The Cities | Black History Month & Rock Island Farm Bureau | WQPT

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black history month leaves a quad cities impact and women running the farms in and around
the cities
agriculture is big business and more often than not it's the women who are running some
of the operations will talk about that
plus could be a volatile year for farming that's still ahead the first welcome to february
black history month in nineteen seventy-six negro history week was expanded in the black
history month it was chosen to be held in february because this month marks the february
fourteenth birthday of frederick douglass and the february twelfth birthday of abraham
lincoln but was it what is its impact here in the quad cities let's find out
joining me now president of rock island county chapter of the n_ double a_c_p_
liz sherwin liz thank you so much for coming in
thank you for inviting
more talk about black history month right now is that something that seems to always
be a problem
not just black history book people forgetting history i think it's very
significant for african-americans because
when we came to america we lost much of our culture and language and that sort of thing
in our carter
gentleman that was responsible for the first
black history
called it negro history week
back in the car nineteen twenty sixty
need for
you know having this an african americans understand
named their culture and
occured in america
for them
are against them
and uh... what is interesting
nine and i was really
impressed about
you guys invited me to talk about
black history month in its impact
one of the first things i did was a no idea of this i went on the internet of
course they're ready go ahead
and i found that they uh... carter would send had been a member of the
nacp
in washington d_c_
uh... i think about nineteen
in fifteen but what was interesting was that he was so radical that the he
had to leave nacp because he can't talk about all kinds of radical things he talked
about possibly
embark businesses that
didn't serve african americans there
he talked about all kinds of things and then nacp wasn't ready for so he left
kept this interesting and and
african-americans knowing about their history
their their conditions here in america
educating future generations he i think it's very important that we do this
because
many of our young people even today
a my children have no concept of the civil rights movement tower
or any of those things that
impacted you know where they are uh... in the world today
so it's very important that we celebrate uh...
black history month not only one month it should be celebrated every day
for has I can see
and in addition to that
many of the conditions there
that uh...
woodsin
in uh... voice saw
are back in the
turn of the century that still exist african american
and that's a good point and that's why i wonder goes it seems like every generation gets further
removed from the last generation and when you're leaving the nineteen twenties
and you're the forties in the fact that it was are very much a segregated uh... army
in any of the fifties and sixties the civil rights movement
in the eighties the nineties the two thousand two thousand tenure first black president
it's it's like people are almost taking this for granted now exactly
on one of the things that uh... happens uh...
nacp when we reorganize
as you know four in rock island all we saw that need to to
try to bring the community together especially
in uh...
remembrance of some
things that have gone on here the quad cities
and nationally
so we do a lot of programs that focus on and on improving the quality of life for people
on one of the
issues from now
they say there are more
young african-american men
ales imprisonment in college
uh... well i did well on the internet again that's not exactly true but it's really close
its sadly close i think it's about nine hundred and some thousand
in college and another
eight hundred some thousand in prison
uh... there's also the issue of of jobs we focused a lot
on jobs and trying to
do job fairs and other activities that promote
the importance of work in
are one of the things
uh...
if you look at information over the past dozen or so years
for minority
is specially
african-americans the unemployment rate has covered between fourteen and fifteen percent
whereas with is a white people it's been like eighty-nine so those are some of
the things that we've been trying to address through the
the trade unions and other
other places in the quad cities because it
is really uh... telling thing
uh... one of the things that
that uh... is most telling
and i was looking at
did despair estimate between people working in different classifications what was interesting
where it was a most people or more african-americans were working
were in like this
health
and uh... i believe it was the health
and maybe retail
you know what and where it was most telling about them not being wasn't construction trades
so uh... those are some of the things that uh... we've tried to address here in the community
about speaking with uh... people in
the trades in the labor are bringing various employers together to talk directly to young
african-americans and other minorities
bout how they can acess
jobs
particular fields now i can look at the internet as well and i can come up with statistics
as well
and i found one that was i thought somewhat disturbing to and i hope i get it right it
was at the martin luther king and junior center website approximately forty one
hundred
people who live within a one mile radius of just the MLK center are considered living
in poverty exact
that's frightening uses also you're talking
at at national levels
let's talk a locally and how we can improve the economy for african-americans what is
being done right now what we've done in the
speak specifically to the rock island county NACCP
last year a lot of the stimulus money came down into the communities to build in
you rebuilding infrastructure so what we did was we had
at about three
uh... workshops in programs that brought people together from our community
to talk about how they can
excess these job
we brought the
uh... the construction company
uh... we brought any other significant people that would have any impact on our people getting
there
jobs together
well what happened was nothing here
and we can attest to that
that if you'd rather long any of the construction sites you will not see any african americans
why do you think that it's well you know there is a fallacy that thirty six
percent are on drugs but who would love a sixty-some percent
hold water
you know as far as i can see
but i think uh...
