Authors, Organizations:

• Anna Aschenbach, New Haven County Branch, Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom
• Joan Cavanagh, CT Peace Coalition/New Haven, Greater New Haven Labor History Association
• Deborah Elmore, Sisters with a New Attitude (SWANA)
• Earth Charter Community of the Lower Valley
• Joelle Fishman, New Haven Peoples Center, CT
• Communist Party USA, Weekly World
• Chris Garaffa, ANSWER CT, NH Workers Association
• Stan Heller, Middle East Crisis Committee, CT United for Peace, The Struggle TV News
• Anne Higgens, People Against Injustice
• Josue Irizarry, Yale Peabody Museum
• Ben Jones, CT Network to Abolish the Death Penalty
• Dorothy Johnson, GNH Labor History Association, former UE Local 299
• Mary Johnson, Coalition for People
• Andrea Cohen-Kiener, Interreligious Eco-Justice Network
• Anne Killheffer, CT Folk Festival
• Stephen Kobasa, Reclaiming the Prophetic Voice
• Henry Lowendorf, Nancy Eberg, Mary Compton, Greater New Haven Peace Council
• Deb Malatesta, ANSWER CT
• Sherman Malone, Haiti Marycare
• Alfred Marder, New Haven Peace Commission
• Patty Nuelsen, Chris Schweitzer, New Haven/León Sister City Project
• Paula Panzarella, PAR, Fight the Hike, May Day Celebration Committee
• Frank Panzarella, Fight the Hike
• Heiwa Salovitz, ADAPT
• Joseph L. Schofield, Citizens Television
• Naomi Shaiken, CT Call to Action
• N’Zinga Shäni, OneWorld Progressive Institute
• Julie Snorek, Amman Imman Water Project
• Rosie Stanko, Citizen’s Oil Co-op
• Maria Tupper, New Haven Bioregional Group
• James van Pelt, Promoting Enduring Peace
• Abbie Willis, CT Workers Solidarity Alliance
• Christopher Zurcher, CT Environmental Headlines, Zurcher Communications (Thanks to Chris for his help getting PAR online: http://par-newhaven.org)

Please submit copy to PAR’s e-mail address: parnewhaven@hotmail.com.

No e-mail? Call Paula at (203) 562-2798 to find out how to submit your article. There is a 350 word limit.

Next Planning Meeting date is Tuesday, May 4 at 7:30 pm…all welcome…call (203) 562-2798 for location.
To subscribe: $13 for 10 issues, check payable to PAR, P.O. Box 995, New Haven, CT 06504.

About calendar items: Read the rest of this entry »

The following is an excerpt from newhaven.craigslist.org/npo/1643988275.html

Youth Rights Media, a New Haven, CT-based nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering youth, seeks an Executive Director.

Youth Rights Media (YRM) builds youth power and leadership by engaging young people in video production and community organizing, equipping youth with the tools, skills and strategies to know, protect, and advance their rights for the purpose of affecting change within themselves and their communities.

For eight years, YRM’s youth media has produced award-winning films that have been distributed nationally. Members of YRM’s organizing initiatives have then used these films locally to launch awareness and action campaigns that have resulted in tangible changes in Connecticut’s justice and education systems. YRM currently has four full-time staff members who work with a core group of approximately 50 youth annually.

The Executive Director must be a visionary and engaging leader, an experienced manager, and deeply committed to young people’s growth and development. YRM is a small, lean organization where all staff play a direct, hands-on role. The Executive Director must excel at balancing multiple tasks, including internal management of the staff and programs, external relationships with key stakeholders, collaborators, and allies, and the demands of working in a fluid, fast-paced youth-centered environment. The Executive Director will be responsible for ensuring that the organization is fiscally and programmatically sound, and must work to strategically advance YRM’s purpose and goals. The Executive Director position is a full-time, salaried position with benefits.

The ideal candidate will posses business and financial management skills; youth development, criminal justice and education policy expertise; and experience leading and managing staff. The ideal candidate will also have a demonstrated commitment to social justice efforts. In addition, the ideal candidate will be:

• Familiar with youth media production, specifically as it relates to issues impacting young people in urban settings;
• Experienced in managing, developing, and leading youth programs that integrate youth development theory, and principles of youth organizing.

by Megan Wulff, megawulff@gmail.com

I’m a prospective Yale law student for this coming fall, and my partner, who is part of a progressive web development organization, is looking for inexpensive (and small) shared office space with other like-minded progressive individuals, basically just room for a desk. Do you have any idea where we could find such a space? Thanks so much for your time!

Millions are affected by the destruction of the earthquake in Haiti. Tens of thousands of people have died and hundreds of thousands have been injured. Here are some of the many organizations providing medical aid and relief.

Haiti Marycare Inc., www.haitimarycare.org, (203) 675-4770.
Haiti Marycare Inc.
55 King Street
Danbury, CT  06811

Haitian Ministries for the Diocese of Norwich,www.haitianministries.org, (860) 848-2237, Ext. 206. To donate, call (860) 638-1018.Or mail your gift to: Haitian Ministries, 1595 Norwich-New London Turnpike, Uncasville, CT  06382. Donors can also give at any Citizens Bank to: Earthquake Relief for Haitian Ministries account # 2231-994385.

Read the rest of this entry »

Please submit copy to PAR’s e-mail address: parnewhaven@hotmail.com. If you do not have e-mail, call Paula at (203) 562-2798 to find out how to submit your article. Next Planning Meeting date is Tuesday Feb. 2, at 7:30 p.m. All are welcome…call (203) 562-2798 for location. To subscribe:  Send $13 for 10 issues, make check payable to PAR, P.O. Box 995, New Haven, CT 06504.

