Category: Memorial

Willie Matos, Friend and Comrade

by Andy Piascik, PAR reader

Willie Matos, who worked his entire adult life for Puerto Rican liberation and freedom for working class people everywhere, passed away on October 14 at 84. Born in Puerto Rico, Willie emigrated with his family to Bridgeport in 1951 and soon confronted the many manifestations of racism that Puerto Ricans face. He also came to better understand that many of the problems are directly related to US colonial domination.

Willie joined the Young Lords Party after its formation in 1968, helped found a chapter in Bridgeport and served on the organization’s national leadership body. He played a leading role in the Bridgeport Lords’ work against slumlords, police brutality and on other issues. They established a Free Breakfast for Children program and worked for the liberation of Puerto Rico and in opposition to the Vietnam War. The Lords also advocated on behalf of the unemployed and helped establish a statewide organization of Puerto Rican migrant agricultural workers.

Willie helped form the Spanish American Coalition and in 1979 pulled together a committee to support striking workers at a local factory. The committee’s work proved important to the strike being settled on favorable terms. He and others carried that work forward in the Plant Closures Project in an attempt to hold corporations accountable for the layoffs ravaging working class communities. Willie helped establish the Vieques Support Committee that sought to end the US Navy’s use of the Puerto Rican island of Vieques for target practice. That effort proved successful and Vieques today is home to the Caribbean’s largest wildlife refuge.

Willie worked for the Connecticut Commission on Human Rights and as an adjunct professor at Housatonic Community College. He remained involved in activist organizations and mentored hundreds of Latino youths. He also gathered for many years on New Year’s Eve day with friends at a marker in Bridgeport that honors Roberto Clemente to pay homage to the great baseball player on the anniversary of his death.

A friend, comrade and mentor to hundreds, Willie’s spirit lives on in those who walk in his footsteps. [See https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/10/29/williematos-friend-and-comrade for a more detailed article]

‘Emma Jones Justice for Malik Corner’ OK’d

by Laura Glesby, Oct. 8, New Haven Independent

The corner where East Haven police officers chased, shot, and killed 21-year-old Malik Jones in 1997 will not be called “Malik Jones Corner” after all.

Instead, the Board of Alders decided to name that inter-section after Jones’s mother, Emma, and the campaign for police accountability she has carried forth after his death…. On Monday, Oct. 7, the full Board of Alders unanimously voted to amend the proposed corner name to “Emma Jones Justice For Malik Corner,” an edit proposed by Fair Haven Alder Frank Redente.

Redente … elaborated after the meeting that he heard passionate feedback from constituents about the corner-naming proposal in recent weeks.

Some opponents of the proposed corner name took issue with Malik’s criminal record… the input that primarily spurred his amendment Monday night was “more that Emma was being left out.” Emma Jones’s activism around the memory of her son led to the creation of New Haven’s Civilian Review Board to review complaints of police misconduct, a board on which Redente now serves…

As he introduced the amendment during Monday’s meeting at City Hall, Redente explained that the name “Emma Jones Justice for Malik Corner” would “shift away from the personal connection and toward justice.”

…[All] the alders present voted in favor of this name change.

The activists who had first submitted the corner name shuffled out of the room after the vote. [Norman] Clement immediately called Jones to update her…

“I think it’s important to have Malik’s name there because of what happened to him, and I never want people to forget,” Jones said. She praised how the new version puts her own name alongside Malik’s and “gives it a greater meaning.”

“It’s a great honor,” she said. “I didn’t expect to be honored. But I’m delighted that people thought enough of me to remember all of the work that I did do.”

She hopes it will speak to the terror that so many mothers of Black sons have felt and still feel — “your son goes out to the store to get a loaf of bread, and you’re terrified because you don’t know whether he’s coming back.”

“I will never forget what that officer did to my son,” she said. Now, neither will the street.

Article can be read in its entirety at https://tinyurl.com/kp997bb7.

Peace Activist Killed in Hit-and-Run

by Dereen Shirnekhi, April 29, 2024, New Haven Independent

[The PAR Planning Committee was shocked to learn of Yusuf Gürsey’s tragic death. We extend our condolences to all who knew him. Yusuf was a well-known peace and justice activist for decades and will be greatly missed.]

Seventy-year-old scholar and city Peace Commission member Yusuf Gürsey died Sunday night [April 28] after a car fatally struck him — and then fled the scene — while he was walking near his home on Whalley Avenue.

