to have to make a special effort to get this sort of information.”

Overcoming Barriers

Stanford University’s fellowship program in hospice and palliative medicine trains medical students and recent graduates how to overcome generational barriers, but confusion among patients still pops up, said V.J. Periyakoil, the program director.

She recalls one young doctor, a woman many months pregnant with her first child, who spent 45 minutes talking with an older man at the veterans’ hospital. Just a couple hours later, the patient demanded to know when a doctor was going to come check on him.

“He didn’t realize that she was a doctor,” Periyakoil said.

Doctors have been informally practicing palliative medicine for decades, managing patients’ pain and symptoms alongside curative treatments for disease, and starting difficult conversations about end-of-life when treatments no longer work. Internists and oncologists learned these skills on the job or taught themselves.

Now there’s a defined path for training the new—and first official—generation of palliative care doctors.

About 12 percent of the doctors certified in hospice and palliative care in 2010 are now 36 or younger, according to the latest data available from the American Board of Medical Specialties. That percentage doubled in two years and is expected to dramatically grow under new rules that prevent older doctors from being grandfathered into the specialty. Starting this year, doctors must complete a one-year training fellowship in palliative medicine, a position that offers a meager salary that few older mid-career doctors will opt for.

Stanford’s fellowship program is one of about 70 similar programs formed in recent years, and among the first launched.

As much as they gain medical skills and knowledge, trainees say they learn how to handle themselves with patients, either by assuming the role of a grandchild or just being humble.

“Sometimes it is scary to know you are much younger than your patient,” said Domingo Maynes, 30, a resident with the program. “But by putting myself in their shoes and talking to the family, I can start to wrap my hands around the intangibles.”

A Sympathetic Ear

For some patients, a doctor’s youth doesn’t matter.

“I’m not interested in what their age is,” said Warren Harding Atkins, 93, who gets treated for severe back pain at the Palo Alto VA. “I want them to find solutions to my problems.”

Atkins tells stories of working in the merchant marine during the 1940s, once delivering a baby on board his ship in the middle of the sea with no medical help. While he bemoans his grandchildren’s generation for not appreciating what they have or learning from history, he is happy with the young doctors looking after him.

“They listen to me, and that’s all I need,” he said.

If anything, the young doctors say their generation is particularly well suited to this kind of care, especially at these early stages of the field when hospitals across the country are opening brand new hospice and palliative care departments.

“This is a generation that grew up hearing about startups and innovation,” said Stephanie Harman, 35, who helped launch the Hospice and Palliative Medicine fellowship at Stanford. “The idea of the specialty of palliative care being a new field, with a lot of opportunity to innovate, and work in a team structure, that’s something this generation is much more primed to do and excited about.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

During Black History Month, the focus is often on individuals. The founder of the month (once Negro History Week) was Dr. Carter G. Woodson, and he chose the week that encompassed both the birthdays of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglas. When other luminaries are mentioned, they are mostly men, but this year, the Association for the Study of African American Life and History (ASALH) has declared that women will anchor the month. It is great to lift up the many Black women luminaries, including Dr. Dorothy Irene Height, Elizabeth Keckley, Cathy Hughes, and so many others.

Yet the real untold story of Black History Month is the story of the organizations that have made a real difference in the advancement of African-American people. The NAACP, founded in 1909, and the National Urban League, founded in 1910 are the most visible organizations, but in 1935 both the National Council of Negro Women (led by Dr. Height from 1957 to her death in 2010) and the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs were founded. Even earlier, in 1896, the National Association of Colored Women’s Clubs was established. Mary Church Terrell was the organization’s first president and this group, still operating, is the oldest organization that works for the benefit of Black women and families.

Until 1960, most African-American women worked as maids, domestics, or private household workers. The National Domestic Workers Union was founded in 1968 by Dorothy Lee Bolden who started working at age 12 for about $1.50 a week. The organization was dedicated to professionalize domestic work, providing training and advocating for fair working conditions. This was yet another example of African-American women coming together to improve their lives and those of their families.

