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District Wide Policy on Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault and Stalking

THE AFRO — January marks the 15th annual National Stalking Awareness Month.

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By George Kevin Jordan

January marks the 15th annual National Stalking Awareness Month, but D.C.has been ahead of the pack with a District wide policy on Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault and Stalking released at the beginning of the year.

“With this policy, we are talking another step to ensure that D.C. Government is a place where all employees feel supported and safe,” Mayor Bowser said in a statement. “By implementing this policy and being more intentional with our guidelines and resources, we can better work together to assist and support victims and survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking.”

According to information from the Stalking Prevention Awareness and Resource Center, (SPARC) an average of 6-7.5 million people are stalked nationally each year. About 1 in 8 employed stalking victims lose time from work as a result of their victimization and more than half lose 5 days of work or more, the data showed.

Though SPARC representatives would not comment on legislation and policy in D.C., they provided this statement:

“Stalking is a pattern of behavior directed at a specific person that causes fear. Many stalking victims experience being followed, approached and/or threatened – including through technology. Stalking is a terrifying and psychologically harmful crime in its own right as well as a predictor of serious violence: in 85% of cases where an intimate partner (i.e., boyfriend or spouse) attempted to murder his partner, stalking preceded the attack.”

D.C.’s policy unpacked workplace-specific signs of domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking, and provides victims with protections against employer discrimination or retaliation. The plan also called for a workplace safety plan, designating agency points of contact for victims, and mandates confidentiality and other protections, according to the Mayor’s office.

The policy was crafted with the help of the D.C. Coalition Against Domestic Violence (DCCADV), a local organization.

“They sent a draft on what they were working on and we provided some feedback,” said Dawn Dalton, Policy Director for DCCADV. “We feel it’s a good policy.”

Late last year, the DCCADV released the  “Surviving DC: A Domestic Violence Report” , detailing the organizations assessment of how a District agency “responds to domestic violence regarding staff who experience domestic violence and survivors who seek services from their agencies.”

The report was a survey of 23 agencies and only two, the Metropolitan Police Department and the Child & Family Services Agencies, received a passing grade.

The survey helped to solidify stark realities about domestic violence and its impact on survivors.

“One of the things we know here in D.C. is that there aren’t enough Domestic Violence services whether it be shelters or long term housing to meet the demand of survivors,” Dalton said.

Luckily the Mayor’s office had already been working on a policy for the District.

“All in all its (the policy) a positive and great step forward for the District to make,” Dalton said.

Other organization heads agree.

“Mayor Bowser’s District-wide Workplace Policy is a groundbreaking initiative that can serve as an example for other states, policymakers, and workplaces to adopt a practice that will not only keep D.C. employees safe, but provide a mechanism for preventing domestic violence,” said L.Y. Marlow Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Saving Promise. “By protecting employees, creating workplace safety, support plans and policies, and offering increased training for D.C. government employees, the District is that much closer to ultimately ending domestic violence.”

According to data from the DCCADV, nearly one-third of unaccompanied homeless women in D.C. indicate that violence is the cause of their current homelessness or housing instability, and 63% of unaccompanied homeless women with past experiences of violence and trauma report at least one act of violence against them during their current period of homelessness or housing instability.

About 50% of D.C. women have experienced psychological aggression perpetrated by an intimate partner in their lifetime, according to the report. Also about 39% of women living D.C. have experienced sexual violence, physical violence and/or stalking perpetrated by an intimate partner.

The D.C. Metro police received 35,909 domestic violence-related calls for service in 2017, according to the DCCADV’s data. This is a decrease from a year ago but an increase since 2013.

On a national level a person is a victim of domestic violence or assault every 20 minutes in this country, according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, impacting about 10 million women and men.

Victims of domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking can reach out to the D.C. Victim Hotline at 1-844-4HELPDC (1-844-443-5732) or contact them via chat at www.dcvictim.org. If anyone is in immediate or imminent danger please dial 911.

