ON THE LINE
Samuel, Leah & SLAUGHTER, JANE & Ness, Erik & METZ, HOLLY & Thornburg, Gina K. & Foley, Dylan
ON THE LINE Simple Justice in L.A. Los Angeles At 1:10 a.m. in downtown Los Angeles, Aura Estrada leaves her $6.90-an-hour job as a janitor and walks to a nearby bus stop, where she waits until...
...Shafer recalls with a laugh how he and producer Matt Keener shopped around Man of the Year to Hollywood studios...
...For more information, contact Earth Lodge, RO...
...612) 870-7121...
...Chicago organizers are targeting companies that contract with the city or receive subsidies...
...Studio reps would ask for "one small change" in the lead's character: "Does he have to be gay...
...We're human, we're people," adds Robinson...
...The biggest victories thus far have come in Massachusetts, where the legislature overrode the governor's veto to raise the state minimum wage to $5.25...
...The ordinance the coition has put before the City Council would raise the bottoffl wage to $7.70 immediately...
...It's usually the first thing of an erotic nature, on the printed page, that a gay person ever sees...
...explains Kary Moss, executive director of the Sugar Law Center for Economic and Social Justice in Detroit, and attorney for the plaintiffs...
...I know gay people who grew up on the magazine...
...When members of the caravan resisted, customs officials struck back, wrestling computers from the hands of the 200 volunteers...
...ERIK NESS Man of the Year Los Angeles As Playgirl magazine's 1992 "Man of the Year...
...The other 70 percent funds the rail lines, used by 6 percent of public-transit commuters, the majority of whom are white, middle-class suburbanites...
...Health effects from radiation exposure can take decades to develop...
...Gina K. Thornburg A RADIATION SITE NEAR YOU Radiation is a silent, invisible, and deadly threat...
...pressure on Indonesia," says Charles Scheiner, the coordinator of the East Timor Action Network, which is headquartered in White Plains, New York...
...in downtown Los Angeles, Aura Estrada leaves her $6.90-an-hour job as a janitor and walks to a nearby bus stop, where she waits until 2:30 a.m...
...Poverty is going up...
...For information, contact the East Timor Action Network/USA, P.O...
...Box I 182, White Plains, NY 10602...
...A million and a half Californians now earn the minimum wage, and Los Angeles has the greatest concentration of minimum-wage workers in the country...
...Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Toronto, and at New York City's prestigious "First Look" preview series, Man of the Year makes its theatrical debut this spring, in selected cities around the United States...
...But intimidation isn't likely to succeed with this dogged group...
...It's the most exhaustive list of U.S...
...carrying hundreds of tons of aid to Cuban churches...
...Because of a weakened economy, many Cuban hospitals have little access to current journals or up-to-date medical information...
...Several protesters received injuries...
...Or contact East Timor Religious Outreach, 1600 Clay Street, San Francisco, CA 94109...
...We get an 80-percent reduction in the amount of [lead-containing] materials...
...When the magazine chose him as its "woman's fantasy figure" for centerfold spreads, calendars, and TV talk shows...
...To help people like Estrada, the Labor/Community Strategy Center decided to organize bus riders to work for a cleaner, safer, more affordable bus system...
...The state's argument was, "We don't choose the site, the company does,' and we were really concerned about that defense...
...The shipment would have helped make possible a computer system linking hospitals, medical schools, and clinics to a data base in Havana...
...Box 756, Manassas, VA 22111, (703) 222-7570, e-mail: jsteinbach@peacenet.org...
...e-mail: escheiner@igc.apc.org...
...Government and industry secrecy surrounding nuclear technology and waste further obscure the threat...
...I can show how it affected everybody...
...Hoi.lv Metz Aid to Cuba Seized San Diego, Ofay Mesa Border Crossing On January 31, Customs officials at the U.S.-Mexico border seized 325 donated computers bound for Cuba...
...Minneapolis, MN 55408...
...Shafer...
...we don't have to file another lawsuit...
...Could an out gay Man of the Year be in Piaygirl's future...
...Then, in January, the school board passed a $7.70 minimum for its employees and contractors...
...Their experiences were the same that straight men had with Plaxbov...
...Unable to prevent the incinerator from being built, the neighbors contacted Moss, who filed a suit against Genesee Power last year on behalf of the residents and the Flint NAACT...
...DYLAN FOLEY...
...In 1962, she staged one of the first White House protests against atmospheric nuclear testing...
...In San Diego, phone (619) 291-6948...
...Authors Louise Franklin-Ramirez and John Steinbach point out that there are 22,000 active nuclear-materials licenses, but government inspectors make only 7,200 inspections annually...
...says Mann...
...She is frightened to stand there alone...
...This is one ot the most devastating things around...
...For more information, contact IFCO-Pastors for Peace...
