CANDLELIGHT PROTEST REMEMBERING GEORGE FLOYD AND RACIAL INJUSTICE SUNDAY, MAY 31st @ 7PM PASADENA CITY HALL

Dear Friends, Like you, I am outraged and saddened by what happened to George Floyd this week, but not surprised. This kind of racial violence by police is all too prevalent in our nation, and here in our city. Many of you have probably seen the shocking video of a young Black man named Christopher Ballew who was savagely beaten by Pasadena police and his leg broken, for a routine traffic stop. If you haven't, here's the link. Fair warning. It's very graphic and disturbing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcNaAH5VSHw

Since moving to Northwest Pasadena nine years ago, I have become increasingly aware of the racial profiling that takes place in our city, and the way that racism impacts people of color. Jill and I have taken part in vigils for African Americans who have killed and beaten, and stood in solidarity with their families and friends. This is a time for prayer and reflection, and action.

Take a moment and remember people of color who who have been killed and beaten here in our city and around the nation. Hold their families and friends in your prayers. And say their names, beginning with:

Kendrec McDade, 19-year-old son of Anya Slaughter, killed in 2012 by Pasadena police for allegedly stealing a laptop.

Reginald Thomas, nicknamed “Daddy Daycare,” father of eight children (with another on the way), killed by Pasadena police in 2016.

Christopher Ballew, beaten by Pasadena police for a routine traffic stop in 2018.

As I write this, protests are taking place and violence erupting across our nation.

Tomorrow here in Pasadena, people of faith will be gathering at 7 pm across from City Hall for a candlelight protest. It will be peaceful but not silent. Please take part if you can. And if you can't make it, please light a candle and pray, or go outside and make some noise, for 8 minutes.

Let this be a time to rededicate ourselves to racial justice and equality for all. Please spread the word of this protest with your friends.

CANDLELIGHT PROTEST REMEMBERING GEORGE FLOYD AND RACIAL INJUSTICE
SUNDAY, MAY 31st @ 7PM
PASADENA CITY HALL (Meet near the Mack and Jackie Robinson statue)
Parking with validation is available at the Holly Street Parking Garage located directly behind First Baptist Church. We invite you to join us Sunday evening for a night of nonviolent action at Pasadena City Hall. We will be wearing masks and observing physical distancing because this action is about the protection of life as sacred. We invite you to bring a candle (real or electric) to light.

Part of this action will be eight minutes of sustained noise to represent the eight minutes officer Derek Chauvin pressed his knee on George Floyd's neck, lynching him while his cries were ignored. Please bring something (bells, noisemakers, pots to bang, your voice to wail) to fill the air with sound during that time.

Warning: Contains violent content and adult language. Bystander footage from the arrest of Christopher Ballew by Pasadena Police on Nov. 9, 2017.

What we can do to help get out the vote and defeat Trump

I received this in the mail. I plan to take part in this campaign to get out the vote and defeat Trump and invite you to do likewise. If you need some motivation, check out this documentary. It shows how Kemp stole the election from Stacy Abrams with voter suppression, and how this has become the Republican strategy for winning despite being a minority party. 

https://www.bravenewfilms.org/suppressed

 Hi.  Here’s a question to consider:

      Do you ever feel frustrated that Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell keep doing harmful things and you feel unable to stop them and their enablers?

      Well, there’s some potentially good news!   There’s a guy named Scott Forman, a Democrat who went to Harvard and then he worked for a software company, where he learned how to measure the impact of hand-written personalized letters in hand-written personalized envelopes to motivate difficult-to-motivate people on important issues.   He first utilized this letter-writing method with a power company energy-saving campaign that used personalized letters to help consumers be motivated not to waste power.    They found the personalized letters to individual customers caused far more behavior change than other methods.   

     Then Forman tried out the personalized letter method in the Alabama Senate race of 2017 where he scientifically measured and discovered that an additional 3.9% of the “Registered Democrats Who Rarely Vote” did in fact vote in 2017 because they received a personal letter reminding them to vote.

