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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 25, 2009
11:23 AM

CONTACT: ACLU

Maria Archuleta, ACLU, (212) 519-7808 or 549-2666; media@aclu.org
Nikki Cox, ACLU of Alabama, (334) 265-2754, x205

Alabama School District Agrees to End Illegal Sex Segregation

Policy Change Comes After Notice From ACLU

MOBILE, Ala. - March 25 - The Mobile County School System has agreed to stop sex segregation in public schools after being notified by the American Civil Liberties Union that its sex segregated programs were illegal and discriminatory. Late last evening, the Board of School Commissioners of Mobile County approved a settlement agreement changing the policy.

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The ACLU conserves America's original civic values working in courts, legislatures and communities to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in the United States by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

ACLU Links:
Posted in civil liberties, Education, inequality

Urban League Asks Obama to Address Ongoing Inequalities

Urban League CEO Marc Morial gestures during an interview with the Associated Press, Tuesday, March 24, 2009 in New York. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

NEW YORK - President Barack Obama should specifically address disparities in black unemployment, foreclosures, education and health care, the National Urban League says in its annual "State of Black America" report.

Despite the progress represented by the election of the first black U.S. president, blacks are twice as likely to be unemployed, three times as likely to live in poverty and more than six times as likely to be incarcerated, says the report, which was being released Wednesday by the civil rights organization.

Posted in inequality

Coping in a World of 'Peak Water'

Women carry buckets of water in Bissau March 6, 2009. (REUTERS/Luc Gnago/GUINEA-BISSAU)

UNITED NATIONS - As more than 20,000 people meet in Istanbul for a major week-long conference on future management of the world's water supplies, women's groups are working to ensure that policy decisions about this critical natural resource take their concerns into account.

About a billion people currently lack safe drinking water, and another two and a half billion have no access to sanitation.

Posted in climate change, inequality, water, women's rights

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 16, 2009
6:04 PM

CONTACT: Children's Defense Fund
Ed Shelleby (202) 662-3602

New Report Finds Low-Income Families Lose Billions to Predatory Commercial Tax Preparers

Report Highlights Importance of Tax Credits for Working Families in Tough Economic Times

WASHINGTON - March 16 - Today the Children's Defense Fund released a report finding that in tax year 2006, low-income families lost $3.1 billion of their Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) benefits to high-interest, short-term loans, tax preparation fees and other financial products issued by commercial tax preparers.
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The Children's Defense Fund (CDF) is a non-profit child advocacy organization that has worked relentlessly for 35 years to ensure a level playing field for all children. We champion policies and programs that lift children out of poverty; protect them from abuse and neglect; and ensure their access to health care, quality education, and a moral and spiritual foundation.
Children's Defense Fund Links:
Posted in Economy/Trade, inequality

Fighting Back in America's 30-Year Class War

David Brooks was upset. You can tell when this conservative and rather-professorial columnist for The New York Times gets upset, because his words almost sag with disappointment - you can practically hear the tsk-tsks and the heavy sighs in each paragraph. When most commentators on the right see things that offend them, they get snarling mad; Brooks gets sad.

Posted in class, inequality

Homeowner Rip-Offs Spark Scores of Lawsuits

Hugo Malara, left, and his fiance Maria Sorto watch television at their rental home in Las Vegas, Monday, Feb. 23, 2009. At left is a portrait of young Maria Sorto. No longer able to make his monthly mortgage payment after losing his job at a neon sign company, Malara paid $800 to a former mortgage broker who advertised a 'money back guarantee' promised to help him negotiate to keep him in his home. They later learned that by the time they wrote him the check they thought would save their home, the bank had already sold it at auction. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)

BOSTON - Many of the biggest mortgage lenders in the U.S. have engaged in widespread, systematic schemes that ripped off hundreds of thousands of families seeking to buy a home, refinance or foreclose, according to lawsuits filed on behalf of consumers.

Scores of class-action lawsuits, from the 1990s and up to today, detail the illegal and questionable practices used by mortgage-lending companies that pushed millions into bad mortgages, then into bad refinancing loans and then into foreclosures with unfair fees.

Posted in Economy/Trade, housing, inequality

Non-Profit Sues Feds Over Border Fence

U.S. Border Patrol agents block the path of protestor Pedro Rios, right, as he attempts to walk up to the U.S.-Mexico border fence at Border Field State Park in San Diego Saturday, Feb. 21, 2009. (AP Photo/Denis Poroy)

McALLEN, Texas - A national consumer advocacy group sued the federal government Wednesday on behalf of a University of Texas law professor seeking documents about the planning of the border fence.

Public Citizen, the group founded by Ralph Nader, filed a lawsuit in U.S. district court in Washington against the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection and the Army Corps of Engineers.

Posted in border fence, inequality

Oh, What a Lovely Class War!

My goodness, how they howl when the proverbial shoe is on the proverbial other foot. You'd think the Red Army had just left Moscow and was preparing a frontal assault on the Federal Reserve.

So what are conservatives, Wall Street and financial television commentators shouting? Socialists! That's right. Spread the word: Socialists are swarming over our nation's Capitol and making off with the means of production, otherwise known as campaign contributions and the federal budget. You got trouble, my friends.

Posted in class, inequality

Aren't There War Criminals in The US?

(Flickr photo by pantagrapher used under Creative Commons license)

UNITED NATIONS - The ongoing political crisis in Sudan is expected to worsen in the face of a rash of threats and warnings following the indictment last week of President Omar Hassan al-Bashir by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague.

The beleaguered Sudanese president has threatened to expel diplomats from Khartoum and throw out more humanitarian organisations - in addition to the 13 that were run out of town last week - in retaliation for the indictment.

Posted in inequality, international law, war crimes

A Little Equality Could Save a Lot of Lives

UNITED NATIONS - When ministers and government officials meet at the end of this year for a critical U.N. climate change conference in Copenhagen, they should bear in mind that the mortality rate for women during climate-related natural disasters is an average of 14 times higher than for men.

"Existing inequalities determine who is dying," Rebecca Pearl, the coordinator of the Global Gender & Climate Alliance, told IPS.

Posted in inequality
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