New Haven Police Department Public Information Officer Christian Bruckhart announced Gürsey’s death in a Monday press release.

… At 9:26 p.m. Sunday night, officers responded to the area of Whalley Avenue and Brownell Street for a car accident involving a pedestrian. They found Gürsey in the street, injured.
… The car, which had fled after the accident, was found later and is being processed for evidence. Police ask that anyone who may have witnessed this incident or who may have information valuable to investigators to call detectives at 203-946-6304 or through the department’s anonymous tip-line at 866-888-TIPS (8477).

Gürsey was originally from Istanbul, Turkey. He had lived in New Haven for almost 40 years and had studied both engineering and linguistics. He was an academic who spent his life at times as a researcher, a professor, and a freelance medical and court translator. He spoke both Turkish and Arabic. Gürsey served on the Greater New Haven Peace Council as well as the city’s Peace Commission.

Fellow city peace commissioner Aaron Goode … described Gürsey as someone who wanted peace in the Middle East: he advocated for nuclear nonproliferation, ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now, ending the war in Gaza.

“It’s very shocking,” said Goode, who said he knew that Gürsey had attended [a] downtown protest in support of Palestine.

Yusuf Gursey. Photo: Yale University

Gürsey was passionate about ending the conflict involving Israel and Gaza, and according to fellow peace commissioner Millie Grenough, he attended every one of the commission’s community conversations around the conflict, the most recent one being just two weeks ago at the Mitchell Library in Westville.

“He was a very learned person,” Goode said of Gürsey, especially when it came to Middle East history. He had an​“encyclopedic knowledge” of history, geography, and theology. Gürsey brought his scholarly nature — he often posted on social media for the birthdays of Turkish writers and thinkers — to everything he did, including the Peace Commission.

“He wasn’t loud and assertive and ebullient,” Goode remembered, ​“he was just a very quiet, scholarly, intellectual, thoughtful presence in whatever setting he was in.” …

[Entire article available here: newhavenindependent.org/article/70_year_old_pedestrian_killed_in_hit_and_run]

Edie Fishman, July 22, 1921 – Feb. 21, 2024

As we go to press, the PAR Planning Committee has learned that Edie Fishman, lifelong activist and fighter for social justice, has died at the age of 102. Even in her last week, Edie was sharp-witted and knew all the words to union songs, which she sang each evening with her daughter Joelle. Our condolences to Joelle and all who knew and loved Edie. Our April newsletter will have more about this amazing, dedicated and compassionate woman.

Edyth Bartman Fishman was born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the daughter of immigrants from Odessa in Czarist Russia. Growing up in the years of the Great Depression shaped her worldview. Thousands were hungry and without work. While in high school both parents fell ill but had no health care. Edie and her sister Lillian took turns going to high school every other day so they could care for their parents.

At age 14 Edie attended a large May Day rally of thousands for workers’ rights outside Philadelphia City Hall organized by the Communist Party. Police on horses used billy clubs to attack the peaceful protest. Edie was enraged and decided that she must be part of this movement. She joined the Young Communist League, and later the Communist Party where she became a leader and remained active throughout her life. ​“I love the struggle,” she said.

Edie was involved in countless struggles for workers’ rights and economic and racial equality and peace. She marched to Washington DC for Social Security and Unemployment Compensation with her schoolmates. She participated in defying the sheriffs and putting furniture back into the homes of evicted families. …

Edie’s lifelong commitment and contribution to equality, peace and social justice will be celebrated in Wooster Square Park on Sunday, July 21, the day before her 103rd birthday.

Contributions in tribute to Edie Fishman can be made to the New Haven Peoples Center or to the People’s World at 37 Howe Street, New Haven, Connecticut 06511.

Read more of the Indy obit here.

Remembering Alfred Marder, Jan. 18, 1922-Dec. 19, 2023: A Century of Struggle for Peace, Justice and Socialism

by Henry Lowendorf, contributor to People’s World

The PAR newsletter committee is greatly saddened to inform our readers of the passing of Al Marder. Al was a member of the PAR community from its inception over thirty years ago. He was active in dozens of peace and justice organizations and instrumental in the founding of many New Haven groups. Our deepest condolences to his family, friends, and all who worked with him.

Al Marder, in his capacity as Amistad Committee President, welcoming the president of Sierra Leone to New Haven City Hall in 2019. Thomas Breen Photo.

