Local Chapter Updates – Social Welfare Action Alliance

SWAA Rochester Chapter Updates

Rochester Chapter 2019:

During 2019, Rochester SWAA presented a Reality Tour in the spring. The chapter also did solidarity support work and helped with fundraising for both the Rochester Homeless Union and the Police Accountability Board.

Cruel and Unusual: Solitary confinement as torture in the U.S. prison system – A call to action

April 18^th at Brockport Downtown – 161 Chestnut Street Rochester, NY 14604 Room 148

Solitary confinement serves as a core mechanism of our racist and classist system of mass incarceration. Currently this affects 80,000 to 100,000 inmates in the United States alone. What impact does this practice have on inmates’ mental health? What does structural racism have to do with mass incarceration? Hear from those who have lived experience from the perspectives of a formerly incarcerated individual and a social worker who was in charge of a solitary unit at Rikers. Learn about alternatives to long term solitary and visions for transformed systems of incarceration.

Participants engaged in a virtual reality experience to glimpse what it’s like to be held in Solitary Confinement (a 6 x 9 space) for 22-24 hrs. a day for months, years and decades with no human contact or interaction. The voices and noises you hear are real people. A full-size replica of a typical solitary confinement cell was on display during this event to give participants the chance to experience the effects of isolation.

Workshop facilitators:

Victor Pate – employed by the National Religious Campaign Against Torture as the NY Statewide Campaign Organizer for The Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement. Victor became involved in the Criminal Justice arena after experiencing and overcoming the many obstacles faced by the formerly incarcerated coming home and striving to regain a foothold on life.

Sandra Bernabei, a social worker and community organizer with the Antiracist Alliance, who brought the undoing racism® workshop to over 18,000 New York City social workers. She’s on the NY regional leadership team of The People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond, working to build a broad-based movement for undoing racism and for the elimination of racial disparities in human services.

Mary Buser, social worker and author of award-winning book, Lockdown on Rikers: Shocking Stories of Abuse and Injustice at New York’s Notorious Jail, worked in the Rikers Island Mental Health Department. She served as Assistant Chief of Mental Health in the 500-cell Punitive Segregation Unit. Post Rikers, she has been an outspoken advocate for the incarcerated, especially the mentally ill and those in solitary confinement.

Moderated by Melanie Funchess – Director of Community Engagement at the Mental Health Association of Rochester – she has served as an advocate for families and youth for many years and has worked extensively in the areas of family engagement and empowerment as well as community building. She presents, trains, and consults locally and nationally in the areas of mental health in communities of color, cultural competence/culturally responsive practice, family engagement, implicit bias, cultural brokering, community engagement and partnership building, racial trauma and healing.

This event was organized by the Rochester Social Welfare Action Alliance and presented by Social Workers Against Solitary Confinement. Sponsored by: the Student Social Work Organization and the Department of Social Work at the College at Brockport; New York State Campaign for Alternatives to Isolated Confinement; the National Religious Campaign Against Torture; Police Accountability Board; United Christian Leadership; the Flying Squirrel; Rochester Poor People’s Campaign; Roc/ACTS – and funded by a grant from the National Homelessness Social Work Initiative. http://www.brockportstylus.org/news/article/current/2019/04/23/101501/solidarity-confinement-panel-highlights-inhumane-prison-practices

Rochester Chapter 2018:

Presented two Reality Tours co-sponsored with the House of Mercy, the Federation of Social Workers, the Genesee Valley Chapter of NASW, EMPOWER Welfare Rights, and Rochester Poor People United. The tours were given to SUNY Brockport students and members of the community to help educate them about poverty in the Rochester area; they included taking people to abandoned houses, the offices of the Department of Social Services, schools in poor neighborhoods, a homeless shelter, and the abandoned subway (where many local homeless people live). Aside from two public tours, an individual tour was given for Human Service majors at Monroe Community College and staff from Strong Behavioral Health, University of Rochester. Several media outlets covered these events. The Campaign for Human Development and the Rochester Unitarian Church helped to fund these tours. The Spring Reality Tour took place on March 24, which involved social work students as participants and organizers. This year incorporated new ideas including the impact of lack of access to healthy nutrition and educational resources. The tour leaders include formerly homeless individuals and social workers. This spring the bus stopped at a tent city homeless encampment and heard from local individuals who are forming a homeless union. Rochester Take Back the Land also had a representative who won an eviction battle with a local bank. Additionally, the bus stopped at a subsidized housing high-rise and the issue of public housing tenants’ rights was addressed by a local activist. The Fall Reality Tour took place on October 20^th. For this tour an additional stop was made at a new city sanctioned homeless encampment.

Homeless Union organizing – On January 12-13, Willie Baptist from the Kairos Center and the New Poor People’s Campaign, Reverend Emily McNeill, Executive Director of the New York State Labor-Religion Coalition, and Kristin Nicely Colangelo, MSW, from the Kairos Center and the Poverty Initiative spent the weekend in Rochester. Local SWAA members met with the above individuals and the local Low Wage Workers Roundtable to discuss forging alliances with human service workers and faith-based organizations.

