The Arthur S. Flemming Center
By Alex Robinson
Winter 2004
Volume 40, Number 1
After over six years of planning, the Arthur S. Flemming Center has officially become part of the activist community. The Flemming Center is one of those rare places where dreams are realized and movements are born. A longstanding project of Emmaus Services, the Center houses non-profit, activist oriented organ-izations. The Flemming Center's long list of organizations reflects the diversity and vitality of the activist community.
Founded twenty-five years ago, Emmaus Services works with the elderly in the Shaw, Logan, and Thomas Circle neighborhoods. Its network of over 300 volunteers provides support to the aging through home visits, grocery deliveries, medical assistance, and finance managing among other services. Emmaus Services also serves as a primary advocate of the elderly in the community. This advocacy role has become increas-ingly important as gentrification displaces more and more DC residents. Though real estate speculators have raised property values over the last several years, values more dramatically in-creased upon arrival of the new convention center. Emmaus Services is straining to prevent further displacement by organizing seniors and working with landlords to preserve available housing.
Co-founded by Mark Anderson of Emmaus Services, Positive Force has worked in the DC area for nineteen years to achieve radical social and political change. Positive Force's unofficial motto of "isolation is the biggest barrier to change" [Chumba-wamba] explains the importance of finding strength in one another within the activist community. Anderson says, "Revolution begins when we bring ourselves to a room of kindred souls and share what's in our hearts and help each other achieve our ideas." Positive Force employs this ideal in its attempts to a build radical, progressive movement; Anderson adds, "Somehow we need to band together to build a movement for fundamental change…To create a city, country, and a world that puts human needs first." Positive Force works to link communities and cultures together through its ongoing projects such as monthly grocery deliveries in the Shaw neighborhood, which allows members to see "a whole other world."
Positive Force also helped launch the Brian Mackenzie Infoshop located in the Flemming Center's bottom floor. The Infoshop carries resources such as radical books and independent music that is otherwise difficult to find in mainstream stores. The Infoshop also operates as a non-profit, working towards a socially con-scious economy. One can parti-cipate in the Infoshop by working as a volunteer of its collectively run staff.
Books to Prisoners, a project of the Quixote Center, aims to educate those behind bars by sending free books at a prisoner's request. Books to Prisoners is currently planning a six month reading program for the Prince George's County Detention Center. Volunteers are needed to work with prisoners on reading programs, answer requests, and package books.
The DC-Independent Media Center (DC-IMC) serves as a DC chapter of the global Indymedia network. Indymedia's purpose is to establish a "media democracy" through empowering the public to create its own media. The IMC diverges from the corporate media, revealing information and points of views that the mainstream refuses to portray. Anyone can get involved in DC-Indymedia by becoming a member and attending 7:30 meetings on Monday nights at the Flemming Center. People are encouraged to publish their photos, articles, and audio/video clips through the DC-Indymedia website (www.dc.indymedia.org).
Founded in 1978, the Inter-Faith Conference (IFC) works to facilitate interfaith dialogue and promote understanding of people from all religions, cultures, and economic levels. The IFC was the first organization to unite the Islamic, Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Jewish communities in interfaith dialogue. The IFC now includes the Baha'I, Hindu/Jain, Islamic, Jewish, Latter-Day Saints (Mormon), Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Sikh com-munities. The IFC also aims to achieve social justice by address-ing issues such as poverty, health, violence, drug use, and discrim-ination. This fall, the IFC will be having a pilgrimage in Anacostia in partnership with the National Day of Prayer for the Environment, connecting the environmentalist and religious communities and also the people and organizations of Anacostia. The IFC's Annual Interfaith Concert will take place in November, one of the many volunteer opportunities of the IFC.
Celebrating its forty-year anniversary, the Washington Peace Center has continually worked to promote both local and global justice. The Peace Center functions as a central place for activists to coordinate on different issues, such as the recent FCC deregulation and anti-war teach-in. Historically, the Peace Center has confronted a range of issues, including the Vietnam War, the Central America and Middle East solidarity movements of the 1980s, and the more current War on Iraq. The Washington Peace Center also runs an activist alert with a listing of events in the community (visit its webpage at www.washingtonpeacecenter.org).
Established in response to the War on Iraq, United For Peace and Justice (UFPJ) is an umbrella coalition of over 500 anti-war organizations. UFPJ mobilized local and national organizations to coordinate national protests from San Francisco to New York City. Recently, UFPJ held a conference in Chicago to establish the future direction and priority campaigns for the organization. UFPJ also elected new leadership in the form of a thirty-five member steering committee. Delegates at the conference voted on a number of priorities that UFPJ will tackle in the future; among these prior-ities are the Bush Administration's foreign policy, immigrants and civil liberties, global economic justice, and a peaceful resolution of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories.
Also a proponent of social and political justice, the Gray Panthers employs the motto of "Age and Youth in Action," seeking to improve the world for people of all ages. Founded by Maggie Kuhn in 1970, Gray Panthers has worked to promote health issues, labor rights, political integrity, and peace across the country. Currently, Gray Panthers is addressing prescription drug policy, national health service, labor movements, and the annual commemoration of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August. Gerry Brittain or the Gray Panthers stresses that new, creative members are needed in order to keep the organization thriving. She encourages anyone to contact the Gray Panthers with any suggestions on how to attract members of all ages.
Hopefully you can offer your time and skills to one of the many organizations at the Flemming Center! Your participation is necessary for the activist com-munity to achieve its goals and work towards a better world.
CONTACTS:
Emmaus Services
http://www.emmausservices.org
(202) 745-1200
Positive Force
http://www.positiveforcedc.org
(703) 276-9768
The Brian MacKenzie Infoshop
http://www.dcinfoshop.org
Books to Prisoners
bookstoprisoners@quixote.org
(301) 254-6279
DC Independent Media Center
http://www.dc.indymedia.org
(202) 452-5936
The InterFaith Conference
http://www.ifcmw.org
(202) 234-6300
The Washington Peace Center
http://www.washingtonpeacecenter.org
(202) 234-2000
United for Peace and Justice
http://www.unitedforpeace.org
(202) 234-2000
Gray Panthers
http://www.graypanthers.org
Rose Marie Flynn
(301) 299-0282
Catholic Worker Bookshop
a href="http://www.catholicworker.com/bookstore" target="_blank">www.catholicworker.com/bookstore
bookstore@catholicworker.com
(202) 722-9873
