Los Angeles Money
by Paul Glover, HOUR Town, July
1992
Like the grinding rocks that make earthquakes there,
the Los Angeles forces of injustice have shaken that city
again. When police power rules, people will rebel, as did the
founders of the United States.
To conquer racism, in Los Angeles and everywhere, people need control
of money, police, jobs, property and culture. They cannot
survive as subjects of hostile authority.
Because corporations seldom hire African-Americans, then pay poorly,
leaving little income but drug sales, South Central residents can
instead hire each other through a system of barter and exchange posts,
as tens of thousands of Angelenos did during the Great
Depression. Rather than use money with slaveowners on it
(Washington, Jefferson, Hamilton, Jackson), South Central residents can
use money they respect and which gives them respect, featuring
Malcolm X, Frederick Douglass and Harriet Tubman. IthacaÕs Quarter HOUR
is currently the only money in the U.S. which honors a person of color.
Because banks suck money from black neighborhoods
and spend it for white power (Community Reinvestment Act surveys prove
this), African-Americans can establish Community Development Credit
Unions which invest every penny in back-owned businesses.
Forthcoming issues of HOUR Town will describe such projects.
And because taxes to the City of Los Angeles feed brutality, the
unified South Central community can refuse to pay local property taxes
until demands such as the following are met:
* South
Central police are hired and fired by a commuhnuty board created by
South Central churches and nonprofit organizations.
* Free
and frequent transit services connect the black community to the rest
of L.A., funded by banks, insurance companies, utilities, industries
and automobile sales/use fees. Lack of transit was
one cause of the 1965 Watts rebellion.
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* All vacant lots
in South Central are
transferred to community land trusts and converted to orchards and
gardens staffed and/or tended by neighbors. The food is then
sold by
the growers at neighborhood farmersÕ markets, or donated, decreasing
dependence on grocery stores.
 If the City
prefers to retaliate,
as with service cuts, foreclosures and tax sales, South Central
residents can as easily disconnect power and water service to rich
neighborhoods. This is tough talk, but white Americans under
military
occupation would do no less.
Such progress by African-Americans
in Los Angeles benefits all races in all cities, by helping establish
proud commumnities independent of military, bureaucratic and corporate
force.
Paul Glover is
author of Los Angeles: A History of the Future.
He holds degrees in Marketing and in City Management. [email protected] |
