Charlotte.com: Mary Schulken

You could be gone in 60 seconds

Fri, 27 Jun 2008 06:58 EDT

I should feel safer.

But I don't.

Now I'm really scared.

Soon, a group of citizens will patrol the business district attached to the neighborhood where I live. They will be on the lookout for lawbreakers lurking in alleys, doorways and dark corners.

They will carry flashlights and notebooks and be the eyes and ears for police in an area of Charlotte where crime has flared like a fresh match.

Some of them will even carry guns.

Wait! Did you say guns? Some of them will carry guns?

Welcome to wild, wild Charlotte. Any day now, the first armed citizen patrol will hit the streets in Plaza Midwood. It's a small group (five or six members) but that's enough to make a difference.

But yikes! What kind of difference will it make?

Who needs statistics?

If you're lucky, you're not part of these numbers.

Violent crime in Charlotte lept 15.3 percent in the first three months of 2008; property crime grew 11.9 percent over the same period in 2007.

Say this with me, please, with conviction: Crime statistics provide no more than a snapshot, showing one point in time. They do not provide a precise picture of community safety.

Not convinced? Me either. Neither are a lot of other Charlotteans. Their eyes and ears tell them the places they live, work and shop are riskier these days.

Ask Scott Yamanashi. In April, a robber shot him during his birthday party at a Plaza Midwood bar. Now he's organized Neighborhood Watch Alliance with some of his friends from the Central Avenue business district.

The group plans to get T-shirts and radios and walk through the district at night. That's pretty bold, considering some of the types skanking around those streets.

Not to worry, though. Some of the patrollers intend to carry handguns.

“We're not trying to take the place of police,”Yamanashi told an Observer reporter. “I just don't feel the urgency by the city or police.”

I can relate. So can a lot of other Charlotteans who have dialed 911 only to watch suspects vanish.

But citizens with guns? On patrol? Where I live?

Now I'm really scared.

Robbers took my car

Don't think I don't know what Yamanashi is talking about.

One night in March, my doorbell rang. A young man selling Kit-Kat bars from a cardboard box did his best to step over our threshold.

He had friends across the street, and more friends hanging around our parked cars.

We called the cops. Meanwhile, my husband kept the group in sight, as police instruct, as they checked car doors and their contents and rang doorbells down our street and the next.

A few nights later, my car went missing.

There are more subtle signs in my neighborhood, too.

I've stopped buying gas at my usual spot on Central. I just don't feel safe standing at the pump confronted by an angry panhandler whose eyes and limbs involuntarily twitch and who won't back off.

But I'm equally unnerved by the prospect of armed citizens patrolling streets.

Cops get a pass

First things first: It takes the heat off police and the heat should stay on. Citizens shouldn't have to strap on weapons and walk the streets to feel as though their neighborhood is secure.

The other reason: It's dangerous. I don't want to live in the wild, wild West any more than I want to live in a place where I am accosted by unpredictable junkies.

Guns change everything. They make it far too easy for citizen patrols to become vigilantes and take the law into their own hands. In that kind of environment, your car may be safe on the street. But you'll be gone in 60 seconds.

Rodney Monroe, Charlotte's new police chief, ought to publicly (and nicely) ask these citizens – and others who may be emboldened by their passion – not to pack heat.

Then he ought to assign more officers to patrols so citizens don't feel it's up to them to take action because the police don't.

This tide of meanness needs to stop

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 09:50 EDT

“I don't see no Americans, I see trespassers, Irish harps doing a job for a nickel a nigger does for a dime and the white man used to get a quarter for.”

William “Bill the Butcher” Cutting, a hardcore nativist who had a bald eagle in his fake eye, ranks among the most vicious film villains of all time.

His character, portrayed stunningly by Daniel Day Lewis in the 2003 movie “Gangs of New York,” led the city's white gangs in battle in the early 19th century against their Irish counterparts.