There is a rich history of African-American sororities and fraternities. Among the sororities, Alpha Kappa Alpha was founded at Howard University in 1908. Delta Sigma Theta Sorority Incorporated was also founded at Howard in 1913 by women who broke off from AKA to emphasize their commitment to scholarship, service, and sisterhood. Delta women marched in the women’s sufferage march in 1913, despite discouragement from white women who did not want to mix race matters with suffrage issues. (Full disclosure—I’m a Delta). Two other Black women’s sororities, Zeta Phi Beta and Sigma Gamma Rho, are organizations that also focus on service. All of the Black women’s sororities are committed to uplifting the community and to providing scholarship assistance to students.

In so many ways, the history of organization is a tribute to the human spirit that transcends stories of individual accomplishment. Organizational development reminds of the ways and the reasons that people come together for uplift and for good, to improve lives, to pay it forward, to pass good things on. Black History Month is often the story of accomplished individuals but the story of organizations is equally compelling. As a nation and a world, we are better off for the efforts of the National Council of negro Women, now led by Dr. Avis Jones DeWeever, for Delta Sigma Theta, led by Cynthia Butler McIntyre, by the Children’s Defense Fund, led by Marian Wright Edelman, and by the National Mentoring Cares Movement, led by former Essence editor Susan Taylor. As we cheer on individuals, we must also cheer on the enduring legacy of organizations founded and led by African-American women.

Julianne Malveaux is President of Bennett College for Women and author of Surviving and Thriving: 365 Facts in Black Economic History.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

We need a teacher evaluation system that looks like somebody designed it on purpose. Only a handful of public officials are still around who were serving in 1989 when Governor Roemer made the last attempt to reform our system. I’m one of them, and I remember the venom, the bitterness and the divisiveness of those days. Roemer’s legislation ended up before the Louisiana Supreme Court (I helped argue the case), which ultimately ruled in his favor, but the causalities were high, and it undermined the program’s success.

We learned a few lessons from that experience that might be helpful now as the debate begins over Governor Jindal’s attempt.

The first lesson we learned was that teacher quality is one of the few ingredients of good public schools that government can control. Parental involvement is also important, but it’s hard, if not impossible, for government to involve parents in their kid’s education if they are unable or don’t want to. Data indicates that 49 percent of Louisiana’s children will be born into a single parent family this year, leaving them much more at risk to growing up poor, undereducated, underemployed or in jail. Of course, some of these kids can, and will, mature into productive citizens because of the Herculean efforts of their parent, but the odds are against them from birth, and just about everything government has tried to better those odds has failed. The moral of the story is to concentrate on what you can control: teacher quality.

The second lesson we learned was to consult and listen to the teachers and principals in designing a teacher evaluation program. The teachers and principals in every single public school in Louisiana know who among their peers is doing a good job and who is not. Design a system to harness their input and knowledge and it will succeed. I’m not saying that what politicians, good government groups, civic leaders, school boards and teacher organizations think doesn’t matter. Most of these groups care deeply about elementary and secondary education, and deserve a seat at the table. But at the end of the day, if the rank and file teachers and principals don’t buy into the new evaluation system-if they don’t think it is fair-it is destined to fail, no matter how many bills the Legislature passes.

The final lesson we learned from the teacher evaluation effort in 1989 was to be careful what you say. Teacher quality is a subject steeped in emotions-anger, fear, pride. It is a subject about which people feel passionately (a good thing) and about which reasonable folks disagree. Name calling, demeaning remarks, incendiary words and sweeping generalizations that don’t respect the nuances of the political and socioeconomic factors that contributed to the deterioration of public education in America are not helpful. Think before you speak.

Louisiana has the rare opportunity to lead this country in developing ideas that lift up the teaching profession, change the lives of our children, and help Louisiana have a brighter future. Lessons learned from the past can help us succeed.

– John Kennedy
La. State Treasurer

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

Special to the NNPA from the St. Louis American

According to digitalspy.com, the price for Whitney Houston’s greatest hits album, The Ultimate Collection, jumped from $4.70 to $14.99 on iTunes after news of the singer’s death.

Upset fans accused Apple of trying to capitalize on Houston’s death. Apple in turn pointed the finger at Sony Music, saying the record company increased the wholesale cost of the album, causing the iTunes price to automatically increase.