     Then Forman tested out the personal letter method again in swing districts in the 2018 Congressional elections and found it once again significantly boosted the actual number of “Registered Democrats Who Sometimes Don’t Vote” who in fact did remember to vote in 2018 in those House districts, many of which flipped from red to blue as a result of that mid-term election of 2018.  

    Forman reasoned that most voters today hate unsolicited phone calls and they don’t want some stranger coming to the door (especially during the Covid-19 this year).   Yes, people are on their phones and Facebook a lot where they get bombarded by election year calls that they tend to ignore, but when a personalized sensible letter with a hand-written envelope arrives in the US mail, it more likely gets opened, it gets read thoroughly, and it leads to the person being more likely to vote.   (See the article in The Atlantic, “A Throwback Way to Win a Pandemic Election” from April 30, 2020 for a description of the letter-writing method and its effectiveness).    

     Now here’s the potential good news:   Scott Forman has put together a non-profit called Vote Forward or VoteFwd.org where they are ready to have us volunteers write personalized letters to “Registered Democrats Who Rarely Vote” or “Registered Democrats Who Sometimes Vote” in numerous battleground states, including Florida, Georgia, Ohio, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Michigan, North Carolina, Texas, and others.   

     Just getting an extra 2% or 4% of these voters in battleground states to vote for a Democrat for President and Senate would restore sanity and decency to our nation.   

     VoteFwd.org is ready with a pile of targeted mailing addresses for 10,000 or 100,000 volunteers to write 50 or 500 letters each that will reach 10 million or more Democratic voters in crucial swing states for November 2020.  They’re calling it “The Big Send” and they’ve partnered with Swing Left, Indivisible, Daily Kos, the Women’s March, and the League of Conservation Voters to urge volunteers to do this old-school, newly-relevant way of Getting Out the Vote.    

      All you need to do to be part of making a huge difference in 2020 is to sign up at VoteFwd.org with your email and create a password.  They will ask you a couple of security questions to make sure you aren’t a robot or a Putin.   Then they let you download the half-typed, half-handwritten letter and the voter mailing addresses that you personally send (with Vote Forward’s p.o. box as the return address from that particular state on the envelope) along with your hand-written envelopes and stamp.  I recommend using colorful paper, a colorful envelope,  or a fun color of ink on the envelope,  along with a stamp that is engaging (Mr. Rogers, Marvin Gaye, “Honoring First Responders,” Gwen Ifill of PBS, Cesar Chavez, National Parks, or gorgeous rivers that are endangered by the current administration).   

       You can start today and save your stamped, addressed envelopes in a box in your home until you mail them during the final week of October to the “Democrats Who Sometimes Don’t Vote” in these key battleground states.   VoteFwd.org has already gotten 1.25 million of these letters written and saved up (“stockpiled like face masks”) by volunteers like you and me.   That means they are already 1/8 the way toward their initial goal of reaching 10 million swing voters during October.   

Making Affordable Housing Happen on Excess Congregational Land

You are invited to a Monthly Housing Justice Educational Forum sponsored by Making Housing and  Community Happen (MHCH). Learn what MHCH is doing to help change the zoning in Pasadena so congregations feeling led to have affordable housing built on their land can do so.

When: Tues. May 26, 2020, 7:00-8:30 PM  Pacific Time.

Presenters: Phil Burns, Andre White and Jill Shook.
Register in advance for this meeting:
https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZwpd--rrTIsGdagYZL3zE8NYsRHgrRdHLWf
After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

For more info contact Jill@makinghousinghappen.com

PRESENTERS

As the leader of The Arroyo Group, a 40-year-old planning and urban design firm, Philip Burns brings the firm’s resources to the Church Land Committee to analyze and write zoning, secure entitlements, build consensus with community leaders and neighbors, and facilitate dialogues within churches. Philip has prepared transit-oriented development plans, zoning ordinances and transportation plans for Metro and the cities of Pasadena and Inglewood, among others. Having served in the Peace Corps in Guatemala, Philip is bilingual in English and Spanish, and he leads children and youth ministry at Pasadena Presbyterian Church. 