Al Marder, a stalwart of the U.S. peace movement and prominent figure in the Communist Party USA, passed away Dec. 19, 2023, at the age of 101. In some ways, the story of his life reads like a serial thriller, with plenty of comedy and tragedy, victories and defeats.

As a teenager, he would sneak out of his parents’ house in a working-class neighborhood of New Haven, early in the morning to meet his good friend Sid Taylor, pushing the family car down the road before starting it so as not to waken his parents. They would distribute fliers and Daily Worker newspapers to workers arriving and leaving plant gates at Sargent and Co. …  Years later, his mother revealed that his parents were in fact aware of his goings-on….

Al Marder poses with New Haven peace activist and Peace Council member Mary Compton at the Peace Day celebration at the Amistad Memorial statue outside New Haven City Hall Sept. 21, 2015. The statue was built thanks to his guidance and supervision. Marder is chairman of the Amistad Committee. (photo: cjzurcher)

Al Marder poses with New Haven peace activist and Peace Council member Mary Compton at the Peace Day celebration at the Amistad Memorial statue outside New Haven City Hall Sept. 21, 2015. The statue was built thanks to his guidance and supervision. Marder is chairman of the Amistad Committee.
(photo: cjzurcher)

Al Marder entered the fight for justice and peace when he was 14 years old, the height of the Great Depression. He saw families being evicted, his own included, and he saw Communists moving their furniture back into tenants’ houses. He wasn’t alone. The nation was demanding peace. Workers were struggling for their rights and moving unionization to the fore. Peace, he said, was a central demand of the Communist Party in the 1930s.

He became an organizer for the Young Communist League (YCL), becoming a leader in the group at age 16. Al began to connect the anti-Semitism that his family, Jewish immigrants from Ukraine, experienced with the prevalent anti-Black racism. He found that Communists modeled equal treatment of everyone.

At the New Haven Peoples Center, Al found his milieu. The community center had been bought by immigrant, socialist-oriented Jewish tradesmen for their own families and the broader community. … Eventually, Al would become the president of the non-profit that runs the Peoples Center….

After the war, the U.S. turned its big guns on its former ally, the Soviet Union, and with McCarthyism, attacked the progressive movements at home. In 1954, one of eight charged in the Smith Act witch hunts in Connecticut for thinking communist thoughts, Al had to leave his family and go underground. Eventually caught, he was tried and acquitted, but not without serious consequences to many lives.
In the 1970s and ’80s, Al became a leader in the peace movement as the president of the U.S. Peace Council and vice president of the World Peace Council, positions he actively held until the end of his life.

A prime organizer of the anti-apartheid struggle in Connecticut, Marder helped create and lead the City of New Haven Peace Commission in 1988 and the years that followed….

The Peace Commission introduced resolutions into the New Haven City Council, the Board of Alders, calling for abolition of nuclear weapons and moving money from war spending to human needs. On three occasions, the resolutions became ballot initiatives that won overwhelming approval from the city’s voters.

As a result of these activities, New Haven was invited to join the U.N.-sponsored International Association of Peace Messenger Cities, of which Al Marder was president for 12 years, the only non-mayor to hold that position.

Urged in 1987 by African American school board president, minister, and friend Rev. Edwin Edmonds, Al founded the Connecticut Amistad Committee, Inc., in the spirit of the original 1839 Amistad Committee, the first integrated abolitionist organization….

With his amazing memory, wry sense of humor, and easy laugh, Al was known to all as a great storyteller, attending to detail and drawing basic lessons. He shared many of those lessons with those who knew him—lessons they will carry with them forever.

A memorial service will take place at Beaverdale Memorial Park, 90 Pine Rock Ave., on Saturday, Jan. 6 at 9:30 a.m. The family asks that, in lieu of flowers, donations be made to one of these causes: Hospice Foundation of America, hospicefoundation.org/Donate; Jewish Voice for Peace, jewishvoiceforpeace.org; and US Peace Council, uspeacecouncil.org.

[Read the full article online from People’s World: www.peoplesworld.org/article/remembering-al-marder-a-century-of-struggle-for-peace-justice-and-socialism/]

[Read an article by Paul Bass for the New Haven Independent and the Marder family’s obituary: www.newhavenindependent.org/article/al_marder_crusading_true_believer_to_the_end_dies_at_101]

Honoring Ali El-Issa: A Legacy of Justice, Peace, and Sovereignty.” 6-8 p.m. Friday Sept. 29, 2023, SCSU

After our September newsletter was printed, we received notice from the Women’s and Gender Studies Department of SCSU of this event honoring Ali El-Issa. We want to make sure you know about this.
Best wishes, the PAR Planning Committee

Please save the date and join us for a special event “Honoring Ali El-Issa: A Legacy of Justice, Peace, and Sovereignty.” 6-8 p.m. Friday Sept. 29, 2023 in ASC Rm 301.

