Virginia Martin

Dogs, Firehoses Were a Precursor to Today’s Violent Protests

Retired Birmingham Police Chief Johnnie Johnson Jr. is a fan of the 1960s TV show “High Chaparral.” He recalls an episode in which someone was paying people to kill Indians. “One day, they said, 'We're gonna have to kill Cannon,'” Johnson said, referring to the white lead character who starred in the show. “The guy said, 'No, no. No way, bruh. Shooting an Indian is one thing but killing a man is something else.’” In that sense, Birmingham was the High Chaparral for police in their dealings with Blacks at the time. Johnson, one of the first Black officers in the Birmingham Police Department and the first Black chief of the department when he was appointed in 1991, said police treated Blacks differently from how they treated whites. Recent protests and clashes grew from the attitudes and events during those days in the 1960s and even earlier. Across the country, there have been incidents of Blacks being killed at the hands of law enforcement officers. George Floyd and Breonna Taylor are just two examples of Blacks who have lost their lives in this manner this year. As multiracial protestors have taken to the streets, police in some places have taken aggressive action to squelch calls for indictments and defunding of law enforcement. For Birmingham, the most pronounced time of friction between the Black community and police was decades ago.  Read more. Who Says You Can't Teach an Old Dog New Tricks?

Transforming Police Dogs — It’s All About the Training

House OKs Apprenticeship Program Opposed by the GOP

Voterama in Congress WASHINGTON – Voting 246 for and 140 against, the House on Nov 20 passed a bill (HR 8294) that would authorize $3.5 billion over five years to expand federally funded apprenticeship programs. While the bill would prepare workers for jobs in traditional industries such as manufacturing, transportation and construction, it also would fund instruction and on-the-job training for specialized fields such as early childhood education, advanced health care and green energy. The House also rejected a Republican-backed alternative to the plan. The Senate, meanwhile, approved President Trump’s nominee to the U.S. Court of International Trade and rejected his nominee to the Federal Reserve System Board of Governors. Read more.

Sharp Rise in Alabama COVID-19 Numbers Causing Alarm

With the number of new daily cases of COVID-19 up by almost half and the number of deaths reported each day up by more than 80% in two weeks’ time, the concern over a so-called “second wave” of infections is increasing. In this week’s BirminghamWatch analysis of coronavirus data, all numbers have taken a sharp turn for the worse. The 7-day average of daily new cases jumped from 1,438.71 two weeks ago to 2,121.29 on Wednesday, an increase of 48.3% and the highest level since the pandemic began. Read more.

Jones Pleads With Public to Follow COVID Safety Guidelines as Cases, Deaths Increase

U.S. Sen. Doug Jones on Wednesday urged people to listen to health care officials’ advice on the coronavirus, not the opinions of politicians. “We have now seen another surge in cases,” Jones said during a press conference with UAB’s Dr. Jeanne Marrazzo. “You will all recall that beginning last April, I kept admonishing folks, ‘Please, please listen to our health care professionals. Do not listen to politicians. Do not listen to anyone other than our health care professionals.’ “What we’ve seen come to pass is exactly what our health care professionals have said,” Jones continued. “As we get into the colder months, as we get into the winter, as people let their guard down and get a little COVID fatigue, we are going to see a rise in cases, and we are seeing a dangerous rise in cases at this point, more than we anticipated and more than we even saw in the summer.” Read more.

Rising COVID-19 Cases Starting to Strain Hospital Resources, Staff

Hospitals across the state are feeling the strain of a growing number of COVID-19 cases but are managing to keep up with patient needs, the president of the Alabama Hospital Association said Tuesday. “We are in a very precarious and potentially dangerous place right now in dealing with COVID cases,” said Dr. Don Williamson, a former state health officer who heads the Hospital Association. Read more.

Commission OKs Cares Act Funding in Quick Session

Tuesday’s committee meeting of the Jefferson County Commission was so fast you would have thought commissioners were trying to beat a deadline. In a sense, they were. As they have for months, commissioners continued their efforts to dole out federal funds related to the novel coronavirus pandemic. The light agenda included 18 resolutions from county manager Tony Petelos to distribute Cares Act funds to help cities, towns and entities in the county address needs of citizens that arose from COVID-19. Petelos said the items that were moved to Thursday’s meeting agenda leave just a few who have not gotten requested money. “We’ll have those next meeting,” Petelos said. Read more.

Birmingham Council Balks at Mayor’s Plan to Bring Back Some Workers, Wants More Information

The Birmingham City Council is mulling a proposal from Mayor Randall Woodfin to bring back up to 132 furloughed city employees by taking $7 million from the city’s reserve fund. The proposal also would reinstate two paid holidays and reverse some salary reductions to appointed staff, both of which, like the furloughs, had been cut due to a city budget shortfall caused by COVID-19. Although Finance Director Lester Smith assured councilors he was confident the money would be reimbursed with Cares Act funding that is awaiting action by the Jefferson County Commission, the proposal was met with deep skepticism from councilors, who criticized the proposal’s lack of detail and argued that it could damage the city’s financial standing. Read more.

Longtime Clanton Mayor Billy Joe Driver Would Have Done Just About Anything for His Little City

If you were in Clanton on Monday, you might have noticed signs of a celebration dedicated to the city’s late mayor, Billy Joe Driver, who died July 9 of COVID-19. There might have been a few people raising a glass to him on what should have been his 85th birthday. It would be entirely appropriate, although Driver was a teetotaler. You see, much of the prosperity around you in this peach capital of Alabama came as a result of Driver’s laser-focused absorption with making Clanton a better place to live and work, and part of that came down to alcohol sales. Read more.

Baxley Predicts Jones Will Get the AG Nod From Biden

What is the next step for Alabama’s soon-to-be former U.S. Sen. Doug Jones? “I fully expect that Doug Jones will be the next United States attorney general,” said Bill Baxley, himself a former Alabama attorney general and a key piece of the church-bombing “cold case” solution that brought Jones to national attention. Baxley cited Jones’ long-time relationship with Biden and his bipartisan approach to politics. Several publications also have listed Jones among top picks for Biden’s cabinet. Read more.

Rebuilding Local News? Start With Local Control

A coalition involving the National Newspaper Association, the Institute for Nonprofit News and a dozen more news organizations recently rolled out an ambitious plan to channel $3 billion to $5 billion dollars from the government, businesses and philanthropies into local journalism. The plan for newsroom funding, called Rebuild Local News, comes as local news organizations in many communities are crumbling. Researchers at the University of North Carolina found that more than one-quarter of the nation’s newspapers had disappeared during the past 15 years. As policymakers, news organizations, advocates and community members think about how to save news organizations that can (and should) be saved and how to replace those that can’t (or shouldn’t), it is vital to remember that simply “providing the news,” shouldn’t be a journalistic organization’s only responsibility. Local news organizations also must be committed to a community, promoting inclusive dialog to help them see and solve local problems. Read more.