6B
Friday, January 13, 1995
NATION/WORLD UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
The University of Kanas
The University of Kansas Opera presents Gilbert and Sullivan's H.M.S. Pinafore
Music and Dance
841-PLAY
1029
Massachusetts
Music Director: Mark Ferrell Stage Director: John Stephens
Department of
7:30 p.m.
Friday & Saturday,
January 13-14 & 20-21,1995
2:30 p.m.
Sunday, January 15, 1995
Swarthout Recital Hall Murphy Hall
General admission tickets are available through the KU box offices (Murphy Hall: 913/864-3982, Lied Center: 913/864-
ARTS, SUA: 913/864-3477) seating is limited; $6 public, $3 students and senior citizens; VISA/MasterCard accepted for phone orders.
PLAY IT AGAIN
SPORTS
Incidents of racism keep residents away from public housing
Integration falters in Texas
VIDOR, Texas — They arrived a year ago in the pre-dawn darkness under the protection of federal marshals: four African-American families picked to integrate an all-white public housing complex in a town ridiculed as one of the nation's most hateful.
The Associated Press
One of the families already has moved out. Two more want to.
The first African-American families, and some of those who followed, are tired of the constant racial taunts they face when they venture beyond the complex's green fence and $500,000 security system.
"I don't want to say anything against stopping them from desegregation," said Donise Jackson. "But if I knew then what I know now, I wouldn't have come."
And they're frustrated by the lack of opportunity in a town that remains nearly all-white. Eighteen African-American families now live in the 74-unit complex, but no one from those families has found work outside of the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, which integrated the project.
Her feelings about Vidor represent a sharp change from just four months ago, when she spoke fondly of her neighbors and was confident she made the right decision.
In September, a man threatened Jackson and her children in a grocery store parking lot.
Some of the African-American families here still feel that way.
Vidor, long labeled a hotbed of Ku Klux Klan activity, is one of 70 public housing authorities in 36 East Texas counties targeted by a 1980 class-action discrimination lawsuit. A federal judge ordered the desegregation effort in 1993.
"It's been nothing but opportunity for me," said Valerie Reed-Stredic, who helped integrate the project on Jan. 13, 1993. She is a HUD trainee in the complex's management office and says that despite the occasional slur, she has made friends and enjoys her new home.
Later that year, Bill Simpson — the only African-American person living in the project — became so fed up with racial harassment that he fled to nearby Beaumont, only to be shot and killed a few hours later in a street robbery.
"He had a knife, and he said he wanted to kill me and my nigger babies." Jackson said.
Soon after, Henry Cisneros, housing secretary, seized control of the Vidor housing authority. He demanded the resignation of its director and vowed that African Americans
But is Vidor worth the effort?
Mattresses at
The complex has undergone a physical facelift since then as well—an new fence, central air conditioning, a community center.
would live in the town of 11,000 people 100 miles east of Houston.
Daniel said HUD should concentrate efforts on other areas where African Americans want to live. Many of those brought to Vidor came from Beaumont, 10 miles away.
"If there was ever a case for cutting federal funds, it is places like that," Daniel said.
HUD officials vehemently disagree. "If we give up on Vidor, we'll have to give up on every place," said Roberta Achtenberg, the department's fair housing chief.
Mike Daniel, the attorney representing 10,000 African-American families in the federal lawsuit to integrate East Texas housing, says Vidor has proven it doesn't deserve any federal housing funds.
Factory Outlet Prices
Some African Americans say the promises HUD made to persuade them to move to Vidor remain unfulfilled.
$ave Big Bucks
Betts Bedroom
842-7378
"Iwas going to get a job. I wasgoing to have brand new furniture — a whole bunch of stuff," said Shelley Ledet, another member of the original four families who is looking to leave.
Ledet is still unemployed. Programs such as GED training at the complex and other vocational benefits have yet to materialize.
Discussion 8
Drop Zone® 4:30, 7:20, 9:35
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Nell PG-13 4:15, 7:00, 9:40
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