This article originally appeared in The Afro

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Oakland Post: Week of October 30 – November 5, 2024

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of October 30 – November 5, 2024

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“Two things can be true at once.” An Afro-Latina Voter Weighs in on Identity and Politics

“As a Puerto Rican I do not feel spoken to in discussions about Latino voters… which is ironic because we are one of the few Latino communities who are also simultaneously American,” Ortiz-Cedeño says. Puerto Ricans born in Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory, have American citizenship by birth but they do not have the right to vote for president if they live on the island. “I think that we miss out on a really interesting opportunity to have a nuanced conversation by ignoring this huge Latino population that is indigenously American.”

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Keyanna Ortiz-Cedeño at her graduation from UC Berkeley after receiving her master’s degree in City Regional Planning. Alongside her, are her parents holding a Puerto Rican flag. Courtesy photo.
Keyanna Ortiz-Cedeño at her graduation from UC Berkeley after receiving her master’s degree in City Regional Planning. Alongside her, are her parents holding a Puerto Rican flag. Courtesy photo.

By Magaly Muñoz

On a sunny afternoon at Los Cilantros Restaurant in Berkeley, California, Keyanna Ortiz-Cedeño, a 27-year-old Afro-Latina with tight curly hair and deep brown skin, stares down at her carne asada tacos, “I’ve definitely eaten more tortillas than plantains over the course of my life,” says Cedeño, who spent her childhood in South Texas, among predominantly Mexican-American Latinos. As she eats, she reflects on the views that American politicians have of Latino voters.

“As a Puerto Rican I do not feel spoken to in discussions about Latino voters… which is ironic because we are one of the few Latino communities who are also simultaneously American,” Ortiz-Cedeño says. Puerto Ricans born in Puerto Rico, a U.S. territory, have American citizenship by birth but they do not have the right to vote for president if they live on the island. “I think that we miss out on a really interesting opportunity to have a nuanced conversation by ignoring this huge Latino population that is indigenously American.”

Ortiz-Cedeño, an urban planner who is focused on disaster resilience, homelessness and economic prosperity for people of color, says that political conversations around Latinos tend to shift towards immigration, “I think this ties back into the ways that our perception of ‘Latino’ tends to be Mexican and Central American because so much of our conversation about Latinos is deeply rooted in what’s happening on the border,” she says. “I don’t think that the Afro-Latino vote is frequently considered when we’re talking about the Latino vote in the United States.”

Primarily surrounded by Mexican-Americans while growing up in South Texas, Keyanna participated in many Chicano cultured events, such as being a dama in several quinceñeras. Courtesy photo.

Primarily surrounded by Mexican-Americans while growing up in South Texas, Keyanna participated in many Chicano cultured events, such as being a dama in several quinceñeras. Courtesy photo.

As Ortiz-Cedeño sifts through childhood photos of her as a happy teen dancing with the Mexican ballet folklorico group in high school and as a dama in quinceñeras, she reflects on growing up in South Texas, an area with a large population of white and Mexican-Americans. The Black population was small, and within it, the Afro-Latino population was practically nonexistent.

“It was interesting to try to have conversations with other Latinos in the community because I think that there was a combination of both willful ignorance and a sort of ill intent and effort to try and deny my experience as a Latino,” she says. “There are a lot of folks in Latin America who experience a lot of cognitive dissonance when they think about the existence of Black Latinos in Latin America.

Ortiz-Cedeño comments on the long history of anti-Blackness in Latin America. “Throughout Latin America, we have a really insidious history with erasing Blackness and I think that that has been carried into the Latino American culture and experience,” she says. “People will tell you, race doesn’t exist in Latin America, like we’re all Dominicans, we’re all Puerto Ricans, we’re all Cubans, we’re all Mexicans. If you were to go to the spaces with where people are from and look at who is experiencing the most acute violence, the most acute poverty, the most acute political oppression and marginalization, those people are usually darker. And that’s not by accident, it’s by design.”

Because of the lack of diversity in her Gulf Coast town, as a teenager, despite being the only Spanish-speaker at her job in Walmart, Latinos refused to ask for her help in Spanish.

“Even if monolingual [Spanish-speaking] people would have to speak with me, then they were trying to speak English, even though they could not speak English, versus engaging with me as a Latina,” she says.

