SCSJ staff attorney Chris Brook spoke January 27 at the fourth annual Duke Law Forum for Law and Social Change symposium on “A Just Transition to a Green Economy.” While hailing the opportunities available in the transition to a green economy, Brook highlighted the potential dangers for low wealth communities of color. Too often industries “push destructive projects to communities of color as green job producers.” Brook focused on SCSJ’s successful effort to oppose the re-opening and expansion of the White Street Landfill in Greensboro, a proposal that began under the auspices of pursuing waste to energy possibilities. Check out Chris’s full discussion here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Dj0KGdvR5U&feature=youtu.be

SCSJ represents the Texas State Conference of NAACP Branches in Texas v. United States, litigation in the federal District Court for the District of Columbia in which the state of Texas is seeking federal preclearance for its Congressional, State House and State Senate redistricting plans. The NAACP is joining with the United States Department of Justice in arguing that these plans were crafted with racially discriminatory intent and will have a retrogressive effect on minority voters.
Trial begins on Tuesday, January 17, 2012 and will conclude at the end of the following week, with closing arguments on February 3. The outcome of this trial will be key in what plan is in place for the 2012 elections conducted in Texas this fall. Texas is an incredibly diverse state, and the NAACP stands with all minority voters in resisting the state’s longstanding and egregious attempts to minimize the voting strength of African-American, Latino, and Asian-American voters in Texas.

The Southern Coalition for Social Justice has been representing the Texas State Conference of Branches of the NAACP in ongoing litigation over Texas’s statewide redistricting plans. On Friday, November 25, a three-judge panel in Texas ordered the implementation of a court-drawn interim plan for Congressional elections in 2012. This plan corrects almost all of the major problems that the NAACP identified in the state’s enacted plan.

In the court-drawn plan, Congressional Districts 9, 18, and 30—districts currently electing the candidates of choice of African-American voters—are not weakened, as they were in the state’s enacted plan. The court-drawn plan respects the cores of the district and does not split significant communities of interest, as the state plan did. The court’s drawing of these districts in a way that respects the integrity of the districts and complies with the Voting Rights Act makes even clearer the discriminatory intent that infected the drawing of minority districts in the state’s plan.

In the state’s enacted plan, Texas had purposefully destroyed a Congressional District 25, a multi-ethnic coalition district based in Austin. The state’s plan carved up East Austin, a historically significant African American community that had always been represented by a single representative, into multiple districts, in order to dilute the voting strength of African American voters in that area. The court’s plan retained the core of CD 25, and kept East Austin intact.

Finally, the court-drawn plan creates a new African-American opportunity district in Tarrant County, in the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex area. After the 2010 Census, Texas gained 4 Congressional representatives because of population growth of the last decade—population growth that was almost entirely from increases in Latino and African-American population. Despite this fact, the congressional plan that Texas drew created no new African-American opportunity districts and no net increase in Latino opportunity districts. Congressional District 33 is majority-minority, with African-Americans constituting a strong plurality of the citizen voting age population. The drawing of Congressional District 33 is fair and complies with the Voting Rights Act, and will enable the minority community in the Dallas-Fort Worth region to elect a candidate of their choice.

The Carrboro Board of Aldermen unanimously rescinded the town's anti-loitering ordinance, which had previously made it a misdemeanor for any person to "stand, sit, recline, linger, or otherwise remain" on the corner of Jones Ferry and Davie Roads between 11AM and 5AM. This corner is the gathering place for predominantly Latino day laborers to find employment in Carrboro. The ordinance's rescission culminates a four month campaign against the ordinance led by SCSJ, beginning with a letter from SCSJ staff attorney Chris Brook highlighting the ordinance's unconstitutionality continuing through a press conference noting how the ordinance made it harder for day laborers to find work and ultimately leading to the unanimous vote.

Ordinance opponents jammed Carrboro Town Hall Tuesday evening with speaker after speaker underlining how the ordinance was inconsistent with Carrboro's worker and immigrant friendly reputation. Amongst these speakers were three Latino day laborers who had lost work opportunities during the four years the ordinance was in place. "I respect the community. I respect the police. All I want is to work," said day laborer Santiago Hernandez. Town Hall erupted in applause at the close of the Board's vote to rescind.