January 12th – Third Presbyterian Church of Rochester – Presentation of the New Poor People’s Campaign and the New York State PPC and discussion with invited community members.

This meeting was initially sparked by the request of Sister Beth LeValley (Sisters of Saint Joseph) after she and Rev. Dailey (Greater Rochester Community of Churches interim executive director) came to Rochester SWAA’s December meeting requesting more background on the New Poor People’s Campaign. Subsequently, GRCC signed onto the local, state and national campaign. This involved outreach to faith-based advocacy groups and churches, including: The Interfaith Alliance of Rochester; The Interfaith Coalition of the Children’s Agenda; RocActs (Poverty/Jobs Task Force); ULCM – Rev. Lewis Stewart

On January 13, 2018 there was a meeting at St. Joe’s House of Hospitality – representatives of the New Poor People’s Campaign (Willie Baptist and Kristin Nicely Colangelo) and the NYS Labor-Religion Coalition (Rev. Emily McNeil) met with anti-poverty activist groups and human service workers (Take Back the Land, SWAA Rochester, workers from St. Joseph’s, House of Mercy Shelter, and other organizers including people from City Roots/Community Land Trust). This meeting was attended by roughly 25 people and 12-15 of the attendees were currently or formerly homeless individuals and people who are poor. Rochester SWAA’s MSW student intern (who was doing 50% of her internship with the Rochester Social Welfare Action Alliance and 50% with the House of Mercy) was part of organizing this orientation and workshop.

Willie Baptist provided a concise history of the original Poor People’s Campaign and why we need a New Poor People’s Campaign. At the end of Willie’s presentation and some further Q&A, the remaining time was dedicated to discussing the formation of a Homeless Union in Rochester. The discussion, led by Ryan Acuff from St. Joseph’s House of Hospitality, produced some initial important philosophical points, strategic targets, and action items. (Since this initial organizing meeting, the Homeless Union has participated in several protests, involving such issues as the closing of a “welfare hotel” and the high sanctioning rate in Monroe County. The group has spoken to the Human Services Committee of the County Legislature and is now meeting on a weekly basis at the House of Mercy.

In April 2018, City of Rochester officials and Spectrum evicted several homeless people living in an encampment on Spectrum’s property. SWAA’s interns made frequent visits to this encampment to bring supplies and food, advocate, and offer alternative housing options as part of their internship with the House of Mercy and the Social Welfare Action Alliance.

Truth Commission on Poverty – April 19, 2018. The Rochester New Poor People’s Campaign invited all people who have been impacted by poverty, discrimination, and related injustices, direct service providers, advocates, faith and religious leaders, and experts to this community gathering. Rochester SWAA played a leadership role in organizing this event. The goal was to tell the truth about ongoing injustices in Rochester and New York communities, develop stronger relationships and build commitment to solidarity. This event was an organizing tool to build community momentum to mobilize with the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival. is a national organization built to fight systemic racism, poverty, ecological destruction and an economy built to fund war. The movement, inspired by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, was officially launched on Dec. 4, 2017.

The PPC identifies the “pillars” of evil which include militarism, poverty, racism and environmental destruction.

Truth Commissions have been used around the world to: hear the stories of those affected by injustices; heal communities; and envision action for the future. Those who testify can take on the challenge of truth telling, which reflects a commitment to uncovering stories that have long been silenced, manipulated and overlooked. The purpose of the Truth Commission is to provide political education and to serve as a space for movement building. The Truth Commissioners represent community leaders who are dedicated to the process of building strategic consensus and direction towards the goals of the New Poor People’s Campaign. For this event, their responsibility was to provide their assessment of what is happening nationally and locally in any of the four major themes of poverty, racism, environmental destruction and militarism. They listened to local community members testify and provide analysis and recommendations for next steps.

Among those testifying included homeless individuals, shelter residents and those facing eviction due to bank foreclosures. Also testifying were individuals who are part of a fledgling tenants’ rights union of those living in public housing and a social worker who does homeless outreach work.

Coverage of the event can be found here:

https://m.rochestercitynewspaper.com/rochester/poor-peoples-campaign-launches-movement-against-poverty/Content?oid=6233324

Rochester Chapter 2017:

Reality Tours were presented in October and June. The Reality Tour is a community education tool that makes poverty in Rochester visible to a wide range of community members. Rochester SWAA is currently in its 15th year of providing Reality Tours. The project is unique because it is a result of collaboration between social work students, human service workers, community-based agencies, local poor people’s organizations and individuals living in poverty. The Reality Tours take participants to key locations that symbolize the funding priorities of local, state, and federal governments. The Reality Tour visits locations such as the Department of Social Services, the House of Mercy, the abandoned subway where homeless people sleep and RCSD schools. The Reality Tour ‘guides’ include human service workers, welfare rights activists, county welfare workers, teachers and principals, citizens concerned with urban gentrification and poor people themselves. Sponsored by: C.O.N.E.A.- Coalition of North East Association; Dept. Of Social Work at the College at Brockport; The Greater Rochester Collaborative MSW Program; House of Mercy; Monroe County Federation of Social Workers IUE-CWA 81381; National Association of Social Workers- Genesee Valley Division; Person Centered Housing Options; Rochester Chapter of the Organization for Women; and the St. John Fisher College Department of Sociology.

