Wednesday, October 05, 2005

One out of 25 =25%?

Demonstration at Catholic Charities construction site

- A protest at a South Side construction turns ugly when demonstrators try to physically stop the work.

"Get your hands off me or arrest me," said Father Michael Pfleger of Saint Sabina Church, who led the protest at a Catholic Charities site, 1210 W. 78th Place. Father Pfleger says the project isn't using enough minority workers.

Catholic Charities says 25-percent of those involved are minority owned businesses. Pfleger says that's not enough.

"They have been promising to hire and so far he's hired one African-American and that is not acceptable in the African-American community. We have a whole database of union people, electric, masonry, the whole thing. He won't hire," said Father Michael Pfleger, Saint Sabina Church.

Police called to the scene asked the protestors to leave because they were on private property. Catholic Charities say they are following hiring practices used by the Archdiocese of Chicago and the City of Chicago.



1. We didn't "try" to stop construction, we did stop it.
2. Not only were they not hiring African American's for the project, they had the nerve to have a sign directing applicants to OUR employment resource center, even though they only hired one person we sent to them.
3. Our employment resource director has spoken to them repeatedly about this since July to no avail.
4. They agreed to our terms of employment when they accepted the contract.
5. Some cocky little policeman tried to put some kind of a pain grip on Fr. Mike.
6. C.,this one is for you. Scout broke through the police line and climbed down in a hole under a back hoe.

2 comments:

existentialist said...

This is awesome Ange! Thanks for posting! :)

voixd'ange said...

It was a little touch and go there for a while Oly. This was one of the more difficult protest that we have done, I felt. Sometimes we go in knowing we have the support of the police, and then other times we aren't sure who's side they are on. This was one of those times, and in those situations arrest is a very real possibility. And even though we may joke about it, we never really WANT to get arrested.