Notes from the 2/20 Miami Community Advisory Committee Meeting

The following is a recap of the CAA meeting that was held tonight in Miami. The author is Imani McKinney, a 29 year old native Miamian who is deeply concerned with the goings on of most of Miami-Dade from the inner city to the boondocks to the glitz and glam of South Beach. He is an aspiring politico who would like to see his city advance to be a true world class city instead of the banana republic that we currently are. You may contact Imani at miamidilemma08@gmail.com

Tonight, at the CAA meeting, the discussion was as follows:

Introduction as to what the Community Action Agency was about and how they would help the West Little River/Brownsville/Model City Area

The members, including known politician Roy Hardemon, who is running for state rep district 109, were up in arms saying that before the CAA could go on with further business, they needed to take care of current business instead of being, as usual for the black community, pushed to the side without having our issues heard. The current issue at hand is the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) providing housing for those seeking affordable housing.

They would not allow the speaker to get on with the agenda. Instead, they demanded that the speaker get the gist of what they wanted. They could not move forward with new business without the old business being handled. They had people sign the HUD form to let people know they wanted the HUD situation handled before anything else could be progressed in terms of community activism. They were tired of being
pushed to the side for other minority groups.

There were about 20-30 people in attendance, quite a few looked to be businessmen. In order to be a part of this group, you have to live, own property, or work in the Brownsville/Model City/West Little River area.

The angry citizens who were in attendance, including, but not limited to African Americans of all ages. At least from ages 29 to their late 80s, judging from the look of a couple of women, one of whom WAS extremely vocal in making sure that the OCED Office of Community and Economic Development get in tune with the Community Action Agency (CAA) to make sure that both agencies were in tune with one another and that both agencies do not screw over the black community with their promises to enhance the growth of jobs and new businesses to launch in the areas surrounding Miami's black community, to make sure that the affordable homes that were promised to the community remains in tact. Though there has been progress with housing, such as the building of the new affordable homes in the former lots of the Scott-Carver projects that had been demolished for 6 years but the empty land still remained. The black community knows that the CAA hadn't done it's job: the land where the Scott projects used to reside, sat idly by while county money was being used for the developers' pockets rather than building homes, had to be taken over by Habitat For Humanity in order for the homes to be erected and for people to finally live in their own domicile rather than waiting for the county to move its good foot onto doing what it promised.

Hopefully, this new community organization that possibly can be borne into greatness can use its influence to finally make changes that our black leaders claim they were doing. Hey, our Latino brethren have tremendous clout. It's time for us to build our own and use it to great advantage: bringing a change in curriculum for our students so that they can be ahead of the class, and not just the expression. Make them see that having an education will lead them to great careers, instead of sitting around doing nothing, struggling when they don't have to struggle and decide they want to rob people. They don't have to. Making sure that we have different industries in Miami so that our students and even those who move to Miami can have different options to start their lives and careers. Making sure traffic is FINALLY alleviated by building the metrorail not only North and South but East and West so that way we don't have to sit through rush hour traffic.

But first thing is first: HUD has to make sure they do right by the black community. Granted, I wasn't at previous meetings to get the gist of what exactly was going on, I can only imagine from what I'd read in newspapers and how HUD hasn't made the commitment it promises in 2001 to the Scott project residents to ensure they would have their own homes in a fair amount of time. Once HUD is done with, then it's on to making sure our children are educated about life and book smarts, then encourage them to stay to stay in Miami for college or at the very least, go to a four year college, or 2 year then transfer to a four year to get their bachelor's degree, and to shoot further to get that Master's but at the very least get your bachelor's degree.