Valerie Ervin Issues "Call to Action" on Economic Justice

Montgomery County Council Member Valerie Ervin, who represents Silver Spring, Takoma Park, Wheaton and Kensington, wrote the following op-ed in the Gazette today. We reproduce it here for our readers.

The Gazette
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Economic justice: A call to action
by Valerie Ervin

This month marks the 40th anniversary of the death of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. He was assassinated while in Memphis supporting sanitation workers who were on strike to improve working conditions and low wages. For Dr. King economic inequality was an important tenet of the civil rights movement. This new focus was the convergence of racial and economic concerns and had the potential to change the course of the movement.

Forty years later many things have changed in Montgomery County, but much remains the same. In 1975, the county’s minority population was 8 percent. In 2005, census data shows the minority population had grown to 41 percent countywide and was 79 percent in some areas. However, a comprehensive discourse about race and poverty is absent.

In Montgomery County, one of the most affluent counties in Maryland, policy makers often ignore the plight of those who are struggling to make ends meet. I believe that a new conversation about poverty and race must take place.

County government officials explain that growth in the county was less than 1 percent last year. However, what does this mean for an average working family? Without a growing tax base, our roads will continue to experience gridlock and our schools will remain overcrowded. More than 5,000 public school employees must travel from as far away as West Virginia each day to teach our children.

Police officers and firefighters go to great lengths to serve our communities, yet many call other jurisdictions home. Commute times are getting longer because, for so many, the cost of living in Montgomery County is a dream that is out of reach. Montgomery County has the second highest foreclosure rate in Maryland, and we have yet to see the worst of this trend.

Each year our public school system must teach more children who arrive at our doors unable to speak English. Poverty is also an issue for our county’s children with nearly 25 percent of school children eligible for free and reduced meals.

So where do we go from here? I have traveled throughout the county and visited the homes of people who dream of simple achievements that many of us take for granted. Their voices are silent in our most critical public policy debates. What I have found is that there is a disconnect between what preoccupies policy makers and what truly troubles the majority of working people who are struggling to care for children, pay for housing and cover the ever increasing costs of utilities, fuel and groceries. The current economic downturn impacts working families disproportionately, but they are too busy trying to make a living to spend time lobbying lawmakers.

As a call to action, I propose a summit for state and local policymakers to begin a new debate — a conversation about how to achieve economic justice for all of our residents. We must focus on opportunities for the future, not artificial limitations imposed by the past.

Valerie Ervin, a Democrat from Silver Spring, represents District 5 on the Montgomery County Council.

A note from Adam Pagnucco.

Council Member Ervin is touching on a theme that was explored in the recent County Council District 4 special election. In the candidate debates in that short campaign, Nancy Navarro repeatedly mentioned the plight of the people "not in the room." In contrast, my blog-brother Kevin Gillogly offered this characterization of the election in a blog post comment: "That is this race in a nutshell: Growth and Land Use Policy. Everything else is smoke screen." The debate on growth policy, poverty, jobs and pay is heating up as this county teeters on the edge of a recession and Valerie Ervin is calling that question.

If another elected leader has a different view, we will carry it for our readers in the interest of encouraging open debate.