RSVP here: bit.ly/RSVPHonoringAli   or scan QR code on flyer.

Co-sponsored by Jewish Voice for Peace – New Haven, Middle East Crisis Committee, Peace Development Fund, and the Women’s & Gender Studies Department at Southern Connecticut State University.

Title: Honoring Ali El-Issa: A Legacy of Justice, Peace, and Sovereignty
Date: Friday, 9/29/2023
Time: 6-8 p.m.
Location: Adanti Student Center, 3rd Floor, Rm 301. Southern Connecticut State University, 501 Crescent St, New Haven, CT 06515

The Women’s & Gender Studies (WGS) Department at Southern Connecticut State University invites you to join us as we celebrate and honor our long-time friend, Ali Saleh El-Issa (1952-2022), who passed to the spirit world early on the morning of September 27th, 2022, at home after a brief illness.

Leaders and Elders from a multitude of Indigenous communities will be in attendance, as well as family, with speakers from American Indian Community House, Jewish Voice for Peace – New Haven, Middle East Crisis Committee, the Palestinian community, Peace Development Fund, and members of the WGS community.

A proud son of Palestine, born in exile and educated in Lebanon, East Germany, and Cuba, Ali was active in the Palestinian liberation movement locally and internationally, as well as all struggles for liberation and sovereignty in Indigenous communities around the world. Many, including WGS members, consider Ali a member of their communities working towards justice and peace. Following the death of his wife Ingrid in 1999, Ali founded and became the President and C.E.O. of the Flying Eagle Woman Fund for Peace, Justice, and Sovereignty, to honor Ingrid’s life and carry on her work on behalf of the Indigenous Peoples of the world as well as her home community, the Menominee Nation, in the state of Wisconsin. WGS established a student service award in Ingrid’s name in 2004. Ali never failed to show up and support our student recipients of the Ingrid Washinawatok El-Issa Service Award.

Upon his first anniversary, WGS shares the resolve as articulated in the tribute published after his death to do our best to carry on with and honor his legacy of peace and justice: ‘The world mourns the tremendous loss of a fierce and fiercely loving leader/brother/mentor in Ali, now a warrior ancestor. His global community will miss him profoundly, and we will do our best to carry on with his legacy and his work, and to hold his and Ingrid’s memories in the light. They were always in service of the people, from all walks of life, in grief and in hope.’

We hope you can join us for this special event honoring Ali’s life and legacy.

Contact WGS Dept. with any questions via email at [email protected] or call our office at 203-392-6133.

George Edwards Memorial Event Scheduled for Saturday, Oct. 29

Staff, New Haven Independent, Sept. 30, 2022

New Haveners will have a chance to share their memories of the late Black Panther and social justice advocate George Edwards at an event set for Saturday, Oct. 29.

Edwards, possibly the most spied-on and messed-with activist in town and omnipresence at public events, died Sept. 16 at the age of 85. (Read a full story about his life at www.newhavenindependent.org/article/panther_passes_on)

George Edwards at a 2016 Hip-Hop Conference. Photo David Yaffe-Bellany

The state tried to frame George Edwards and lock him up for life. His fellow revolutionaries tortured him and tried to kill him. They didn’t know whom they were messing with. He survived — and kept at his Black Panther mission for another half century long after generations of fellow fighters left the theater.

It was kidney cancer that finally claimed the life of George Edwards. Until his final months, he remained one of New Haven’s most visible and engaging voices, challenging power and supporting grassroots social justice crusades.

The memorial event in his honor will take place at the Q House, 197 Dixwell Ave from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. His daughter Elizabeth Dickerson asks anyone wishing to speak at the event to contact her in advance at liz_dickerson@ sbcglobal.net. Attendees are also encouraged to bring gently used clothing to the event to be distributed to the needy.

A GoFundMe drive at www.gofundme.com/f/a-panther-passes-on?qid=7a85d1598883d37c6f39445c1186572c has been established to help pay for funeral costs. Some money will also go toward placing Edwards’ name on a brick at the Q House.