Apple later returned the album to its original price late Sunday, February 12. No word on whether other online stores such as Amazon and Google Music were affected.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

By all accounts, Israeli and American military officials are clear about one thing: Iran does not possess nuclear weapons, is not likely to have weapons in the near future, and does not constitute an immediate danger to Israel.

The most strenuous objection to an Iranian attack by Israel comes from recently retired Mossad head Meir Dagan, who called attacking Iran “the stupidest thing I have ever heard.” His predecessor, Ephraim Halevy, seconded his assessment. Dagan’s successor, Tamir Pardo, and former Israeli Defense Force Chief of Staff Dan Halutz both declared that Iran is “not an existential threat” to Israel.

And since it is unlikely that Israel could launch such an attack without U.S. approval, the opinions of American officials are equally important.

American concerns hinge on Iran’s nuclear program. Though there is widespread suspicion that Iran may have a nuclear weapons program, there is no evidence that such a program exists. The latest pronouncement came on January 31 from U.S. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, who stated in testimony before Congress: “We do not know … if Iran will eventually decide to build nuclear weapons.”

His assessment echoes that of CIA Director David Petraeus and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta that Iran is not building nuclear weapons at present.

Still, the threat that Israel might attack Iran this spring was renewed by Panetta, and has been the stuff of speculation for several weeks. Speaking to Washington Post column­ist David Ignatius, Secretary Panetta said there is a strong likelihood that Israel will strike Iran in April, May or June, expressing concern about this turn of events and the opposition of the United States government to such a strike.

Israeli defense analysts also warn of the danger to Israel itself if the government does the unthinkable and launches a first strike against Iran. According to senior military analysts, more than 15,000 rockets could be launched against Israeli targets in retaliation.

Jerusalem Post military correspondents Yaakov Katz and Melanie Lidman write that every city in Israel could be attacked, including the Port of Haifa and Jerusalem itself—heretofore “im­mune” from attack because of its many Muslim religious sites. “The threat scenarios,” they add, “are compiled by the Home Front Command and are based on intelligence collected regarding the enemy’s intentions as well as its capabilities.”

The ‘Clean Break’ Doctrine

So why is Israel continuing to pursue a clearly dangerous course opposed by so many?

The ostensible reason given by Israel is that Iran will be entering a “zone of immunity,” whereby progress on a nuclear weapon will be so extensive and their underground concealment so impregnable that further advances will be unstoppable should they decide to manufacture weapons.

This sounds plausible on the face of it, except for the fact that all of Iran’s nuclear facilities are under inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Every scrap of uranium both enriched and unenriched is under seal. The only underground facility in Iran—the Fordow plant near the city of Qum—was declared before any fissile material or equipment was introduced and like all other facilities is under constant inspection.

It is also noteworthy that the IAEA continues to report that Iran has not diverted any radioactive material for military purposes.

For an explanation concerning the continual drumbeat to attack, therefore, one must return to Netanyahu who, during his first term as prime minister in 1996, spoke of the “immediate danger facing Israel.” By “danger” he meant of course Iraq, for which he sought the advice of a group of American neoconservatives who presented a plan on safeguarding Israel’s security.

Titled “A Clean Break: A New Strategy for Securing the Realm,” the report was co-authored by a study group under the direction of former United States Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle. The group—which included Douglas Feith, David and Meyrav Wurmser, James Colbert, Robert Loewenberg and Charles Fair­banks, Jr.—urged regime change throughout the Middle East, beginning with Saddam Hussein and later the governments of Syria and Iran.

The “Clean Break” doctrine was followed by the establishment of the Project for a New American Century, whose members—including Feith, Perle, and Wurmser augmented by John Bolton, and Meyrav Wurmser—pushed the agenda of regime change throughout the Middle East. Under George W. Bush these individuals began to set policy—including the first stage of their plan, the removal of Saddam Hussein.

The problem they faced was gaining public credibility and justification for an attack, the solution to which came in the form of “weapons of mass destruction,” which served as the pretext on which the United States invaded Iraq in 2003. It is the pretext with which Israel and its American supporters would attack Iran today.

