Black caucus abuses its power on scholarships
I was totally disgusted by the front page story on June 30 concerning scholarships awarded by the N.C. Legislative Black Caucus Foundation. It doesn't take a rocket scientist or multiple committees to figure out that giving scholarships to family members of the officers of an organization is an ethics issue. To hide behind the need to "wait on advice from the legislature's joint ethics committee" is a cop-out, plain and simple. The only reason you need some committee to draft rules is so you can see just how close to the line you can operate.
I'm a proud member of the Summit Rotary Club. We give multiple youth scholarships every year and one of our most basic requirements is that a recipient not be the child of a Rotarian, plain and simple. We also send youth on cultural exchanges to other countries and again, a recipient can't be a Rotarian.
I've got a suggestion for every North Carolina political leader, foundation officer/member or anyone else concerned about ethical behavior; adopt Rotary's four-way test for all you say and do; is it the truth; is it fair to all concerned; will it build good will and better friendships; and will it be beneficial to all concerned?
Ask those four simple questions and you will have gone a long way toward resolving the need for ethics committees and the like.
Steele Smith
Jamestown
Comments (8)
To report abuse of the comment feature on this site, please use the feedback form at the bottom of any page.
Well Steele, the only question the NC political "leaders" ask themselves is will it line my pockets and will it make me look good. Truth, fair, good will and friednships, and beneficial aren't even in the vocabularies of the NC political groups. The only word they understand is MONEY for them.
Posted on July 5, 2007 7:36 AM
Is there an NC Legislative White Caucus?
Posted on July 5, 2007 7:46 AM
N.C. Legislative Black Caucus Foundation . . .
. . . it's most likely the white folks fault for this too . . .
Posted on July 5, 2007 8:14 AM
You're absolutely right, Steele. But it should be taken one step further. There should be a prohibition on scholarships for not only of children of the members of the Black Caucus Foundation, and any other such organization, but on the entire immediate family of the members AND STAFF of the NCLBCF: Parents, siblings, children, children of siblings and grandchildren.
Surely, there are enough deserving students to be found without shaking the family tree.
Posted on July 5, 2007 8:46 AM
Excellent thought there fellow Rotarian.
Posted on July 5, 2007 8:47 AM
The following is from today's Winston Salem Journal:
"The head of the N.C. Legislative Black Caucus Foundation says that the group's scholarship program may be a political target because of "racial targeting."
In a letter to meida outlets, Rep. Alma Adams defended the foundation's practices and questioned the motives of Joe Sinsheimer, a Democrat who has criticized the foundation for handing out scholarship money to relatives offive legislators.
"What's up, anyway, when a registered white Democrat viciously attacks black Democratic legislators," wrote Adams, D-Guilford. "His scrutiny appears racially directed."
(End of article)
No, Ms. Adams, the scrutiny is not racial, it's ethical! Your statement makes it official - the race card is to be played whenever anyone questions a black person's ethics. Add to that calling the questioning a "vicious attack" and you can make the question sound worse. Next it'll be a "lynching"!
If you cannot see that taking money from lobbyists, corporations and other donors, and then giving it out to your own family members at least appears to be the wrong thing to do, you are just plain stupid. However, I don't think you are stupid. I think you are a criminal.
Posted on July 5, 2007 3:47 PM
Nic, you speak my mind!
Shalom
Posted on July 5, 2007 9:50 PM
One has to wonder what messages the Black community is projecting when "they" assume everything is owed them.
I really think Black people are showing us they are racist, if not maybe they 'need to do some deep work' to work out thier personal issues as a race . . .
Posted on July 6, 2007 7:18 AM