Raleighwood, NC

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Clyde Smith

clyde(at)netweed(dot)com

Saturday, 5/22: Band Together NC 2010 Concert f/ Michael Franti & Spearhead for StepUP Ministry

Michael Franti & Spearhead: All Rebel Rockers

A special benefit show is happening at the Lincoln Theatre both inside and out. Michael Franti & Spearhead are headlining the show which benefits Raleigh's StepUP Ministry and is cosponsored by Downtown Raleigh.

Band Together NC Background Info

Show Schedule:
The Old Ceremony: 6-7pm
Anoop Desai: 7-7:45pm (Inside Lincoln Theatre)
One EskimO: 7:30-8:30pm
Michael Franti & Spearhead: 9-11pm
Holy Ghost Tent Revival: 11:15-1am (Special late night party/concert inside Lincoln Theatre; first come basis due to limited capacity)

Michael Franti & Spearhead: Time To Go Home

More on the Concert:
Awesome outdoor charity concert in front of Lincoln Theatre in downtown Raleigh
Doors at 5pm/music 6 to 11pm (Rain or Shine) with late night party inside until 1am
Tickets are $22.00 advance/$25.00 day of/$150 VIP (21+ event)

Tickets, get your Tickets!

Official Site:
Band Together NC

Bob Geary on Wake County School Board

Bob Geary writes for the Independent Weekly, a publication with which I've had a love/hate relationship since their launch in Durham back in '82 or '83. That was also my first year out of college and I had an amazing time in Durham getting to know a progressive/radical community with a very deep bench.

Bob does some nice work and I'll try to update this post as regularly as I can. You can check IndyWeek for his regional news coverage and his Citizen blog for posts about the big town of Raleighwood.

Bob Geary on Wake County School Board Issues

From IndyWeek News in 2010:

Wake County goes to hell

Wake County politics: It's complicated

Diversity takes a backseat in Wake schools: Rich kid, poor kid

Why did the new majority hire its own attorney, Tom Farr?

Wake schools fight escalates

From the Citizen blog in 2010:

Wake schools: It’s not over; the battle is just beginning

Wake school board: the usual 5-4 for “community assignment zones”

School board on the brink; Debra Goldman has the comm

Del Burns resigns as Wake schools leader — in protest

HK on J is coming Feb. 13 — it's not a march, it's a movement worth joining

NAACP calls Sunday forum on threat to Wake schools; WakeUP sets coalition

Wake school board votes 5-4 to end year-round assignments — somehow

It's Tuesday, 5:40 pm — do you know where your school board is?

From IndyWeek News in 2009:

Conservative Wake school board members discover change is tougher
than it looks: A reality check

The Wake school board's conservative bloc grabs power:
Doesn't play well with others

Tedesco: No Wake schools coup planned—yet

From the Citizen blog in 2009:

Students launch online petition to preserve magnet schools in Wake

Tedesco wins, conservative majority now in control of Wake schools

Truitt drops out, warns against resegregation of schools in Wake

Truitt will drop out of District 2 race tomorrow, cementing
"neighborhood schools" majority

Truitt versus Tedesco: It matters.

Now that the rabid-right Republicans run the Wake schools,
will they wreck them?

Wake schools to come apart? Will the new school board fire Del Burns?

Related Raleighwood, NC Coverage: Wake Co. School Board

N&O Blog: WakeEd by T. Keung Hui

WakeEd Blog: Home Page

Built using the WakeEd Blog RSS Feed powered by Feed2JS
with hosting by Modevia Web Services. Thanks, y'all!

Related Raleighwood, NC Coverage: Wake Co. School Board

Planned Parenthood: Say NO to Wake Co. Abortion Coverage Ban

Say NO to Wake Co. Abortion Coverage Ban:

"On Monday, February 15, the Wake County Board of Commissioners will vote on whether to eliminate insurance coverage for abortion from all county employees' benefit plans. We need you to add your voice to growing public outcry about this politically-motivated attack on women's healthcare."

"THE FACT REMAINS: Abortion care is part of a comprehensive a health insurance plan, which is why more than 80 percent of private insurance plans already cover abortion."

"The politicization of women's personal reproductive lives definitely didn't stop with the Stupak amendment – which would limit abortion coverage at the federal level – and now we have found it at our own back door."

Raleigh Downtowner Magazine Steps Up Its Game!

I don't actually have a big problem with Raleigh Downtowner Magazine. They serve a specific niche that just happens to mostly be about white people with some cash, so I've tended to lump them in with Raleigh's ongoing campaign to "Get White People Downtown," which seems to be going pretty well.

But it's not like they don't care about people of color or poor people per se. In fact, a recent print issue that is also available in .pdf form is a pleasant surprise with a cover story focused on "9 for the Needy" plus stories about some of the cooler businesses around the area.

Oh, snap, it's the return of Peter Eichenberger (as RD's "Senior Writer") who provides the intro to an article by Chris Moutos focused on the following local service organizations:

Alliance Medical Ministry

Pretty in Pink Foundation

Wee Care Children's Enrichment Program

Loaves and Fishes Ministry, Inc.

SAFEchild

Haven House

Raleigh Rescue Mission

Meals on Wheels of Wake County

Warmth for Wake

They also have an additional list of worthy organizations at the end of the article. If you think that's a good thing, as do I, I'd encourage you to contact them in support of creating a dedicated directory page on their website:

Telephone: 919.821.9000
Email: office@raleighdowntowner.com

In addition to 9 for the Needy, this issue promoted a number of businesses which make Raleigh cooler than not, from NoFo Cafe to a Hillsborough assortment to Five Star.