The Butcher (http://www. youtube.com/watch?v=djU2b_E WuDE& feature=related) was skilled with sharp knives. He hated immigrants – especially the Irish – like cockroaches, and lived to smash them.

He made the “I don't see no Americans” comment to New York City's Boss Tweed as the two watched a shipload disembark on the city's busy waterfront.

Those words are made-up, of course. They were scripted for a character who was a man of his time – an era when the rule of law had not yet taken root in a young nation.

In its place, fear, bigotry and violence had melded in a lethal mixture.

“If only I had the guns, Mr. Tweed, I'd shoot every one of them before they set foot on American soil.”

Today's subtle bigotry

Such blunt menace would seem outrageous today.

Or would it?

Listen closely. The scapegoating aimed at illegal Hispanic immigrants in North Carolina right now may be more subtle, but it's no less fervent than the bigotry of Bill the Butcher. And it's just as dangerous and self-defeating.

“We have a destructive human tsunami headed our way,” said William Gheen of Americans for Legal Immigration, a political action committee based in Raleigh that pushes anti-immigrant legislation. “N.C. lawmakers must act now to protect American jobs, tax resources and lives. Our state must … batten down the hatches immediately.”

In Beaufort County, some 80 miles east of Raleigh, county commissioners asked the health and social services departments to count Spanish surnames to determine illegal immigrant clients. Commissioners want to cut off water service to households of illegal immigrants and scrap state and federally funded programs that cannot be closed to immigrants, such as health clinics and prenatal care for the poor.

“When you're a pregnant lady sitting there, that's a personal problem,” said commissioner Hood Richardson. “That's not a public problem.”

This tide of meanness needs to stop.

Don't let fear lead the way

An estimated 380,000 illegal immigrants live in North Carolina. It's true they broke the law to come here. It's true they put pressure on our publicly funded law enforcement, public schools and health care resources.

But they also perform jobs that are vital to our economy – and our communities. Most of those jobs are hard, dirty, repetitive and dangerous. That's why most of us don't want to do them.

Honestly? This change in our demographics is here, whether we want it or not. We need to take a deep breath and stop letting fear lead the way we respond politically and culturally.

“You can't fight forever,” Boss Tweed told Bill the Butcher.

“I can go down doing it,” the Butcher said.

“And you will,” Tweed replied.

And he did.

Who's at risk if cops shoot at will? We all are

Thu, 29 May 2008 02:08 EDT

We like to think we're pretty smart here in Charlotte, and we are.

We buy money. We sell money. We make money. That's our trade. And it takes brains and strategic thinking to do it well.

But in one respect, we've shown our ignorance in the past week here in the Queen City.

Too many of us don't grasp why it's so important not to have trigger-happy police officers.

Conflicting accounts

Nearly 10 days have passed since Aaron Winchester, 21, was shot twice in the back and died on Sylvania Avenue, a residential street north of uptown. Police and witnesses said he ran from a Charlotte-Mecklenburg police officer after being questioned about a domestic incident that resulted in a traffic accident. But that's where the accounts part ways.Police said Winchester reached for something in his back right pocket as he ran and started to turn toward the officer with a gun in his hand. A silver handgun was found just inches from the body.

Yet five witnesses told Observer reporters they did not see Winchester reach into his pocket. Period.

CMPD is conducting a local and criminal probe into the officer shooting, using its own investigators. That's the department's policy.

The family, meanwhile, has asked for an outside agency to investigate.

That step makes all kinds of sense. But it has divided public opinion into two extremes.

One side accuses the police department of almost everything, from making a tragic mistake to deliberately gunning down a young black man. One woman at a community meeting with police even used the word "assassinate." That's absurd.

The other side blames the victim.

"Resisting arrest, pulling a gun on pursuing officers, forceful response. Open, shut, done. One less criminal we ALL have to worry about."

That's n8 dogg speaking, responding to a question on The Daily Views, the editorial board's blog, asking whether Charlotte ought to automatically request outside investigations into police shootings (http://obsdailyviews.blogspot.com).

