Rather than yelling, protesters on Holman Avenue and Cullen Boulevard played jazz music to challenge the University’s indirect investments in private prisons.
Social work graduate students Julia Kramp and Nakia Winfield and community organizer Michael Allen led the protest Thursday afternoon beside TDECU Stadium. The Free Radicals jazz band played as the protesters handed out flyers to passersby.
“They’ve commodified human beings,” Allen said. “In other words, these private prisons have guaranteed occupancy rates, or else they can sue the state. The judges all of a sudden have pressure to fill these prisons, so people are going there for nonviolent drug convictions. They’re being pumped into the system that’s using them as a commodity, basically.”
Kramp and Winfield started a Change.org petition a month ago hoping to persuade the Board of Regents to divest stock in banking firms that have stock in Corrections Corporation of America and GEO Group.
“We would like them to institute a policy that says they won’t invest in for-profit prisons again or in institutions that own majority shares in private prisons,” Kramp said. “There’s a wide array of other investments that they have, so we would like to see that money that’s going to (Ameriprise and J.P. Moran Chase) rerouted.”
According to the protesters’ pamphlets, those two companies “are two of the largest for-profit prison corporations in America” and the industry “has an incentive to lock up as many people as possible to maximize profits.”
“I’m about to graduate from the University of Houston, and we have Tier One status, and honestly I’m really proud of our institution,” Winfield said. “But this (investment) doesn’t match up with the rest of that. I feel like they could be so much better than this.”
The partners’ next step would have been speaking at the May 19 Board of Regents meeting, but for the first time in nearly a decade, the meeting changed locations to UH-Victoria.
“Now we can’t go in there and talk to them about this unless we want to do a three-hour drive, which really sucks,” Winfield said. “I feel like this could have been a really good opportunity to really be genuine about the democracy and about the students’ ownership of campus and listen to what students were saying.”
Allen connected with Kramp and Winfield via Facebook, where he frequently posts on the page for End Mass Incarceration Houston. Allen works with a group called Enlace International, which campaigns for university and corporate divestment from private prisons. Kramp and Winfield reached out to Allen after reading about the group’s findings that UH was also involved.
“The Board of Regents knows it,” Allen said. “They’re a bunch of rich, old white guys who don’t really care about poor people, about black people or about brown people. I don’t know any way to sugarcoat it. I think it is the epitome of hypocrisy.”
One protester, Free Radicals trombone player Henry Darragh, graduated from UH in December with a doctorate in musical arts after serving two years in prison on a nonviolent drug offense.
“I’m an ex-convict and know a thing or two about the prison industrial complex and was surprised to hear that UH is indirectly supporting incarceration, though I don’t think if Renu Khator or the Board of Regents knew they would (continue investing),” Darragh said.
A doctorate in Trombone and an ex-con, and full of debt? People protesting when they should be studying for EOSEs. Community Organizer Michael Allen thinks that the BoR is full of old white guys … when most are of color.
An underwhelming protest with a non-response response from the public. A Fails and Burleson Failed story.
Again … I hope that Renu and the BoR tell them to GO POUND SAND.
Meanwhile we have 40% (94 million) Americans NOT WORKING … but only 5% unemployment is reported. US employers struggling to keep afloat and keep people employed.
UH Socialist have no idea of the bad side of Socialism, but merrily march toward the cliff.
’nuff said … back to study.
http://mediamatters.org/video/2015/11/10/fox-business-maria-bartiromo-pushes-myth-that-a/206773
Ah … what part of the U6 Unemployment Numbers do you not understand.
Dang dude … do Mom and Dad still have to wipe you after you go Do Do.
Mohammed… you know little about me and even less about prison. You’re comments, while sounding intelligent, are wrough with ignorance. I hope your studying went well. Go Coogs.
The U6 unemployment rate counts not only people without work seeking
full-time employment (the more familiar U-3 rate), but also counts
“marginally attached workers and those working part-time for economic
reasons.”
Note that some of these part-time workers counted as employed by U-3
could be working as little as an hour a week.
And the “marginally attached workers” include those who have gotten
discouraged and stopped looking, but still want to work.
The age considered for this calculation is 16 years and over
U6 unemployment rate
Jan 2015 – 11.3 Feb 2015 – 11.0 Mar 2015 – 10.9 Apr 2015 – 10.8
Jan 2016 – 9.9 Feb 2016 – 9.7 Mar 2016 – 9.8 Apr 2016 – 9.7
These are the numbers where are you getting 40% Unemployed I would like to see that data. And yes I know you have missed me.