Addiction, recovery and the failed war on drugs: A community dialogue with Jose Benitez. – March 30, 2017

In his talk, Benitez discussed the statistics of our national opioid epidemic and described ineffective U.S. policies in preventing its growth. Benitez gave an overview of harm-reduction approaches that address health disparities in the current epidemic. He was joined in a discussion panel with local substance abuse activists: Jennifer Faringer, Director of DePaul’s National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence- Rochester Area and Chair of Monroe County Opioid Task Force, Yana Khashper, Co-Founder of ROCovery Fitness and Michelle Boyd, Vice-Chair of Rochester Area Task Force on AIDS. Jose Benitez is the executive director at Prevention Point in Philadelphia (ppponline.org) and a SUNY Brockport Alumnus. Benitez and Prevention Point have been recognized by NBC News and the Philadelphia Weekly for their work. Prevention Point provides outreach services to people with addictions, including such things as case management and housing referrals in addition to clean syringes.

Background: Jose Benitez didn’t set out to open a shelter, but when months went by without city attention to a growing tent community along a railway bed, he opened the basement of Prevention Point Philadelphia, a needle-exchange program, to keep as many homeless addicted men from frostbite as possible. “A pop-up shelter,” he called it. “It was to save people from freezing to death. We have 22 beds and the only reason we have 22 beds is because we can’t fit any more.” As executive director of the nonprofit agency that provides health services as well as a needle exchange, Benitez has run outreach programs and worked with addicted individuals in the worst of circumstances. On a single day, last Nov. 17^th, 50 overdoses were reported in Philly, with five deaths. www.philly.com/philly/news/20160228_For_drug-ravaged_denizens_of_Tent_City__a_shelter_from_the_cold.html

This community dialogue was attended by 110 individuals and was organized by Rochester SWAA and sponsored by the Brockport Student Social Work Organization, The Social Work Department at Brockport, Person Centered Housing Options, the School of Human Services Dean’s office, The House of Mercy Shelter, and the SUNY Brockport Promoting Excellence in Diversity Grant Fund.

During his time in Rochester, Benitez toured the House of Mercy shelter where several Brockport students (and an alumni) interned. A few months later, Prevention Point was funded by the City of Philadelphia to run a year-round shelter for those who are actively using heroin. Benitez wanted to model the new space on the architectural design of the Rochester shelter and Brockport faculty were able to facilitate that process.

The Rumble for Human Rights (Detroit, Michigan) June 8-9, 2017

The purpose of this event was to hold an assembly of people involved in the social welfare and human services in any capacity to analyze the ways denial of water rights impacts the struggle for all human rights, and to create a practice of radical resistance and transformation. This event was held in partnership with the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, The Kairos Center, and the Social Welfare Action Alliance – National Organization. A College at Brockport social work BSW senior worked on this event’s planning committee as part of her internship with both Rochester SWAA and the House of Mercy homeless shelter as did a GRC-MSW intern.

Although this event focused on multiple manifestations of human rights violations, a special focus was on the right to water. The privatization of water and lack of access to healthy water in many low-income areas is tied to evictions and foreclosures in several communities where water bills are tied to property taxes. This has also resulted in child welfare investigations and in some cases child removal when children were found to be living in housing with an unsafe or no water supply. Detroit is one such community and this is beginning to happen in Rochester, New York.

The “Rumble for Human Rights” was a special social work/human services curriculum that built upon MWRO’s Second International Gathering of Social Movements for the Rights to Water and Housing held on June 2-4, 2017. The New York-based Kairos Center/ Poverty Initiative is a partner in this process as they recently launched a New Poor People’s Campaign beginning in the fall of 2017. Rochester SWAA played a role in organizing this event, sending several members and bringing two Brockport BSW social work students to travel to Detroit for this national gathering.

Faith for a Fair New York Conference and Poor People’s Campaign Mass Meeting, Binghamton, New York October 17-18, 2017. Rochester SWAA sent several members to this conference which brought together faith, labor and community leaders from across New York with leaders of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, including the Rev. Dr. William Barber.

They released a report on the Truth Commission on Poverty in New York State’s findings, shared the history of the national Poor People’s Campaign launching in 2018, and discussed ways to build a stronger statewide movement for economic, social and racial justice in New York.