...Dirk Shafcr revealed everything to millions of readers—except the fact that he is gay...
...In Houston, a coalition spearheaded by the Service Employees International Union Local 100 and ACORN is asking voters to increase the minimum wage to $6.50, which would lift a family of three out of poverty by the government's stingy definition...
...DIRECT ACTION ON EAST TIMOR In December 1975, the Indonesian army invaded the former Portuguese colony of East Timor, killing 250,000 people, a third of the country's population...
...Demolition wood from older buildings that goes into the incinerator is often covered with lead-based paint...
...who approves of outing only for "hypocritical politicians who are hurting gay causes...
...Buoyed by these successes, organizers are optimistic about their chances in court...
...and in Milwaukee, where the city council agreed in November to require contractors to pay at least $6.05...
...Police held eleven overnight in federal facilities...
...The vast majority of Los Angeles bus riders are low-income, working-class people of color, whose transportation needs have long been ignored...
...we just go back to the same judge...
...We're building an organization around the experience of oppression...
...Shafer and Keener finally agreed to make the movie themselves, shooting it in thirteen days on what Shafer calls a "micro-budget...
...A second attempt to transport computers across the California-Mexico border and the Vermont-Canada border on February 17 resulted in government seizure of seventy more...
...A settlement in Genesee County circuit court represents a significant victory to residents of the mostly black, low-income area near Flint...
...Shafer took on the role as a "small, part-time job...
...I can include my parents' reaction, my lover's reaction, my best friend, who was pretending to be my girlfriend...
...The Labor/Community Strategy Center and the Bus Riders' Union are suing the Metropolitan Transportation Authority for maintaining separate and unequal systems of transportation, thereby discriminating against low-income people of color...
...Our goal in Washington is to increase U.S...
...Working for a Living Wage Voters in a slew of cities this fall may have the chance to vote for higher wages...
...radiation sources ever produced...
...Moss says...
...On Valentine's Day, the pickets gath-ered in front of Whole Foods, a yuppie health-food store that secured city help to build in an upscale neighborhood, but pays $5 to $6 an hour and is a "fierce union-buster," according to organizers...
...Praised in 1995 at gay film festivals in Chicago, D.C...
...The problem is overwhelming, but Franklin-Ramirez is an inspiration: Ninety years old, she began her peace activism in the 1930s when she protested scrap-metal shipments to Japan...
...We actually think we're going to win...
...The more we learned, the more frightened we became," said Robinson...
...Contrary to popular belief, most minimum-wage workers are not young people in their first jobs...
...Leah Samuel...
...The state had approved the siting (of the incinerator] without inquiring into the health of the community or its racial makeup...
...Members of the Inter-religious Foundation for Community Organizing had intended to transport the computers via Mexico to help develop a national Cuban medical-information system...
...In California, the Living Wage Coalition's initiative would raise the state minimum for all private sector workers to $5.75 in 1998...
...They haven't had to deal with it and I think it's time they do...
...The Flint incinerator happens to be located across the street from an elementary school...
...Organizers in Chicago are picketing other recipients of city largesse that pay low wages...
...says Shafer...
...But we were treated like a bunch of foolish people, like we didn't matter...
...The feature also includes moving commentary on the perils of coming out to family members, and about the loss of friends to AIDS...
...Three-quarters of them are adults and most belong to low-income families...
...government from selling F-16 fighter planes and other weapons to Indonesia...
...Our long-term goal is self-determination for the East Timorese...
...Lillian Robinson, sixty-eight, a forty-year resident of the area, gathered her neighbors to form the group United for Action in 1992, when she learned of plans to locate the incinerator in the area...
...If the first bus is late and she misses her chance to transfer to a second one, Estrada has to walk twelve blocks home...
...FAX (612) 870-7109...
...In the past, the Interrcligious Foundation for Community Organizing has successfully sponsored "Friendshipments...
...In September 1994 the Bus Riders' Union won a court order preventing the Metropolitan Transit Authority from eliminating the monthly bus pass and from increasing bus fare for five months...
...Readers in Missouri, Oregon, Arizona, Idaho, Montana, New York City, Jersey City, Buffalo, and Albany can check out local campaigns by calling the local Central Labor Council (AFL-CIO...
...Tampa...
...Congress has balked at even this increase, so local organizers are taking matters into their own hands, aided by the New Party, labor unions, and ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now...
...It has mobilized demonstrators at Indonesian consulates in the United States and has also directed repeated phone campaigns at the White House...
...Actors include Shafer himself, his kid sister, his best friend Vivian, and beefcake model Fabio...
...If she wants to take her two small children anywhere, they also have to pay full fare...
...work doesn't pay anymore," says the New Party's Cara Letofsky...
...soil, and water of surrounding areas...
...Deadly Radiation Hazards USA Database won't exactly set you at ease, but it will give you the information you need...
