HAMILTON: MLK Day and ‘community’ in Niagara’s the new Old South

Ken Hamilton

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Ken Hamilton

January 5, 2012

By Ken Hamilton Niagara Gazette The Niagara Gazette Fri Jan 06, 2012, 02:35 PM EST

NIAGARA FALLS — Because of the southern movement of some of our brightest students, has it caused the Old South to actually shift north?

Or is this something far worse — a re-entrenchment of the colonialism against which Martin Luther King and others fought?

I ask that question in light of again seeing others, such as the so-called Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Celebration Committee, make the choices for us of who our MLK heroes will be; and I question our absent and quiet acceptance of their selections.

How far Niagara Falls’ African-American community really come when the very institutions against which King himself once fought are now naming those who those institutions think best represents his legacy?

How far have we come when the destiny of King’s people remain relatively very much where they have long been stuck?

I do recognize the great work that has been done in the core professions of many of the organizations that have taken upon themselves to honor King for us — even though too often it appears they do so to merely honor themselves.

HANCI provides a valuable service to all in the community, the Falls Police Department provides a blanket of safety under which we all survive, DiCamillo’s Bakery has long supported my beloved Niagara Falls Public Library system, of which I once served as board president, and Leadership Niagara, an organization that has had me to speak before their leadership classes on many occasions, has the potential to create many game-changing citizens.

Rod Watson is a well-respected and admired colleague of mine, and I currently work with him on the Buffalo Association of Black Journalists. He is the keynote speaker for the so-called “community celebration” at the high school’s performing arts center, and is someone who has critically written about the very issue of the community’s omission in decision-making, such as this one. It would be interesting to hear what he has to say.

Even the Niagara Falls school system, and its closely-associated Niagara Falls Housing Authority, believes that their own goals in these selections are noble. But the fact remains that not one of the organizations that are sponsoring the event at the high school are truly African-American organizations, even though one organization is currently headed by one, and some have a spackling of African-American members.

What troubles me is that those who do not live within King’s beloved community still continuously determine who it is that those who do walk most faithfully in the footsteps of King should admire; this, in the absence of polling the impacted communities for whom King once fought and died.

My understanding of the Italian Festival is that the entire Italian community — and their churches — has a say in which citizens among them are their Special Citizens; and I believe that their successful practices are a model for us all to follow.

But when it comes to those who look and live most like King, it seems that the arrogance of others is inflicted upon us. Are they, who are unlike us, better poised to do our thinking for us? I don’t think so. We African-Americans, like most Americans, are people who cherish self-determination. No doubt that we need the help of other Americans at times; but, like you, we appreciate responses more so than impositions.

One board of education member asked me why there was very little community attendance at their events. I told him that it was because there was very little community input into their selections. While there is some appreciation from the community for their efforts, it is because sometimes, in their selections, they get it right; but many times they do not.

Perhaps next year the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Community Celebration Committee could be more sensitive to the impacted community and follow the credo of the National Federation for Just Communities of Western New York (NFJC), one of the sponsors, and actually send out questionnaires to the churches and other social organizations within the community to get community members’ input into who the community thinks best represents the values of both Martin Luther King and themselves.

That would truly be community justice in Niagara’s new Old South.

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HAMILTON: MLK Day and ‘community’ in Niagara’s the new Old South

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