Rochester Chapter 2016:

Connect. Move. Act. Standing together for Human Rights, Rochester, New York. (April 14, 2016 – April 15, 2016). This was a two-day human rights summit. This event was organized by Rochester SWAA and sponsored by: The College at Brockport’s: Social Work Department; the Student Social Work Organization the Women and Gender Studies Program; Department of Public Administration; Promoting Excellence in Diversity Grant Fund; and the Office of the Dean of the School of Education and Human Services. Also sponsored by: Justice Ministry Team of the Downtown United Presbyterian Church; Department of Human Services at Monroe Community College; House of Mercy; Michigan Welfare Rights Organization; the Poverty Initiative at the Kairos Center; National Social Welfare Action Alliance; Rochester Chapter of National Social Welfare Action Alliance; Take Back the Land.

The event included a panel discussion at the MetroCenter on April 14th and an all-day conference including panel presentations and workshops. Each day was attended by over 100 participants. Workshops featured:

Fighting for U.S. Water Rights: Emergency Management and Austerity Threats to Clean, Affordable Water – Michigan Welfare Rights Organization

Radical Racial Justice: “Soul Murder” and Surviving White Supremacy – Ricardo Adams, Leigh-Anne Francis, Melanie Funchess

Flying under the radar: Radical practice dangers and opportunities – Mary Bricker-Jenkins and Carrie Young

A New and Unsettling Force for Human Rights: Building a new Poor People’s Campaign for today – Willie Baptist and Rev. Liz Theoharis

Worker Rights in the 21st century U.S. – Bruce Popper

The power of video and the importance of movement media – Ted Forsyth from Rochester Indymedia

It’s a crime to be poor – Judge Karen Morris

Featured speaker on Thursday night’s kick-off panel: Maureen D. Taylor, MSW – Since 1993, Maureen Taylor has served as Chair of the Michigan Welfare Rights Organization, a union of public assistance recipients, low-income workers and the unemployed that organizes members to fight for their rights and to eliminate poverty in this country. Over the past several years, Maureen spearheaded several MWRO campaigns to protect low-income Detroiters against electricity, gas and water shut-offs. She participated in negotiations for the Water Affordability Plan for the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department; and she was a key consultant on two award-winning documentaries, “The Water Front,” about water rights and water affordability in Highland Park, Michigan; and the film, “A World Without Water” on the crises of international water affordability and access which featured a segment on Detroit. MWRO organizers gave reports about water shutoffs and unaffordability in Detroit: water poisoning in Flint; and water bills as tax liens on Highland Park homeowners.

Rochester Chapter 2015:

The New Poor People’s Campaign – A dialog with Willie Baptist and Picture the Homeless. (April 16, 2015). – A formerly homeless father – came out of the Watts uprisings, the Black Student Movement, and worked as a lead organizer with the United Steelworkers. Baptist has 40 years of experience organizing with poor people, including such groups as the National Union of the Homeless, the Kensington Welfare Rights Union, the National Welfare Rights Union, and the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign. He is currently the Poverty Initiative Scholar-in-Residence and is the Coordinator of Poverty Scholarship and Leadership Development for the Kairos Center based in New York City. Other speakers were Picture the Homeless Organizers Marcus Moore and Nikita. During their visit, the homeless organizers met with leadership of Sanctuary Village and other homeless persons and activists. Groups represented included The Interfaith Alliance of Rochester; St. Joseph’s House of Hospitality; House of Mercy; Asbury Methodist Church, Rochester ACTS, CCSI and others.

Rochester Chapter 2014:

The tour was given to a group of doctors and researchers from University of Rochester Strong Hospital as well as first-year students who are enrolled in the Learning Community Program at St. John Fisher College.

November 19, 2014: “Connecting the struggles and building a movement: Stories of Survival and Resistance” – a presentation and community gathering featuring Cheri Honkala. Honkala is the leader of the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign. She was joined by a community panel of experts and activists as part of this event: Margy Meath, Nick Coulter, Ricardo Adams and Ryan Acuff. Sponsored by: The Office of the Dean of the School of Education and Human Services and the Social Work Department of the College at Brockport; Flying Squirrel Community Space; Department of Sociology, Criminology, and Anthropology of St. John Fisher College; Metro Justice; The Rochester Chapter of the National Organization for Women; Take Back the Land; Rochester Human Rights Committee.

Rochester Chapter 2013:

Presented two Reality Tours (October and April) co-sponsored with the House of Mercy, the Federation of Social Workers, the Genesee Valley Chapter of NASW, EMPOWER Welfare Rights, and Rochester Poor People United. The tours were given to SUNY Brockport students and members of the community to help educate them about poverty in the Rochester area; they included taking people to abandoned houses, the offices of the Department of Social Services, schools in poor neighborhoods, a homeless shelter, and the abandoned subway (where many local homeless people live). Aside from two public tours, an individual tour was given for Human Service majors at Monroe Community College and AmeriCorps staff.

