Dear Commons Community,

The case of Trayvon Martin, the 17-year-old African-American student, who was shot last month as he walked home one night has stirred national outrage and protests.  All the facts of the case are not known but it appears that once again loose gun control, racial profiling, and so-called Stand Your Ground laws (SYG) set the stage for this tragedy.  The New York Times has an editorial that reviews the issues of SYG:

“The local police in Sanford, Fla., ruled the shooting justifiable under a (SYG) law that was created to give the benefit of the doubt to people who shoot their guns in public areas and then claim self-defense. This statute goes well beyond the traditional principles of self-defense in homes. In 2005, Florida became the first in the nation to adopt this type of measure, with overwhelming bipartisan approval and the signature of Gov. Jeb Bush.

Since the enactment of the law, claims of justifiable homicide tripled in Florida, according to state data. “It’s almost insane what we are having to deal with,” Willie Meggs, the state attorney in Tallahassee, declared this week. Self-defense is being invoked in everything from gang shootings to backyard disputes between neighbors, with prosecutors left to disprove the shooters’ claims. “

The editorial conclusion:

“Stand Your Ground laws are abominations that should be repealed. One obvious flaw among many is that slain victims can never tell their side of the story.”

Trayvon Martin surely will not be able to.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The New York Times is reporting that in a speech on Wednesday in Singapore, where he received a prize for urban sustainability, Mayor Bloomberg spoke about the difficulties of leading a city into the future amid a political culture that is often focused on the short term.

The mayor noted that technology, despite its benefits, can add new pitfalls to an already grueling process. “Social media is going to make it even more difficult to make long-term investments” in cities, Mr. Bloomberg said.

“We are basically having a referendum on every single thing that we do every day,” he said. “And it’s very hard for people to stand up to that and say, ‘No, no, this is what we’re going to do,’ when there’s constant criticism, and an election process that you have to look forward to and face periodically.”

Andrew Rasiej, the founder of Personal Democracy Media, a group that studies how technology is changing politics, said he admired the mayor’s engagement with social media. But he said he could also empathize with Mr. Bloomberg’s concerns.

“He is expressing the difficulties and the challenges of using social media in an effective way in governing,” Mr. Rasiej said in an interview. “But I also want to encourage him to say the technology also offers an opportunity to build a better and more robust democracy.”

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Yesterday, the Professional Staff Congress  filed a lawsuit in New York State Supreme Court, New York County, challenging the adoption of the controversial Pathways resolution by the CUNY Board of Trustees.

Below is an email fro PSC President, Barbara Bowen, providing the details.

Tony

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Dear Members and Colleagues,

Yesterday afternoon the PSC filed a lawsuit in New York State Supreme Court, New York County, challenging the adoption of the Pathways resolution by the CUNY Board of Trustees. I am joined as plaintiff on the suit by Sandi Cooper and Terrence Martell, leaders of the University Faculty Senate. This is the first of two lawsuits against Pathways that the PSC plans to support.   We will also support a lawsuit to be brought by students at a later date, focused on the harm Pathways will do to their education at CUNY. Our press release on the growing opposition to Pathways was issued early this morning.

The lawsuit filed yesterday concentrates on the violation of the settlement agreement reached in 1997 between CUNY, on the one hand, and the PSC and University Faculty Senate on the other. That settlement agreement reaffirmed that the CUNY faculty, through the University Faculty Senate and the college faculty senates and councils, are responsible for the formulation of policy relating to curriculum, the awarding of college credit, the granting of degrees and other academic matters.

The PSC has invested considerable resources in filing the suit, and we will pursue it vigorously. But the most important actions are those you take on campus.

I attended the University Faculty Senate meeting last night, and not a single person spoke in favor of Pathways, yet many felt they had no choice but to vote for its approval. We do have a choice. Faculty and faculty bodies across the University are standing up and registering their opposition to Pathways. Those of us who hold elected faculty governance positions have the freedom—and the responsibility—to vote in ways that we believe are academically and pedagogically sound.

You can stand up for what you believe even if you are not on an elected governance committee. Sign the union petition on Pathways online by noon on Friday, March 23, and your name will appear along with thousands of others in the next Clarion. (Duplicate and ineligible signatures will be eliminated.)

Faculty and staff on every campus are struggling to do what’s right for our students, yet feeling forced to make decisions by the absurd and coercive timeframe for Pathways implementation. There is no justification for rushing a curriculum revision of this magnitude. It’s time for 80th Street to slow down, start again, and respect the role of our elected faculty bodies.

In solidarity,
Barbara Bowen
President, PSC