"Carrboro residents, more than 150 of whom signed a letter to the Board of Aldermen calling for the ordinance's repeal, made their voices heard loud and clear on this issue," said SCSJ staff attorney Chris Brook. "Its repeal is a victory for the dignity of individuals simply seeking to put food on their families' tables. We applaud the Board for rescinding this ordinance and hope it is the first step in bringing Carrboro together to collaboratively and creatively address the challenges facing day laborers in our community."

In addition to the more than 150 Carrboro residents signing onto the letter to Board of Aldermen, the effort to rescind the ordinance mobilized an unprecedented number of groups in community including SCSJ, the UNC Center for Civil Rights, the UNC Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity, the Carolina Law Immigration/Human Rights Policy Clinic, the Carolina Law Civil Clinic, the Chapel Hill/Carrboro branch of the NAACP, the Chapel Hill/Carrboro Human Rights Center, the ACLU of North Carolina, the North Carolina Justice Center, the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, and the N.C. Immigrant Rights Project.

SCSJ staff attorney Chris Brook spoke November 8 at an NC Central panel discussion on environmental justice. Addressing the Central Law Black Law Student Association, Environmental Law Society, and Constitutional Law and Civil Rights Society, Brook generally outlined the origins of the environmental justice movement in Warren County, North Carolina. He also spoke of SCSJ's recent successes in obtaining a benefits package for the New Hill community, which struggled against the placement of a sewage treatment plant in their community, as well as stopping Greensboro's efforts to re-open the White Street Landfill in predominantly African-American Northeast Greensboro. "Too often environmental impacts are placed in communities of color," said Brook. "This was a great opportunity to make the scope of these ongoing challenges known."

This morning, a federal district court in Washington, D.C. denied a request by Texas for approval of the State's congressional, Texas House and Texas Senate redistricting plans without conducting a trial to determine whether these plans were drawn with the intent or effect of diminishing the ability of minority voters to elect the candidates of their choice.

The Southern Coalition for Social Justice, on behalf of the Texas State Conference of NAACP Branches and in conjunction with the Texas Legislative Black Caucus and the League of United Latin American Citizens, offered briefing and oral argument to the court on November 2, 2011, urging the court not to approve the redistricting plans because the plans are unfair to Black and Latino voters.

Because of the Court’s ruling, the state’s enacted redistricting plans for Congress, State House, and State Senate cannot be used for the 2012 elections. A federal district court in San Antonio will now draw interim redistricting plans for 2012 elections. The court in San Antonio has already conducted hearings on those interim plans, in which SCSJ presented information to the court on how to draw plans that would be fair to minority voters.

Today SCSJ filed a lawsuit on behalf of four statewide organizations and 27 individual voters, challenging the newly enacted redistricting plans for the North Carolina State House, State Senate and U.S. Congress. We allege that all three plans “are an intentional and cynical use of race that exceeds what is required to ensure fairness to previously disenfranchised racial minority voters.” In addition to violating the equal protection rights of North Carolina voters on the basis of race, the maps also unfairly create two classes of voters in the state. One class is those who live in split precincts and who will experience delays, confusion and a heightened risk of receiving the wrong ballot. Approximately two million voting age adults in the state (27% of the total voting age population) live in a split precinct. The other class is those voters who do not live in a split precinct and who will not face these problems. African-American voting age adults are 50% more likely than whites to live in a split precinct.
The organizational plaintiffs are the North Carolina NAACP, Democracy North Carolina, the North Carolina League of Women Voters and the North Carolina A. Philip Randolph Institute. We seek to overturn the legislature’s unconstitutional packing of black voters. The Complaint is attached below.

For a musical explanation of what this case is about, check out this video from ProPublica: http://www.propublica.org/article/video-the-redistricting-song.

SCSJ conducted its fifth wills’ clinic in Tarboro, North Carolina, as part of its efforts to prevent a leading cause of land loss in the South: heirs’ property passing without a will. During the October 21-23 clinic, 20 Edgecombe County residents had 55 end of life documents made free of charge. Many thanks to everyone who made the service possible: SCSJ coordinating attorney Chris Brook, the office of the Edgecombe County Agricultural Extension, and the ten law student volunteers from Carolina and Campbell Law. SCSJ will conduct its next wills’ clinic in Edgecombe County the weekend of February 17-19. www.southerncoalition.org/documents/willsclinicphoto_0.jpg

At 11AM on October 18, 2011 three dozen Carrboro residents gathered at the corner of Davie and Jones Ferry Roads in violation of the town’s anti-loitering ordinance. The ordinance makes it a misdemeanor to "stand, sit, recline, linger, or otherwise remain" on this corner "between the hours of 11 a.m. and 5 a.m." Day laborers impacted by the ordinance, attorneys underlining its unconstitutionality, and residents who believe the ordinance is contrary to Carrboro’s welcome, progressive reputation all called for its immediate repeal.