April 5, 2013: “Radical practice: Championing human rights in our everyday lives.” This was a roundtable discussion and community-based dialog concerning ways to ensure the human rights of both workers and clients in the provision of social services. Attended by approximately 50 community members.

Rochester Chapter 2012:

May 18, 2012: Rochester SWAA sponsored an event “Making Rochester a Human Rights City.” This was an invitation only roundtable discussion on a proposal for Rochester to become a Human Rights City. A small number of cities in the United States have become Human Rights Cities by law. Their implementation of the law has varied. Members of Occupy Rochester have put forth a working proposal to Mayor Richards for Rochester to become a Human Rights City. The roundtable discussion’s purpose was to garner feedback on the working proposal and how such a proposal could be voted into legislation. Approximately 25 people attended, representing such organizations as: Greater Rochester Community of Churches; The College at Brockport (faculty and students); Empire Justice Law Center; RIT; Office of Mental Health; Take Back the Land; Metro Justice of Rochester; Action for a Better Community; Catholic Family Center

November 16, 2012: “Human rights in human services – support for clients and workers.” A roundtable dialogue for human service workers and students. Featured Fred Newdom, professor of Social Work at Smith College. This event was attended by 50 community members and included a high level of participation by Brockport faculty, students and alumni.

Rochester Chapter 2011:

Rochester Chapter 2010:

Housing is a Human Right Truth Commission, November 18th, 2011. Co-sponsored by: EMPOWER Welfare Rights, House of Mercy, Rochester Poor Peoples Coalition, Federation of Social Workers, Rochester Chapter of the National Organization for Women, The College at Brockport’s Social Work Department, Greater Rochester Collaborative Masters in Social Work Program, St. Joseph’s Neighborhood Center, Rochester Chapter of NASW. Several prominent community leaders heard the testimony of individuals struggling to achieve or maintain affordable housing. Their stories reflected substance use, mental health, poverty, racism, sexism, domestic violence as barriers to safe housing. This also included the creation of a Housing and Economic Human Rights Violation documentation toolkit and Homelessness, Housing and Foreclosure Fact Sheet.

The Take Back the Land- Movement is a national network of organizations dedicated to elevating housing to the level of a human right and securing community control over land. TBTL defends people from foreclosure-related evictions and assists homeless people to move into vacant, bank-owned homes. Take Back the Land – Rochester Chapter was born out of collaborative discussions with Rochester SWAA and local community activists concerned with housing foreclosures and homelessness. SWAA Rochester has supported the local effort, which garnered national media attention in the spring (CNN, Huffington Post, 60 Minutes) when Cathy Lennon was evicted from her home by a mortgage company after efforts to make payments faltered due to her husband’s death from brain cancer. In collaboration with TBTL, SWAA sponsored a Housing and Human Rights Educational forum in March 2011.

Rochester Chapter 2009:

The Rochester Chapter has been recovering from its whirlwind of fall activities. In October, we organized a conference entitled Poverty and Violence: Assault on Human Rights. More than 200 people from many segments of the community came together to hear keynote speakers, activists and authors Diane Dujon and Ann Withorn discuss connections between violence in our community and economic injustice.

Author and Yale University professor Elijah Anderson also spoke, and his topic was Against the Wall: Poor, Young, Black and Male, explaining how the global economy is creating fewer jobs, global competition for low paying jobs and hence fewer options for poor, particularly young black men, to pull themselves out of poverty. The conference concluded with Rochester SWAA’s first “Truth Commission, Putting Poverty on Trial.” Fred Newdom, who presented at the conference, also served as moderator for the Truth Commission.

The Truth Commission was largely a joint effort between the graduate students from the Greater Rochester MSW Collaborative, a Social and Economic justice BSW class at SUNY Brockport, and the local community. SWAA’s Hubert Wilkerson, formerly an organizer with Poor People United, played an important role by serving as a liaison between students and the grassroots community. His guidance allowed students to learn key interviewing techniques that supported the collection of several Economic Human Rights Violations. Truth Commissioners representing a variety of backgrounds and experiences, such as union organizing, social services administration, outreach to the homeless, and general human rights activism, acknowledged the testimonies and provided suggestions on how to alleviate further violations.

The following weekend, the Rochester Chapter hosted the SWAA National Steering Committee. There was a great turnout and many local members graciously stepped up to feed, house and connect with our National members. Cheri Honkala of Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign was in attendance and shared some of her experiences at the RNC.

Currently we are working on getting local members and interested grassroots leaders to the National SWAA Conference in July. We are still continuing to organize Reality Tours in the City of Rochester and fund a paid part-time organizer that works with a very dedicated SWAA member to plan, update and implement our Reality Tours. An example of this is a plan to organize a pilot tour for the differently-abled riders this spring.

