L to R : Corey Martin, Miriam Leftwich, Hodges Smith, Dr.Carol P. Zippert and Carrie Logan, Director of the Chamber. Smith, Martin and Zippert were honored as citizens of the year. Leftwich and Ralph Liverman (not shown) were honored for volunteer of the year.
March 30, 2023. At Thursday night’s banquet, the Eutaw Area Chamber of Commerce honored citizens and volunteers of the year. Vaughn Poe, Greene County resident and Director of the Alabama Real Estate Commission in Montgomery was keynote speaker.
Apr. 1, 2023 (GIN) – The Wangari Maathai Foundation observed the late Nobel laureate Wangari Maathai’s birthday on April 1 with a call to invest in the planet.
“Wangari literally invested her life from a young age in this planet,” foundation CEO Njeri Kabeberi said. “As we celebrate the day God gave her to the world, and in the run-up to the International Mother Earth Day (April 22), let us begin to contemplate what each of us shall invest in the planet.”
Dr Wangari Muta Maathai founded the Green Belt Movement in 1977 to plant trees across Kenya, alleviate poverty and end conflict. She mobilized Kenyans, particularly women, to plant more than 30 million trees in 30 years and inspired the United Nations to launch a campaign that has led to the planting of 11 billion trees worldwide.
More than 900,000 Kenyan women benefited from her tree-planting campaign by selling seedlings for reforestation.
She was, notably, a woman of many firsts. Wangari was the first woman from Central and East Africa to earn a doctorate, obtaining her PhD from the University of Nairobi in 1971, and the first Black and African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize ‘for her contribution to sustainable development, democracy and peace’ in 2004.
After graduating, Maathai became involved in a number of humanitarian organizations, including the Kenyan Red Cross, the Environmental Liaison Centre and the National Council of Women of Kenya.
Maathai’s work led her to observe a correlation between poverty and environmental degradation, based on experiences of food security and water scarcity in rural Kenya. Environmental issues in Kenya today include deforestation, soil erosion, desertification, water shortage and degraded water quality, flooding, poaching, and domestic and industrial pollution.
Prof. Maathai was appointed Goodwill Ambassador for the Congo Basin Forest Ecosystem, the world’s “second lung” after the Amazon Rainforest. Her four books (The Green Belt Movement, Unbowed, The Challenge for Africa, and Replenishing the Earth) and the documentary Taking Root: The Vision of Wangari Maathai expanded on and deepened the key concepts behind the Green Belt Movement’s work and approach.
The work of Professor Maathai and the Green Belt Movement continues to stand as a testament to the power of grassroots organizing, proof that one person’s simple idea—that a community should come together to plant trees, can make a difference.
Her legacy truly lives on through the Movement which to date remains in the frontline of advocating for environmental conservation in Kenya and making great progress on reclaiming and restoring forest land.
The Green Belt Movement has inspired similar movements in many other African countries and continues to help combat rural hunger, desertification and water crises in over 30 countries.
Yet her story and her accomplishments remain virtually untold throughout the global North, despite her activism creating significant change and a lasting impact on women’s lives and the environment today.
Maathai died in 2011 at the age of 71.
The Foundation will launch its second strategic plan this month on International Mother Earth Day with the theme ‘Invest in our planet’.
Another quarter of Black women ages 25 to 34 surveyed said they were sent home from work because of their hair.
