Mid-South Peace & Justice Center

City Code Stops Churches from Housing the Homeless

Watch this video from  Channel 5 News to learn more.

• Please take a moment now to email city officials
  in support of Room in the Inn
• Attend a town hall meeting on Sunday, Nov. 17,
  at 1:00 pm in the Trinity Education Building at
  1738 Galloway.

Trinity United Methodist Church invites you to a Town Hall Meeting about Room in the Inn-Memphis on Sunday, November 17, at 1 p.m.in the Trinity Education Building at the corner of Evergreen and Galloway.

City Councilman Jim Strickland will be present as well as the Rev. Lisa Anderson, director of Room in the Inn-Memphis, and Trinity representatives. Our hope is to give our neighbors an overview of this program and discuss any concerns they might have about how the program will work at Trinity UMC. It would be helpful for us to have Room in the Inn-Memphis supporters at this meeting to help counter any negative opinions.

The City Planning Office is helping Trinity UMC to craft language to change the size of the property requirement in the code. It will go to the Land Use Board and then to the City Council and County Commission for three readings each, giving the public chances to object. However, this process begins in December and will last at least a couple of months. Our immediate need is to get started in November without the fear of a church being cited for this violation. This code is ignored for all other groups, the only reason it is coming up for Trinity now is the prejudice against the guests being homeless.

Please take a moment now to email city officials in support of Room in the Inn
Reid.Hedgepeth@memphistn.gov; Shea.Flinn@memphistn.gov; Kemp.Conrad@memphistn.gov; Myron.Lowery@memphistn.gov;Janis.Fullilove@memphistn.gov; Joe.Brown@memphistn.gov; Jim.Strickland@memphistn.gov; Wanda.Halbert@memphistn.gov;Harold.Collins@memphistn.gov; Bill.Boyd@memphistn.gov; Bill.Morrison@memphistn.gov; Edmund.Fordjr@memphistn.gov;
Lee.Harris@memphistn.gov

Bands not Bombs: A benefit featuring Hope Clayburn’s Soul Scrimmage

A benefit for the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center

Join us for an evening of dancing, friends and fun!

Saturday, April 5 :: 9:00pm
Young Avenue Deli

Featuring Hope Clayburn’s Soul Scrimmage and special guests Jason “Hex” Freeman and Lurrell Low.

$10 to get in. 100% of proceeds go to support important work in the community.

Doors at 8pm, show starts at 9.

Tickets can be purchased at the door or online HERE. Consider purchasing a ticket for one to donate to someone that can’t afford to be there

Help us get the word out by inviting your friends to our event on Facebook!

Community-Police Relations Forum To Be Held in Frayser

The Community-Police Relations (CPR) Core Group is in your communities, asking the question “What is your vision of community and police relations?” You tell us!

Please join us on Saturday, July 27^th
Noon – 2:00 pm.  (sign in at 11:30 am)
Union Grove Church, 2285 Frayser Blvd.
Hosted by Rangeline CDC, Charlie Caswell.

This forum will give you the opportunity to share your story and vision for Community-Police Relations.  The experience shared will be used to develop and implement concrete changes toward a safer community.  Be a part of the conversation as the community sets the vision of how we will deal with crime and violence in our city as we work to build a better relationship with community and law enforcement.  Be a part of the solution.

For more information, contact:
Melissa Miller-Monie
Organizing Coordinator
901-725-4990
melissa@midsouthpeace.org

The CPR project is a groundbreaking partnership between citizens and law enforcement officers that is challenging both groups to overcome their differences and distrust to work together on the deepest problems of our community.

On the weekend of March 1st through 3rd, we had the first Core Organizer Training of the year. The 14-hour training was attended by seventeen diverse participants, ages 20 to 60, from different social and economic backgrounds, and from varied organizations such as Occupy Memphis, H.O.P.E., M.G.L.C.C., GrowMemphis, CROW and others.

The experience of participating in the Core Organizer Training is completely different each time. The curriculum doesn’t change, but the knowledge and experience brought to the group by each participant is unique.

The Core Organizer Training has been built upon a method called “direct education.” Direct education directly confronts and challenges the current traditional system where there is evidence of injustice in how people are taught. Rather than accepting traditional education at face value, which gives all the expertise to textbooks and to teachers or trainers, direct education invites the expertise of the people themselves. Direct education is about liberation and empowerment.  It calls upon the direct source of wisdom – the group itself!

There is a lot of theorizing in organizing; and people can read book after book, but active exposure in the field – true community organizing – yields invaluable experience.

