Black Neighborhoods

The symbolic burial of the N-word at this week's annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was an important attempt to put to rest a word that has long been used to insult and disrespect those who are black. As welcome as this funeral was, however, the NAACP and others in the black community should be even more focused on the kind of disrespect that results in mindless violence and too many black-on-black killings. As an incendiary symbol of hatred and racism, probably no word is as loaded as the N-word.

Democratic mayoral candidate Martin O'Malley, whose strong showing in Tuesday's primary surprised even his most ardent supporters, gained one in three black votes and nine of every 10 white votes.According to a Sun analysis of voting results, O'Malley ran 28 percentage points higher in such black neighborhoods as Walbrook Junction than former City Council President Mary Pat Clarke, who is white, did in 1995 against Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke. O'Malley also posted 25 percentage points more than Clarke did in liberal white neighborhoods such as Hamilton, which gave Schmoke one in three votes four years ago.O'Malley picked up 53 percent of the vote citywide -- despite running against two veteran African-American politicians and 14 other candidates.

Standing under a faded "Drug Free Zone" sign, Northeast City Councilman Martin O'Malley announced his bid to become Baltimore's next mayor yesterday, pledging to wipe out the open-air drug markets linked to numerous killings and shootings.The 36-year-old former state prosecutor, who built his council reputation calling for tougher crime-fighting strategies, said making city streets safer will attract jobs, improve schools and halt the exodus of 1,000 city residents a month."I believe I can turn this city around by making it a safer place," O'Malley said, surrounded by about three dozen supporters at Harford Road and The Alameda.

THE withdrawal of Democrat Eileen M. Rehrmann from the gubernatorial race a week ago scuttles the attempt by political strategist Larry Gibson, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke and Prince George's County Executive Wayne Curry to create a bargaining situation. But what will it mean for future attempts by black people to exercise real political power in Maryland?Originally, Gibson & Co. had envisioned a lively competition for the black vote by Gov. Parris N. Glendening and Ms. Rehrmann. Of course, the nature of the competition depended upon the success of the black politicos in wooing black voters from Mr. Glendening, an incumbent.

WASHINGTON -- Rap music producer Bill Stephney told a gathering of black conservatives and clergy yesterday that "it probably seems rather strange that the likes of me is addressing you."The 34-year-old co-founder of the rap group Public Enemy told the Black Conservative Unity Summit that he came because he was fed up with what's happening to the black family.With video clips from newscasts, he clicked off the evidence: single mothers who stabbed, beat or poisoned their children.Those tragedies are an urgent call to return to morality, Stephney said, laying out the central theme of the Howard University gathering of about 60 black conservatives who want to infuse a new way of approaching problems among African-Americans.

DENVER -- After a 3-year-old boy was killed in a drive-by shooting in December, 100 black men fanned out through a black neighborhood here. They knocked on doors until leads resulted in three arrests several days later.After rival gangs firebombed four houses in the same northeast Denver neighborhood in January, more than 1,000 men turned out for a five-hour protest rally, the All Black Men Conference. The firebombings stopped.It has been nearly six months since the Million Man March, the gathering of hundreds of thousands of black men in Washington in October organized by the Nation of Islam and its leader, Louis Farrakhan.

CONSPIRACY THEORIES about secret U.S. government efforts to undermine the rights of blacks are legend in the African-American community. And some of these theories have been confirmed: The U.S. government did spy on and intimidate black political leaders. It did sponsor scientific experimentation on unsuspecting black soldiers and civilians.Now comes "Dark Alliance: The Story Behind the Crack Explosion," a three-part investigative series published last month the San Jose Mercury News, that details how massive amounts of cheap, powdered cocaine were funneled into South Central Los Angeles by a well-known CIA operative in an attempt increase funding for the contra army in Nicaragua.

The NAACP and the American Civil Liberties Union have accused PHH Corp. of discriminatory mortgage lendingpractices in Philadelphia, a charge that the Hunt Valley-based company denies.In a complaint filed Thursday with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission, the two groups say PHH U.S. Mortgage Corp. of Mount Laurel, N.J. -- PHH's mortgage lending division -- unfairly denied loans to African-Americans and rejected loans for properties in Philadelphia's black neighborhoods.PHH contends that it has programs and safeguards that prevent bias in lending.

What the American Civil Liberties Union hopes to achieve through its public housing suit is clear. It hopes to duplicate Hills vs. Gautreaux and force the predominantly white counties surrounding majority black Baltimore to house some of the city's poor and subsidized families.Whether the ACLU suit will manage to repeat what happened in Chicago is quite another matter. Yes, Hills vs. Gautreaux began spreading subsidized families throughout the Chicago metropolitan area, but only because of a long legal tug-of-war that ended favorably for the plaintiffs.