Could it be me?

n8 dogg's view is dead wrong, but it touches a nerve. People who have had homes burglarized or cars stolen or who have stared unexpectedly into the business end of a revolver have callused skin. They are ready to skip the little niceties such as innocent until proven guilty.

But the law says we can't skip due process. Nor should we want to. Nor, too, can we ignore obvious questions when a police officer shoots somebody in the back and people saw what happened in different ways.

The circumstances and varying reports about Winchester's death ought to set off the self-preservation alarm in anyone's brain. Not because the officer necessarily did anything wrong, mind you. But because we, the people who are policed, need to know beyond the slightest doubt which account of that shooting is accurate.

Police officers walk a dangerous path every minute they're on duty. N.C. law allows police to use deadly force when an officer believes his life, or the life of another, is in danger. A complicating factor: Police in Charlotte are confronting an increasing number of suspects who are armed. That ups the anxiety -- and the ante.

Sometimes officers have no choice. Winchester's shooting may fall into that category. It may not. But we need to know with confidence.

Why? If this becomes a city where police shoot first and ask questions later, lawbreakers aren't the only ones in danger. We all are.

It doesn't matter what street you live on, what color skin you have or how much money you make. All you have to do is be in the wrong spot at the wrong time or make the wrong move.

That's why it's so important to make sure you don't have trigger-happy police and make sure everybody knows you won't tolerate it.

You'd think a place with so many smart people would have figured that out.

Mary C.

Schulken

It's roads, stupid, but it ought to be broadband

Thu, 22 May 2008 02:05 EDT

My mother's dining room table is an office with a view. The black-dirt big field on her farm has a sandy crust that sprouts tiny green pigtails this time of year. Watch for a while and you'll see a herd of deer nibbling at the edges, or maybe a roving band of wild turkeys waddling up and down the rows.

Every time I visit, I entertain a fleeting fantasy: Ditch the city and the office and start a different life in this rural place. Trade the structure and stress of working for someone else for the flexibility of doing your own thing in a place with space, natural scenery and less expensive living.

Then I dial up.

That particular part of Columbus County, in N.C.'s southern coastal plain, is outside the reach of broadband or DSL or cable modem access. To check a fact, send an e-mail or, for that matter, to read a daily newspaper, you wait. And wait. And wait.

Brrrrt-bonnnnnk-breeeeeek! Then: thousand one, thousand two, thousand three ... and so on.

Reality sets in. Even the best business plan can't overcome digital exile.

The gold standard

That's a round-about way of explaining why universal high-speed Internet access is important in North Carolina, but it's on point. Debate this election year has focused heavily on roads, and the need to reform the state's antiquated, politics-infested system of planning, building and paying for transportation. There's good reason. Growth in commerce and population has sprawled beyond the state's ability to build and maintain infrastructure for an effective highway system.But when we talk about infrastructure, we ought to talk about high-speed Internet access, too. It's the gold standard for education, medicine and economic development, the equivalent of an eight-lane interstate in a global, information-based economy.

Communities that are without it -- plenty still are -- are simply left without a crucial connection.

The state legislature created the e-NC Authority in 1999 to work with counties to bring broadband technology to their communities. Its latest report on connectivity in 2007 found access increasing at a slower rate.

The toughest problem: rural counties where there are too few people per square mile to entice cable or telecommunications companies to invest in lines and capacity.

"Major deployment in urban communities is more or less done," said Jane Smith Patterson, executive director. "What we are trying to push for now is broadband expansion into the most underserved areas of our state, which are often rural."

Consider:

• In four counties -- Jones, Greene, Warren and Gates -- less than 50 percent of the households can obtain access to high speed Internet services.

• In 21 counties, less than 70 percent of the households have access to high-speed Internet. Those counties include Columbus, Duplin, Pamlico and Washington, all in the East, and Cherokee, Macon and Graham, all in the far West. In between, counties such as Chatham and Montgomery have low rates of high-speed connectivity.

