News

Help us in supporting a long time member and volunteer, Tommy Foster. Your generous donation can help relieve Tommy’s overwhelming medical debt!

As those of us who know him can tell you (and who doesn’t know Tommy?) he is a multimedia artist and endlessly creative entrepreneur. He brought Java Cabana to the Cooper-Young neighborhood along with his First Church Of Elvis Impersonators and the Viva Memphis Wedding Chapel where he solemnized over 500 marriages. He’s also the father of Memphis artist and activist Bennett Foster.

Tommy has stage 4 Metastatic (it has spread from where it originated) poorly differentiated (this means it is immature, this is not something we favor) adenocarcinoma (the type of cells in that are cancerous) and has spread to the bone.

Recently, Tommy’s cancer spread to his liver.

Though he has undergone chemo, raditation and an experimental treatment, including Keytruda fusions at the West Clinic, they have had no effect. He finished a 3rd round of radiation on his pelvis in May. He is no longer able to walk without a walker, or drive a car, let alone earn an income. Medical bills from treatments and high prescription costs are piling up, and Medicare doesnt come close to covering these expenses.

Tommy wants to thank you all for the love you’ve shown him throughout this battle. He will keep fighting with your continued support.

To make a donation to help the Foster family please click the link below:
https://www.gofundme.com/tommy-fosters-medical-fund

Help us welcome Faith Pollan, the Mid-South Peace & Justice Center‘s newest team addition!

Faith Pollan was born in Lakeland, FL and grew up in Memphis. She graduated from Christian Brothers University in 2012 with a Bachelors in Business Administration with a concentration in Management. Faith became involved with the Green Party of Shelby County as well as phone banking efforts for Tami Sawyer during the 2016 election cycle. She has served as the events committee chair for the Memphis Feminist Collective since the winter of 2016. In the fall of 2016, Faith formed the Mid-South Reproductive Rights Coalition in an effort to better unify volunteer efforts for local sexual health organizations. She recently joined the MSPJC team as a community organizing coordinator as part of the Juvenile Justice Project.

MATA Public Input – New 31?

“MATA is hosting a public meeting tonight at the Benjamin Hooks Library to gather your input on new service changes, including a partial restoration of the 31 Crosstown. MBRU will be there to speak on the record in favor of the new 31, and of expanding the proposal to fully restore service.

If you are not able to attend, you can still help. Please send your comments for the full restoration of the 31 Crosstown to MATA’s transit planners via email, post, or phone!

(Facebook link: https://www.facebook.com/events/1826288477699188/)

We also have a general meeting coming up on June 10th, from 12-2 PM at the Cossitt Library! We’ll be discussing the ongoing 31 campaign and our plans for the summer. Hope you can make it!”

PERL has a general interest meeting TOMORROW, May 25 from 6-7 at the Mid-South Peace & Justice Center.

We welcome anyone to attend, especially if you have concerns about sexual violence in the community. At the meeting we will work on our community action plan to hold the Memphis Police Department accountable for its handling of sex crimes.

To RSVP for PERL’s General Meeting on Facebook, click here.

Also, don’t forget about PERL’s bi-weekly peer support group meetings, open to all victims of sexual assault and rape, happening at the same location @ 6PM. Below is the schedule for these particular meetings.

On May 23, MBRU held a “31 Crosstown Lobby Day” at City Hall, where we presented more than 2,000 petition signatures (and counting!) to the Memphis City Council. Members of the City Council have shown a lot of support for the route, and Councilwoman Swearengen even called it “a slap in the face” of citizens not to bring the route back. Thank you to all our members and allies who showed up, showed out, and helped with rides!

Coming up, we’ll be taking our campaign to the Benjamin L. Hooks Library on May 31, where MATA will hold an input meeting for their latest proposed service changes from 5-7 PM. Come out, speak out, and show your support for the full restoration of the 31 Crosstown! If you are not able to attend, you can still help. Please send your comments for the full restoration of the 31 Crosstown to MATA’s transit planners! You can contact them via email at: publiccomments@matatransit.com

To RSVP via the Facebook event page, click here.

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions is coming to Memphis this Thursday and we are asking the entire community to come out and join us as we call on our local elected and appointed leaders in our criminal justice system to stay at work and not attend.