THE IRONY IS glaring in a dispute concerning the sale of the nation's largest black-owned bank, Indecorp Inc. of Chicago, to a white bank that actually has a better record of investing in the minority community. Should the symbolism of black ownership count more than the actual dollars and cents impact a company may have on life in black neighborhoods? Answering that question may require a greater degree of maturity on the subject of race relations than the American people seem to have right now.The owners of Indecorp would like to sell it to South Shore Bank.

Baltimore's lawsuit against Wells Fargo for its subprime mortgages has stirred up frustration among industry players, who say they're increasingly taking heat for offering loans in poorer and minority neighborhoods despite being urged for years to do just that. "What are you supposed to do?" asked Thomas Shaner, executive director of the Maryland Association of Mortgage Brokers, repeating the sentiment he heard this week. The city's suit, filed Tuesday, alleges that Wells Fargo targeted black neighborhoods for the higher-cost, looser-standards home loans and is responsible for the resulting high foreclosure rates.

A spike in foreclosures can be seen across Baltimore: families moving out and houses ending up vacant and shuttered. The personal losses are devastating enough, but an investigation by the city suggests a disturbing trend - Baltimore's foreclosures are most prevalent in black neighborhoods, and it's not coincidental. The disproportionate rate, the city contends, is the result of an insidious and illegal practice, reverse redlining. The claims are at the center of an innovative lawsuit filed this week by Mayor Sheila Dixon's administration against Wells Fargo Bank, one of the top two mortgage lenders in Baltimore in the past three years.

The symbolic burial of the N-word at this week's annual convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was an important attempt to put to rest a word that has long been used to insult and disrespect those who are black. As welcome as this funeral was, however, the NAACP and others in the black community should be even more focused on the kind of disrespect that results in mindless violence and too many black-on-black killings. As an incendiary symbol of hatred and racism, probably no word is as loaded as the N-word.

Young black men in our communities are falling into a deep hole - a hole filled with crime, unemployment and despair. They are falling so far, and so fast, that extricating many of them might well be impossible. And yet, for their sakes and ours, we must try. Our personal lives and our many years spent as a Circuit Court judge and college professor, respectively, have caused us to question the destiny of the black community - particularly that of the black male. In December 2004 we independently published articles in a book titled The State of Black Baltimore.

WASHINGTON -- After making what he admits were "demagogic" remarks about Jewish, Asian and Arab business owners, Andrew Young has done the right thing. The former civil rights leader, Atlanta mayor and U.N. ambassador found himself guilty and sentenced himself to resign as head of a Wal-Mart advocacy group. Mr. Young, 74, stuck his wingtips in his mouth during an interview published in Thursday's Los Angeles Sentinel, the West Coast's oldest and largest black-owned weekly. He was asked whether Wal-Mart squeezed small stores out of black neighborhoods.

WHEN IRIS Smith moved into the Glen section of Northwest Baltimore, one of her neighbors was Jose Brito. That was 29 years ago. Today, Smith, an African-American medical social worker who grew up in Atlantic City, and Brito, a Jewish engineer who came to Baltimore from Brazil, are still in their houses a few blocks north of Pimlico Race Course. Smith, who heads the Glen Neighborhood Improvement Association, likes being able to take the subway to her job downtown and return to her shaded street.

ATLANTA - The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. might be pleasantly surprised by many of the changes in the nation's social fabric since his death. The civil rights movement accomplished an astonishing transformation. But Dr. King would no doubt be quite disappointed in one area of black life that has only deteriorated since his assassination: the percentage of black men in prison. In 1954, black inmates accounted for 30 percent of the nation's prison population, according to the Sentencing Project, a Washington-based group that advocates alternative sentencing.

IN THEORY, the American housing market is free and open. Theory would then predict that market forces would control supply and demand and thereby distribute houses in a fair manner depending on the economic choices of the household. But this is still not the case for black homebuyers in metropolitan areas. For a variety of reasons - including continued, if not so open, racism and discrimination - black homebuyers pay more than their white counterparts, get stuck with higher-interest loans and get less home value for the money spent.

SELMA, Ala. - After more than 30 years, Mayor Joseph T. Smitherman's high-wire act above the city's churning racial politics had begun to settle into routine. Every four years, he would hold barbecues in black neighborhoods, boasting about the number of black department heads he had appointed, while reminding white voters he would be "the last white mayor of Selma," hinting a black deluge was around the corner. But this year, Smitherman has found himself in the fight of his life, forced for the first time into a runoff election - on Tuesday - against a black candidate, and the hints have become a bit less subtle.

THE UNIDENTIFIED caller described herself as a New Yorker who had moved to Baltimore. Taking exception to my Wednesday column, which suggested the city could do better than acting police Commissioner Ed Norris, the caller asked: "What about all the black drug dealers who are committing violent crimes in black neighborhoods?" I love to take a train of thought to its logical conclusion. The question can inspire several answers, not the least of which are these: What about all those white suburban drug users who drive into Baltimore and buy drugs from those black drug dealers and thus keep them in business and fuel the violence?