Those areas, and others like them, represent the last mile. They are at a significant disadvantage. Being without high-speed Internet in the 21st century is no different than being bypassed by electricity in the last century.

In the dark

Just look at some of the things high-speed allows you to do.

• Take most online college courses offered by the state's university system.

• Go to a clinic or small hospital nearby and be examined by a specialist in a regional medical center.

• Grow a global start-up business such as graphics, consulting or engineering in a rural community.

• Sell your cottage industry's products globally.

• Persuade investors in a center of commerce such Charlotte or Raleigh to open franchises in your town.

The bottom line? Access to high-speed Internet is as basic today as being connected by a good road -- and offers the same public benefit. Yet the private sector will not pay to put it within reach of every household and every community in North Carolina. The state needs to step up and invest in connecting the last mile.

It's the roads, stupid, but it ought to be broadband, too.

Mary C.

Schulken

Nobody's winning this ping-pong policy game

Thu, 15 May 2008 02:07 EDT

It's a ping-ping match gone mad.

At one end, paddle in hand, is Scott Ralls, new president of the N.C. community college system. He's working up a powerful sweat swiftly swatting the ball.

His opponent? Himself. And neither side seems to be winning.

Not so fast

North Carolina's community colleges have banned illegal immigrants from seeking degrees. That reverses a controversial policy ordered last fall allowing undocumented students to enter so long as they pay expensive out-of-state tuition.Mr. Ralls took that action in his first few days as the top leader of the state's 58 community colleges. He based it on advice from the state attorney general's office, which said last week federal law appears to prevent states from enrolling illegal immigrants in state colleges and universities.

The trouble is, this may not even be an accurate reading of the law.

It's so iffy, in fact, that North Carolina's other higher education guru -- university system President Erskine Bowles -- wisely told chancellors to stay the course until the relevant law could be clarified.

Which raises the question: Why would the leader of the community college system be so quick to fire a serve with spin over the net?

Not black and white

Let's face it. Saying illegal immigrants ought to have rights is like shouting "Go Duke!" at the base of the Old Well in Chapel Hill. This is not a thing that brings out reasoned responses.

Ditto for saying they ought to be able to attend college -- even if they pay exorbitant rates.

But the issue isn't as black-and-white as it sounds.

For one thing, we're not just talking about adults who broke the law to come here. Most undocumented college students were brought here years ago as children by their parents. They graduated from high school here and have become part of our culture and our communities.

For another, it's in the long-term interest of the state to offer people who live and work here as much education as possible. We are all better off with workers who have skills and knowledge than we are with untrained, uneducated workers.

Those are both reasons why acting hastily to bar illegal immigrants from enrollment is a lousy policy.

Here's another: The federal government says it has no authority over admissions at North Carolina colleges. Both Ralls and the attorney general's office are seeking further clarification. Even Ralls admits the policy could change again.

So why play ping-pong?

This policy reflects an attitude a lot of North Carolinians share: People who come here illegally have no business taking advantage of public resources built for the benefit of citizens and paid for with tax dollars.

It's also strategic: A few politicians in the state legislature may be a little more amenable to community college budget requests if schools crack down on illegals.

Meanwhile, the ball flies furiously back and forth across the net.

Mary C.

Schulken

Guns and xenophobia? Nope. Try resilience

Thu, 17 Apr 2008 01:52 EDT

Somewhere in North Carolina, somebody in some itty-bitty mapdot is watching a car bumper rust, thinking about buying that new gun and just praying that the family of Latinos here to plant tobacco won't move in up the road.

Even the melting sweetness of a banana cream Moon Pie -- one of the major food groups in small-town North Carolina, along with barbecue, Nehi Cola and four-corner Nabs -- can't douse the acrid taste of bitterness that wells up at the thought of dreams that have gone belly-up.

