Pepper’s Persistence and a Peace Hero’s Passing

Disregarding the public relations disaster he created the first time he tried this publicity stunt, City Councilman David Pepper, candidate for mayor, is trying the same tack again. Pepper recently whined about his opponent, State Sen. Mark Mallory (D-West End), refusing to distance himself from statements by a marginal African-American activist, Nate Livingston. Mallory responded by publicly denouncing every mean thing anyone has ever said about Pepper, requesting daily updates from the Pepper campaign so he could also denounce any new mean things said about him.

Undaunted by the mockery that followed, last week Pepper did it again, this time complaining that Mallory hasn’t renounced the endorsement by another marginal African-American group, the Black Fist. Pepper is too smart to be worried that the Black Fist — which has three known members — can influence the election. That leaves one possibility: He keeps trotting out the marginal African-American activists in order to play the race card, hoping to scare white voters away from Mallory. Meanwhile, Mallory has been showing how un-marginal his support his, recently gaining the endorsement of the AFL-CIO, Hamilton County’s legislative delegation in Columbus and even two old Republican stalwarts, former state senate presidents Dick Finan and Stanley Aronoff.

Peace activists in Cincinnati are mourning the death of the Rev. Raymond Woodruff, a retired minister of the United Church of Christ (see “A Fierce Nonviolence,” issue of March 3-9, 2003), at the age of 83. Woodruff will be deeply missed, according to Steve Sunderland, a professor of social work at the University of Cincinnati and founder of the High School Peace Village.

“Ray was the most stubborn and most energetic peace worker I knew,” Sunderland says.

“Whether standing outside the ballpark in a white sheet in respect for the dead of Iraq when Bush visited or thinking out loud about peaceful and respectful resistance, he was always himself, always optimistic that reason and compassion would win, and always interested in what everyone had to say. Ray taught us that the lessons of peace can be learned at any age, by any person of compassion, and in a jovial manner.”

Woodruff left his remains to science.

Progress for the Poor, Prisoners and Plant Eaters
A unique program by the Over-the-Rhine Housing Network and Cornerstone Community Loan Fund is a finalist for a grant from Impact 100. The agencies hope to receive $112,000 to support Cornerstone Renter Equity at Community Views, a housing rehab project. Renter Equity provides low-income renters the opportunity to build wealth by maintaining their rental housing, in much the same way homeowners build equity in their homes (see All the News That Fits, issue of July 20-26).

“Renter Equity develops sustainable communities by engaging the participation of people who do not own property and making them part of the economic system,” says Margie Spinney, executive director of Cornerstone.

Impact 100 is a nonprofit organization comprised of women with a desire to make a difference in the lives of others and to make Greater Cincinnati a better place to live. The organization is expected to announce grant recipients at its Oct. 20 annual meeting. Other finalists are Genesis Men’s Program, Visionaries and Voices, Project Connect and Cincinnati Works.

Prisoners in Ohio will have improved access to health care thanks to a lawsuit by the Ohio Justice and Policy Center, the Cincinnati nonprofit group formerly known as the Prison Reform Advocacy Center. The group has reached a settlement with the Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (ODRC) in a class action suit, filed in federal court, that alleged the state’s prison health care system is unconstitutional. The settlement will lead to major reforms in the way health care is delivered to Ohio’s 45,000 prisoners, according to David Singleton, executive director of the Justice and Policy Center.

The suit catalogued an array of systemwide problems, including medical and dental staffing shortages, unreasonably long delays in routine and emergency care, problems ordering and obtaining the results of diagnostic tests and inadequate quality control. As part of the settlement, ODRC will add approximately 300 medical staff, including 21 new physicians, over four years.

Howard Lyman, the author whose appearance on Oprah Winfrey sparked a lawsuit by Texas cattlemen, appears at 7 p.m. Monday at Xavier University. His first book, Mad Cowboy, told of his transition from cattle rancher to vegetarian. His new book, No More Bull, is about the ecologically disastrous state of food production in the United States.

His appearance is sponsored by Advocates for Animals at XU, EarthSave Cincinnati and the Cincinnati Vegetarian Resource Group. The program is in Kelly Auditorium in Alter Hall, and admission is free.

This article appears in Oct 12-18, 2005.