 Andre White serves as a development advisor/owner’s representative to local churches through the Church Land Committee. He has spent the last fourteen years working on the development of and investment in affordable and market-rate housing in California and four other states. In 2019 Andre started his firm, Mitchelville Real Estate Group, due to his realization that often non-profit and institutional organizations do not have a representative to advise and help them navigate through all of the nuances and particulars of a complicated real estate development and investment partnership.

Help us to address the housing crisis during this time of pandemic

Pasadena has become an epicenter of the Covid 19 outbreak, with over 50 fatalities–more than the city of Long Beach and more than Orange County! Hardest hit in our city has been

the North Fair Oaks area, where nursing homes have been so badly hit that National Guard medics were sent in. Making Housing and Community Happen (MHCH) has a North Fair Oaks Empowerment Initiative, comprised largely of African American pastors, who are reaching out to this stricken community and just gathered 250 face masks to give to these nursing homes. More importantly, we are planning ahead to address a housing crisis that will almost certainly worsen as a result of this pandemic and its economic fallout. We have 26 willing to offer their land for urgently needed affordable and homeless housing. Our Congregational Land Committee is helping to make this a reality. See: https://www.makinghousinghappen.org/church-land

During this Covid 19 crisis, our homeless neighbors need housing more than ever. Last

week we had 55 people join us for our event: "Addressing Homelessness in a Time of Pandemic: Immediate Needs and Longer Term Solutions." 

On Monday, May 11, the Pasadena City Council will consider two proposals for permanent supportive housing that could house up to 135 of our homeless neighbors. This week we are mobilizing churches and people of conscience to support these proposals. Please help us by writing to our city council. See https://laquaker.blogspot.com/2020/05/action-alert-may-11.html

People experiencing homelessness are the most at risk during this crisis because they can’t “shelter in place” and congregate shelters have become breeding grounds for infection. For this reason, we are supporting Project Room Key, the governor’s initiative that will house 15,000 homeless people in motels (many of which have less than 10% occupancy due to this crisis). We are urging our city not only to house homeless people in motels through this program, but to partner with affordable housing developers to purchase motels for permanent supportive housing. This is a model will help our homeless neighbors in the short and long term. The Covid 19 pandemic will have long-lasting effects on housing as well as other aspects of our lives. Making Housing and Community Happen  is working to make sure that everyone is safely housed. This is not only our mission and our vision, it is also God’s vision, according to the prophet Micah, who said: “Everyone beneath their own vine and fig tree will live in peace and unafraid” (Micah 4:4). Please contribute to our work so that we can work to ensure that everyone will be safely housed both during and after this Covid 19 pandemic.  Pasadena has become an epicenter of the Covid 19 outbreak, with over 50 fatalities–more than the city of Long Beach and more than Orange County! Hardest hit in our city has been the North Fair Oaks area, where nursing homes have been so badly hit that National Guard medics were sent in. Making Housing and Community Happen (MHCH) has a North Fair Oaks Empowerment Initiative, comprised largely of African American pastors, who are reaching out to this stricken community and just gathered 250 face masks to give to these nursing homes. More importantly, we are planning ahead to address a housing crisis that will almost certainly worsen as a result of this pandemic and its economic fallout. We have 26 willing to offer their land for urgently needed affordable and homeless housing. Our Congregational Land Committee is helping to make this a reality. See: https://www.makinghousinghappen.org/church-land During this Covid 19 crisis, our homeless neighbors need housing more than ever. Last week we had 55 people join us for our event: "Addressing Homelessness in a Time of Pandemic: Immediate Needs and Longer Term Solutions."  On Monday, May 11, the Pasadena City Council will consider two proposals for permanent supportive housing that could house up to 135 of our homeless neighbors. This week we are mobilizing churches and people of conscience to support these proposals. Please help us by writing to our city council. See https://laquaker.blogspot.com/2020/05/action-alert-may-11.html People experiencing homelessness are the most at risk during this crisis because they can’t “shelter in place” and congregate shelters have become breeding grounds for infection. For this reason, we are supporting Project Room Key, the governor’s initiative that will house 15,000 homeless people in motels (many of which have less than 10% occupancy due to this crisis). We are urging our city not only to house homeless people in motels through this program, but to partner with affordable housing developers to purchase motels for permanent supportive housing. This is a model will help our homeless neighbors in the short and long term. The Covid 19 pandemic will have long-lasting effects on housing as well as other aspects of our lives. Making Housing and Community Happen  is working to make sure that everyone is safely housed. This is not only our mission and our vision, it is also God’s vision, according to the prophet Micah, who said: “Everyone beneath their own vine and fig tree will live in peace and unafraid” (Micah 4:4). Please contribute to our work so that we can work to ensure that everyone will be safely housed both during and after this Covid 19 pandemic. Click here to donate Click here to learn more about Making Housing and Community Happen (MHCH)

