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SUCCESS SECRETS OF
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*Organizer, Preserving California Black Heritage conference Sept. 30-Oct. 2 San Francisco
* Presenter, 40th Anniversary, College of Ethnic Studies
San Francisco State University Oct. 7 San Francisco
Retiring While Black
Million African-Americans
leave labor force by August
WASHINGTON -- More than 1.2 million African-Americans left the labor force from August 2008 to August 2009, according to the latest employment situation announcement by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
That meant the employment to population ratio among African-Americans fell from 57.8 percent to 52.8 in a year's time.
The 1.2 million decline of employed from 16,132,000 to 14,929,000 is important because these individuals are not included in the unemployment rate, which is the most widely reported measure from the monthly survey.
Unemployment rates are alarming in their own right, but apparently dramatically understate the impact of the recession on the most severely affected sector of the labor force.
There are 730,000 additional black unemployed nationally to create a jump from 10.7 percent in August 2008 to 15.1 percent in August 2009. BLS reports that 1,925,000 blacks were unemployed in August 2008; while 2,655,000 were unemployed in August 2009. However, the total employed dropped from 16,132,000 in August 2008 to 14.929,000.
A quirk in the way unemployment rates are calculated tends to underrepresent those
out of work the longest. The traditional unemployment rate only includes those who are actively looking for work in the past month. Those who haven't attempted to seek a job during that period are excluded from the calculation. These "discouraged" workers often do not qualify for benefits such as unemployment insurance or training.
The figures show that the rise in umemployment only accounts for just over half of the decline in the ranks of black employed.
Such gloomy statistics are a further indication that the most effective step to reduce unemployment among those actively seeking work and a return to the workforce for those who have become discouraged is the growth in black entrepreneurship promoted through National Black Business Month.
Buy Now
Christian Science Monitor June 14, 2009
Consumer dollars concentrated in 13 states with $400 billion in income
WALLS COME TUMBLING DOWN
State of Black Business 2009 sixth edition
Ranks state by state for black business affinity index; with most up-to-date national and regional information on black businesses and consumer markets.
The impetus for the report and National Black Business Month was civil engineer Frederick E. Jordan, current president of the San Francisco African-American Chamber of Commerce and author of the book The Lynching of the American Dream.
He commissioned the study because of the lack of reliable, real-time information on African-American entrepreneurs. The information in Walls Come Tumbling Down is five years more up to date than the most recent Census studies most commonly cited.
SAN FRANCISCO- Thirteen states have a estimated $20 billion or more of aggregate income among their black consumers, reports Walls Come Tumbling Down: the State of Black Business, sixth edition.. During National Black Business Month, consumers are urged to seek out at least one black business each day during August 2009.
At the website blackbusinessmonth.com,supporters are given suggestions on types of for-profit and non-profit businesses to support each day.
"African-American consumers spend 50 percent more time shopping than the general population," notes Walls Come Tumbling Down..
The states with the highest black aggregate income are, in order: New York, California, Georgia, Texas, Florida, Maryland, Illinois, Virginia, North Carolina, New Jersey, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsyvania.
The policy environment makes a difference in the business climate for African-American entrepreneurs in those states. For instance, Texas and Florida have black populations of 2.9 million, but Florida has 26,000 more black businesses.
Maryland's black population of 1.7 million contains 49,918 black self-employed workers, but Pennsylvania's 1.4 million population only has 25,064
One of the goals of National Black Business Month and the State of Black Business report is to allow policy makers and the public to benchmark the effectiveness of various strategies.
John William Templeton, executive editor of blackmoney.com and co-founder of National Black Business Month in 2004, says, "These number indicate the impact consumers can have on economic development and job creation by supporting the 1.2 million African-American entrepreneurs. during August and through the entire year.
Bayview's Last Stand: Protecting Historic Black Neighborhoods: Sept. 30-Oct.2
could be irreversably lost.
Karina Muniz, outreach coordinator of the Los Angeles Conservancy, works with a Hispanic neighborhood facing similar development pressures , Pico-Union, as part of a national outreach to diverse groups effort funded by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
She will participate in the Preserving California Black Heritageconference to discuss the application of the California Environmental Quality Act for historic preservation.
Bayview/Hunters Point has a rich tradition of community organization, including an extensive network of block clubs and gardeners during the 1960s.
Robert Simms, editor of The Spokeman, a newspaper
SAN FRANCISCO -- The economics of historic preservation usually mean displacement and invisiblity for African-Americans.