Israel’s ‘Great Statesman’

Most of the neoconservatives who concocted this scenario are out of power. They continue to inhabit the think tanks of Washington, appearing ubiquitously in mainstream media. However, Prime Minister Netanyahu, for whom this plan was written, is most definitely in power, and he possesses the red button that could launch the Iranian attack. But would he?

Here one must look at Netan­yahu’s temperament. A telling portrait of the Prime Minister was presented by Carlo Strenger in the Israeli newspaper Ha’aretz on September 9, 2010.

“Netanyahu likes to think in large historical contexts,” Stengler writes, “and he likes to model himself along the lines of great statesmen. So far, Churchill has been his favorite, because Bibi thinks of himself as the Churchill that warns the world of Political Islam while the Chamberlains of this world are trying to appease it.”

For Netanyahu, it is a posture replete with hubris and grandiloquence. But he is joined by an equally remarkable partner, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, whose hero is Charles deGaulle—a leader who flew in the face of his own advisers.

Barak, noted Ha’aretz writer Aluf Benn on March 11, 2010, “is now exhorting Netanyahu to be a de Gaulle and not a Churchill, because the British leader merely said ‘no’ and refused to budge, while his counterpart in Paris settled on no less than changing the world.”

The specter of a Churchill and a de Gaulle at the helm in Israel, ignoring their own advisers and convinced they are right and the world is wrong is an extremely dangerous situation. Netanyahu has a 15-year mission to reshape the Middle East that he sees as his destiny—his “Churchill moment.” With Ehud Barak by his side, his politics constitute a perfect match of heedlessness and stubborn pride flying in the face of both facts and reason.

These two prideful men could set the world aflame and insist, as the destruction and mayhem rage after a needless attack on Iran, that their generals, advisers, as well as the world community were all unprincipled fools.

William O. Beeman is Professor and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. He has conducted research in the Middle East for more than 40 years. He is author of The “Great Satan” vs. the “Mad Mullahs”: How the United States and Iran Demonize Each Other.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.

Part II in the series

There’s been a great deal of conversation in the community in recent years about the power relationship between Blacks and whites and how that relationship is manifested in the criminal justice system, economy and local public schools. It’s a dialogue that is long overdue and one we need to keep going until we find solutions to problems like the inequitable distribution of wealth and opportunities in this city.

Like Kwanzaa, Black History Month and its celebration need not be limited to a finite number of days. We can celebrate and utilize the lessons learned every day of our lives. We can also continue to expand our collective Black history I.Q. by gathering more information about our past in this city, nation and global village. The more you learn, the more you realize you don’t know about the past. That realization can be overwhelming, but it also has the power to liberate our minds and spirits and give us a renewed sense of purpose. Many of us, for example, still don’t know enough about Freedom’s Eve, the annual December 31 observance that marks the night before Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, and the 1811 slave revolt which began just west of New Orleans and was the largest slave rebellion in U.S. history. Many historians liken the excitement and hope surrounding Freedom’s Eve to the emotions many Black people felt almost four years ago when we witnessed the inauguration of the nation’s first Black president.

Many of us are still unaware of the historical and cultural importance of Congo Square in Louis Armstrong Park here in New Orleans, where Africans gathered on Sundays for fellowship, commerce, the dissemination of information and creative expression. It is a cultural, historical and political mecca every bit as important to African America as Harlem was to people of color in the 1920s.

We still don’t know enough about the slave revolt of 1811, but that seems to be changing after we observed its 200th anniversary last year and continue to gather historical documents that fill in some of the blanks about this monumental event. Since the mid-1990s, the African American History Alliance of Louisiana has done a great job of expanding our understanding of this revolt and other pieces of Black history by offering annual observances and programs honoring these ancestral freedom fighters. The Louisiana Museum of African American History has continued to carry on that very important mission. One of my biggest regrets is that I was never able to go to the Chalmette Cemetery with Buffalo Soldier historian Hiram Cooke before his passing. I had expressed an interest in visiting the gravesites of some of the Buffalo Soldiers who were laid to rest there. Understanding the history of the Buffalo Soldiers is particularly important in New Orleans where several units were formed. Here in the Crescent City, Black history is a living, breathing entity that allows us to commune with our ancestors. There are certain parts of the city where one can get a very strong sense of a spiritual connection with our forebears and what life must have been like for them. But often the material history of Africans in antebellum New Orleans has been hidden from the light of day by the descendants of Europeans who lived here and profited greatly from the free labor enslaved Africans provided. Every time we visit the African American Resource Center in the main branch of the New Orleans Public Library or the Amistad Research Center on the Tulane University campus we seize an opportunity to fill in some of the missing pieces of the African Maafa puzzle. And children who see us get excited about reading and researching our history grow up to become adults who share that hunger for knowledge and history.