Since I'm focusing quite a bit on racial issues in my writing at Raleighwood, NC, I'd like to make a special note that, beyond what may well be a great restaurant, Five Star has a great nightclub at which I've spent my last two New Year's Eve celebrations. Both times Five Star had the most interesting and comfortable mix of races and ethnicities that I've experienced in Raleigh.

In the past, Five Star has hosted Blacklisted every First Friday with no cover and no dress code. I haven't been on those nights but I imagine it's quite a bit of fun and I've been very impressed by their dj's in the past. Blacklisted's various web points of presence are currently outdated but I imagine the party continues.

Credit where credit's due:
Publisher Crash Gregg interviews Robert Weiss, Artistic Director for the Carolina Ballet. I'm not the biggest fan of ballet but you can't have a real city without a real ballet and they've done pretty darn well for themselves.

Surprise find:
Melissa Santos profiles Krav Maga Raleigh. I don't know Ken Richstad and I never assume a teacher is good based on their own abilities since teaching is an art of it's own but, if he's good, it's well worth a look.  Krav Maga is the real deal, i.e., it's not about the belts, it's about the abilities.

I've been looking for a martial arts teacher and I'll let you know if I take the free intro class. Check his site's links page for some other solid looking local schools. It's always a good sign when people link out.

Cool.  I did not realize Peter had returned to the fray but I'm thinking this might work. RD's approach has the potential to rein in Peter's wilding out tendencies while they get a good writer who has something to say and gives a damn.  Plus, Peter's love of Raleigh and the people of Raleigh is sincere, in case you've wondered in the past.

That might be a surprisingly nice fit and this would be a fine issue even without Peter's contributions. Guess I'll have to break down and go check out some more recent issues of Raleigh Downtowner Magazine since I'm now at least a couple behind!

Raleigh School Board: NAACP Meeting Today & the Incredible Frustration of Being Late to the Game

If you're familiar with the Raleigh School Board and their new resegregationist members, this post will make sense to you.

If you're not, you may still get something out of it but, despite the fact that lots of people are working on this issue, I don't even have a website to send you to for more information.*  There probably is something out there but the newsletter I currently receive doesn't even identify the organization with which it's associated!

Raleigh, what's up?!?

There is an NAACP meeting tonight that looks worth attending.  Here's what I received:

"The NAACP will hold a meeting this Sunday at 5:00 PM at the Martin St. Baptist Church, 1001 E. Martin St., Raleigh. The meeting is titled "WE WILL NEVER GO BACK" and the subject is "What is the nature of the threat of re-segregation raised by 5 out of 9 Wake School Board members? Developing Coordinated Actions.""

I'd send you to the NAACP website but, though the national site does list the local organizations, the only listed website is incredibly out-of-date and neglected.

Now, this is the kind of thing I could be helping folks with, not so much building full-fledged websites, but helping put together simple web tools that can provide the core web communication that this campaign lacks.

Unfortunately I'm not going to be doing that anytime soon because it's 2010 and I need real work that pays a real wage and I'm not going to make that happen without stepping back from things that aren't crucial to my survival.

This deeply frustrates me because if folks had told me what was up before the election, I could have helped a lot in different ways including setting up web outlets for information that wouldn't require ongoing tech skills.  And we could have worked a lot more efficiently before the election.  The game now is much tougher.

It's doubly weird that a man without children who has no plans on having any is my key source of information on the ground.  None of the parents I know mentioned any of this until after the fact and then they just sat around and sadly shook their heads!

For the record I have been talking to folks to see where they're at and gathering information, which is more of a starting point than a course of action.  And I also recently spoke at a School Board meeting on the effects of resegregation on Raleigh's brand.

I may try to start doing some things here or elsewhere as a minor media intervention but this campaign needs much more and, though I see the forces building on the ground, their apparent overreliance on old media is really holding them back.

And the fact that nobody really needs me or any other mildly technical human to set up a strong web presence just heightens that absence.

Note: If you do have a related website up, hit me up for help with Search Engine Optimization and other ways of getting your site seen.  I've had a lot of success, especially with Google, though you can't tell from this blog!  I've never really put in the work here that's necessary for people to easily find me but if you need some evidence, I can send you a list of terms for which many of my other sites have had top listings for a number of years on Google.

*Note 2: I realize there are lots of individual articles and blog posts and so forth out there but which should I send folks to?  We need some basic information resources and a consistent spot for gathering links to all these dispersed bits and pieces that are so easily lost online.

I'm Already Loving Raleigh's Smoke Free Nightlife!

I went out last night to a bar I've been to before where you'd smell cigarette smoke even when you wouldn't see anybody smoking.  Sometimes cigarette smoke helps hide other nasty odors but the smoke free air smelled quite nice.

I'm prompted to write this after getting up and not smelling like cigarettes!  Yay!

Raleighwood, NC Supports Raleigh's Muslim Community

I've been away from this blog for a minute but I hope to return soon on a regular basis.  However, I feel that it's crucial to express my support for Raleigh's Muslim community at a time of great stress.

Whatever the situation with those accused of terrorist plots by the FBI, an organization itself known for terrorizing American citizens with unpopular views, I want to make it clear that I support religious freedom and diverse points of view including those of Muslim citizens and guests in Raleigh.

Freedom of religion is said to be one of the basic principles of American society.  Let's prove that true by living that principle on a daily basis.

Peace,
Clyde Smith
Raleighwood, NC Blogger in Chief

Barrel Monster Artist Busted

• N.C. State student accused of creating a 'monster' :: WRAL.com

Related Raleighwood, NC Coverage:
The Return of uliveandyouburn ["Barrel Monster" post]