New Majority Coalition contemplates next steps
Yawu Miller
In developing a political agenda last year, members of the New Majority
Coalition engaged members of the Asian, black and Latino communities
in discussions aimed at identifying the concerns of the people of
color who make up the majority of the city’s population and
a minority of its elected officials.
In May, coalition members met at the Women’s Service Club’s
Massachusetts Ave. building to agree on an agenda that included
changing the city’s affordable housing guidelines, supporting
more funding for jobs for youths, the establishment of a civilian
review board, CORI law reform and more staff for parent outreach
coordinators in the Boston Public Schools.
Those priorities became fodder for city council hearings and the
city council race as coalition members and their organizations worked
together to help shape public policy. A candidates forum held in
October helped put many of the group’s objectives on the table.
“People were talking about it for weeks because we put out
some hard questions that let people really distinguish between candidates,”
said Lydia Lowe, the coalition’s chairwoman.
Take the issue of the city’s use of the area median income
in devising affordable housing income guidelines. While city officials
factor in the incomes of wealthy suburban communities in the calculation
for the area median income, the coalition supports Councilor Felix
Arroyo’s call for defining as affordable the median income
of Boston residents only.
If the candidates were unaware of the issue before the coalition’s
forum, by the end they were all in agreement with the plan. Similarly,
all the candidates expressed support for reforming the state’s
CORI laws, which often prevent applicants with arrest records from
securing jobs.
Perhaps more importantly, all incumbent councilors — even
those with uncontested races — supported Councilor Chuck Turner’s
resolution calling on the city to refuse to do business with firms
that discriminate against job applicants with CORI records.
Perhaps more than in any other race, voters of color were sought-after
by the eight at-large candidates in the city council race and the
coalition’s articulation of the policy preferences of communities
of color demonstrated the organization’s ability to speak
for the city’s new majority, according to former state Rep.
Mel King.
“After that forum, I saw some of the candidates beginning
to change their positions,” he said. “That’s the
power of being able to clearly articulate what we want.”
With a campaign season and a year’s worth of mission-building
behind them, coalition members are ready for their next phase, according
to Lowe: organization building.
The group will now begin seeking funding, formalize its structure,
outreach to new members and develop promotional materials.
“We have to find out niche,” Lowe said during a meeting
of the group last week a Freedom House. “How are we different
from the organizations we’ve been building coalitions with?”
Lowe suggested that the coalition could organize itself as a 501c3
nonprofit and set up separate organization with a 501c4 designation
that would allow it to engage in partisan political activities.
The New Majority Coalition grew out of a 2003 conference held by
the Asian American Studies, the Trotter Institute and the Gaston
Institute — three think tanks run out of UMass Boston. The
conference was meant to examine the growing clout of the city’s
people of color who in the 2000 Census for the first time were shown
to be the majority of the city’s population.
In addition to the founding institutes at UMass Boston, the coalition
has worked with organizations including the Dudley Street Neighborhood
Initiative, ACORN, MassVOTE, the American Muslim Society, the Boston
Tenant Coalition, the Latino political organization ¿Oiste?,
Alternatives for Communities and Environment and the Commonwealth
Legislative Seminar.
|
|