“This is one of the only venues where we can provide for our families,” day laborer Angel Martinez told the crowd. “Once we are asked to leave, there’s nowhere else we can go.”
SCSJ staff attorney Chris Brook opened the press conference by reading a letter signed by 115 Carrboro residents to the Board of Alderman highlighting that the ordinance "violates the civil and human rights of any person who would otherwise lawfully be present at the intersection." Prior to its start, Carrboro announced they would not seek to enforce the ordinance to disrupt the press conference. Brook highlighted the problematic nature of this selective enforcement noting, “Our First Amendment rights are not being obstructed today, but day laborers’ rights are infringed upon every day.”
For more on this press conference please visit:

http://www.indyweek.com/triangulator/archives/2011/10/25/group-calls-for...

The following op-ed appeared in the Greensboro News-Record on Sunday. It was written by SCSJ staff attorney Chris Brook, who represented numerous clients in a lawsuit against the city over the Council's attempt to re-open the White Street Landfill to municipal solid waste. SCSJ also intervened in a case involving the company selected by the council.

On July 17, 2001, the Greensboro City Council passed a resolution barring further expansion of the White Street Landfill and sought to chart a course to a waste-disposal alternative. More than 10 years later — and following a divisive effort to reopen the landfill that saw three requests for proposals put forward and then abandoned; landfill opponents and supporters suing the city; and an attempt by council members to recuse a fellow member from voting on a landfill contract — it may seem a solution to Greensboro’s garbage problem is further away than ever.

That doesn’t have to be so. While it was painful, the recent White Street discussion underlined the city’s three core waste-disposal values, which can serve as a guide to an equitable, sustainable and fiscally responsible long-term solution.

First, the White Street Landfill must remain closed to municipal solid waste.

Greensboro made a promise to its residents in 2001 that White Street would not be expanded and the city would transition the vast majority of its waste to another site. In 2006 this promise became reality. Elderly couples used to waking to the hum of garbage trucks lined up outside their windows slept a little better. Families considering moving elsewhere chose to stay in Greensboro. And first-time homebuyers purchased houses near the landfill based on the assurance that White Street was closed for good. These Greensboro residents have relied upon the word of their city and deserve to have their faith and loyalty rewarded.

Second, Greensboro should dispose of its waste in a manner that minimizes health, economic and environmental impacts.

There is no perfect place for a landfill; it will upset someone wherever it goes. However, some locations are better than others. For example, 7,548 Greensboro residents live within a mile radius of the White Street facility, a number sure to increase as the eastern portion of the city continues to grow. By contrast, Greensboro currently ships its garbage to the Uwharrie Regional Landfill. Only approximately 100 people live within a mile radius of that facility. The closest town is Troy, population 3,430, whose downtown is five miles from the landfill.

This is not necessarily to advocate that Greensboro continue to use Uwharrie, but instead an illustration of how thoughtful siting can minimize impacts.

Third, Greensboro policymakers should select a fiscally responsible waste-disposal option.

The conservative, four-person City Council faction that drove the recent White Street discussion was right that cost is an issue, or, as Councilman Danny Thompson succinctly summarized, “It’s dollars and cents.”

Their first mistake was treating cost as the only issue. Their second mistake was trumpeting short-term savings, while failing to consider the long-term fiscal implications of reopening a landfill only four miles from downtown Greensboro. Driving a hard bargain with Greensboro taxpayer dollars is an imperative going forward, but it must be placed in the context of the city’s responsibilities to its residents and the need to foster economic growth for future generations.

There are potential solutions on the horizon that could allow Greensboro to honor the three core values underlined by the recent White Street debate. Republic Services has identified $3.5 million in potential annual savings through continued use of the Uwharrie Regional Landfill. Nearby Randolph County has expressed interest in hosting a regional landfill, which has the potential to minimize impacts.

While it is too early to tell if these proposals will pan out, it is not too early for voters to do their due diligence on City Council candidates to ensure they will pursue equitable, sustainable and fiscally responsible solutions. Without officeholders squarely focused on long-term answers, Greensboro could be having this same conversation in 2021.