Archive - Jan 26, 2010

• Doctors in Haiti express concern over long term care for injured
• Residents crowd in tent cities, food and water still scarce in Port Au Prince
• Obama announces three-year federal spending freeze
• Male students of color face high drop out numbers, low grad rates
• Transit Authority withholds stimulus funds from BART for possible violations of Civil Rights Act

• Two Venezuelan students killed in protest over RCTV
• ICRC calls for more protection for civilians in Afghanistan
• Sri Lanka incumbent says challenger not eligible to serve
• Death toll rises in Nigerian sectarian violence, officials arrest hundreds
• Four more sentenced to death over unrest in Urumchi
• Schwarzenegger suggests outsourcing CA prisons to Mexico
• Former Guatemalan President rounded up at ranch

Haiti's president Rene Preval is urgently calling for an additional 200,000 tents for the country's homeless and asked for planes carrying tents to have priority at Port Au Prince's airport. Attention is focusing on the country's nearly 1 million left without shelter by the earthquake. The UN has cleared 12 acres north of Port Au Prince, which it hopes will be used as sites for temporary settlements. An estimated 200,000 have already fled the capital.

Dr. Joia Mukherjee is the medical director for Partners in Health, an organization that has 170 medical teams in Haiti. She calls this a massive demographic shift in Haiti that is putting pressure on rural communities.

"Mayors and local officials have asked us for thousands and thousands of tents as they try to absorb and house the numbers of refugees who are flooding out of the capital who have lost their homes."

Dr. Mukherjee said her teams are concerned about infections. Staff has already found cases of tetanus and, in a country where vaccinations are uncommon, the danger is widespread.

Another long term concern is aiding recovery for the thousands of survivors who underwent amputations as a result of crushing injuries. Dr. Mukherjee said the country lacks support for these survivors.

"We're going to need a lot of rehab support, a lot of prosthetic support, but also some vision of what it is going to be like to have a nation of people, many of whom are disabled. And then add to that, which I think goes hand in hand, there is a huge amount of psychological trauma: one, for people with amputations and then two, just psychological trauma in general. We have inadequate support for the long term needs of a population that is this wounded and this traumatized."

The United Nations has also identified care after surgery as a priority. Paul Garwood is a spokesperson for the World Health Organization.

"In particular we see a great need for services for amputees. There have been thousands of people who have suffered amputations. As a result of this emergency, we've seen in some hospitals every day from 30 to 100 amputations taking place. At the moment, the key focus for WHO and other health providers on the ground to is to provide better and more rehabilitation and other post-op services to enable people to recover from their amputations."

Meanwhile, in Port Au Prince roads are beginning to open up, but there are still reports of aid delayed at the airport as people wait in long lines for food and water on the streets of the capital.

Dolores M. Bernal is an FSRN reporter. We reached her by mobile phone in Port Au Prince.

In Washington, President Obama has announced a three-year freeze on discretionary spending. The news comes just ahead of his second State of the Union address scheduled for Wednesday evening and is part of his Administration’s focus on the economy. The announcement is being met by frustration among liberal lawmakers. Conservatives say the President is moving in the right direction. FSRN’s Leigh Ann Caldwell reports.

Across the US, young male students of color face higher drop out rates and lower rates of attending and graduating from college. While the statistics aren’t surprising, the higher education admissions group, The College Board, wants to increase the visibility of the problem. On Capitol Hill today, the group joined lawmakers and experts to discuss what can be done to address this challenge. FSRN's Karen Miller reports.

Public interest advocates are applauding a decision by the Federal Transit Authority to withhold $70 million dollars in stimulus funding from the Bay Area Rapid Transit agency for possible violations of the Civil Rights Act. The issue surrounds a half-billion dollar BART transportation project called the "Oakland Airport Connector." Critics say the project is geared toward more affluent people and leaves out low-income residents and people of color. Bob Allen is Transportation & Housing Director with Urban Habitat, one of the Bay Area advocacy groups that helped to file a Title VI complaint against BART.

“Of particular concern for us is the prohibitive cost for riding the new project. The Connector would replace an existing bus shuttle that presently delivers passengers and workers to the airport for 12 minutes for a fare of three dollars each way. However, under the new Connector, passengers and workers would be charged six dollars each way, or twelve dollars round trip on top of their normal BART fare. The price alone would exclude many Oakland residents and we believe would impose significant economic burden on airport workers, many of whom are low-wage earners.”

Allen says they're also concerned that the project doesn't include stops along the way, thus limiting the number of people who would use the project for transportation. Reverend Scott Denman with the advocacy group Genesis says the faith community sees the issue as "Robin Hood in reverse."

“When you take money out of stimulus funds and use it to assist those who can afford airline tickets while taking away the opportunity for those to ride buses -- to schools, to the church, to work to the doctor -- the injustice is not only obvious but quite obscene in our opinion and is really a no brainer.”

Some watching this case say the federal government's actions in Oakland are significant as it indicates a commitment to investigate civil rights complaints. Former senior policy advisor for the Department of Transportation Marc Brenman said this is the first time stimulus funds have been withheld for social equity purposes.

“Since 1964 the principle of the Civil Rights Act has been that federal money should not be spent in a discriminatory way. President Clinton’s environmental justice executive order in 1995 required federal agencies to examine and reduce the adverse impacts of federal projects on low-income and minority people. USDOT and FTA wrote guidance for Title VI years ago. Now they’ve shown how to make that guidance work with the help of dedicated public advocates."

The FTA gave BART a March 5th deadline to meet several demands, including conducting an adequate "equity analysis" that examines the project's impact on transportation service and fares. If BART fails to meet the deadline, the stimulus funds could be re-allocated to another entity or project. In a statement, BART said they have "always been and will continue to be committed to providing non-discriminatory, equitable, accessible and safe public transportation to all the Bay Area residents."