i think in our quad cities we have what we call institutionalized racism
it is prevalent in our school system as well as
and on some of the employment
areas especially
construction
and the trades
these i'll be you know they have all
kinds of
of the issues of systems of how you access the trade unions but they are not necessarily
open to african-americans are
many minorities so they're
uh... are left out of these
head and then there's a whole
consistency of american greed
and many of the for people that are on the company's
rather than hire from the house side of people that don't look like the and they'll have
a mother or dad
aren't you know that's over and sell
it is a very difficult uh...
avenue four for many people to to access in terms of important on the other hand are we
seeing more businesses that are being run by african-american successfully
i believe there
some that are
happening in the quad cities
but is necessarily not enough
you know in
generally uh...
african-americans tend to
use any business
that has product
they don't care african-american mexicain however there is something we like we're gonna go by
whereas i think other people don't necessarily do that
i mean i don't see
uh... people
you know coming to say for instance the west end of davenport or certain areas of davenport
or rock island just because its african american business and
its a product they want
so i think that uh... you know i was just what people are are comfortable with doing
we talk about another area because you were talking about jobs and job creation and
there is a job fair a little bit of seminar coming up in march no
uh... its actually in apirl people it is in april as you know i thought a little bit
people you get involved i'll tell you how we've been doing this for this will be the
third year
uh... we call in job junction
and it is a combination of activities one is actually the day
we we were we have a job fair in we have
had it martin luther king centers second baptist church
this year we are trying procure martin luther king's since under construction right
over to insure but i will we do is we bring employees together and we invite all the major
employers in the quad cities to come in
have their information
have is set up were individuals can actually sit down and talk to the employer's about
the skill levels in the things that they
need to be preparing themselves for if they want to work it at their locations
another part we also do resume building for people many people don't have a resume critically
important so we work with then we have two or three people we have
roving laptops
and we set our work with the hand and help them develop a resume
east as well as interviewing process says we've had people from
uh... blackhawk college other places that coming actually
you know
talk to the the people that are in attendance about
you know what they
need to prepare them for it sales for work in in
the work world right and i
then we also one of the other aspects of it
is once the
people talk to the employors
we have a card for them to fill out
came to us which of the employees they were interested in
in getting a job with
and we actually take them
a forwared to that employers say
this is so and so
it stop with at the fair
interested in job
at your location whereas some things you can do to to get them chance or an opportunity
to too
and uh... position at your company is once again coming up in april this is april
lot more information from the MLK center in rock island
and please
take access to itand because i mean
the first year we had about
a hundred and thirty some people last year we have hundred plus we have another
probably fifteen sixteen employers it works out really good with the remaining minutes
is that we have like you want to talk about something that is in particular
you yourself ok on this black history month your story of coming to the quad cities
is an interesting story in itself
share that with with me
in the fifties i guess that was the major migration
of african americans to the north from the sharecroppers their whatever of the south
and my father i moved here in the fifties and later the family moved here
uh... the interesting thing was when i lived in the south and actually
uh... very limited contact with the majority population in
and um... one of the things that i found out someone asked me this awhile ago was the you
know when did you first
experiencesof racism and prejudice
and i started thinking i said well maybe i was five or six
i really know how to too
define it we lived there
there was two libraries there was a library for the
the the majority population in the library for for black people and the library for the
majority population with this beautiful white built the building with pillows then
just huge
uh... library was a three-room shoot gun shed is actually what i was
but how he's allowed to reading and stuff so i spent many days there but that was a
glaring i think i was five a six and i was a glaring
uh... thing for me that uh... well these people were not
there's something different i mean
i have this and other people have access to the so much more
and so you came north
we came north i we moved here we moved to rock island the west end of our family moved there
uh... on the block that i lived on
there were only two african american families
everybody else was caucasian and that's shows that there's been a extreme change in the
quad cities in terms of of diversity and because i had never are heading
contact with white people
there was a young girl same
block with me that she would come by everyday and she was speak to me and i would just by
roll my
eyes and because i was one of my practices
and so i went and one day and i told my older sister because she had moved here and her
husband was working at the arsenal
person on the street is harassing bother me
and she who is he
situation thought it was a dirty old man and i says you know is that girl down the street
that little white girl
what is she doing that says she's speaking to me and she says well
what's wrong with that i don't
know anything about her
and so she said well his probably same age problem because you have that i have
to go to school and and that's all i have to go to school
you know because i've never gone to school
answering yes and the little girl kept
after me and finally i have
i was able to communicate with her uh...
