Speak Out Today! Wear Red!

We need you today and wearing something red. Red means "We Won't REpeat the Defeat!" Meaning, the defeat of 50 years ago where broken promises were never kept and repeated displacement, lack of investment and benign neglect has been the order of the day in the Historic Hill District of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

City Planning Commission Hearing
200 Ross Street, Downtown Pgh
Come at 2pm, 3pm, 4pm, 5pm, 6pm.
After school.
After work.
As you are.

So, give us three minutes and we will change the course of history forever. Whether we stop the City Planning Commission vote or not today, you need to come and show your support. Show the City of Pittsburgh, Allegheny County, the State of Pennsylvania and this entire nation that you care about one of the world's most famous neighborhoods and most importantly, that you care about poor and working-class people who are standing up to Big Businesses that get loads of corporate welfare but don't want to give much of anything back to the community. Show that you care about people who refuse to be "built upon" and gentrified, thereby making it displacement #3 and #4. We live here. We work here. We play here. All we ask is that by showing up, wearing red and speaking out, you support our cause of proper reinvestment, FULL representation of the Hill (including but not limited to One Hill) and self-determination.

If you need a ride from the Hill, there will be buses running from Grace Memorial Church (Upper Hill), Wesley Center AME Zion Church (Middle Hill) and the Hill House (Lower Hill). Call 412-621-9612. Spread the word.

"We Won't Repeat the Defeat!"

We Won't Repeat the Defeat!: Speaking Truth To and About Power

Greetings folks,

Three important announcements where we request your attendance/participation:

1. One Hill CBA Coalition meeting Monday, January 07, 2008, Hill House Kaufmann Auditorium, 1835 Centre Ave, 6:00pm

2. City Planning Commission Hearing, January 14, 2008, 200 Ross Street, Downtown Pittsburgh, 2:00pm – Come prepared to support and to speak on our behalf for three minutes!

3. Watch our speeches from the last Planning Commission Meeting on Dec. 11, 2007:

“We Won’t Repeat the Defeat!: Historic Hill vs. Big Business”

Part I: Don Carter, Planning Consultant, Pittsburgh Penguins

Part II: Carmen Pace, George Moses, Tim Stevens

Part III: Evan Frazier, Sheila Petite, Carl Redwood

Part IV: Terri Baltimore, Rev. Foster, Bomani Howze

Part V: Marimba Milliones and Kimberly Ellis

Part VI: Rev. Glenn Grayson, Rev. Thomas Smith, Eugene Taylor

Part VII: Brenda Tate and Minister Jasiri X

A Bit of History

As many of you may know, the Historic Hill District community is in the middle of a revolution for the 21^st Century. The two major issues that have swung our neighborhood into action centered around the gaming applications for the State of Pennsylvania and the three gaming applicants for the City of Pittsburgh’s sole slots license---one of whom sought to place their casino right at our front door (and the only applicant seeking to place their casino in our neighborhood). This would not have occurred without the local nods that collaborated in thinking this would be a good idea. Due to the success of State Representative Jake Wheatley and the Hill District Gaming Task Force in informing the community and the Raise Your Hand! No Casino on the Hill Campaign (including the activist Hill ministers) in mobilizing the community to take a stand against the Isle of Capri Casino Company and the “Pittsburgh First” (Hill District Last) organization, we successfully defeated their plans on December 20, 2006, when the Category II slots license was granted to another competitor---Don Barden’s Majestic Star Casino, to be placed on the North Shore.

Today, our major point of contention is with some of the same group of persons who sought to place this casino at our front door but were granted huge public subsidy and public lands to build their new arena, also at our front door. A new arena, of course, is a totally different development from a casino, which could be much easily supported, however, the responsibility of a large, multimillion dollar corporation such as the Pittsburgh Penguins hockey team (with a billion dollar owner-Ron Burkle), coupled with gargantuan public subsidy demands that we insist on proper reinvestment to the low income, working-class community that must host this arena---the Historic Hill.

Thus, in 2006, the Hill District Gaming Task Force insisted on a Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) in its Ten Point Key-Reinvestment Proposal given to each gaming applicant. In January 2007, a small group of individuals representing Hill residents, organizations and clergy stood in icy cold weather at the present Civic Arena to demand a seat at the table and prevent the Pittsburgh Pens from signing a lease with the City and County with little or no regard for Hill residents whose neighborhood hosts the arena. In April 2007, many of these same persons issued a term sheet with a list of demands for reinvestment (based on the points of the 2006 Hill District Gaming Task Force), followed by the creation of the One Hill CBA Coalition (with the support of City Councilor Tonya Payne), which started a community process to develop planks, asks and a “Blueprint for a Livable Hill” document that shaped negotiations for the CBA.