I'm talking with tongue firmly planted in cheek, of course. I grew up in an itty-bitty Tar Heel mapdot and lived in rural northeastern North Carolina for much of my life. My closest friends and my dearest relatives still call small-town North Carolina home. I love barbecue, and yes, moon pies, although my waistline no longer allows me enough slack to chomp freely on either.

Perhaps rural Pennsylvania is a whole lot different than rural parts of the Tar Heel state. But I have to say, I don't think Barack Obama quite got this one right.

Frightened? Shoot and pray

I'm sure by now he wishes he had said anything but what he did."It's not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."

That's how Obama sized up the anger he heard from small-town Pennsylvanians and parsed it to supporters in San Francisco, a continent (or perhaps a universe) away from the lives he was describing.

His larger point is dead-on. Small towns and people who live in them have taken a beating. Economic and cultural changes have taken jobs, gutted communities and drawn the best and the brightest to metropolitan areas where there are opportunities and amenities.

Don't buy it? Take a drive through, say, Robeson County in Eastern North Carolina, where the latest Census estimate found 32 percent of the people live below the federal poverty level.

The culprit? Thousands of textile and tobacco jobs vamoosed in the past decade. So far, not much has come along to take their place.

Are people who have been disadvantaged by those turns frustrated and bitter? I haven't asked them, but I'm guessing many are.

Have they turned to shooting and praying and xenophobia to explain their feelings?

Maybe some have. But many, many more have committed hopeful acts: They enroll in community colleges, start small businesses and pick up odd jobs to pay bills. And in their spare time, they've also done useful, optimistic things: They mentor kids in public schools, deliver meals on wheels or run for town council to try and get things done.

The fact is, resilience is a way of life in small-town North Carolina. Resourcefulness is a way of life. Bitterness is not.

Someone who wants to be president needs to demonstrate he knows that better than Obama has.

A learning curve

What Obama implied about anger turning to misplaced faith and fear has some truth. But that goes on everywhere, not just in small towns. The problem is, he painted a caricature. He made stick figures out of issues that are complex and highly personal. We've come to expect more than that from a candidate who has shown a remarkable ability to explain this nation to itself in a way that people can trust.

With stunning nuance and frankness, Obama last month told the story of where we are on the issue of race in America. In that speech he showed us what he knew, and he knows plenty.

Now he's shown us what he needs to learn.

Does that mean he's elitist, unfit to nominate as a candidate for the nation's highest office? No.

Does it mean his view may be more limited than we thought? That he has more explaining to do, particularly here in North Carolina, urban by a hair but holding with clenched fists to our small-town roots?

Absolutely.

Mary C.

Schulken

The debate? Football. The issue? Identity

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:54 EDT

For the moment, the 49er football crowd has quieted at UNC Charlotte. The next play will be a big one: Chancellor Phil Dubois is expected by June to weigh in to trustees on findings of a study that back it.

If Dubois is smart, he'll thank the high-powered players who concluded it would be no sweat to raise the millions and millions needed, then say: "Show me the money."

No leatherheads on campus

In the meantime, while there's a lull in the action, let's dig deeper into what this drive downfield is really about.College hoops is hot at UNCC, but football fans are out of luck. No leatherheads can be found at the 60-year-old university -- North Carolina's fourth largest campus. But the cheering for that costly, high-profile sport has reached a deafening roar.

A feasibility study has recommended that UNCC start a football program by 2012, and recommended it shoot for a Football Bowl Subdivision (formerly Division 1-A) team.

It's not as easy as it sounds.

A winning football team brings a host of benefits for a campus: team spirit, happy alumni, free publicity. But it costs mucho bucks.

The feasibility study found football at UNCC would cost $5.9 million each year to operate. Adding it would also require, until Title IX, $3 million more for women's sports.

Then there's the matter of a proper stadium. A 30,000-seat one would cost $60 million to $70 million.

The majority of that money would have to come from two sources: private donations or a much, much higher mandatory student athletic fee.