acclimated me to the school system i mean she walked me to school every day walk me
home and so that's kinda how i became sensical
so they are the race
because we have a lot to learn
between each other out
so it was quite interesting because you know growing up in the rural south
not having any contact with are white people other than because i did last or is the undertaker
in that community that undertaken the store owners all those people were african-american
and we can go and do business with them and i have a there were uh... other businesses
that you know we can access downtown instead of but in our communities it wasn't generally
african americans who are on the business is all my teachers were african-american
and the principal and and that sort of thing so when i came here it was uh... direct
direct change in my view of the world
liz so good of you to join us black history month as you said he should be more than just four weeks probably
fifty two of the year yes d have to keep it in your heart but much more t
thats for joining us....thank you
well the big snow storm is all over the cold
has sat in now we're waiting for a little
weekend warm up so what to do
lora adams is about to join us with some fun things to do when you go up in about quad cities
but first a look at a local music performances the group based in moline
say they've say the play knee slaping bluegrass
i am lora adams
this is a starting february third threw febrary ninth coming up on wqpt_
frontline presents the wounded platoon tracking life after the single platoon
what's happening in our area
arc of rock island county st. annes parish team for the third annual trivia night on
saturday february fifth benefiting both organizations learn the basics of cross-country skiing and
tour the Wapsi Center trails if conditions allow or join four choral groups to find
free and attack concert at centennial hall and onstage in the quad cities metamorphosis
continues through febrary fifth at augustana college I love you your'e perfect and now change
at harrison hill top until february nineteenth and circa twenty one's all shook
up continues to march nineteenth
for information on these and other events logged onto wqpt dot org
the year twenty eleven will include a pivotal three hundred sixty five days for farm families
we've seen high commodity prices which helped line farmers' pockets
but there's gonna be a hike in insurance premiums to insure those crops there going to be rising
oil prices which means more expensive fertilizer
let's be honest who knows what the weather will bring deann bloomberg of the
rock island county farm bureau are you doing I'm good
thanks for coming in a such a nasty a week of weather and let's start with what is going
on this coming week the overall women's conference
couple years you've been doing about the hundred women showed up last by year tell me where
the uh... the it because of this came from
he literally program that started with iowa state extension
on and myself to be
and eastern iowa native
uh... and having grown up and uh... i would say to extension family iowa 4h
felt compelled to get back involved so
kinda joining forces and collaborating with them as working with the farm bureau
set to take off here uh...
next week next week february tenth eleventh isle capri and tell me you know i mean we're
talking about one of the greatest things is that
you'll give them an opportunity women in farming an opportunity network
where is it a farming is a give guys in coveralls in a tractor and you don't think of the women
who a lot of times are the ones that are either in the tractor is well or behind running the
computers an operation is running smoothly
the name overall women it does not mean that will be wearing overalls at the conference
um... that we will be
taking those two days to really network
and a lot of farm wives in western illinois will have the opportunity
to be able to do some breakout
group sessions with a lot of people
but with the really focusing on eyes the thursday afternoon speaker roger mccowan with iowa
state university he'll be talking about from the tax implications that are affecting farm
families
affecting that as far as
raising about me and prices that have been rising upward
and then on friday they'll come back into a multitude of break-out sessions so tell
me a little bit about the role of women in farming these days because farming is big
business is the number one business in iowa
so i think close to the number one business an illinois as well
yes it is that you know we we're huge contributor to the gross domestic product
but we do have to recognize it as early as the as the early eighties
a lot of women left the farm and started working off the farm uh... especially during the farm
crisis and what they did is it pulled a lot of those
uh...
groups that were established back then was what was the farm women's committee it
was the cow bells i was a poor cats that would work on little volunteer projects
and they're not around anymore uh... and so what we can as we need to rely upon those
weomen we can and have been taken day off
but also help than educate
about
you know new tax law changes things that they could be doing to market the crop better for
there husband
because a lot of times
even farmers will say themselves
the women do a better job of marketing a crop because they're totally detached from the
farming operation and i'm not wrong when saying is a big
business interests more farm operation it is critical to have that
business
it's definitely a small family farm business and so it takes both individuals working together
and
blancing the tasks that are involved in the farming operation
there is a lot regulations that are coming into play to and sometimes
the husband is so busy doing a lot of the
outside activities and doing a lot of labor
portion it takes the wife to do a lot of filling out of the paperwork from getting
those things in line
four a number of state and federal agencies once again this coming up next week waterfront
the convention center in bettendorf one of these i was talking about
is the higher commodity prices soy beans corn seeing some new highs their but with
that's coming other expenses like we're talk about fertilizer uh... in insurance premiums
and the like
is it easy to forecast twenty eleven at this point for rural families
i don't consider myself an economist but for practical uh... history you take a look at
some of those notions you know all the costs of gone up yes list prices have gone up
uh... but there's new our costs that are being passed on to the farmer onto share is still
a small percentage however what's nice is crop insurance is there for a bit of a risk
management tool that we didn't have
or it wasn't as widely used ten fifteen years ago
you know there's like with anything there's positives and negatives
nother major issues facing uh...
