COLORLINES - Dispatches

As the Court Decides Health Reform, East Oakland Fights for the Basics

by Tram Nguyen on May 22 2012, 9:21AM

Once home to good manufacturing jobs, East Oakland today is a microcosm of the structural components of racial health disparities. One community-led health project could be a model for the future.

Topics: Dispatches, Health

Kelley Williams-Bolar’s Long, Winding Fight to Educate Her Daughters

by Julianne Hing on May 16 2012, 9:30AM

When the Ohio mom was prosecuted last year for sending her daughters to a neighboring school district, her story became a cause celebre. Now, she’s joined a growing movement for more parental control over school reform. But is it just a front for privatization?

Topics: Dispatches, Education Reform, Schools & Youth

A Group of Parents in the Calif. Desert May Be the Future of School Reform

by Julianne Hing on February 15 2012, 9:53AM

Parents are no longer content to let politicians and policy makers lead the debate. But does the answer many are embracing turn them into an astroturf movement for dismantling public schools?

Topics: Dispatches, Education Reform, Schools & Youth

How East Haven, Conn., Became Synonymous With Racial Profiling

by Seth Freed Wessler on February 2 2012, 10:22AM

Even if the town cops’ lawlessness is fixed, questions remain that go far beyond East Haven’s city limits. The issue was not just that racist local cops wanted to deport immigrants; it’s that federal immigration authorities obliged them.

Topics: Criminal Justice, Dispatches, Immigration

Dispatch From Detention: A Rare Look Inside Our ‘Humane’ Immigration Jails

by Seth Freed Wessler on January 4 2012, 9:19AM

Deporting 400,000 people a year means big business for the rural towns and private prison contractors that warehouse many detained immigrants.

Topics: Deportation Dragnet, Dispatches, Immigration

A Bronx Tale: How Racism Created Poverty, and Still Perpetuates It

by Kai Wright on December 16 2011, 10:20AM

The poverty in which millions of people of color live is not accidental. It’s the result of decades of political choices that first created ghettos and then left them prey to a growing industry that profits from their existence. The Bronx offers a uniquely clear example.

Topics: Dispatches, Economy

Zurana Horton’s Murder Gives Brooklyn a Ground Zero of Gun Terror

by Curtis Stephen on November 1 2011, 9:45AM

When a 34-year-old mom was gunned down by stray bullets, her murder gripped the city and made global headlines. The news cycle has moved on, but Brownsville remains as flooded as ever with guns.

Topics: Criminal Justice, Dispatches

The Alabama Town Most Changed (and Saved) by Immigration

by Gabriel Thompson on August 25 2011, 9:06AM

From a distance—the perspective from which immigration is too often discussed—this small town seems like an apt illustration of why Alabama should crack down on immigrants. Up close, it’s clear immigration is actually saving Russellville.

Topics: Alabama Immigration, Dispatches, Immigration

Dispatch from London: A Night Bus Ride Through the Riot Corridor

by Sean O'Neill on August 18 2011, 10:02AM

On this bus, you can see the exhaustion that often comes with low-wage labor in the birthplace of capitalism—and with being the cultural scapegoat for the increasing anxieties of the British middle class.

Topics: Dispatches, Global Affairs, London Riots

Dispatch From Angola: Faith-Based Slavery in a Louisiana Prison

by Liliana Segura on August 4 2011, 10:03AM

Angola is the largest maximum-security prison in the country. At least 90 percent of its inmates will die there. And Evangelical Warden Burl Cain has made sure their lives look as much like “slavery times” as possible.

Topics: Criminal Justice, Dispatches

Javier Sicilia’s Poetry in Motion Against the U.S.-Mexico Drug Wars

by Debbie Nathan on June 14 2011, 8:56AM

After losing his son to drug violence, a renowned Mexican artist set out on a cross-country trek to dramatize the death that our failed, militaristic response to narcotics has spawned.

Topics: Dispatches, Drug War, Global Affairs

Dispatch from Death Row: Saving Troy Davis With a Family’s Love

by Jen Marlowe on June 1 2011, 9:00AM

While human rights advocates work furiously to stop the execution of man they say is innocent, he’s been focused on raising his sister’s son into a proud young man.

Topics: Criminal Justice, Dispatches, Troy Davis

Dispatch From El Salvador: Obama’s Drug War Feels Eerily Familiar

by Roberto Lovato on March 31 2011, 10:56AM

Salvadorans watch uneasily as a new leftist government militarizes daily life in the same way the old right-wing one did—only now, they hunt narcos instead of communists.

Topics: Dispatches, Drug War, Global Affairs

Dispatch From Cancun: Developing Paradise in the Suicide Capital

by Roberto Lovato on December 3 2010, 10:06AM

As world leaders gather for climate talks on one side of town, Roberto Lovato visits the other, where the turmoil of climate change threatens hearts and minds, too.

Topics: Dispatches, Environment