Direct education also opens a safe space for participants to bring to the circle their knowledge as a human beings, and enables them to take risks. Here, their own life skills are realized and easily applied to the work of organizing. This experiential method of education becomes very powerful for teaching. Participants discover; trust and reinforce their inner power; build confidence in themselves; and experience getting to know a group of supportive people who share that effort.

We believe that every person has a lot of knowledge to offer that is supplemental to their organizing or professional knowledge. The Core Organizer Training offers a space for an individual and group to develop, share and grow such skills.

The topics of the Core Organizer Training are Introduction to Organizing, Organizing your Community, Strategy Planning, Media, Transforming Conflict, Nonviolent Direct Action and Campaign. Each one of these topics are approached in an experiential as well as theoretical way. If you want to make your community a better place to live, or you already are working at organizing your community and will want to learn new tools and skills, this training is for you!

Our next Core Organizing Training will be in Spanish on August, 2013. If you speak Spanish or have friends who speak Spanish let them know about this training. Any cultural experience will also be a plus for this training.

Our next Core Organizing Training in English will be this fall.

Please, if you want to participate in those trainings send us an email or call us to register you in our waiting list.

gio@midsouthpeace.org – 901-725-4990

Upcoming Development Support Workshop

Emotional Support for Men

Men are expected to be self-sufficient and to have all the answers to every problem, which leaves them feeling isolated and alone with their struggles. This workshop will help men to have a safe place to explore past hurts and current patterns based in old hurts, to develop close, healthy relationships with women and men, to become better allies to women and to learn how to interrupt sexism, to reclaim a sense of your own goodness and worth, and more.

When: Saturday, March 16, 1 – 6pm

Where: MSPJC, 3573 Southern Ave. Memphis TN 38111 – wheelchair accessible.

Cost: Sliding scale $25-$50

Registration online or by phone is required, please click here to register.

For more information email at gio@midsouthpeace.org or call us 901-725-4990

Donations for scholarships are gratefully accepted.

Find our events on Facebook at  www.facebook.com/midsouthpeace

A Process Toward Reconciliation

In late spring of 2012, the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center’s coordinator of the Community-Police Relations (CPR) project conducted over twenty one-on-one sessions  with local community leaders, initially asking the question:

“What is your vision for community and police reconciliation in our city?”

Mid-South Peace and Justice Center invited both stakeholders from the community and from law enforcement to a kickoff presentation of the CPR project which began with a dialog about the difficulties between the two groups. First, the participants shared concerns about the using the word ‘reconciliation’,  initially the “R” in the title of the project. They expressed their belief that there cannot be reconciliation without first having relationships, and  wanted to re-frame the question to read: “What is your vision for community and police relations?” And thus, the name of the project was changed from Community-Police Reconciliation to Community-Police Relations.

Community members and members of law enforcement from the Memphis Police Department (MPD) and the Shelby County Sheriff’s Department met in separate circles for several months until November 16, 2012, when these two groups joined. This CPR “core” group has been meeting monthly ever since, working together to face the challenges and overcome the barriers that have traditionally kept community and law enforcement divided at many levels.

The Core group his now entering a second phase, making plans to roll out similar forums for dialog between community members and law enforcement into different communities across the city.

On Friday, February 22, 2013 the group met to address the structures needed to continue the growth of this work.  They determined that in addition to the working groups overseeing facilitation, training, and media/messaging, they would form an outreach working group and a steering committee.  The steering committee — comprised of three members from law enforcement, three community leaders, and the CPR staff at MSPJC — will meet in-between the monthly core group meetings to oversee organizational tasks, and most immediately, to create a proposal for the goals and the format of the community forums to be presented to the core group next month for approval.

CPR is also developing a presentation for the command staff and administration of MPD, and representatives of the Sheriff’s Department, tentatively planned for the end of April. The presentation will be previewed by community leaders and followed by a trial run of the community forum, creating an opportunity for stakeholders to learn more about what the core group has experienced, through various means such as Playback Memphis’ improvisational theater, dialog circles, collective testimony, and sessions to brainstorm solutions.  It will also provide CPR with a chance to see which elements work best in the community forums, and which ones need tweaking before we take them out into other areas of the city.

If you would like to be involved in CPR in any way, please contact us (information below).  As we expand this process, CPR is looking for venues and hosts for the community forums in the coming months – churches, community centers, neighborhood associations and groups, schools, etc.