I agree with writer Evan Narcisse’s contention that Black History Month is as great a time as any for African America to talk about some things that too often are left unsaid.

Let’s use that time to talk about reparations, relationships between dark- and light-skinned Blacks in the 21st century, relationships between U.S. Blacks and continental Africans, affirmative action, class divisions in African America, the challenges facing HBCUs and misogyny among Black males. Let’s talk about why so many Black children have a difficult time in school, illiteracy in communities of color, the impact of AIDS on African America and Black identity issues. Let’s use the time to challenge and encourage young people to perform community service, learn more about environmental racism, find solutions to homelessness and to develop strategies that increase support for Black businesses.

Let’s take Black children on tours of HBCUs and share our own college experiences with them. Let’s challenge our children to write down family stories about how their parents and grandparents met and fell in love. Challenge them to tell their own stories and share their early experiences. Let’s give them a reason to feel that they’re part of something that’s bigger than they are and a reason to hold their heads up high.

It dawned on me several years ago that any celebration of Black History Month should revolve around studying each family’s unique history as well as African America’s collective heritage.

To that end, I have taken on the challenge of creating a family scrapbook with photos and stories about my grandparents, parents, siblings and extended family members.

I was actually encouraged to do so by the late Alex Haley, author of Roots and The Autobiography of Malcolm X, who I met as an undergraduate in college. During his presentation, Haley encouraged every member of the audience to take it upon himself to gather his or her family history. He talked about how as a child he often sat at the feet of his grandmother and other family members who passed down stories that dated back centuries. It was then that he received the inspiration to chronicle his family’s history and present it to the world.

One of the lasting lessons from Alex Haley’s life is that is you never know how your discussions of family history will impact younger family members. Children are naturally intrigued by compelling stories and every family has in its history the stuff movies and dreams are made of.

Children who are trying to find their way can be inspired to strive harder in school and in their personal development by family stories of darker days and how their ancestors overcame adversity

It’s important that we do more during Black History Month than simply memorize the names, dates and contributions of Black inventors and trailblazers. We need to know the stories behind the history, what obstacles our ancestors faced and how they overcame them.

Black History Month is an excellent opportunity for members of the community to come together to discuss how far we’ve come and the battles that lie ahead. However, if we only get together during the month of February to talk about Black history and culture we are missing the point of Carter G. Woodson. It’s a time for us to pause and reflect on the ties that bind us, as well as a time for Africans in America to celebrate that which is uniquely ours.

It’s important to remember that no one can tell us how to best utilize or celebrate Black History Month. That’s entirely up to us, no matter how others view the month of February or how they plan to use the annual observance. People who are free don’t have to sit around and wait on someone else to tell them when and how to celebrate who they are and how far they’ve come. As you celebrate Black History Month this year, I respectfully ask that you pause to celebrate you. Celebrate the African in you and the wisdom that teaches the sons and daughters of the Motherland to utter “I am because we are.” Celebrate African beauty, strength, resilience, courage, creativity and the long line of kings, queens, pharoahs, chiefs, businessmen, healers, seers, holy men, warriors, wordsmiths, dancers, singers, musicians, everyday people and griots that make up the rich tapestry of our collective heritage.

The hopes, dreams, prayers, sacrifices and struggles of our ancestors culminate in each of us. By remembering and honoring the greatness in them, we pay tribute to ourselves and the awesome legacy we are a part of. Hotep.

This article originally published in the February 20, 2012 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.