Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission

From the Antelope Valley Press, Tuesday, February 9, 2010:

By Charles F. Bostwick and Dennis Anderson
Valley Press Editors

LANCASTER – The Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission voted unanimously Monday night to send strong letters of condemnation to Lancaster Mayor R. Rex Parris and Councilwoman Sherry Marquez over their recent comments about the Christian and Muslim religions.

The vote followed a three-hour meeting attended by nearly 100 people of whom about 40 were regular members of the task force, formed in 1996 by the cities of Lancaster and Palmdale following a rash of racially-motivated assaults.

By the meeting’s start, most of the members of the commission had heart that Parris twho hours earlier had issued an apology that some, if not all,accepted as basically sincere. That was not the case for the terse two-word apology uttered by Marquez at a hastily called City Hall press conference.

At the meeting were Christians such as Bishop Henry Hearns, pastor of Living Stone Cathedral of Worship in Littlerock as well as Parris’s predecessor as Lancaster mayor; at least 20 members of the Antelope Valley Muslim community; at least a half-dozen supporters of Marquez from Lancaster Baptist Church, which she attends; Unitarian-Universalists; Wiccans; members of the organized gay community; Buddhists, and Jewish and Orthodox Jewish representatives. Also in attendance were Lancaster mayoral and city council candidates, and Palmdale Mayor Jim Ledford.

“I accept the mayor’s apology. I do not accept her apology,” said Kamal Al-Khativ, exectuive director of the American Islamic Institute of the Antelope Valley in Palmdale. “I am disappointed with both individuals.”

[Read more →]

Tags: Community, Religion, Task Force by admin
Comments Off

This article appeared in the AV Press, Saturday, August 8, 2009

By Daisy Ratzlaff
Valley Press Staff Writer

LANCASTER – Palmdale and Lancaster officials hope a newly-instated mediation program resolving neighborhood disputes will help foster greater communications between neighbors and relieve courts, code enforcement and sheriff’s department personnel of having to deal with issues pertaining to matters residents could otherwise solve themselves.

Darren Parker, president of the Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission, said residents who have complaints about their neighbors’ cars being parked on their front lawns or overgrown tree branches that grow into their yards now have an alternative option rather than notifying city or deputies to handle “the more civil rather than criminal matter.”

“This program is designed to help neighbors who are in dispute at no cost to them t solve their problem in order to build safer, better and stronger neighborhoods,” Parker said.

The mediation program, which runs under the Neighbor Dispute Resolution Program, was developed by the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich and the Antelope Vally Human Relations Commission as well as Lancaster and Palmdale city officials. It officially began operation Thursday and will allow residents to call a special hot line and ask for one of 20 mediators and four senior mediators to help resolve neighbor-to-neighbor problems, Parker said.

“we found out that one out of every three cases that the task force deals with may at some point have started as a neighborhood dispute,” he said. “We are happy that we have law enforcement with us, and it looks like it will take the work off their desks and put in the proper place, where the issues can be addressed on a one-on-one basis.”

[Read more →]

Tags: Conflict resolution, Darren Parker, Mediation, Neighbors, Task Force by admin
No Comments »

This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Sunday, July 12, 2009.

By ALEXA VAUGHN
Valley Press Staff Writer

PALMDALE – Members of the Antelope Valley branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, city officials and more than 50 Valley residents celebrated the organization’s 100th year Saturday morning with music, cake and local stories of racial equality’s progression.

At the Poncitlan Square event, organized by Antelope Valley NAACP Vice President Juan Blanco, was Hank Dixon from “The Originals” singing the group’s 1969 hit “Baby I’m For Real,” a performance of the play “Slave Girl” by Palmdale High School graduate Naomi Derensbourg-Toppin and black leaders past and present from across the Valley.

Among those reflecting on the role of the NAACP in the Antelope Valley since the local chapter was founded in the 1960s, was the branch’s founding president, Lois Patton.

When Patton’s husband, an inspector who worked for Lockheed, was transferred to Palmdale, Patton said it was nearly impossible to get a house within the area’s white residential communities.

“Instead they would lead you to the outskirts, and I mean out – out in Sun Village,” Patton said. “Our house had an acre of land with it, but we didn’t want all that. We didn’t want to be farmers.

[Read more →]

Tags: Community, Darren Parker, Housing Discrimination, Juan Blanco, Lois Patton, NAACP, Progress, Task Force by admin
No Comments »

This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Saturday, March 21, 2009.