Lastly, we are organizing a Spring 2009 event to further our work of highlighting poverty and economic human rights. We are bringing Ethel Long Scott, aka “Street Warrior” and Executive Director of the Women’s Economic Agenda Project (WEAP), to Rochester as our keynote speaker. Ms. Long Scott will address an academic audience at the State University of New York at Brockport, a community audience in the City of Rochester, and will meet with local SWAA members. We hope to present these local organizing efforts to the national audience at the joint SWAA-PPEHRC Louisville Conference in July.

Rochester Chapter 2008:

In October, The Rochester Chapter is very busy planning an October 2008 Conference titled Violence and Poverty: Assault on Human Rights. We are collaborating with SUNY Brockport College, St. John Fisher College, Rochester Institute of Technology, Greater Rochester Collaborative MSW Program, the Rochester Chapter of NOW, local churches and poor people’s organizations in an effort to respond to the recent increase in violence in our community. The conference speakers and workshops will focus on economic injustice and show its connections to the violence in our community. We have Elijah Anderson, Diane Dujan, Ann Withorn, Fred Newdom and many others scheduled to speak and offer workshops.

We continue to plan and offer Reality Tours and have received small grants to enable us to fund a part time organizer. The new organizer is a BSW student and new SWAA member. We hope to find funding to make this an ongoing position. Our membership has increased to include many people with diverse backgrounds who are willing to combine their passion for social justice and their unique talents. Our membership now includes a self taught web designer who has made our web page interesting, informative and most of all easy to use. Another new member is a media arts and sciences professor who is generously bringing her considerable talents to add exciting elements to our fall conference. We are also pleased to have an AmericCorp Vista volunteer who is highly skilled and dedicated to community organizing. Also joining us is a sociology professor whose connections have brought us our keynote speaker for the conference. A formerly homeless community organizer has also recently joined us and adds valuable input and perspective. Lastly, the Rochester Chapter is hosting the SWAA National Steering Committee Meeting, also in October.

Rochester Chapter 2007:

In December, The Rochester Chapter continues to have great success with our Reality Tours. We have had members of the Monroe County Legislature, City of Rochester school teachers, doctors and residents from the University of Rochester, college students and high school students and church groups. We often have waiting lists for our upcoming tours. We were recently awarded a grant to fund a paid organizer position to help administer and produce the Reality Tours for SWAA. One of our members became the official organizer and did a wonderful job. Our next tours may focus particularly on women and children and poverty with special input and assistance from the Rochester Chapter of NOW and the SUNY Brockport Women’s Center. Last spring, SWAA Rochester brought Willie Baptist to the SUNY Brockport campus to speak on “Becoming an Activist to End Poverty.” He spoke on campus and later that evening in the community and the events attracted about 150 people.

Two Rochester SWAA members were accepted at the National Conference in New Orleans to present a workshop on “How to Organize a Reality Tour.”

Our website is up and running and one of our members will be monitoring and adding updates. We are hoping this will help us attract new members. Lastly, we are looking forward to holding a small conference in the fall of 2008 that we hope will be a precursor for a conference in the spring of 2009. This will take a lot of effort and planning and we are hoping with an increase in membership and momentum we will be successful.

Rochester Chapter 2007:

This summer, four SWAA members attended the National Truth Commission in Cleveland, sponsored by the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign. Two of the group members were students who found it an energizing experience, and a good introduction to the concept of economic human rights.

The Rochester Chapter is still inundated with requests from various groups to run Reality Tours. We decided to “kick it up a notch” and challenged ourselves by running four tours in one weekend! Participants included: the Jewish Community Federation; three social action groups from local Catholic Churches; University of Rochester Medical Students; SUNY Brockport Social Work students; and various other members of the community, about 100 riders total. We already have requests from a local Unitarian church and professors from other universities. We added a city school district principal and teacher to our line-up of speakers, as well as a professor from the University of Rochester who has done an amazing project on homicides in our community (see other story). One of our members is developing a grant proposal so that we might hire an organizer to work on these tours to free us up for other activities. There are already several names on a waiting list for the next tour.

We showed the video “Poverty Outlaw” to two groups of students on the SUNY Brockport campus in October. Plans for the spring include a community forum tying urban violence to the denial of economic human rights. We hope to invite Willie Baptist and possibly other KWRU members to facilitate this event.

Rochester Chapter May 2006:

Rochester SWAA, through some American Democracy Project funds and SWAA member Margery Saunders, deviously brought Fred Newdom to campus March 1st and 2nd to give a “Distinguished Scholars” presentation to the whole campus community as well as two lobbying/advocacy workshops to SUNY Brockport social work students.

We now seem to be able to run Reality Tours without having to worry about filling the bus anymore! We’ve had a recent request for a tour to be given especially for the Homeless Services Network (75 people). Three SWAA members gave a “How to organize a Reality Tour” workshop to the New York State NASW conference in Albany on March 24th, with approximately 45 folks in attendance.