[George Edwards was an extraordinary and compassionate activist. Many, if not most, of PAR’s readers, worked with him on justice and community issues in New Haven. In almost six decades, we have no doubt he touched the lives of tens of thousands of New Haven residents, activists and Yale students. “The students are here for only four years and then they go all over the world. I’m going to train them
to be activists while I have this chance.” George was a mentor to many and held steadfast to the principles of the original Black Panthers. In addition to his work in the Black Panther Party, he played a core role in New Haven’s struggle against apartheid in South Africa, organized many annual May Day celebrations on the New Haven Green, spoke out and organized against police brutality, was a
supporter of Palestinian rights, demonstrated against the various wars, bombings and invasions the U.S. carried out — Panama, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Afghanistan, etc., demanded the release of Leonard Peltier, Mumia Abu-Jamal and all other U.S. political prisoners, had a weekly show on CTV where he introduced viewers to activism, history and the current events of the day and taught them how to analyze, protested against nuclear power, was an AIDS-prevention activist and worked at the New Haven Needle Ex-change Project, and when the pandemic began, he gave out masks, condoms, water bottles and gloves to people from his front porch. In addition to the New Haven Independent, George has been featured in the New Haven Register many times through the years and the New York Times. This is a brief description of the work George did and the causes he took on.]

 

George Edwards, Black Panther and Lifelong Revolutionary July 31, 1937-Sept. 16, 2022

Our deepest condolences to the family and friends of George Edwards, an extraordinary and compassionate activist. Many, if not most, of PAR’s readers, worked with him on justice and community issues in New Haven. In almost six decades, we have no doubt he touched the lives of tens of thousands of New Haven residents, activists and Yale students. “The students are here for only four years and then they go all over the world. I’m going to train them to be activists while I have this chance.” He was a mentor to many and held steadfast to the principles of the original Black Panthers. In addition to his work in the Black Panther Party, he played a core role in New Haven’s struggle against apartheid in South Africa, organized many annual May Day celebrations on the New Haven Green, spoke out and organized against police brutality, was a supporter of Palestinian rights, demonstrated against the various wars, bombings and invasions the U.S. carried out — Panama, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Afghanistan, etc., demanded the release of Leonard Peltier, Mumia Abu-Jamal and all other U.S. political prisoners, had a weekly show on CTV where he introduced viewers to activism, history and the current events of the day and taught them how to analyze, protested against nuclear power, was an AIDS-prevention activist and worked at the New Haven Needle Exchange Project, and when the pandemic began, he gave out masks, condoms, water bottles and gloves to people from his front porch. This is a brief description of the work he did and the causes he took on.

In Memoriam: Hazel Williams, Newhallville Organizer. Oct. 18, 1944-Aug. 27, 2022

Hazel Williams, a native of Brunswick, Georgia, moved to New Haven in 1968. She was a top-notch organizer in the Newhallville community, and deeply concerned about helping the well-being of all. Our sympathy to her family, her friends, and to everyone whose lives she touched.

The following excerpts are from the New Haven Register article of Sept. 3, written by Mark Zaretsky. Read the entire article at https://www.nhregister.com/news/article/New-Haven-s-Hazel-Williams-recalled-as-17416113.php.

Hazel V. Williams

Hazel V. Williams, founder of Newhallville’s Pond Street Block Watch, was a passionate advocate for neighbors taking responsibility for their neighborhoods, a gardener extraordinaire and — not to be minimized — master of all things baking and dessert-like.

“She was a fierce advocate for people in the community standing up and taking ownership of their block,” and was adamant “that people should participate” in the political process, said Barbara Vereen, the city’s 20th Ward Democratic Committee co-chairwoman.

“We have a lot of people who stand up and talk about it,” Vereen said. But Williams “actually did the work. She told you like it is. She did not hold back,” but she always gave advice “in a caring, loving way.”

“‘Fierce’ is the first word that comes to mind when I think of my dear friend Hazel,” who could be a “mom, aunt, sister all rolled up in one,” said friend Letitia Charles. “To me, Hazel embodied a Sister Warrior and Mother Earth!”

Williams and the block watch also collaborated with the Yale School of Forestry and the Black Student Alliance at Yale to plant daffodils throughout the neighborhood.

The work they did together helped reduce crime in the Pond Street neighborhood, located on the Newhallville-Hamden line, to zero for 26 straight years. The success of the Pond Street Block Watch was one of the cornerstones of the city’s presentation when New Haven won the national All-America City designation in a competition in Mobile, Ala., in June 1998.