Please donate to help us address the housing crisis

GPAHG Action Alert May 11

During this Covid 19 crisis we have an opportunity to help create more affordable and homeless housing and to prevent homelessness. This is both an immediate and long-term need that we want the Pasadena City Council to address during its May 4th session, which will begin at 2 pm on Monday afternoon. Please join us in supporting 69 units of homeless senior housing at Heritage Square South and the Salvation Army "Hope Center" proposal for 65 units of permanent supportive housing.   Please email the Pasadena City Council at: 

publiccomment@cityofpasadena.net

We want the City council to give its final approval to the Heritage Square South project—69 units of homeless senior housing--on May 11th. Note that your letter must be 200 words long for it to be read during the City Council meeting. Below is a sample letter plus additional talking points. It is recommended that you briefly describe yourself, including what part of the city you live or work or worship in. If you have a moving personal story, please include it or use it instead of these talking points. If you have time to personalize your letter, it will be more effective. If not, please use the following template. Every letter submitted will be counted and will have an impact on our City Council members!

Dear Mayor and City Council members,

Dear Mayor and City Council members,

I thank you for your unanimous approval of homeless senior housing at Heritage Square South in 2018. I also want to thank you for your 100% vote in support of the Salvation Army proposal to build permanent supportive housing. I urge you to give final approval for both these proposals. Pasadena's homeless population will undoubtedly increase as a result of the Covid 19 crisis and its economic fallout. The Salvation Army proposal meets an urgent need.  and has not met with much opposition from neighbors. Heritage Square South  has wide-spread community support from churches and neighbors in Northwest Pasadena. Both are ideal sites. Heritage Square and the Salvation Army site  are both close to amenities that this population needs: a pharmacy, grocery store, restaurants and public transportation. And, Heritage Square South it is next door to another senior facility that can provide supportive services. Using this site for affordable housing is appropriate since it was purchased with HUD funding for this use.  Both of these projects will not use the City's General Funds and will provide millions of dollars in economic benefits to our city because of the 20-20-20 rule. The need is urgent, and growing. The sooner we house our city’s homeless population, the better for our businesses and residents—but especially those without a home!

1.    There has been overwhelming public support for housing homeless seniors at this site from churches and neighbors. Over 1,000 letters and signatures were gathered to support this project. Hundreds of people have shown up in support during Council meetings. Opposition has been minimal. That’s why the Council unanimously approved mixed use (homeless senior housing and commercial) for this site in December 2018. The Council was so eager to house homeless seniors that it fast-tracked this project by quickly identifying an experienced developer to come up with a proposal and vet it with the community asap. That process has taken two years. It will take another two or three years to complete the project once it is approved.

2.    The Covid 19 crisis has shown us that homeless seniors are the most vulnerable population and therefore have the greatest need for housing. According to the 2019 Homeless Count, one third of those experiencing homelessness in Pasadena are 55 years old or older, and many are homeless because of rising rents. The sooner that this population is housed, the better.

3.    This is an ideal site for seniors. It’s near public transport, pharmacy, grocery store, and restaurants—everything that elderly people need. It’s also next door to another senior housing center (Heritage Square North) so resources can be shared.

4.    If the project is delayed, it could jeopardize funding. This land was purchased with HUD money for affordable housing 15 years ago and at some point the money will have to be returned if the site isn’t used for this purpose. Since this project doesn’t require money from the City’s General Fund, now is the time to act and let this much needed project move forward.