Most recently, we collaborated with Let Justice Roll – a coalition of faith and community voices working to alleviate poverty in Rochester. They approached SWAA and wanted to know if we were willing to run a tour if they financed it, with the explicit goal of targeting Monroe County Legislators, the County Executive, and the new Mayor. The Tour ran on April 8th, with 12 politicians on board, along with a mix of community activists, church groups, and students. The tour was very successful, ending with lunch at a local homeless shelter and a de-briefing period.

We’ve also had a tour request from a SUNY Geneseo Education professor who has a grant to promote literacy to underprivileged school districts. SWAA is going to give a “mini tour” to teachers in the Rochester City School district on May 11th.

A few workshop participants at the NASW conference who expressed a real interest in the Tour were with the Binghamton, New York Homeless Coalition. They came to Rochester on April 8th and took the Tour to get a sense of it, with the intention of replicating it in Binghamton!

Finally, we are piloting a “Faces of the Fallen” project, with a few SUNY Brockport students gathering stories of economic human rights abuses, which we will put on our local web site and build from there starting next fall. We are currently hoping that a few SWAA members can attend the National Truth Commission in Cleveland this July.

Rochester Chapter 2005:

This fall (November), the Rochester chapter worked with the local NASW chapter as well as the Federation of Social Workers (the union that represents county workers in the Department of Human Services) to distribute our 2005 voter education/registration brochures. Every member of our county legislature (because of new term limits) was up for re-election. Member Susan Ruhlin was particularly active in voter registration work.

In October we ran another Reality Tour. We had a full bus; many of the 40 passengers came from suburban church groups. This time we tried to include a few more “consumers” of social services, and added a speaker on Medicaid and lead paint poisoning. This Tour was co-sponsored by the local NASW chapter. In fact, a week before the Tour we had an op-ed article published in the Rochester newspaper that was also endorsed by the Federation of Social Workers as well as the NASW chapter – no small feat! This article focused on challenging our County Executive’s recent assertions that the reason the County budget is running such a deficit was due to social services.

In the month of November, Rochester SWAA sponsored two screenings of the documentary, “Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Price,” both on the SUNY Brockport campus and the downtown SUNY Metro Center. For more information about the Rochester chapter, contact Melissa Sydor at melsk@me.com.

In July, Rochester SWWA members have been very active working in coalition with other grassroots community groups. On February 14, 2005, Alberta Roesser of SWAA traveled to Albany with Sister Grace Miller of the House of Mercy and Jon Greenbaum of Metro Justice to lobby against Governor Pataki’s budget cuts and to show support for the Empire State Economic Security Campaign (ES2).

The “delegation” visited the offices of Assemblyperson Susan John, as well as Senators Patterson, Maziarz, and Robach. Most often, they met with their assistants except with Rochester area Senator Robach, whom they met with personally. The overall response from the politicians was that our concerns were taken seriously and that our delegation should leave feeling assured that the cuts to Medicaid were not going through. But SWAA member Roesser stated: “That is not how I felt. When Mark Dunlea of Hunger Action Network of New York State supplied Senator Robach with some specific solutions, the Senator refused to believe any of the facts that Dunlea presented. At least our representatives understood we came not only with problems but also with viable solutions.”

SWAA Rochester also organized another Reality Tour in April, and once again we had a full bus! Two SUNY Brockport Social Work students coordinated the Tour for their senior project.

Two SWAA members were represented at an April 7th “Emergency rally to stop Pataki’s budget cuts to Medicaid and Family Health Plus.” Eight cities across New York State rallied to defend patients and local institutions from Pataki’s draconian cuts in the proposed state budget. One of our members was on an advisory committee for the planning of “From Poverty to Dignity & Decency for All.” This was a community conference (an offshoot of “Let Justice Roll” organized by the National Council of Churches and the Center for Community Change) that took place on May 13th and 14th to develop an action plan to address poverty in the Greater Rochester Area. Three SWAA members attended the conference.

Alberta Roesser is also the new President of the Greater Rochester Chapter of the National Organization for Women. And Susan Ruhlin has been writing grants with Poor People United to raise funds for a human rights project house, which will house chronically homeless adult men and women.

Finally, Rochester SWAA has plans to begin work in conjunction with Rochester Voters Alliance, the Federation of Social Workers, and NASW to organize legislative candidate forums in the upcoming months in the City of Rochester, focusing on poverty issues. If you would like more information about Rochester’s SWAA chapter, contact Melissa Sydor at melsk@me.com.