If you would like more information about bringing CPR to your community or want to host a forum please contact: 

Melissa Miller-Monie
CPR Organizing Coordinator
melissa@midsouthpeace.org
901-725-4990

Providing tools to create: Safety Security and Solutions

H.O.P.E. is the name of a Mid-South Peace and Justice Center sponsored organization whose members are exclusively people who are currently homeless or have formerly experienced homelessness. For over a year now, H.O.P.E. has been organizing and agitating around the issues that are a priority to the homeless community. For meeting times and dates, call 901-300-0006.

A new publication scheduled to launch on March 20th aims to provide a voice as well as opportunity for Memphians with a personal experience of homelessness. ‘The Bridge: Memphis Street Newspaper’ is similar to street news publications in other cities like Nashville and Boston that seek to provide a safe and legal means of income for folks in a tough situation, as well as deliver the stories and opinions of the homeless community to the general public. H.O.P.E. is very excited to see this project launching in the City of Memphis.  We see it as another example of how the conversation is shifting and developing around issues of homelessness and poverty in our city. We also see it as a way our members can share their talents and insights with the larger community. Like ‘The Bridge’ on FB

♥ Project Homeless Connect 3

H.O.P.E. would like to say ‘thank you’ to all our supporters & allies who volunteered last month on Valentine’s Day to show some love for the homeless community with Project Homeless Connect, a massive outreach and service event to break down barriers that make it difficult to leave homelessness. The event was a huge success, with more than 800 volunteers and 720 guests in attendance, 85 of whom were veterans. There were a total of 1049 interviews conducted for housing, 97 consumers assisted with legal issues through the Street Court, 229 vision screenings, 162 medical assessments, 50 prescriptions provided, 88 individuals received Social Security services, 140 people were able to obtain ID’s and 152 haircuts were given.  Project Homeless Connect 4 is set for September of 2013. Check the Community Alliance for the Homeless’  website for more details.

Criminalization of the Homeless- H.O.P.E.’s Ongoing Internal Affairs investigation

On November 15, 2012, at roughly 7:15 pm, H.O.P.E. members were departing from a regular weekly meeting at the Manna House (1268 Jefferson) when they were stopped and harassed by two officers who accused them of ‘obstructing the sidewalk.’ Three members received citations to appear in court on these bogus charges. We had our day in court and the charges were dismissed. However H.O.P.E. members are not content to let this issue rest, as we realize that this type of targeted harassment is an everyday occurrence for many of our brothers and sisters on the street.  On November 16^th, the day following the original incident, H.O.P.E. members filed formal complaints at the Union/Crump Precinct regarding the harassment. Members of H.O.P.E. and witnesses also went to Internal Affairs and filed numerous statements and complaints in order to ensure that this matter was handled properly. After almost four months, we’ve learned a lot about  this process and how frustrating going through all the proper channels can be. We plan on following up this investigation to the satisfaction of our members.

H.O.P.E. members have begun to meet every Friday to form a campaign called Street-Watch which will be doing outreach predominantly in the downtown area to document and address instances of police harassment, and will be working with the public defenders office to organize a series of ‘know your rights’ trainings. stay tuned for more details……………

Feeding the Movement:

H.O.P.E would like to once again thank Just for Lunch and Trolley Stop Market for showing some love by donating meals each month for our weekly H.O.P.E. meetings! We would also like to thank Memphis Center for Independent Living for providing us with space for our meetings while we seek a permanent location. There are lots of ways to feed the movement, and we would like to thank all of our allies for their continued support.

If you are interested in how you can support the work of H.O.P.E. members,please contact Paul Garner @ 901.725.4990 or paul@midsouthpeace.org and don’t forget to ‘like us’ on Facebook for more H.O.P.E. updates!

March 30: Confront the Klan by Building Community.

Creative Arts Building
@ Tiger Lane
Free and Open to the Public
10 a.m. – 5 p.m.

There has been much written and said about the planned March 30th rally of the KKK. This rally is inspired by recent Memphis City Council action changing the names of three Confederate parks, Nathan Bedford Forrest Park, Jefferson Davis Park and Confederate Park. The parks were given temporary placeholder names and their permanent names will be decided later with a great deal of promised public input.

These facts have been presented and these stories covered in the media and discussed in our workplaces, classrooms, places of worship and homes. Yet, it falls to the public, to the people of Memphis and Shelby County to answer one pivotal question. What is to be our response to this?

Some very sincere and passionate people believe in being at the scene of the Klan rally to show, publicly and assertively, that hate-mongers such as the Klan and their ilk are neither welcome or wanted within our community.

March 30th at Tiger Lane (old Fairgrounds) from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. is the date and time of an unprecedented community-wide partnership under the banner of HEART OF MEMPHIS.