uh... a role america's farm bill twenty twelve work has already begun on that always
worried about at least of the farmers are always worried about uh... what's going to
happen in washington d_c_ and whether they even understand what's going on in middle
america talked me through this right now yeah this is something that
on myself working for of rock island county farm bureau i've been fortunate to serve on
the illinois farm bureau farm policy task force is a staff member you know there's twenty-six
farmers are not statewide and they started as early as july
talking about this
you're not talking
about a farm bill till twenty twelve the were already taking those progressive steps
and the reason is is
that only from your recognizes that there is a definite budget constraints
on that we're gonna have to work with and so that's why we want to be on the four front
trying to take uh... aggressive approach and say here's some of things that maybe we can
change and modify some of our spending limits and what i've always heard from farmers is
that ok view that cut some of the uh... government programs then let past better
market overseas
and exports are proving to be come a bigger and bigger four iowa and illinois iowa
the number one pork
provider in japan a number of other nations so are we seeing better export better
better idea of i'd non-uniform trade groups are going overseas are we seeing that
more effective
here we are keno especially with the situation is going on egypt right now the
first thing we don't want to do is going to any type of
trade limitations on because that does disrupt the market considerablyyou know
maybe playing a little bit of the market we know that as well with oil
because egypt is in the top fifthteen
uh... of one of the importers of our products to sell
uh... were working on a korea
free trade agreement there's a lot of things to work through
uh... but you know farmers do demands
uh... expect those types of trade markets because we are the number one food fiber and
fuel producer in the world and let me tell you one more area
and that is the little micro farms neesh farms that are going
on all over the place we see that pop up more and more yeah that's been our largest growth
is women especially
have gotten into doing a little bit more small-scale farming
and a lot of the people that ten years ago that said okay i'm just gonna have ten acres
in the habit
as a lawn
are now starting to realize that maybe i can take some of that and convert it into some
specially cops
uh... we see huge growth in that area and that's been
you know that's what's so great about the united states is total safe in
abundant food supply and we have a lot of different ways
and i think what it's also done is it's allowed those people that didn't have
a direct connection to the farm are now starting understand
daily issues that farmers do a special if weather past all those things that go with
it so
we are fortunate to have so many choices here in the united states you can pick organic
you can add non organic you can't you know it's affordable you can have you know local
food
direct to your own plate even restaurants
i think it's an exciting time and we have a better idea now of where their food has
come from her uh... both from the corporate farms as well for the smaller
farms as well right
and an t another misnomer out there as corporate farms still ninety percent of
the farms are family farm
that's not to say that might be larger in
number baker's help but there may be five families involved in that
you know that's what's so great about these eastern iowa and western illinois is it we have got
generations upon generations of families here that are farming
very successful their kids
and of what iowa staty university of illinois illinois state you and i
spent five six years in the workforce comeback in our investing here locally
that's its an exciting time
in farming and in agriculture right now if we're gonna feed the world in the next
twenty to twenty-five years as the world's population doubles
going to be exploding in that's the other thing is you know how are we gonna do it with
what we have today we have to do more with less
i thank you deann
and that if you want to have more information about farm bureau activities and the latest
news down on the farm
check out the five year old website and if you had to the overall women's conference
make sure you say hello to deann
and just a reminder if your child has a knack for writing
we want to
read from them
the p_b_s_ kids' go writers contest for children in kindergarten through third grade
is going on right now and we want them to send us their original stories
there are sixteen local winners four from each grade we've got details on our website
at W q p t dot
that's where you'll find the registration form
the rules anna writer's guide there also need to free workshops this month one in davenport
the other in moline so get your kids involved
check out w q p d dot org for the detail
and that puts wrap
on things for this week
for those loved winters this must be a great week for you
for the rest of you spring is just eight weeks away
that's just around the corner
even here in the cities
production funding for the cities is provided by a grant from the doris and victor day foundation