As we prepare to celebrate the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr., we should be cautious about congratulating ourselves for having overcome segregation and the resultant inequality against which King is best known for fighting. Indeed, the problems of racial segregation in housing and education are no less urgent than they were 40 years ago.

A study published this past May in the American Sociological Review shows that today, blacks and whites overwhelmingly live in neighborhoods with members of their own race. Though they do so by choice, this is still problematic because, as a 2011 study from the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies found, in the cities with such high levels of racial segregation, blacks and Latinos live far shorter lives than whites and are much more prone to long-term health problems, like asthma, due to higher pollution levels.

The picture is no brighter in public schools, as a report issued in September by the Civil Rights Project at UCLA shows. It found that school segregation for blacks, Latinos and poor students has returned to levels we haven’t seen since the 1970s. And we know from 30 years’ worth of research that test scores and college-level success are far lower for students who attend racially segregated schools. Nonetheless, in our present moment, 60% to 80% of districts in major metropolitan areas like Chicago, New York, Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Dallas have schools that are overwhelmingly segregated by race.

Read more at TIME.

t's the Obama speech on race you probably haven't heard.

In June 2007, then-Sen. Barack Obama told a mostly black audience of ministers that the country's leaders "don't care about" New Orleans residents, suggesting the city was neglected in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina because of institutional racism, according to an unedited video reported on by The Daily Caller.

In the address, delivered during the upswing of the Democratic presidential primary season, candidate Obama specifically criticizes in outspoken terms the decision not to waive a federal law known as the Stafford Act that requires communities hit by disasters to match 10 percent of federal aid.

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...at the time of Obama's speech, there were still concerns about federal response to the disaster under the Stafford Act, which governs relief efforts. The Federal Emergency Management Agency was unwilling to waive the law’s 10 percent local match provision for aid, like it did after the Sept. 11 attacks and other hurricanes.

“One reason cited for FEMA’s reluctance to waive the 10 percent match in New Orleans is concern about corruption,” the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies said in a 2008 report on the relief efforts.

That report also noted that then-Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco was pushing in early 2007 for a federal law eliminating the 10 percent match. The House passed the bill, but it stalled in the Senate and President Bush had threatened to veto it.

Read more at FOX News.

Both President Obama and Mitt Romney, his Republican challenger, have rejected an invitation from the NAACP and other Black groups, to participate in a forum to discuss issues important to African-Americans.

In late September, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People invited President Barack Obama and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney to articulate their plans for the Black community at a presidential forum planned for October 9 at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, the nation’s oldest Black degree-granting institution.

The NAACP collaborated with the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), MSNBC-TV, the Grio, and American Urban Radio Network in preparation for the forum. Veteran, award-winning journalist Lester Holt had agreed to moderate.

Jerry Lopes, president of American Urban Radio Network, said on Monday that both candidates had declined to appear, citing scheduling conflicts.

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This year, CNN chief political correspondent and host of “State of the Union” Candy Crowley will become the first woman in two decades to moderate a presidential debate. Crowley has big shoes to fill. Simpson also holds the record for the highest number of viewers for a presidential debate at 69.9 million.

Although the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, a nonprofit organization that advocates for public policy reform to improve communities of color, applauded the CPD for selecting Crowley to moderate one of the presidential debates, they questioned the commissions rationale for denying Univision’s request for a fourth debate in a letter written to Janet Brown, executive director for the Commission on Presidential Debates.

The commission argued that the general election debate focuses on “issues of national interest that affect all citizens, including Univision’s audience.”

Read more at The Seattle Medium, The Charlotte Post, or The New Pittsburgh Courier.

White Americans now have more than 20 times the wealth of the average black household and 18 times more wealth than that of Latino household, according to a study released Monday by the Pew Research Center.

The wealth gap between blacks and whites continues to grow, the study found, and is now the widest in 25 years.

The study confirmed what many already knew — the “Great Recession” has wreaked havoc on the nation’s must vulnerable communities.

Read more at Politic365.

Democracy Now! interviews former chief of racial statistics at the Census Bureau Roderick Harrison on growing wealth gap between minorities and whites after the recession.

Beverly Reaves says she was shopping for a home the first time she felt racially profiled. The ordeal of facing police with guns drawn left her shaken and distrustful of police. Researchers are looking at how police patrol black and minority communities and say in a recent study that there is a stronger focus on black communities especially when it comes to drug enforcement.

Beverly Reaves says she was shopping for a home the first time she felt racially profiled. The ordeal of facing police with guns drawn left her shaken and distrustful of police. Researchers are looking at how police patrol black and minority communities and say in a recent study that there is a stronger focus on black communities especially when it comes to drug enforcement.

Roderick Harrison is a demographer at the joint center for political and economic studies and is a professor at Howard University.

Harrison says that very often minorities are easier targets because their offenses are done in public while their white counterparts have the money to hide illegal activity.

Read and watch more at Press TV.

In celebration of Mary McLeod Bethune's birthday, a Civil Rights Preservation Forum will be held at Howard University's Blackburn Center on Saturday, July 9 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Michael Wenger will participate in a panel entitled Exploring Black Women and Civil Rights Activism. More information on this and other Mary McLeod Bethune birthday events, visit the National Park Service website.

This document summarizes a forum convened by the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies on April 11, 2006, in collaboration with the National Policy Alliance (NPA). It is part of a broader Joint Center Never Again effort designed to help ensure that the tragedies that befell Gulf Coast residents, particularly low-income residents and African Americans, in the aftermath of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita never again occur.

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Date Published: April 2006

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How can online dialogue on controversial issues of race and ethnicity strengthen local coalitions and promote action to address a specific issue?

From Talk to Action is a booklet concerning racial profiling and how to make creative use of online dialogue to foster improved race relations and civic empowerment. The booklet has a dual purpose. First, it is intended as a guide to community leaders who wish to foster dialogue, bolster action and awareness, and create positive solutions in their communities to address racial profiling. Second, the booklet is intended as a summary of a unique effort to demonstrate how online communications can be used to foster civic empowerment. By linking people who otherwise might not come in contact with each other, the technology can help to break down barriers to communication and interaction and thus both debunk negative stereotypes that continue to plague us and generate cooperative efforts to bridge racial and ethnic divisions.

Available in Hard Copy Only.

To order a hard copy of this publication, download the publication order form.

All prices do NOT include shipping and handling fees. Please see form for more details.

Date Published: April 2002

Price: $10.00