Southern Echo, Inc. is now accepting applications for our small grants program for mature grassroots community-based organizations engaged in community organizing work.

The primary purpose of this program is to strengthen low-income communities and neighborhoods by investing in the development of local leaders through the community organizing process.

Grants of up to $20,000 (note that the average grant size is $15,000.00) are awarded, supported by training and technical assistance, to strengthen community organizing groups and help them to connect to networks and coalitions.

Click HERE to access the cover sheet for the grant application. Click HERE to access the application and guidelines.

Itta Bena, MS – October 14, 2010 – Itta Bena, MS – On October 14, 2010 Southern Echo and the MS Delta Catalyst Roundtable will hold a convening at MS Valley State University of approximately 500 parents, students, educators and public officials from more than 40 school districts to analyze and assess the research-based data that demonstrates the proposed public school consolidation strategies of MS Governor Haley Barbour are not an appropriate approach to or solution for the problems facing Mississippi school districts.

The convening will consider alternative paths more appropriate and suitable to address the needs of Mississippi school districts and the students and parents who comprise their primary constituency. In addition, the participants will discuss next steps to be taken, including what may take place at the next regularly-scheduled legislative session in 2011.

Jackson, MS - August 20-22, 2010 - On August 20-22, 2010 Southern Echo and the Pushback Network, a national network of state-based grassroots community organizations, will partner to conduct a 2.5 day residential training school for grassroots community organizations in the Pushback Network from Mississippi, Nevada, New Mexico, Texas, and New York. There will be participants from other organizations, also.

The training sessions will focus on how political redistricting and reapportionment have been used to control the distribution of power throughout American history, the legal principles and political considerations that drive the redistricting process now, the mechanics of preparing redistricting plans from the census data, the complex criteria that now are used to evaluate the constitutionality, legality and political viability of proposed redistricting plans, and why community organizing around redistricting has been a formidable basis for significant grassroots community successes in the redistricting process.

The school will also focus on how community organizations can build relationships with attorneys, demographers and social scientists to form a powerful team that can support the needs and interests of grassroots communities to obtain fair redistricting plans that provide them with reasonable opportunities to elect representatives of their own choice.

The enrollment for this training has been by invitation through the Pushback Network.

Jackson, MS – August 2, 2010 – The Standing Joint Legislative Committee on Reapportionment will hold twelve (12) public hearings across the state to enable members of the public to explain to the Committee what values, standards and benchmarks the Committee ought to use when it redistricts the congressional, legislative and judicial districts in 2011 after the new census data is released.

The Census data must be provided to each state on or before April 1, 2011, but will most likely be available by late January or early February.

These hearings are an opportunity for community to express its concerns that the Committee use values, standards and benchmarks that comply with the federal Voting Rights Act, that do not dilute minority voting strength, keep communities of interest together, and that maintain the gains in representation that communities of color achieved through years of struggle to end systemic exclusion from voting and representation.

The announced Committee hearing schedule is located HERE.

Durham, NC – July 26-31, 2010 – During six days of intensive training a new generation of younger social scientists, cartographers and community organizers of color from across the nation worked together under the guidance from the Southern Coalition for Social Justice to learn the tools and skills of creating fair political boundary lines, how to work together across disparate disciplines and diverse cultures to support the redistricting needs and interests of grassroots communities of low-wealth and of color, and the legal principles and political considerations necessary to create successful plans at the congressional, state, county and municipal levels.

The Southern Coalition, based in Durham, NC, spent the past year working with a diverse multi-discipline Advisory Board to design and implement the challenging task of training this younger generation to bend their respective crafts to be expert witnesses in redistricting litigation, create plans based on the values, standards and benchmarks of redistricting, and to enable communities to be effective on the political playing field to create fair plans.

The Southern Coalition, led by Atty. Anita Earls, consultant Anthony Fairfax and social scientist Dick Engstrom, each an experienced practitioner, were driven by the urgency of building a new generation of motivated, skilled people to undertake the complex elements of redistricting. There are only a few such people of color active in redistricting today who understand and are responsive to the needs and interests of grassroots communities.

Southern Echo Executive Director Leroy Johnson and Senior Organizer and Training Coordinator Mike Sayer were on the Southern Coalition Advisory Board and part of the training staff for this week-long process.