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Notes from the Road
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date: Friday, Feb. 11 & Sat. Feb 12
locale: Cleveland/Dayton OH
"To end poverty, not to manage poverty." Jim Fleming is speaking to a group of musicians and activists in a crowded penthouse suite at the Sheraton on the second day of the Folk Alliance. Jim is a partner in Fleming & Tamulevich, the largest booking agency in the folk/acoustic realm, and for years, he's been involved with a group called the Kensington Welfare Rights Union, a group based in Philadelphia PA. Their mission - to create a grassroots movement among poor people to end poverty. Fleming notes the media blackout regarding poverty, including NPR, illustrated by the march from Washington, DC to the United Nations last year that no one in the room remembers because no one but Pacifica covered the story. He explains that he is involved because he is convinced that folk musicians reach an "alternative audience" of people outside the mainstream media who might be receptive to the message, and that these audiences listen carefully. He also knows that, taken together, folk musicians play to several hundred thousand people a year.
 Tom Paxton (by the door) was one of many to attend this gathering to rally musicians to the cause of ending poverty. |
Now that we know why we are here, he introduces the main speaker, Cheri Honkala, director of KWRU, and herself a former homeless single mother. Honkala explains that the work of the KWRU. They are a group of volunteers working to train leaders among the poor so they can lead their own movement. The group has filed a petition filed with Janet Reno indicting the US Government for human rights violations and has contributed to a recent report documenting these violations against the poor in America. Honkala knows the problem of the media blackout personally. She was arrested during the recent WTO demonstrations in Seattle for stepping into the street. |
She was charged with assaulting an officer, and then, when no officer stepped forward to confirm the claim, the charge was reduced to obstructing an officer. Chillingly, the first plea bargain she was offered was probation plus promising not to organize for two years. Ironically, her son is now a movie star - the lead child actor in Snow Day, but when he appeared today on Good Morning America, they didn't use the segment where he describes being homeless in this country. She reminds us of the heritage of folk music, which is the telling of stories, and the giving of a voice to developing movements.
Cheri introduces a young woman named Erica, a member of the KWRU Human Rights Choir. Erica sings a marching hymn:
Right now - we'll not back down
Right now - we'll not be moved
Right now - we staked our claim now
Right now - we mapped out our route.
A poet, like the Ancient Mariner, says some poems, beginning with the line: "Those in power always want those in poverty to live on poetry."
There are copies of the human rights report on the table, as well as fliers announcing a major demonstration on July 31 to coincide with the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia. The goal is to resist the perennial efforts by host cities - with silent consent from the press - to make the poor and homeless invisible for the duration of the event, sweeping them off the streets and beautifying facades.
Looking around the room, I see veterans like the Nields, Tom Paxton, and Cliff Eberhardt, as well as newcomers like Anne Heaton, attending her first conference. Pierre Guerrin, president of the National Folk Alliance, is our host in this suite. We all give our own silent consent to use our stages to talk about it, sealed with a bit of Jim Fleming's birthday cake.
Hugh Blumenfeld, Editor
hugh@balladtree.com
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