Naacp Officials

Lauded by police departments statewide as an effective crime-fighting tool, the idea of allowing officers to take home their cruisers has been greeted with skepticism by some Baltimore County officials and a go-slow warning from a local NAACP official, who fears it would promote harassment of minorities. Similar programs have been established in every other major suburban Maryland jurisdiction, and they are regarded by many police officials as extensions of community-policing efforts that have helped reduce crime.

African-Americans need a new generation of freedom fighters to continue the struggle against discrimination, the Rev. Jamal-Harrison Bryant told an audience of about 500 politicians, civic leaders and local residents who attended the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. 12th Annual Awards Dinner held in Annapolis yesterday. Bryant, NAACP national youth director, called for a "passing of the torch" from the generation represented by the well-dressed and slightly graying crowd at the dinner to today's young people, saying the generation needs to understand that racism is still alive.

A PARADE of current and wannabe movie and TV celebrities flit through the aisles, hugging and glad-handing each other while keeping one eye on the cameras filming the event. This is the NAACP's Image Awards. Many of those on display at last year's ceremony were young and nominated, it seemed, only because they had appeared in a recent TV show, cut a pop or rap album or published a kiss-and-tell autobiography. NAACP officials have proved deaf to the grumbles from many blacks that the Image Awards have become a black imitation of the Academy Awards.

African-American leaders are touting a revival of the Carroll County chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.At a meeting in Westminster on Tuesday, religious leaders cited the indifference of government and a lack of economic opportunity as reasons for reviving the chapter. The civil rights organization closed its county office about four years ago."Somehow we allowed the NAACP charter to slip through our fingers and become inactive," said the Rev. James E. Hinton, pastor of Union Memorial Baptist Church in Westminster.

NEW YORK -- Three years after he was dismissed as executive director of the NAACP, Ben Chavis has emerged as the second most powerful figure in the Nation of Islam -- and as a likely successor to Minister Louis Farrakhan.Last week, Farrakhan cemented the position of Chavis -- now known as Minister Benjamin F. Muhammad -- by putting him in charge of the black Muslim organization's most famous East Coast ministry: Muhammad's Mosque No. 7 in Harlem. In a speech on 127th Street, Farrakhan also said Muhammad would supervise all Nation of Islam mosques from Massachusetts to North Carolina, including the one in Baltimore.

The NAACP's magazine surely won't become a hotbed of conservatism when it resumes publication in July.But if Paul Ruffins has his way, The Crisis will house a wide range of opinion on black American life -- including thinkers whose philosophy owes more to Newt Gingrich than to W. E. B. DuBois."

An Anne Arundel Circuit judge yesterday threw out a suit filed by the former president of the county NAACP aimed at reversing the results of a 1995 election she narrowly lost.Judge Eugene M. Lerner ruled that he lacked jurisdiction over Jean A. Creek's suit because Maryland judges are barred from second-guessing decisions of an out-of-state entity such as the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People."Maryland Courts lack subject matter jurisdiction when the internal affairs of a foreign [out-of-state]

Two months after a black family's North Laurel home was ransacked and defaced with racial epithets, the president of the Howard County chapter of the NAACP called yesterday for an end to what he called "institutional racism" in the county.Jenkins Odoms Jr. told reporters at the First Baptist Church of Guilford that racism is evident in county housing, employment, public safety and education practices."We're going to have to go back and hit the streets," said Odoms, joined by the Rev. John L. Wright, pastor of First Baptist, and the Rev. Robert A. F. Turner, head of the Howard County African-American Coalition, which represents 50 organizations countywide.

The NAACP has named an administrator to oversee the finances of its struggling Baltimore branch, which owes the national organization more than $60,000.The 3,500-member city branch's debt to the national NAACP, which has headquarters in Baltimore, includes $50,000 in back membership dues and $13,000 in annual assessments, said Rodney A. Orange, branch president.The Baltimore branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People has had troubled finances for several years.

MINNEAPOLIS -- If the NAACP is like family, as its leaders often say, then yesterday was a family feud.A noisy protest by Detroit delegates shut down the legislative session of the group's 86th annual convention. The delegates had been denied voting credentials because of a financial dispute with NAACP headquarters in Baltimore.Chanting "No justice, no peace," the 21 delegates and supporters drowned out proceedings on the convention floor, forcing adjournment. The convention had been billed as a time of healing after a year of NAACP infighting.