By Claretta Bellamy, NBC News
A majority of Black women say they feel they have to change their hair just to be taken seriously for job opportunities and in professional settings, according to a survey commissioned by LinkedIn and Dove. Approximately 1,000 Black women ages 25 to 64, both part-time and full-time employees, took part in the CROWN Research Study. Some 66% of them said they had changed their hair for a job interview to lessen the chances of being passed over due to hair discrimination. Twenty-five percent of Black women said they believed they were denied a job interview because of their hair. When looking at the data, said Andrew McCaskill, a senior director of global communications and career expert for LinkedIn, workplaces need “to work better” for women in general, but especially Black women. This is particularly pertinent now that more Black women are opting to wear their natural hair instead of straightening their hair with chemical relaxers, which reportedly can increase the risk of developing uterine cancer. Once they have landed their jobs, Black women with textured hair are twice as likely to experience microaggressions in the workplace compared to Black women with straight hair. And 25% of Black women ages 25 to 34 surveyed said they were sent home from work because of their hair. Black women and young Black professionals have shared conversations about their own hair journey through Dove’s #BlackHairIsProfessional campaign which, McCaskill said, provides a safe space to do so. In one LinkedIn post, a Black woman shared a screenshot of a message she received online criticizing her natural hair — saying she needs to “tone it down and make it flat” while also labeling the woman’s hair as “scary.” The woman shared her own selfie wearing her natural hair and said instead, she decided to “TURN IT UP & PUFF IT OUT!” Experiencing hair discrimination at an early point in a Black professional’s career can cause an automatic “disconnect of belonging” and a loss of confidence in their skills, McCaskill said. One example he cited is a young Black worker not getting the anticipated reaction for their work because the manager “is focused on something like their hair,” he said. “What we know is that, as you get more mature in your career, you’re typically also more confident in your skills that you have and what you bring to the table,” McCaskill said. “For younger folks, these types of aggressions and microaggressions can cause real angst for them in terms of even to the point of doubting their skills and saying, ‘I can’t do this anymore.’” Efforts to advance legislation have been implemented on a state and national level. The House passed the Crown Act last March to ban hair-related discrimination. California was also the first state to ban hair discrimination in 2019, with a list of other states following suit, including Massachusetts, which passed its anti-hair discrimination law last July. Companies can foster belonging among Black employees by “giving people space for their authenticity at work and being intentional about it,” McCaskill said. And most importantly, they need to “believe Black women when they have the bravery and courage to say that they are experiencing microaggressions and or hair discrimination at work.” LinkedIn, McCaskill said, provides diversity, equity and inclusion courses on topics such as uncovering unconscious bias in recruiting and interviewing. But he also said Black professionals should protect their own identity and expression. “If your authentic self and your authentic hair are not welcome in that space, that’s probably not a space where you will be able to thrive anyway, he said.”
DoD Secretary Lloyd Austin and Alabama Senator Tommy Tubberville
By: Josh Moon, Alabama Political Reporter
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, in a rare offensive, spent some time during Tuesday’s Senate Armed Services hearing to publicly call out Alabama Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s blockade of senior military promotions, saying the delays are hurting military readiness and will leave the military poorly positioned should it enter into a global conflict.
“There are a number of things happening globally that indicate that we could be in a contest on any one given day,” Austin said during the hearing. “Not approving the recommendations for promotions actually creates a ripple effect through the force that makes us far less ready than we need to be. The effects are cumulative and it will affect families. It will affect kids going to schools because they won’t be able to change their duty station. It’s a powerful effect and will have an impact on our readiness.”
Tuberville has blocked at least 160 promotions over the military’s policy that allows troops to be reimbursed for travel and granted leave to receive reproductive health care, including abortions. Tuberville argued that the new policy allows for taxpayer money to be spent on abortions.
“I want to be clear on this: My hold has nothing to do with the Supreme Court’s decision to the access of abortion,” Tuberville said. “This is about not forcing the taxpayers of this country to fund abortions.”
But the policy specifically doesn’t pay for abortions, only travel expenses for troops stationed in areas, such as Alabama, where all abortion services are illegal, to travel to neighboring states to receive legally provided care.
Austin said the policy is “on solid legal ground,” and said it provides some 80,000 female troops with access to care that they should have the option to receive but sometimes don’t because of where they are stationed, which is out of their control.
Regardless, Tuberville’s blockade of the promotions – a position that other Republicans on the Armed Services Committee have not joined – comes at the worst possible time. Hundreds of top-level military leaders have retired or are planning to retire in the coming few months. The Pentagon said more than 650 general and flag officers will require Senate confirmation soon, including at least 80 three- or four-star generals or admirals.
Armed Services chair Jack Reed (D-Rhode Island) cautioned that, “If we cannot resolve the situation, we will be, in many respects, leaderless at a time of great conflict.”
Austin also spoke privately with Tuberville recently in hopes of moving him away from the blockade. Tuberville does not appear ready to budge.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, during a speech on the Senate floor Tuesday, criticized Tuberville and said his block of military promotions over a political issue risks politicizing a process that has until now remained above the political fray. “If every single one of us objected to the promotion of military personnel whenever we feel passionately or strongly about an issue, our military would simply grind to a halt,” Schumer said. “This level of obstruction—of routine military promotions—is a reckless departure from Senate norm; none of us want to live in a world where military appointments get routinely politicized and that’s just what the Senator from Alabama is doing.