“I think that the perception of Latinos in the United States is of a light brown person with long, wavy or straight hair. The perfect amount of curves and the perfect combination of Indigenous and white genes. And very rarely will people also consider that maybe they also have a sprinkle of Blackness in them as well,” she says. “Over 90% of the slave trade went to the Caribbean and Latin America.”

Keyanna as a toddler, holding a whiteboard up with her last name, Ortiz-Cedeño, on it. Courtesy photo.

Keyanna as a toddler, holding a whiteboard up with her last name, Ortiz-Cedeño, on it. Courtesy photo.

Ortiz-Cedeño remembers when a Cuban family moved in next door to her in Texas. The teen daughter had blue-eyes, blonde hair and only spoke Spanish, which caused neighboring Latinos to take pause because she didn’t fit the Latino “look” they were used to.

“People didn’t have an option to try and negate her [Latino] identity because they had to acknowledge her for everything that she was,” Ortiz-Cedeño says.

Later on, the girl’s cousins, a Black, Spanish-speaking Cuban family, came into town and again locals were forced to reckon with the fact that not all Latinos fit a certain criteria.

“I think it forced everybody to have to confront a reality that they knew in the back of their mind but didn’t want to acknowledge at the forefront,” Ortiz-Cedeño says.

Having gone through these experiences as an Afro-Latina, Ortiz-Cedeño says it’s easy for her to understand Kamala Harris’ mixed Indian and Jamaican heritage, “It comes really naturally to accept that she is both Indian and Black. Two things can exist at the same time,” she says. “I had a long term partner for about seven years who was South Indian, from the same state as Kamala Harris, so if we had had a kid, they would look like [Harris],” Ortiz-Cedeño jokingly shares.

She says she can relate to having to walk the road of people only wanting to see Harris as a Black American. The talking point about [Harris] not being Indian or not being Black, just deciding to be Black, is really disingenuous and cheap,” she says.

Ortiz-Cedeño believes that the Harris campaign has not capitalized on the vice president’s mixed identity, which could be vital in bringing together different communities to understand each other on a new level and allow for improvements on America’s racial dynamics.

Keyanna co-managed a recovery center with her mother after Hurricane Harvey. They packed essentials, such as diapers, food, and water for families in need. Courtesy photo.

Keyanna co-managed a recovery center with her mother after Hurricane Harvey. They packed essentials, such as diapers, food, and water for families in need. Courtesy photo.

As she rushes into a Berkeley Urban Planning Commission meeting straight out of Ashby BART station, Ortiz-Cedeño explains her love for talking about all things infrastructure, homelessness, and healthcare access. The topics can be dry for many, she admits, but in the end, she gets to address long-standing systemic issues that often hinder opportunities for growth for people of color.

Having lived through the effects of Hurricane Katrina as a child, with the flooding and mass migration of Louisiana residents into Texas, Ortiz-Cedeño was radicalized into issues of displacement, emergency mitigation, and housing at nine years old.

“I remember my principal had to carry her students on her shoulders and swim us home because so many parents were trying to drive in and get their kids from school [due to] the flooding that was pushing their cars away,” she recalls.

Her family relocated to Houston soon after Katrina, only to be met with a deadly Hurricane Rita. They wound up in a mega-shelter, where Ortiz-Cedeño says she heard survivors stories of the unstable conditions in New Orleans and beyond, which got her wondering about urban planning, a term she wasn’t familiar with at the time.

“I think that when you put people in the context of the things that were happening in this country around [these hurricanes], a lot of us started to really think seriously about who gets to make decisions about the urban environment,” she adds.

Watching the heavy displacement of disaster survivors, hearing stories of her Navy veteran father’s chronic homelessness, and her own mother’s work and activism with homeless communities in the non–profit sector put her on the path to progressive politics and solutions, she says. After attending college on the East Coast- where she says she was finally recognized as a Puerto Rican- and working in housing, economic development, and public policy, she returned to California to earn a Master’s in City Regional Planning from UC Berkeley.

Young Keyanna volunteering at a beach clean up. Activism and giving back to her community has always been a key part of her upbringing. Courtesy photo.

Young Keyanna volunteering at a beach clean up. Activism and giving back to her community has always been a key part of her upbringing. Courtesy photo.