Read the entire article at https://www.nhregister.com/news/article/New-Haven-s-Hazel-Williams-recalled-as-17416113.php.

 

In Memoriam: Semi Semi-Dikoko, ‘The Mayor of Westville,’ July 27, 1953-Sept. 8, 2022

by Lucy Gellman, Arts Council of Greater New Haven, Arts Paper

Semi Semi-Dikoko was born in Congo, worked in many countries and moved to New Haven in 1991. Our condolences to his family and to his large community of friends. He was an artist, a computer analyst with IBM, played flute and trombone, lived in Brussels, Belgium, and Bremen, Germany. In addition to English, he spoke German, French, Japanese, Bantu, and Swahili. He was president of the Friends of Edgewood Park, and he had a pilot’s license. He was friendly, warm and engaging, and had a wide and deep presence in New Haven, especially in Westville.

The following excerpts are from the article Lucy Gellman wrote for the Sept. 14, 2022 Arts Paper. You can read it in its entirety at www.newhavenarts.org/arts-paper/articles/the-mayor-of-westville-new-haven-mourns-remembers-semi-semi-dikoko.

Semi Semi-Dikoko, a tireless advocate for the arts who blessed New Haven with three decades of a gentle and gen-erous spirit, died at Smilow Cancer Hospital. The cause was prostate cancer, which Semi-Dikoko had been fighting bravely and often quietly for four years. In the past decade, he also battled lymphoma, which was until recently in remission. He was 69 years old.

Semi Semi-Dikoko with David Sepulveda and Aleta Staton at the Arts Awards in December 2012. Photo: Judy Sirota Rosenthal. Photo used with permission from the photographer.

“Semi just touched so many lives,” said his friend and studio mate David Sepulveda. The two, who shared a studio at West River Arts, were so close they often seemed like two halves of the same, vibrantly beating heart.

He was trained as a systems architect and consultant, who worked for IBM, Fujitsu Americas, Deutsche Bank, NASA, and Southern New England Telecommunications (SNET) among others. He was a dedicated public servant, whose thousands of volunteer hours spanned Friends of Edgewood Park to Artspace New Haven to the Westville Village Renaissance Alliance. For most of his friends, he was Semi, a warm and constant presence who always had time for the people in his life.

“His art was human connectivity,” said Aaron Goode, who met him over a decade ago when the two enrolled in the city’s first Democracy School class. “That was his medium. He was a painter of civic canvases. Westville, that was one of his canvases, but so was New Haven and so was New York.”

Memorial for Activist Heiwa Salovitz

We hope you can come to this memorial for our dear friend Heiwa Salovitz, who died so suddenly at the beginning of this year, at his home in Austin, Texas.

If you know of others who were his friends for the many years he lived in CT,  please feel free to pass this along to them as well.

June 11, 1 p.m., Community Room at John Prete Savin Rock Housing, 1187 Campbell Ave., West Haven.

Bring your memories and stories to share!

Info: email Joan at [email protected] or Elaine at [email protected].

CT People’s World May Day 2022: Art Perlo Presente

by Joelle Fishman, CT People’s World

CT People’s World May Day 2022: Art Perlo Presente on Sunday, May 1, 6:30 p.m., at the New Haven Peoples Center and also virtually on FB Live at 7 p.m.

Come together in solidarity for the launch of the Art Perlo Presente website carrying his legacy forward for a just society. 6:30 p.m. for pizza will be followed at 7 p.m. with the program launching of the Art Perlo Presente website, including clips from three videos (30th-anniversary Local 34, Black History Month Youth March honoring Art Perlo, and May Day Around the World 2021). Then enjoy at 8 p.m. “United to Fight Back,” a virtual celebration with the national People’s World.

Art Perlo Presente includes selections from Art’s writings, videos, recipes, tributes, photos, and organizing as well as “Building the Movement Today,” with an opportunity to add a post. It promises to be a valuable and lively resource for education and action.