Unfortunately, because neither the City, County nor Pittsburgh Penguins had produced or signed a CBA or a plan of reinvestment with the Hill District community, we all had to come together at the City Planning Commission Hearing on December 11, 2007 to request that the Commission vote “No” on passing the Pens’ plan for the arena until they responded to further community concerns around planning and signed a legally binding contract for proper reinvestment.

The videos listed above capture that hearing and Part I of our testimony. We have yet to sign a CBA or gain proper reinvestment for our community, so we ask that you support our cause by writing letters, making phone calls, hitting the streets and coming to the January 14^th meeting, in particular.

Countdown to a CBA and Proper Reinvestment

This was an old post that I did not get back to but here it is now, still relevant and clarifying.

The questions are:

Will the Pittsburgh Penguins hockey team (as a corporate entity, we are not talking about the players and/or fans), which has been siphoning off of the Black Hill District community for decades and benefited from the government's benign neglect of the Hill, ever give anything substantial back to the community, especially now that the corporation has received millions of dollars of public subsidy (we pay taxes, too!)?

There are two groups of representatives bodies at the table seeking proper reinvestment and/or a Community Benefits Agreement:

1. The Hill District ministers, residents and stakeholder's group - a representative body of persons who stood in the freezing cold, in front of the arena on January 28, 2007, to demand Hill representation at the table, as news media and others reported the Pens were slated to sign their lease agreement with the Sports and Exhibition Authority (SEA) and the County in order to stay in the city. And, the group of persons who presented a "term sheet" of their own in April 2007, which included a demand for a CBA as well as other forms of reinvestment, such as 30% minority employment, first source hiring, a community development fund, appointment to boards, control of our land, etc.

2. The One Hill CBA Coalition, formed in June 2007, with relative ease, particularly after this first group secured an agreement to allow for six months to engage in a CBA process. This is a worthy cause, as CBAs are popping up all across the country. However, since this would be the first time such an agreement would occur within the state of Pennsylvania, let alone the city of Pittsburgh, it was imperative that the Hill District community issue its own agenda to ensure proper reinvestment. The One Hill CBA was empowered and funded by Pittsburgh UNITED (Unions and Neighborhoods Investing in Transforming Economic Development), which was funded by a number of foundations but mostly the Falk Fund and the Heinz Endowments.

In short, Pittsburgh UNITED was slated to be a new era of a Civil Rights Movement (or maybe even a Poor People's Campaign) that would provide institutional change and ensure that a CBA would be the standard for any large development with public subsidy.

Well, let's just say that the dream still eludes us; and for many reasons that I won't get into at this point in time. However, the strengths and weaknesses of all of these groups within the importance of this entire cause will be explored as I continue to outline the happenings in the final lapses of this here hockey ring.

As of this moment, the Pens have refused to provide any funds whatsoever for the Community Development fund and have not signed off on any other plank or concern. Neither has the City. Neither has the County.

Yet, the Pens must go before City Planning on December 11th and the general trajectory of a CBA campaign is that if there is no signed agreement, the community will ask that City Planning NOT approve the plan of the developer. If there is a signed agreement, the community agrees to support the developer.

Our City Council Representative, Tonya Payne, is in the unique position of also being a URA Board member and has a 'special' relationship with the Pens. And, yet, Payne stopped coming to One Hill meetings over a month ago and there is no agreement signed with One Hill, the group she used to try to isolate and eradicate those whom she believes are aligned with her rival and former incumbent challenger, Sala Udin. She won the election but one cannot tell based on her continued paranoia and negative, divisive behavior.

Now, Mayor Ravenstahl, who just won re-election with a 10-1 margin in Black communities over his competitor, Mark DeSantis (R), definitely owes. And it goes without saying that he has a 'special relationship' with the Pens, as he flew off into the sunset on Ron Burkle's jet months ago and more recently, was treated to a charity golf game to the tune of thousands of dollars. Fine. But Pens' fans were not your swing vote and you did not have a 10-1 margin over your competitor anywhere else.

Perhaps that's why he was still campaigning in the Historic Hill District on election day. I heard he came by the Madison elementary school (now closed, btw) twice.

(thanks, Agent Ska, great work!)

So, all that to say it'll be interesting when the Dec. 11th City Planning hearing arrives; and even more interesting during the January vote.