Her vast interest in the urban success of underserved communities even took her abroad to Israel and Palestine when she was an undergraduate college student. “I’ve seen the border with Gaza, I’ve had homestays with farmers in the West Bank,” she says. “For me personally, Palestine is an issue that is really close to the heart.”

“I have a very intimate understanding of the conflict and I’m very disturbed by the way in which the [Democratic] party has not been willing to engage in what I would perceive to be a thoughtful enough conversation about the conflict,” Ortiz-Cedeño says. “The issue of Palestine is going to be one of those that is a make or break issue for her. It has not been one that has been taken seriously enough by the party.”

Ortiz-Cedeño is not under the illusion that one candidate will address every policy issue she wants to see tackled by the president. But she believes it’s better than what former President Donald Trump has to offer.

“Trump has made it very clear what his intentions are with Palestine, and what his relationship is with [Benjamin] Netanyahu,” Ortiz-Cedeño says. “I understand the political strategy that many people are trying to engage in by withholding their vote, but I would also encourage them to re-engage in the political process.”

Casting her vote for Harris is a decision grounded in calculation rather than outright support. “I think I can vote in this election in order to have harm reduction… because I have deep care and concern for other communities that are going to be impacted by a Trump presidency,” Ortiz-Cedeño says.

She also hopes that American politicians will consider the nuance and perspective that Afro-Latinos bring to the table when it comes to politics, policy, and race in America, “When we don’t think expansively about who is Latino in the United States, the breadth of Latino experiences in the United States, we miss an opportunity to capture how diverse Latinos interests are politically.”

This story was reported in collaboration with PBS VOCES: Latino Vote 2024.

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California Black Media

Ahead of Nov. Election, Event to Check Pulse of California’s Political Landscape

The Public Policy Institute of California is hosting a “2024 Speaker Series on California’s Future,” a preview event outlining the political landscape of the state and the nation ahead of the upcoming November elections. The event, which will be held Sept. 26 from 12 noon to 1 p.m., will include a panel of prominent political journalists who will assess the mood of the electorate and discuss themes and issues that are likely to shape the election outcome in November.

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PPIC
PPIC

By Bo Tefu, California Black Media

The Public Policy Institute of California is hosting a “2024 Speaker Series on California’s Future,” a preview event outlining the political landscape of the state and the nation ahead of the upcoming November elections.

The event, which will be held Sept. 26 from 12 noon to 1 p.m.,   will include a panel of prominent political journalists who will assess the mood of the electorate and discuss themes and issues that are likely to shape the election outcome in November.

The welcome and opening remarks of the event will be led by Tani Cantil-Sakauye, the president and chief executive officer of the PPIC. The discussion will be moderated by FOX 11 news anchor Elex Michaelson, journalists joining the conversation include senior political writer Joe Garofoli of the San Francisco Chronicle, national politics reporter Astead Herndon of the The New York Times, political correspondent for KQED Marisa Lagos, and senior political reporter POLITICO Melanie Mason.

A statewide survey by the PPIC revealed key findings that highlighted people’s concerns regarding candidates of choice for the 2024 presidential election, the 10 state propositions on the ballot, and the financial direction of the state in the next 12 months.

Since Vice President Kamala Harris replaced President Joe Biden as the Democratic Party standard bearer, 6 in 10 California likely voters support the Democratic presidential ticket compared to the Republican party and other candidates.

“Californians’ support for the Democratic presidential candidate — and partisans’ overwhelming preference for their party’s candidates — were the consistent trends before Harris replaced Biden,” the survey report stated.

Among the 10 ballot measures, approximately 71% of voters are expected to vote yes on Proposition 36, allowing felony charges and increased sentences for some drug and theft crimes.

According to the survey, the majority of voters, “think it is a good thing that a majority of voters can make laws and change public policies by passing initiatives.” Voters agree that initiatives on the ballot, “bring up important public policy issues that the Governor and Legislature have not adequately addressed.”

The survey also revealed that nearly half of voters think the state and country are headed in the wrong direction and expect financial struggles in the next 12 months.

The event will be held at the Sheraton Grand Hotel in Sacramento.

The PPIC Speaker Series on California’s Future invites thought leaders and changemakers to address challenges in the state. Residents can visit the PPIC website for more information and register for the event available online and in person.

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