Sunday, May 1, at the New Haven Peoples Center, 37 Howe Street and also virtually on FB Live at https://www.facebook.com/events/504174641206708

Contributions can be made at: https://actionnetwork.org/fundraising/art-perlo-presente-carry-it-forward

Then watch “United to Fight Back,” a virtual national People’s World celebration: https://peoplesworld.org/article/peoples-world-may-day-celebration-fundraiser

For more information, email [email protected]

Heiwa Salovitz in His Own Words

Why Oral History Matters, an Interview

by Erica Suprenant and Shannon Elizondo, ADAPT of Texas

“What brings me to oral history? Well as a person with a disability — I’ve had my disability all my life — people with disabilities tend to be seen as the invisible people. We tend not to document their stories; we tend not to listen to them; we tend not to think their lives are interesting. So that’s what brings me to oral history, ’cause I want people to learn about my story. I want to learn about theirs, and so we can see the commonality in the struggle, because we all have struggled. We all have things we can learn from each other, things we can contribute to society, and hopefully change society for the better. And it’s just interesting to hear different people’s perspectives on their life and their world experiences.” ~ Heiwa Salovitz, October 11, 2011, a member of ADAPT of Texas, https://eschucha6.rssing.com/chan-44504162/article4.html?zx=814

Speaking Out Against Voting Restrictions 

Heiwa’s testimony at the Texas Legislature against SB 1 (which unfortunately passed, imposing severe and racist voting restrictions) www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmNPmAlK5u8

Rembrances of Heiwa Salovitz

From email sent by Elaine Kolb, Jan. 11, 2022

First met Heiwa Salovitz when he was in his late teens and I was almost 40. Back then, my partner, Patti Deak, was President of the Greater New Haven Disability Rights Activists (GNHDRA). Heiwa occasionally attended some of our events, sometimes held at SCSU. Patti & I agreed that Heiwa had great leadership potential.

Sometime after Patti died in 1999, Heiwa and I bonded more directly, both involved with social justice struggles. Over these years, our connection & trust deepened profoundly. Just visited him for a week in September. His personal care assistant (PCA) found him dead, sitting in his power wheelchair on January 3, 2022.

Heiwa, Japanese word meaning “peace”or “harmony.” The only “Heiwa” I’ve ever known was surely one of a kind. Yes, that’s partly why we became so close. Takes one to know one…

~ From email sent by Joan Cavanagh on Jan. 4, 2022

Heiwa Salovitz, Presente!

Dear Friends and Fellow Travelers,

This isn’t the sort of New Year’s email I’d choose to write. In sorrow and shock I have to report the passing of a dear friend, Heiwa Salovitz, over the weekend in Austin, Texas. Heiwa was a stalwart and principled fighter for disability justice, peace (the meaning of his name), and human rights whom many of you knew. A member of the Muslim community, he was part of the work of the New Haven Sunday Vigil for Peace and Justice, the Greater New Haven Coalition for People, the New Haven initiatives of Amman Imman (Water is Life) and many other local groups and organizations before moving to Austin to work with Texas ADAPT.

We will have a local memorial gathering at some time in the future.

Heiwa’s life was unique, courageous and important. May his memory be for a blessing.

~ Joan Cavanagh

My Friend Heiwa Salovitz

By Paula Panzarella

Needing a wheelchair didn’t keep Heiwa from being involved with community actions or peace rallies. He was on the May Day Celebration Committee, helping plan the yearly International Workers Day festival on the New Haven Green. He joined Fight the Hike and traveled to Hartford to give public testimony at the State Legislature about the hardships CT’s electric rates caused the disabled community and lower-income residents. Every Sunday he would come to the peace and justice vigils in the rain, snow or freezing weather. He was intent on making a difference in this world.

In all the groups we were in together, he helped broaden our perspective on how we needed to improve our outreach and accessibility to include more people in the various struggles for justice.

Heiwa was courageous, smart, patient, modest, and had a great sense of humor. In 2010, he left New Haven to join the Austin chapter of ADAPT. He was intent on working with others in the disability rights community who, like him, were not afraid of pushing the envelope, risking arrest and fighting for recognition of their human rights and dignity. Unfortunately, New Haven wasn’t radical enough for him.
His mother was Italian and French and raised Catholic, his father was Jewish, and Heiwa was a converted Muslim. His name means “Peace” in Japanese – in all ways he embodied his multi-cultural appreciation of the world.

I’m glad we met, grateful for his friendship, and heartbroken about his passing.

Lynda Faye Wilson March 24, 1946-Jan. 31, 2022

With great sadness, we are letting our readers know of the passing of Linda Faye Wilson. She was part of many New Haven organizations through the years, and a number of PAR activists worked with her on many issues.

Lynda was a member of People Against Injustice, Sisters with a New Attitude, Survivors of Homicide, the Ryan White AIDS Council, and Hill North Community Management Team, to name a few. She also took on a number of responsibilities for her church. She fiercely worked and advocated for her community, and maintained her optimism and humor through many hardships.