The appointment of Jeff Sessions represents a major step backwards in our criminal justice system and to positive oversight and reform efforts in police accountability. His previous remark on crime which included Memphis seeks to use our serous problems and capitalize on them to feed into fear and division and lead us further into the arms of the prison industrial complex.
Our local leaders parrot the same lines when they should be protecting us and speaking out with us.

Jeff Sessions and his President use terrorizing language and cruel policies towards our undocumented brothers and sisters, which divides families and destroys lives.
Yet our local leaders are silent on the matter or pass the buck.

Jeff Session believes that violence inflicted on our LGBTQ neighbors is not a hate crime and has a record of supporting repeatedly supported laws that criminalize LGBTQ activity, and using them to harass LGBTQ couples and individuals
Yet our local leaders are silent on the matter or pass the buck.

Untested Rape Kits is a national crisis and is a local one as well. Jeff Session voted against the Violence against Women’s Act THREE times and opposed RAPE being listed as a hate crime.
Yet our local leaders are silent on the matter or pass the buck.

This is a man whose pronounced racism urged Coretta Scott King to write the words “Mr. Sessions has used the awesome powers of his office in a shabby attempt to intimidate and frighten elderly black voters. For this reprehensible conduct, he should not be rewarded with a federal judgeship.” …and here in the city where Coretta Scott King’s husband was murdered as we approach the 50th anniversary of his murder it is almost sacrilege that anyone who calls themselves a public servant for the people of Memphis to allow themselves to be used for a cheap media stop.

That is why we say he should not be welcomed here in the city where every issue we grapple with locally is either taking a step back or issues already ignored will continue to be ignored under a Sessions term as Attorney General.

We call on District Attorney Amy Weirich, Shelby County Sheriff Bill Oldham, Memphis Police Director Mike Rallings and our City and county Mayors Mark Luttrell and Jim Strickland to serve your community by staying at your jobs and do not legitimize this photo op with our presence.

We urge all of you to come and bring your issues.

This action is hosted by Mid-South Peace and Justice Center, NAACP, Sister Reach, Official Black Lives Matter, Coalition of Concerned Citizens, Memphis Grassroots Organization, Indivisible Memphis, Our Revolution901, Comunidades Unidas en Una Voz, Tennessee Young Democrats, P.E.R.L, M.B.R.U. and our community members!

Please share the Facebook event page and invite your friends and family. We are in this together!!

Join us on Thursday, May 11th, as we CONTINUE to watch the watchers!

Activists and community members fought long and hard to re-establish Memphis’ Civilian Law Enforcement Review Board (CLERB), to review cases deemed unsustained or unfounded by MPD’s Internal Affair. So far this year, FOUR cases have been sustained by CLERB in favor of civilian complaintants.

By ordinance, the police director has 10 days to respond publicly to these recomendations and explain what he will or will not do in response. Instead the Director waited until last Friday (14 business days later) to send his reponse, and it wasn’t encouraging.

Aside from some glaring factual errors contained within the letters, Director Rallings made it clear that he has no intention of taking CLERB’s recommendations into consideration, a slap in the face to complainants who have waited years for some semblance of justice.

We have heard the Director give frequent lip service to accountability and transparency, but his actions to the contrary speak much louder. This sends a message to the public and to police officers that this department has no interest in reform and that they will go above and beyond to protect dirty cops from oversight and accountability.

Last month, CLERB began hearing the case of Mr. Marcus Walker from 2011, when police beat and pepper sprayed him after a faulty LPR scanner flagged his car for “possible suspended license” This month CLERB will continue to hear this case.

Complainants like Mr. Walker have had to relive the traumatic experiences in the public eye, and have their character questioned as if they are the accused. They didn’t ask for that, they only asked for justice. Now, there’s not much assurance that Director Rallings will take any recommendations for reform or accountability under serious consideration. Please join us tomorrow, and help provide moral support to complainants like Mr. Walker.

Join us!  Thursday, May 11th, City Hall (125 N Main, 5th Floor)

4-6PM (Public Meeting, so come and go as you please)
#PoliceAccountability #WatchTheWatchers
****Free Parking on Mud Island Lot (Poplar & Front)****