Submitted by Amanda Ogus on Fri, 06/22/2007 - 12:24pm
in
  • Facing
    South     reports on the People’s Freedom Caravan, a regional group leaving New Mexico on June 25 with plans to travel to New Orleans to build solidarity with grassroots groups and
    highlight the government’s unfair treatment of survivors of
    Hurricane Katrina. This event is a
    precursor to the U.S. Social Forum in Atlanta next week. The organizers explain that
    “Post-Katrina life in New Orleans has shown that
    there is no real recovery of the Gulf Coast, but only a massive
    privatization scheme that takes away our homes, communities, and human
    rights.” Bringing public attention to
    this devastated region is the only way to promote action in an area where after
    a year, only 18% of the public schools had reopened and 60% of the homes had
    electricity service    . For more
    information, check out previous postings, Katrina "report cards", and fact sheets.
  • Prometheus
    6     is also blogging New Orleans, focusing on the Army Corps of Engineers recent report on many neighborhoods in New Orleans' extreme
    vulnerability to future storms. Large
    areas of the city would still be flooded in the event of a major storm, and the progress is
    slower than expected. Residents can
    study the city on a new website on a block-by-block basis for different kinds
    of storms.
  • Immigration Equality Blog reports on
    a recent Migration Policy Institute report (pdf) about the results of a Senate bill
    proposal and how it affects family members trying to immigrate. The
    report highlights the change from a system that “allocates about two-thirds of
    permanent visas to family members and less than one-fifth to employment-based
    immigrants, to a system that eventually allocates perhaps less that half of all
    visas to family members and about two-fifths to points-based immigrants.” The report also shows the current age and
    education demographics of the immigrants in 2005, and extrapolates how the new
    policy would effect immigration.
  • Yolanda Ochoa tells another touching immigration story as part of the Dreams Across America videos. After immigrating, Yolanda went back to school to learn English and study to start her career as a nursing assistant.  Her dream is to eliminate all children witnessing their parents being deported, and is committed to immigration reform.