Over a week after the massive earthquake struck Haiti, the need for life-saving medical services remains overwhelming. Casualty estimates have risen. The death toll may be as high as 200,000 and the number of injured and homeless is in the millions.

MADRE is continuing our emergency efforts to get medicines and medical supplies to Haiti through the Dominican Republic. A shipment of supplies arrived Wednesday, Jan. 20, and more supplies are expected in the coming days. Right now, the biggest concern is for replenishing stocks of antibiotics in order to fight off infection.

Operating Rooms Up and Running

Our partners on the ground are working day and night to meet the desperate need for medical treatment. They have set up field hospitals both inside and outside of Port-au-Prince and are performing surgeries to treat widespread bone injuries and infections. MADRE is working in support of Zanmi Lasante, a Haitian healthcare organization founded by Partners in Health.

At the general hospital in Port-au-Prince, there are now 12 functioning operating rooms, with surgeries being performed day and night in each. Outside of the city, in the Central Plateau and Artibonite regions, there are eight more operating rooms for the busloads of people fleeing the city each day.

Though the 6.1 aftershock quake that struck Haiti yesterday morning caused the evacuation of the general hospital in Port-au-Prince, no structural damage resulted, and the hospital was able to quickly restore order and continue operations.

By Joseph L. Schofield, Executive Director, CTV

Residents of New Haven, Hamden and West Haven can receive Citizens Television (CTV) on Comcast channels 26, 27 and 96.  Subscribers to AT&T cannot receive CTV at all, even though they pay the same monthly community access fee as Comcast subscribers do. Why is that?

The CTV board of directors has persistently voted not to go onto the AT&T U-Verse system for a number of reasons, among which is economic discrimination. AT&T was granted special status by the CT state legislature in 2006 to offer competition to established cable providers in the state (Comcast, Charter, etc.) as a means of driving prices down. But unlike the cable providers, who have to offer their services to any resident in the provider’s service area, AT&T was allowed to cherrypick the neighborhoods they would serve – meaning they could serve only those areas that were most profitable to them. And so, while every resident in the New Haven service area can get Comcast, considerably fewer can get AT&T.

Why would a resident choose AT&T over Comcast? One reason: if the cost is cheaper. So residents who can get both Comcast and AT&T have an economic choice that their neighbors maybe several blocks away do not have. It is outright economic discrimination.

But there are other issues. AT&T would hide CTV on a channel with literally all of the other public access stations in the state. Residents would have to search for us. And when found, we would take longer to appear on your screen. And that appearance would not be a regular full television picture, but the inferior image you would get in Windows Media Player on your computer. More discrimination. CTV would not be treated as a real television station, but as a second-rate entity.

Help us out. Call your state Reps and Senators and tell them to roll back the legislation that lets AT&T economically discriminate against all of us and makes public access inferior to commercial television. For more information, visit www.citizenstv.org.

– by Stan Heller, Middle East Crisis Committee

The Palestinians of the Gaza Strip have been under a crippling total siege for years. Last winter, 1400 were killed by the Israeli army. Israel forbids the surviving Gazan Palestinians the materials to rebuild.

There have been a series of attempts to break the siege, popular marches from Egypt and attempts by boat. George Galloway brought 200 Americans and many truck loads of supplies in July, but the Egyptians only let the internationals stay for 24 hours.

December 27 will see the biggest attempt yet, with 500 or more led by Code Pink going from Egypt to Gaza and then a big march to the wall separating the Strip from Israel proper.

To get it maximum press attention we’re having a big meeting and short march on Sunday afternoon, December 27, probably in New Haven. Mark your calendar for this important event.

For more details see www.TheStruggle.org or call 203-934-2761.

Readers of June 2009 issue may remember we wrote that without additional volunteers, we were unsure whether PAR could continue.  We are happy to announce that we are on solid ground for the September 2009 – June 2010 subscription year.

If you have not yet done so, please re-subscribe.  You may not realize that the subscription rate ($13 for 10 issues) is calculated by our printing costs and the postage needed to mail a one-ounce newsletter for ten months. We also encourage you to buy a subscription for a friend before we have to raise the rate to $15.  Please make the check payable to PAR, and mail to: PAR, P.O. Box 995, New Haven, CT 06504.

Our thanks to all who came to the June 19 PARty, where dozens of our readers and supporters had the chance to see old friends and make new friends, while enjoying great food and wonderful music.  The response from so many reaffirmed the value of our newsletter to the New Haven progressive community.

This is a period of adjustment for our newsletter team as Sally Joughin, founding member of PAR, long-time PAR newsletter editor and Planning Committee member has moved to Portland, Oregon.   Sally’s expertise in placing graphics in the newsletter helped create the professional look of our newsletter.  We wish her luck in Portland, and will miss her leadership, encouragement and work in PAR and many other New Haven organizations.

We are fortunate that Chris Zurcher, creator of environmentalheadlines.com/ct, has joined the PAR Planning Committee.  With his help, we look forward to having a PAR website in the near future to further the networking among the progressive community.  He will also develop a Facebook page to bring PAR solidly into the 21st Century!

The PAR Planning Committee and newsletter production team welcome your suggestions and involvement.  If you want to come to our meetings, help with mailings or organize a PAR event, please call Mary at (203)387-7858 or Paula at (203) 562-2798, or e-mail parnewhaven@hotmail.com.

Thank you for your help in creating this community newsletter.