Category Archives: news

Ras Baraka Fights a Historic Tide in Newark Mayoral Race

Posted on by toddpanther

Ras Baraka

I’ve made some corrections to this since the first version went out to the Black press yesterday.

 

SOUTH ORANGE, N.J. – History keeps colliding with the present as Ras Baraka, a Newark city councilperson and city school principal, is exactly one week away from finding out if he will become mayor of Newark, New Jersey’s largest city.

In a press conference in front of his campaign headquarters Tuesday, Baraka accused his opponent, Seton Hall University Law School professor Shavar Jeffries, of openly being supported by outsiders who are attempting to buy the Newark election. He spent a lot of time talking about Newark First, an independent group that has poured almost $2 million into Jeffries’ coffers.

Newark First, charged Baraka, is aligned with Education Reform Now, a group out of New York City that pushes for the creation of charter schools.

A Google search at deadline for Newark First resulted in no website. Education Reform Now describes itself on its website as “a non-partisan 501c3 organization (that) is committed to ensuring that all children can access a high-quality public education regardless of race, gender, geography, or socio-economic status.”

Much of this election is based on who is going to control education in the city. Since 1995, the state has controlled the Newark school district, and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s appointed Newark superintendent, Cami Anderson, is, like Christie, much maligned here.

Baraka, calling the situation with Newark First “a money laundering scheme,” complained that most of the group’s money was given to Jeffries by anonymous donors. “Shavar Jefrries has raised more than any person in the race. We’re not upset that he raised more money. We’re upset that we don’t know where the money is coming from.”

The press conference came hours after Jeffries, standing in front of Newark City Hall, accused Baraka of accepting $4,400 in “pay to play” campaign contributions from companies in no-bid contracts with the city over the past two years. Baraka denied the charges in a newspaper interview and at the press conference Tuesday, saying that the contributions were well within the city’s executive order and that those who donated, according to the law, can’t do business in the city for a year.

Amid the charges and counter-charges, and the heckling of the rival campaign at each other’s public events, a name Baraka mentioned set off my historical Spider-Sense: Adubato. Baraka mentioned that the Jeffries campaign was aligned with both Newark First and “the Adubato machine.”

I first thought he meant Steve Adubato Jr., an influential local broadcaster, as the major power broker in Essex County, the county of which Newark is its political hub. But a friend of mine quickly corrected me: He meant Steve Adubato Sr., a major Newark power broker who was instrumental in stopping a man by the name of Amiri Baraka—the leader of the city’s Black power and arts movements and a major, national figure—from building Kawaida Towers, an African-centered cultural center and apartment complex in Newark.

The elder Baraka was stymied by the unions, Adubato Sr.’s machine and the Mafia. (Before Mayor Kenneth Gibson became the first Black mayor of Newark in 1970, the Mafia openly controlled the city.) Baraka’s political movement put Gibson in office, but as far as Kawaida Towers was concerned, Gibson’s hands were tied, Black elected city officials chose sides, and Baraka’s plans and movement fizzled.

baraka 1970 in at lanta

Is history trying to at least rhyme, if not outright repeat itself? It seems so. The surnames remain the same, and maybe not just that.

Amiri Baraka died in January of this year. His legacy is his children.

The Newark mayoral election determines who will have disproportionate power in Essex County, which means the mayor will have influence in how the county will lean in state races, including the one that will replace Christie.

Newark may be a post-Black Power city in 2014, but red, black and green scraps remain amid the street debris. A large amount of people in the city are poor, and many are under-educated, but they are not stupid. They know who stands for, and against, them.

In Newark: Scrambled Notes No. 2

Posted on by toddpanther

popMay Day in the Brick City. the People’s Organization for Progress had a march downtown (and this photo isn’t it; this is a, uh, web “file” photo 🙂 ). I began my journalistic career 29 years ago covering POP. Lawrence Hamm (far right, in the back with the gray hair), 60, has literally dedicated his life to struggle for social justice in Newark and Northern New Jersey. One of the stops on the march was City Hall, which, at least for me, had more resonance than usual less than two weeks before the election.

(It was great to see Hamm again, and for more than one reason: he was recovering from a bad car accident!)

At the end of the rally, I walked the one block back to City Hall. The Ras Baraka campaign song Mrs. Baraka played for me was blasting loud. A few minutes later, I saw three people carrying Jeffries signs get into an unmarked van and drive away.

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Thanks to my friend, teacher’s union rep Annette Alston (“charter school” is a four-letter word to her :)) , I get to meet the candidate briefly at an Ironbound restaurant. He is exhausted.

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I go to the POP meeting (my first time in 29 years [!], since my past identity as an “objective” journalist would have felt out-of-place), and the candidate’s there, to the surprise of all gathered.  He’s taking the last of a Q+A when we walk in the basement of the church that Martin Luther King spoke at the last week of his life. I hear him mention that it’s time to re-brand Newark as an international city–a name worthy of a major seaport and international airport.  The nickname “Brick City” belongs to the old, industrial era, he said.

At the meeting, the GOTV effort for the candidate was discussed–who can drive folks to the polls, etc. A good May Day.

 

In Newark: Scrambled Notes No. 1

Posted on by toddpanther

Newark-NJ-Banner-3

So I’m at the corner of Broad and Market streets in downtown Newark (the intersection of two major thoroughfares) about an hour ago, and I’m talking to a woman who is leaning toward supporting Ras Baraka for mayor. She tells me how Central High School, the school Ras Baraka was principal of, is now much cleaner and “no one is roaming the halls.”

I go into the McDonald’s to make some change. A brother is in a wheelchair scooter with a Newark Fraternal Order of Police badge on it. He has on a “Team Baraka” jacket on and he’s passing out a newspaper-formatted flyer showing how much money Shavar Jeffries has raised–by outsiders. A sister sitting diagonally from me in the next set of seats gives me her copy. I open it and see the ugliest picture of Gov. Chris Christie Baraka’s people could find. I ask the sister who she is voting for, and she says she’s waiting until the upcoming debate to decide.

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Watching the campaign commercials. The worst thing Jeffries can think of to say against Baraka is that he’s run for office for 20 years and actually used his expense accounts?!? Really? Is that allyagot? No wonder he needs $1 million-plus.

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I saw Amina Baraka the night I came in, on Saturday. (My friend, Liam McGrath, who I hitchhiked with from Maryland and a former SUNY-Stonybrook student of Baraka’s, was with me.) As usual, I barged in Mr. Baraka’s house, unannounced.  Well, clearly not as usual now. Not surprisingly, his spirit wafts throughout the place.  She played for us a campaign song a local recording artist made. She is very proud. I am trying to keep the memories at bay while drowning in them.