By Stacy M. Brown, NNPA Newswire Senior National Correspondent
Former President Donald Trump is now criminal defendant Donald Trump. For at least several moments on Tuesday, April 4, Trump was placed under arrest. His Miranda rights read, and fingerprints taken, but authorities spared him a mugshot and customary perp walk. Still, as he headed to the 15th floor courtroom at 100 Centre Street downtown, Trump joined the nearly 8,000 other non-violent felony defendants who have been arraigned in Manhattan so far in 2023. Shortly before 2 p.m. EST, Trump became the first former U.S. President arrested and criminally charged. This after becoming the first to have been impeached twice. “Can’t believe this is happening,” Trump posted as he headed into a courtroom where he found, perhaps for the first time in his adult life, that he wasn’t in control of the proceedings in front of him. It’s an ironic, if not predictable, fall for a man who campaigned in 2016 by mercilessly leading chants of “Lock her up,” against Democrat Hillary Clinton. And as unprecedented and surreal was the arrest, the charges leveled against the bombastic MAGA leader reveal what prosecutors claim is a man who operated as if he were above the law for a long time – including when he ruled the Oval Office. Indeed, the freshly unsealed indictment brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg included 34 criminal charges – all felonies related to falsifying business records, including several relating to allegedly making hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal. Judge Juan Merchan, a former prosecutor with 16 years on the bench, unsealed Indictment No. 71543-23, after Trump’s team reviewed them. Bragg alleged that Trump falsified business records to hide other crimes, including illegally pumping up his presidential campaign with ill-gotten cash. Specifically, the indictment alleges that Trump conspired with others to undermine the integrity of the 2016 election, a contest in which Trump defeated Clinton. Prosecutors alleged that Trump took part in an unlawful “catch and kill” scheme that included an illegal $130,000 payment he ordered to suppress information that would hurt his presidential campaign. Trump allegedly violated state and local election laws, making the charges a felony. The charges potentially carry a four-year prison sentence, which could mean that Trump, the current GOP 2024 presidential frontrunner, has entered a race that could end with him either in the White House or in prison. Despite an apparent somber mood displayed by Trump which signaled just how weighty the proceedings were, his campaign released a fundraising email seeking contributions of at least $47 for a T-shirt that contained a fake mugshot of the ex-president emblazoned with the words “Not Guilty.” Reportedly, Trump has raised more than $10 million in campaign contributions since word of an indictment spread. With security a big issue in the ex-president’s arraignment, prosecutors in Atlanta and Washington continue to investigate Trump, which could also lead to criminal charges, were provided the ability of witnessing how New York handles a case involving a divisive former commander in chief in a safe and drama-free way could be a critical test case. The potential cases against Trump in Atlanta and Washington relate to the former president’s interference in the 2020 presidential election in Georgia and the January 6 insurrection on Capitol Hill that left several people dead. Many top Republicans, including some of Trump’s potential rivals in next year’s GOP presidential primary, have criticized the case against him. President Joe Biden, who has yet to announce that he’s seeking reelection next year, and other leading Democrats have primarily had little to say about it. Trump is scheduled to return to Manhattan for a second court date in December. Prosecutors insist their case against Trump has nothing to do with politics. “Manhattan is home to the country’s most significant business market,” Bragg stated. “We cannot allow New York businesses to manipulate their records to cover up criminal conduct. As this office has done time and time again, we today uphold our solemn responsibility to ensure that everyone stands equal before the law.”
As of March 28, 2023 at 10:00 AM
(According to Alabama Political Reporter)
Alabama had 1,650,449 confirmed cases of coronavirus,
(2,064) more than last report, with 21,127 deaths (13) more
than last report.
Greene County had 2,326 confirmed cases, 6 more cases than last report, with 54 deaths
Sumter Co. had 3,191 cases with 55 deaths
Hale Co. had 5,749 cases with 110 deaths
Note: Greene County Physicians Clinic has testing and vaccination for COVID-19; including the new bivalent booster for Omicron variants.
Call for appointments at 205/372-3388, Ext. 142;
ages 5 and up.
