Community

The Beacon Deacon: Gussie Reese

Published

11 years ago

December 13, 2013

Every once in a while, we will have an encounter with a person that goes beyond meeting someone for the very first time and from that point forward, becoming lasting friends. How do I know? Because in 1992, at a Saint John District Association training session at Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, Sacramento, CA, I was introduced to Sister Gussie Reese.

Soon to be 95 years old, her memory is sharp and likened to the prized reference books located in my personal library.

What, I do is, mention a general topic, and she provides all of the first-hand specifics. Taken from, an article by, Alex Breitler, January 18^th, 2009; reported in the, Stockton Record, newspaper, titled, ‘Journey Of A Lifetime,’ “Sister Reese and her classmates, in the segregated, Birmingham, Jefferson County, Alabama, learned to read from schoolbooks whose binding were broken, whose pages were scribbled upon and torn. The books were castoffs from white-only schools.”

An only child, Sister Gussie has a fond and vivid memory of her mother, Lula B., and grandmother, Anita, who she talks about them with great passion. She was brought up attending Saint James Baptist Church in Birmingham, as well as Dunbar and Industrial high schools.

After receiving a scholarship to attend Miles College, her first teaching position after graduating was at a Church School in Greensboro, Mississippi.

In 1951, Sister Reese worked at McClellan Air Field in Sacramento, where she saw a poster, announcing overseas placement opportunities. With a chuckle, she says, “I went directly to the personnel office and requested and application.”

The personnel clerk was baffled by the request and informed Sister Reese that there were no positions for her current classification, with the U.S. Armed Forces Institute, (USAFI). Following a brief, but stern discussion on the matter, the clerk surrendered the application.

After submitting the completed application, and without a response, a few weeks having passed; Sister Reese, returned to the personnel office, and asked, ”Had there been any discrepancies with my submitted app?” The young fellow searched, but could not locate the document.

Sister Reese, pointing her finger toward the clerk, said, “I submitted my app to her, weeks ago!” Needless to say, another application was completed that day, and within two weeks, she was assigned to Japan, a first and only.

Quoting from the earlier mentioned, Alex Breitler article, “She broke her own color barrier in Stockton in 1956, when she became the city’s first secondary-school black teacher at Edison High School.” She retired in 1979. In this writer’s opinion, Sister Reese is an extraordinary human being.

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Oakland Post: Week of April 30 – May 6, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of April 30 – May 6, 2025

Published

4 days ago

May 4, 2025

Oakland Post

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Gov. Newsom Approves $170 Million to Fast Track Wildfire Resilience

AB 100 approves major investments in regional conservancies across the state, including over $30 million each for the Sierra Nevada, Santa Monica Mountains, State Coastal, and San Gabriel/Lower LA Rivers and Mountains conservancies. An additional $10 million will support wildfire response and resilience efforts.

Published

1 week ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

Courtesy of California Governor Gavin Newsom’s Facebook page.

By Bo Tefu
California Black Media

With wildfire season approaching, last week Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Assembly Bill (AB) 100, unlocking $170 million to fast-track wildfire prevention and forest management projects — many of which directly protect communities of color, who are often hardest hit by climate-driven disasters.

“With this latest round of funding, we’re continuing to increase the speed and size of forest and vegetation management essential to protecting communities,” said Newsom when he announced the funding on April 14.

“We are leaving no stone unturned — including cutting red tape — in our mission to ensure our neighborhoods are protected from destructive wildfires,” he said.

Newsom also signed an executive order suspending certain regulations to allow urgent work to move forward faster.

This funding builds on California’s broader Wildfire and Forest Resilience Action Plan, a $2.7 billion effort to reduce fuel loads, increase prescribed burning, and harden communities. The state has also launched new dashboards to keep the public informed and hold agencies accountable.

California has also committed to continue investing $200 million annually through 2028 to expand this effort, ensuring long-term resilience, particularly in vulnerable communities.

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California Rideshare Drivers and Supporters Step Up Push to Unionize

Today in California, over 600,000 rideshare drivers want the ability to form or join unions for the sole purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid and protection. It’s a right, and recently at the State Capitol, a large number of people, including some rideshare drivers and others working in the gig economy, reaffirmed that they want to exercise it.

Published

1 week ago

April 28, 2025

Oakland Post

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By Antonio‌ ‌Ray‌ ‌Harvey‌
California‌ ‌Black‌ ‌Media‌

On July 5, 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into federal law the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). Also known as the “Wagner Act,” the law paved the way for employees to have “the right to self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations,” and “to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, according to the legislation’s language.

On April 8, the rideshare drivers held a rally with lawmakers to garner support for Assembly Bill (AB) 1340, the “Transportation Network Company Drivers (TNC) Labor Relations Act.”

Authored by Assemblymembers Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) and Marc Berman (D-Menlo Park), AB 1340 would allow drivers to create a union and negotiate contracts with industry leaders like Uber and Lyft.

“All work has dignity, and every worker deserves a voice — especially in these uncertain times,” Wicks said at the rally. “AB 1340 empowers drivers with the choice to join a union and negotiate for better wages, benefits, and protections. When workers stand together, they are one of the most powerful forces for justice in California.”

Wicks and Berman were joined by three members of the California Legislative Black Caucus (CLBC): Assemblymembers Tina McKinnor (D-Inglewood), Sade Elhawary (D-Los Angeles), and Isaac Bryan (D-Ladera Heights).

Yvonne Wheeler, president of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor; April Verrett, President of Service Employees International Union (SEIU); Tia Orr, Executive Director of SEIU; and a host of others participated in the demonstration on the grounds of the state capitol.

“This is not a gig. This is your life. This is your job,” Bryan said at the rally. “When we organize and fight for our collective needs, it pulls from the people who have so much that they don’t know what to do with it and puts it in the hands of people who are struggling every single day.”

Existing law, the “Protect App-Based Drivers and Services Act,” created by Proposition (Prop) 22, a ballot initiative, categorizes app-based drivers for companies such as Uber and Lyft as independent contractors.

Prop 22 was approved by voters in the November 2020 statewide general election. Since then, Prop 22 has been in court facing challenges from groups trying to overturn it.

However, last July, Prop 22 was upheld by the California Supreme Court last July.

In a 2024, statement after the ruling, Lyft stated that 80% of the rideshare drivers they surveyed acknowledged that Prop 22 “was good for them” and “median hourly earnings of drivers on the Lyft platform in California were 22% higher in 2023 than in 2019.”

Wicks and Berman crafted AB 1340 to circumvent Prop 22.

“With AB 1340, we are putting power in the hands of hundreds of thousands of workers to raise the bar in their industry and create a model for an equitable and innovative partnership in the tech sector,” Berman said.