HEART OF MEMPHIS will provide an event that is free and open to the public, safe and family friendly. This event will not only have great music, dance, food and culture, but most of all, will focus on building a long-term movement that opposes racism and discrimination of any kind in our city on March 30th and every day thereafter. This pivotal section of the event is the first annual MEMPHIS UNITED: People’s Conference on Race and Equality.

This will be a space where the greater community can hold substantial conversations and dialog about racism – both interpersonal and systemic – in our community. There will be a rich selection of workshops and trainings available around grassroots organizing, nonviolent direct action, mindful communication, anti-racism and anti-oppression organizing and understanding privilege.

What we cannot have is a lot of energy and passion being expended on Saturday the 30th in the name of fighting racism, that all goes away the next day, Easter Sunday; or worse, a repeat of the violence of 1998.

Let’s make this Resurrection Sunday a resurrection of our community’s commitment to building the beloved community. The event is free and I do so hope that Memphians of all races will attend,  bring your children and, join the work of ending our city’s legacy of hate.

I urge all of us to be mindful and do nothing that would play into the hands of racists and for all of us to act responsibly in the coming days.

Please join our Facebook page here: facebook.com/MemphisUnited
Check out the full Heart of Memphis lineup here.

Peace, Salaam, Shalom.

The Memphis Bus Riders Union would like to see you at our 1 year Anniversary celebration!

Saturday March 9th, 12-2pm at the Memphis Center for Independent Living 1633 Madison Ave. (bus #2)

There will be free food, refreshments and birthday cake!

For 1 year bus riders and supporters have been working to bring the issues of transit dependent Memphians to the attention of MATA officials, city government and the public. Because this effort has been carried out by volunteers, supplies are few and hard to come by. As cuts to public transit funding from the city and federal government increase, so do cuts to service. We’re getting organized and your support keeps it going.

*PLEASE BRING AN ITEM FROM OUR WISH LIST*

-Yellow poster board and or foam core
-Yellow printing paper
-stamps
-scotch tape
-staples/clips
-pens/black markers/black or yellow paint/sponge brushes
-clipboards
-clear packing tape
-yellow t-shirts
-black or yellow Speedball silk screen ink
-silk screens

We appreciate your support! 

See you on Saturday, March 9th, 12-2PM

Memphis Center for Independent Living (MCIL) is excited to announce

“Rolling for Independence!”

 This fundraising event will highlight bike lanes in Midtown.

MCIL was one of the groups instrumental in advocacy efforts for this addition to our community! MCIL has a long history of advocacy for people with disabilities in Memphis, working for equality and accessibility for everyone. This wheeling event offers an opportunity for wheelers and rollers of all types to join together for this family friendly celebration and community building event. Your participation will help demonstrate that disability rights are important and that you support accessible communities where everyone is welcome!

Bring the whole family for fun and community building! Ride to honor a particular person, roll with a group or just come by for support. Rolling for Independence will take place on Saturday, March 23rd beginning at 9:30 am and finishing up at noon with lunch and awards at MCIL’s offices at 1633 Madison. This event will offer mapped routes of 2 miles and 20 miles, for the more athletic rollers longer routes can be rolled by repeating either of the mapped routes. Event entry fees begin at $10. Family and group rates are also available. Registration forms and information may be obtained at MCIL or online at http://rollingforindependence-
com.webs.com/. Event sign-in and late registration will begin at 8:30AM on March 23rd for the 20 mile or greater roll. Family and team rollers may sign in from 9AM-10AM. Awards will be given for the team with the most spirit and the individual who has collected the largest total sponsor donations. Helmets are required to participate!

If you have questions regarding this event please Call Sandi at 901-726-6404.

Allison Glass and Jacob Flowers will facilitate MSPJC’s flagship skill building organizer training over the weekend of March 1-3. The Core Organizer Training teaches participants the foundational skills you need to be effective organizers and win on issues that are important to you. If you want to be more effective in the work you’re doing in the community, register here today!

Topics covered include:

• campaign planning,
• tactics,
• coalition building,
• working with and creating your own media,
• conflict transformation,
• meeting facilitation
• nonviolent direct action.

These skills will be taught through hands-on application, resulting in participants having direct experience and practice to that these skills can be immediately implemented. And because this training is skill-based, these skills can be used in any community work in which you are engaged. We will learn together as a group, where all experience and expertise will be honored and shared.

This intensive weekend training will convene Friday 6-9pm, Saturday 9am-5pm, and Sunday 1-5pm at MSPJC, 3573 Southern. You must be present for the entire training, and registration here is required. Please contact Gio at 725-4990 or gio@midsouthpeace.org with any additional questions, and we look forward to learning with you!