The debate comes down to this: Do you wrest millions of dollars each year from students and boosters to finance football? Or do you focus the university's growing but finite resources on its quickly expanding enrollment and academic mission?

This is a tantalizing moment in the life of a young university, one whose identity is still unfolding. It can be a defining moment. But is football what students, fans and ardent supporters really searching for?

Or, is it the surest path to recognition, both by a metropolitan area that seems disconnected to its namesake public university and a state university system dominated by flagships and more established campuses?

A deeper yearning

Jeffrey Leak, an associate professor in English, was the sole faculty member on the Football Feasibility Committee. Hethinks the yearning is for an identity, and football is the vehicle.

"I am not a football fan but I have been surprised at the level of interest articulated by folks who want football," he said in an e-mail. "While somewhat naive in their expectations, I think the deeper desire is to have their school, their alma mater, readily identifiable with the community. For them, football is a way to do that."

UNCC is a lovely surprise tucked away off N.C. 49. The rolling terrain, wooded paths and explosion of new, crisply appointed architecture unfold into a campus that is in the process of becoming, not one that has marked its place. It has the size. It has the academic foundation. Its future is locked with the fate of the state's most urban region.

But on campus, the college atmosphere is still evolving. Off campus, UNC Chapel Hill and N.C. State are the big names in town. And outside Charlotte, nobody quite knows what is UNCC's specialty.

The debate is about football. But the issue is identity.

Mary C.

Schulken

Honoring the Spanglers

Sun, 09 Mar 2008 07:23 EDT

Erskine Bowles is not shy about pointing it out when things are accomplished during his tenure as president of the University of North Carolina system. To date, he can claim accountability, more state money and a cap on tuition.

But getting C.D. Spangler's name on a building -- now that's something.

"Every time we sent him a mock-up of how the sign out front was going to look, he sent it back with the Spangler name smaller and smaller," Bowles told the educators and state leaders gathered Friday to honor former UNC system president Spangler and his wife, Meredith Griggs Spangler, of Charlotte. The general administration building and annex now bear their names.

"The last time, he sent the design back with the Spangler name at the bottom," Bowles said. "I thought, OK, you win."

Here's what he's talking about: The Spanglers are among the state's wealthiest families. They are also among the most generous, both with their dollars and their stewardship. But you'd never know it because the Spanglers are uncharacteristically averse to claiming credit.

Spangler, a businessman whose successful construction company and other investments have made him a billionaire, has quietly endowed or helped build a ton of things across North Carolina. Many of his family's beneficiaries are high-profile, but often they're not.

One recent example: Last year the Spanglers donated $26.9 million to create as many as 96 endowed professorships across the state's 16 universities.

What's unusual about that gift?

For one thing, it significantly helps the state's nine smaller campuses, which have far smaller bases of private support.

For another, the gift came with an unusual stipulation: None of the professorships would be named for Spangler or any member of his family.

That's not because Dick Spangler is shy. He has served in high-profile, hot-seat public positions, from vice-chair of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board to being the first non-academic appointed to lead the state's university system.

He also speaks out. Last month he incurred the wrath of many in the 49er nation by publicly cautioning UNC Charlotte about the cost of starting a football program.

The way Spangler and his family have lived their lives and shared their wealth shows a deep appreciation for the egalitarian ideals that define North Carolina. It demonstrates a belief that ready access to quality education at all levels is the path to a better life for the state's citizens and a strong, competitive economy.

His friends and former UNC colleagues joked last week about how Clemmie Dixon Spangler Jr., a Charlotte boy educated at Chapel Hill and Harvard, is so uncomfortable with recognition, especially the kind that carves his family's name in granite.

But there's a lot to be said for humility.

In that sense, the building that bears Spangler's name, and his wife's name, is perfect. If the sign didn't point it out, you might not even know it was there: a plain, white 1970s-vintage facade nestled in the pines on the approach to the nation's oldest public university.

Mary C.

Schulken