By JULIE DRAKE
Valley Press Staff Writer

LANCASTER – About 300 middle and high school students and a handful of adults kept their attention focused on the elegant, bespectacled bald man with the slight gray beard and in the camel-colored suit standing before them Friday morning in the small gymnasium inside the physical education building at Eastside High School’s permanent campus.

The man was psychologist Dr. Terrence Roberts, one of the Little Rock Nine, the African-American high school students who volunteered to integrate the formerly all-white Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas in 1957.

Roberts, then a 15-year-old junior, and the eight other students attended Central High for one year. To avoid integration the following year, then-Gov. Orval Faubus ordered Little Rock’s public school system shut down. As a result, Roberts and his family moved to California.

The psychologist was the keynote speaker at Eastside High’s joint teen summit, which included Eastside junior and senior students as well as students from Piute and New Vista middle schools.

Roberts played a brief video history of the Little Rock Nine before he gave his speech and took questions from the audience afterward.

[Read more →]

Tags: Darren Parker, PEACE, SHARE, Task Force by admin
No Comments »

This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Tuesday, September 9, 2008.

By NORMAN SHOAF
Valley Press Religion Editor

LANCASTER – “America – United We Stand, Divided We Fall” has been chosen as the theme for the 9-11 Memorial and Unity Service on Thursday at the Islamic Center of North Valley.

The service, observed each year since 2002, brings together civic officials and faith leaders for prayer, patriotic speeches and remembrance for the victims of the 9-11 terror strikes on the United States.

The event, which is scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m., is open to the public.

This year’s memorial, sponsored by the Antelope Valley Interfaith Council and the Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission and endorsed by the cities of Lancaster and Palmdale, will feature a keynote address from the Rev. Leonard Jackson, from the office of Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa.

The evening’s ceremonies will include prayers, readings and presentations from representatives of diverse Valley houses of faith. A community meal will be served at no charge following the event.

[Read more →]

Tags: 9/11, Community, Interfaith Council, Memorial, Task Force, Unity by admin
No Comments »

HATE CRIME? – The windows in the back of Debbie Phillips’ Lancaster home show the graffiti left by an unknown person Wednesday night. Phillips said she notified the AV Human Relations Commission and the American Civil Liberties Union about the incident, but because the graffiti didn’t directly mention religion, Commission President Darren Parker said he doesn’t know if the incident can be categorized as a hate crime. EVELYN KRISTO/Valley Press

Woman protested City Hall posting ‘In God We Trust’

This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Friday, May 30, 2008.

By VERONICA ROCHA
Valley Press Staff Writer

LANCASTER – A Lancaster woman’s home was vandalized overnight Wednesday with “In God We Trust or ?” painted across her windows in what she believes is retaliation for speaking out against placing a similar phrase in City Council chambers.

Debbie Phillips said she spotted the bold, black lettering on two windows and a sliding glass door – marked by someone who entered her fenced backyard – after she woke up Thursday morning.

“I feel like somebody came in my home and invaded my space,” Phillips said.

Phillips said she notified the Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission, which investigates hate crimes, and the American Civil Liberties Union about the incident.

“I want this to be noted in the crime rate as a hate crime,” she said.

Commission President Darren Parker said the group is investigating whether Thursday’s vandalism qualified as a hate crime.

[Read more →]

Tags: Darren Parker, Graffiti, Religion, Task Force, Vandalism by admin
No Comments »

This story appeared in the Antelope Valley Press
Thursday, May 1, 2008.

By JULIE DRAKE
Valley Press Staff Writer

LANCASTER – An unidentified Eastside Union School District trustee has complained to the Antelope Valley Human Relations Commission that a fellow trustee referred to female trustees as “girls” who follow his directions and also said that African Americans are only good at sports, a task force official said.

After investigating, task force President Darren Parker said the task force’s recommendation will be for Eastside trustees to undergo diversity and sensitivity training and to refer to district and state policy.

The task force will offer support and mediation, training and other resources for training, he said.

“They’ve got to clean up house or we get back involved,” Parker said.

The task force will discuss the complaint and its investigation into it at its next meeting, scheduled for 7 p.m. Monday, May 19, at the Larry Chimbole Cultural Center, 38350 Sierra Highway, Palmdale. Parker said Eastside trustees will be asked to attend the meeting to report what measures they have taken to address the complaints.

[Read more →]

Tags: Diversity, Mediation, Racism, Sexism, Stereotypes, Task Force by admin
No Comments »

Greetings,

The next AV Commission meeting will be on Monday March 17 at 6:30 PM at
the Larry Chimbole Cultural Center in Palmdale. See you there.

Thank you,
Bob Forshay
vice chair-AVHRTF

Tags: Meeting, Task Force by admin
No Comments »