In February, The Rochester SWAA Chapter has been quite active. Last spring we hosted Mary Bricker-Jenkins and Willie Baptist at events that were co-sponsored by the SUNY Brockport Social Work Depart- ment, Poor People United, Strong Memorial Hospital’s Social Work Division’s Social Action Committee, and the Federation of Social Workers. Willie and Mary (and a “team” of presenters from KWRU) gave Economic Human Rights workshops on the Brockport Campus, at Baden Street Settlement House, and Strong Memorial Hospital. Their presentations had an exhibit of the “Shirts Off Our Backs,” part of a traveling t-shirt exhibit from the “Welfare Made a Difference Campaign.” Brockport students also made shirts with local poor people at various agency locations.

In April we also sponsored another Reality Tour. One of the “tourists” happened to be an MSW student who was so inspired by what she saw that she helped Poor People United secure a grant to purchase a bus to convert into an emergency hypothermia “shelter on wheels.” The bus just made its debut during the second week of December!

This fall, we worked on our own voter registration project specific to the greater Rochester area. We formed a coalition with the local chapter of NASW and the Federation of Social Workers (union of social workers at the Department of Social Services). Representatives from these three organizations met regularly and pooled resources to create a brochure targeted to human services workers and one targeted to low income workers explaining the issues that might be of concern to Monroe County residents. We sent these brochures in addition to schedules for opportunities to registered voters to one hundred and fifty organizations and human service agencies.

SUNY Brockport social work students worked with the coalition and we focused voter registration efforts on low income housing areas in districts where county legislator seats where up for reelection. This was a big year for County government races; the Republican-controlled legislature had six seats open for reelections with the possibility of swaying the legislature to the Democratic side. We were able to register over eight hundred voters and on Election Day we helped make sure voters had transportation and child care to get to the polls. This effort built the ties between the three organizations and we have plans to continue working together in the future.

During the fall, in conjunction with local organizations such as SUNY Brockport, Poor People United, the Federation of Social Workers and House of Mercy, we held another Reality Tour, with a new “twist.” We included issues related to the local refugee population and HIV/AIDS in Rochester. Among the passengers were eight medical students from the University or Rochester who have been part of a team that opened a “free clinic” in the city.

SWAA – along with the Rochester Poor People’s Coalition – cosponsored an event with Poor People United, bringing Ron Casanova (NYC chapter of the Poor People’s Economic Human Rights Campaign) to Rochester for a speaking engagement that was preceded by the showing of GNN’s Crack the CIA and KWRU’s Corner Wars.

Rochester Chapter March 2004:

In the past six months, our Chapter has been very active. We worked with local groups – Poor People United, Rochester Poor People’s Coalition, and Metro Justice to protest the disastrous County Budget cuts and organized efforts to influence the budget decision-making process. We continue to build connections with the Federation of Social Workers (the union representing workers at the Department of Health and Human Services) and became a task force of Metro Justice of Rochester (a longstanding independent, grassroots, progressive membership organization). We helped the Rochester Poor People’s Coalition organize a protest at the County Legislature, and supported Poor People United in their fight to obtain a hypothermia shelter. We ran a Reality Tour in October that left us with a 25-person waiting list, and which was attended by several elected officials and “kicked-off” with an appearance from Rochester Mayor Bill Johnson. This tour (and the accompanying media coverage) helped us to expand our membership; one of our members created an excellent database for us which contains close to 300 names. We also helped poor people from Rochester get to the Kensington Welfare Rights Union march in August. More recently, we supported the local NASW’s “Walk a Mile in Our Shoes” campaign.

Rochester Chapter 2003:

In June, The Rochester SWAA Chapter – with the Rochester Poor People’s Coalition, the House of Mercy, and SUNY Brockport Social Work students – organized a downtown rally on December 7th at the Salvation Army and the Central Church of Christ to greet the New Freedom Bus Tour. Through donations and fund-raising, students were able to buy the food and prepare and serve a dinner for the freedom riders. Students also found housing for the bus riders, and another downtown church fed the group breakfast.

A vigil was held at School No. 17 on December 8th in Rochester with local welfare rights activists and the Freedom Bus riders to draw attention to the national campaign for economic human rights as well as the fact that Rochester is the 11th in the nation in the numbers of its children living in poverty. This event was covered in the Democrat and Chronicle newspaper and two local TV news programs).

In March, SWAA members Barbara Kasper and Melissa Sydor gave a workshop on “women and welfare reform” as part of the annual International Women’s Day conference. The workshop was well attended and it generated a great deal of positive feedback.

In April, the chapter sponsored its fifth “Reality Tour.” We were able to fill a school bus with students and members of the community for this three-hour consciousness-raising event. Tour “guides” included representatives from the Rochester Poor People’s Coalition, Human Service Workers United, EMPOWER Welfare Rights, and folks who work with people with AIDS in the low-income community. One local TV station sent a reporter and camera person to cover the tour, and a newspaper reporter accompanied us to most of the tour stops as well.

Beyond these activities, our Chapter continues to bring together activists from various organizations to plan action strategies aimed at drawing attention to the devastating effects of the County budget cuts and the numerous ways our local welfare department is denying people their right to services.