A favorite saying of hers was, “I’m blessed in all this mess.”

She was a warrior, fighting for justice on all fronts for all people. A true community leader and activist, generous and kind, she will be missed by all who knew her.

Joe Luciano Sept. 28, 1938-Feb. 1, 2022, at Monument Health Hospice House

Joe Luciano (Facebook)

Joe Luciano (Facebook)

A staunch advocate for disability rights has died. Joe Luciano led demonstrations against his local post office in Seymour that was not wheelchair accessible. He was the founder of Disability Rights Action Group, and the creator of the 2014-2018 Underground Travel Guide, listing accessible places to visit in New Haven County via Connecticut ADA paratransit providers.

In 2019, he moved to Rapid City, South Dakota. As he wrote in the Oct. 2020 PAR newsletter, “Last year I moved west from Downtown Seymour Ct after realizing it would never become a Livable Community in my lifetime.”

Unfortunately, South Dakota didn’t live up to his expectations, as you can read in his PAR article Don’t Move to South Dakota. https://par-newhaven.org/2020/09/27/dont-move-to-south-dakota/

A true humanitarian, Joe was concerned about all issues of injustice and focused his fight on the rights of the disabled.

The PAR Planning Committee is grateful for the struggles he led, and the articles he wrote so we could bring the issues to our readers’ attention.

You can read a New Haven Register article about him at:
https://www.nhregister.com/news/article/James-Walker-Bound-a-senior-with-disabilities-13772366.php

Heiwa Salovitz, June 10, 1969 – January 3, 2022

Heiwa was a New Haven activist until 2010 when he moved to Austin to work with its chapter of the disability rights organization ADAPT. His involvement in many New Haven organizations for peace, justice, disability rights, human rights, equity and respect for all impacted everyone who knew him. Heiwa was Muslim, had cerebral palsy, and used a wheelchair. He was active, outspoken and effective in making change. The PAR Planning Committee extends our deepest condolences to all his family and to his many friends.

From The Record-Journal, Jan. 7, 2022

Heiwa Salovitz, of Austin, Texas, formerly of Wallingford and New Haven, passed away January 3, 2022.
He is survived by his mother Elaine Harris (late Richard Harris), his siblings Charlie, Robin, Amy (Gary), Larry (Debra). He was the beloved uncle to Autumn (Marvin), Heather, Noah, Ava, and Sophie, great-uncle to Harmony, Jadyn, Shaelynn, Brooklyn, and Sirene. He was predceased by his bio parents Simon Salovitz and Dee LeDoux.

He will be missed by his many friends and extended ADAPT family, where he was a fierce advocate of change and reform for people with disabilities.

Art Perlo, 74

by Paul Bass, New Haven Independent, Dec. 23, 2021

Art Perlo, Ward 24 co-chair and executive board member of the Yale Unions Retirees Association, passed away on Dec. 18, 2021, after a year-long battle with bladder cancer.

Alder Evette Hamilton called him a “gentle giant” for his kindness, commitment, humor and broad knowledge that touched the lives of so many in the city, state and around the country.

Born in New York on November 2, 1947, son of Marxist economist Victor Perlo and artist Ellen Perlo, Art moved to New Haven in 1975 after living in Chicago and Portland, Oregon, to join his life partner Joelle Fishman, participating in her People before Profits campaigns for Congress and mayor.

As an independent economist and activist, Art devoted his talents to the cause of the rights and equality of working class people of all races, genders and national backgrounds.

An IT worker at Yale’s Molecular Biophysics and Biochemistry lab for 35 years, he helped organize and was a founding member of the clerical and technical workers union Local 34 Unite Here in 1984. Although not eligible for the union with his managerial and professional job classification, he was appreciated for honoring the strikes of Local 34 and Local 35, joining his co-workers on the picket line for respect and improved wages and benefits. He was an early proponent for restructuring Yale’s hiring practices to open job opportunities for Black and Latino New Haven residents.

Since the 1990s ….

READ THIS ENTIRE OBITUARY HERE:  www.newhavenindependent.org/obituaries/art_perlo_74

Contributions to the causes closest to Art’s heart can be made at: https://actionnetwork.org/fundraising/art-perlo-presente-carry-it-forward/

Due to the rise in COVID a gathering will not be held at this time. On January 1, 2023 an open house continuing the annual tradition of Art and Joelle will be held to celebrate Art’s life and carry on the movement-building his life exemplifies.

 

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