However, there is an increasing awareness among scholars, affordable housing advocates and community members that historic preservation programs can be used to protect and enhance African-American communities.
Several conferences, including a preservation conference in Atlanta this week, Breaking the Color Line, which focuses on national parks; the Association for the Study of African-American Life and History in Cincinnati next week, and the third annual Preserving California Black Heritage conference Sept. 30-Oct. 2 are coalescing those efforts. The theme for Preserving California Black Heritage is Bayview's Last Stand:
Protecting Historic Black Neighborhoods. The conference, in several venues along the main street of Bayview, Third Street, begins with a focus on the economics of historic preservation led by Rick Moss, historian member of the State HIstorical Resources Commission, and Ed Donaldson, housing coordinator for the San Francisco Housing Development Corp.. Both grew up in a San Francisco which had a black population which topped 12 percent as late as 1970.
That was the year before the closing of the Hunters Point Shipyard, the main employment magnet for Bayview and the Western Addition neighborhoods.
The shipyard, an EPA Superfund site, still managed to protect the Bayview community from gentrification until a new Mission Bay biotechnology complex emerged from a railyard which separated
Bayview from downtown San Francisco. The complex includes office parks, condos and a new campus for the University of California-San Francisco.
Now, the 19th century buildings of Bayview-Hunters Point, which date back as far as the Civil War, are in the sights of buyers who are attracted by the relatively low prices in the most expensive housing market in the nation.
Combine that with the concentration of 95 percent of foreclosures in the southeast part of the city which includes Bayview/Hunters Point and the OMI neighborhood, with another concentration of black homeowners, and the historic cultural landscape of the community, which is protected under preservation laws
published in Bayview from 1964 to 1970, recalls that "people have really kept the houses up. Blacks preserved that housing stock when no one else wanted to live there."
Simms leads a Conversation with Robert Simms: Bayview in the 1960s program on Friday, Oct. 2 at the conclusion of the conference at 6 p.m.
Among the models shared during the conference are programs like that initiated by Texas Rep. Garnet Coleman in Houston's Third Ward.. Coleman has attracted $15 million to buy up properties in danger of gentrification, the process of displacing low-income dwellers with higher-income in-migrants who can pay more for the buildings. Another program in Philadelphia, led by Melissa Jest, is helping to stablize the Yorktown community there through preservation strategies.
new products
San Jose Mercury News, Oakland Tribune and Contra Costa Times, April 5, 2009
Policymakers to watch
INCREASING BLACK ENTREPRENEURSHIP
The best way to reduce black unemployment
The sixth edition of the State of Black Business notes that African-American unemployment, now over 15 percent, can most effectively be reduced by increasing black entrepreneurship.
With 1.2 million black businesses, adding just one employee would reduce black unemployment below the national average.
In this year's edition, we calculate a ratio of black/white self-employment for each state with more than 1,000 black firms. In most jurisdictions, there is a 2 to 1 gap. There is a similar gap in unemployment rates between African-Americans and the general labor force on the national level.
With major industrial employers such as automakers shrinking their labor forces, governments laying off workers, it is the entrepreneural sector which is the only practical alternative. By visiting at least one black business a day during August and patronizing the firms that earn your business, you help spread the "reciprocity virus."
Black Students Internet Guide 2009
More than 400 sites which support the education of learners of African descent. Great classroom and homework tool includes 50 Most Important African-Americans in Technology.
New York Society of Security Analysts newsletter
October 2008
New faces in the Obama administration include (from left) U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, FDA Administrator Dr. Margaret Hamburg, Surgeon General-designate Dr. Regina Benjamin, Daniel Hinson, new director of the Minority Business Development Agency and Dennis Hightower, deputy commerce secretary.
IMPORTANT EVENT FOR SCHOLARS,
PROPERTY OWNERS, PLANNERS,
Preserving California Black Heritage
Third Annual Conference
Sept. 30-Oct. 2, 2009
San Francisco
Topics include
Legacy of black architects in the Golden State
The architectural heritage of black churches
Infusion of African-American heritage in classrooms
Preservation and neighborhood revitalization
REGISTER
To participate in
National Black
Business Month
and catch
the reciprocity
viru,s
e-mail us
http://www.blackbusinessmonth.com
provides suggested ways to support
black entrepreneurs for each of the
31 days of August 2009.