...five members began a fast to protest the government seizure...
...Right now the magazine is still formatted for female readers, he says, but "maybe I'm pushing them into the nineties...
...At the time of his visit, Brody said the Indonesian army was going from house to house, beating young men to discourage them from attending demonstrations commemorating the invasion's anniversary...
...Man of the Year deftly mixes real TV footage from Donahue and Joan Rivers with fictional plots and reenactments...
...The group has 4,000 members and thirteen chapters nationwide...
...914) 428-7299...
...I'm glad it's happening now...
...Because we have a little bit of power, [the transit authority] can't dismiss us anymore...
...The Bus Riders' Union was born...
...Despite this constant threat of violence, even schoolchildren came up to Brody's group and whispered, "Independence or death...
...The organization regards the summons as the federal government's attempt to intimidate it from delivering further aid to the country...
...But by the end of his reign— with its absurd "Best Buns" contest, sham Valentine "dream date," and stint as a heterosexual romance hot-line host—Shafer knew he had the ingredients for a satiric film...
...Today, the brutality of the occupation continues—mass arrests, murder, and torture are commonplace...
...Burning it emits lead particles into the air...
...President Clinton has proposed raising it to $5.15—far below the official poverty line...
...It also means that if we believe the company is screwing up...
...On the bus you have a Latina sitting next to an African-American sitting next to an Asian, and the bus service is horrible, they're arriving to work late, they don't have enough cash for their children," says Kikanza Ramsey, one of ten organizers who regularly ride the buses, distributing fliers and recruiting new members...
...She pays $1.60 for her commute...
...Reed Brody, a New York-based human-rights worker, traveled to Dili in November...
...People should have clean air and decent water...
...The issue of "outing" also follows Shafer throughout the film, as ACT OUT members trail the Playgirl contest winner, threatening to reveal his sexual orientation during one of his live, nationally televised talk-show appearances...
...On February 21...
...Even though the 350,000 people who ride the bus account for 94 percent of those who use local public transportation, the county's Metropolitan Transportation Authority spends only 30 percent of its budget on them...
...I know that nobody can live in this environment and be healthy...
...The suit charged that the residents were victims of environmental racism, and that the placement of the incinerator in their neighborhood violated Michigan's civil-rights statute...
...On the other side of town, Teamster-organized Brach's Candy-unable to compete with subsidized and anti-union Farley—has slashed two-thirds of its well-paid jobs...
...in Baltimore, where the city council passed a living-wage ordinance in late 1994 requiring city contractors to pay $6.60 this year and $7.70 in 1998...
...I have never been to a country where the repression was so obvious, yet where the resistance was so obvious as well," said Brody...
...On February 7. the organization received a subpoena to appear before a federal grand jury to present information on previous shipments...
...Their poster boy company is Farley Candy, which received a $3 million subsidy from the city and pays just above minimum wage...
...The settlement limits toxins the Genesee Power Company's incinerator can burn...
...From New York City to California, labor-community coalitions are demanding a "living wage" for the lowest-paid workers...
...The information is arranged by state, so it's easy to find out what kind of radiation is near you or your loved ones...
...Dubbing their efforts the "Billions for Buses" campaign, union members are calling for fifty-cent bus fares, a $20 monthly bus pass (the current cost is $49), a moratorium on rail spending, 2,000 new clean-fuel buses, and an elected transit-authority board...
...The East Timor Action Network was founded in 1991 after Indonesian soldiers massacred 250 civilians in a Dili, East Timor, cemetery...
...says he's thankful he was able to choose when he would come out of the closet...
...Or call Jen Kern at ACORN's national office, (202) 547-2500...
...because I can present my story in a much more complete way than if it happened on a talk show...
...Relative to purchasing power, the federal minimum wage of $4.25 is at a forty-year low...
...In two years, more than 1,000 Angelenos have become members, and are joining the cause at the rate of fifty per week...
...They bring in about half of their family's total earnings, according to the Economic Policy Institute...
...The network is able to provide access to hard-to-find documents, articles, and videos concerning Indonesia's genocidal campaign in East Timor...
...610 West 2Sth Street...
...It's very exciting to do left wing organizing in rightwing times, especially when the work takes off...
...As the occupation of East Timor enters its twenty-first year, the East Timor Action Network/USA is planning a lobbying effort in Washington in late March to try to prevent the U.S...
...He estimates the magazine's gay readership is far greater than the 15 percent a Playgirl spokesperson cited recently...
...We have a chance to represent 350,000 people, people nobody cared about, people nobody thought could be organized," says the Center's director, Eric Mann...
...Jane Slaughter Neighbors Fight Michigan Incinerator FI in t, M ichigan Thanks to effective neighborhood organizing, some Michigan residents will have fewer particles of lead and other toxins blowing through their neighborhood...
Vol. 60 • April 1996 • No. 4