My Love Handle Mama!!!! YOU’RE ALIVE!!!
We have to agree that Bush has had the lowest numbers between Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. In addition, Obama has had the HIGHEST number U6 numbers EVER!!!
Obama’s U3 numbers are fudged … his people continue to reduce the UNIVERSE of available jobs to get 5.0% unemployment.
Detroit is a ghost town at rush-hour. Most of the jobs created each month are part-time. Does that sound like economic growth to you?
Obama said he was going to fundamentally change the country, and he has. We have less freedoms. The work week has shrunk to 30 hrs because of the failed ObamaCare, just ask JC Penney. Costs for running a household are going up, especially with coal being decimated by Obama. Now what is going to run those electric vehicles? Solar? We’d have rolling black-outs by then.
We live in uncertain times. While the simpleminded think that times could not be better … they again, have not seen the bad side of Socialism.
The simpleminded are promised Santa Claus, but are shielded from the backside Nightmare.
Sorry, the U6 numbers just don’t match with what you are saying, Bush’s average over his term was in the 10 percent with a big spike at the end of his presidency because of the wallstreet/big bank BS and they continued to rise until mid 2010 during the Obama presidency. since then they have been on a slow but steady decline, till they are now back to Bush’s average.
Detroit’s emergency manager has stepped down and the city council and mayor have taken control back and it is on the rise, slowly. But a lot of what killed Detroit was NAFTA, a trade agreement pushed by Republicans and supported by Clinton.
Yes Obama kept renewing and even approved the Republican lead legislation to expand the Patriot Acts that have eroded our civil liberties. That was the Patriot Act pushed for by Bush/Cheney, remember?
The average worker works, and has been working since Bush, for more than 40 hours per week. Our worker productivity is the greatest ever and yet wages have been flat since Reagan, unless you are a CEO or executive then you can run your company into the ground layoff thousands of workers and still get over 100 million dollar bonus and your corporation not pay taxes and get massive rebates in the millions (I am looking at GE for just one of those).
Bob you can’t just say its all Obama’s fault and not produce any verifiable facts. The congress has been obstructionist since the Republican’s gained the house. They are more concerned with tearing down the presidency than with working with it. They are, by their own admission, obstructionist. Trade agreements wanted by the Republicans and those Democrats in the pockets of the big corporations have raped the jobs and pay from American workers.
We don’t live in a socialist state, we live in an oligarchy a corporatis state where big money rules all and less than 1% have more wealth than the bottom 50% of the country. I agree Obama did not keep his 2008 campaign promises but to point the finger at him with out acknowledging the Republicans massive contribution to the problem is to either ignore the facts or chose to be ignorant.
TB … you can defend all you want, but I cannot agree. The Democrats and GOP Establishment are the same, and I was not defending either.
You hate the rich … I say we need the rich to provide us with jobs. You say the 1% have the wealth over the bottom feeders… I say they pay the most tax so bottom feeders can feed.
You say that worker productivity has never been greater, I say that Caterpillar is leaving for Mexico because of ObamaCare, and JC Penney is restructuring to survive because of its devastating mandates.
You say Bush/Cheney brought about the Patriot Act … I say that Obama has abused the law.
You say Detroit was killed by NAFTA … I say they killed themselves with corruption and ineffective Socialist leadership.
You say we are not a Socialist state … I say that we are being forced to confirm to Socialist ways such as being forced to buy healthcare; and being forced to curb our speech against SocDems or face jail time.
Boobala, I hear you saying all this, show me the money, i.e. where you are getting your facts? You say we need the rich to provide us with jobs. I point to the fact that all the bush tax breaks, that have been approved each time they came up for renewal. The tax breaks that go the 1% and not the middle class. This last time they came up they finally did not get Obama’s signature.
I do say worker productivity has never been greater and all the labor reports, even during the Bush years, backs that up. Caterpillar is moving to Mexico because they can pay just a few dollars to the workers because of NAFTA.
Just exactly what socialist programs killed Detroit? I point to NAFTA allowing the car manufacturers to move not just car production, but all the ancillary products needed, like parts for repair and replacement, to china and mexico.
I agree that Obama care is not the way to go, it should be single payer, as so many doctors and healthcare providers say we need to save our healthcare system.
During our most prosperous time, back in the 50s the tax rate on the rich was 90% and you know what, they did great. Jobs were created. Now I am not saying they should pay 90%, but a real tax rate that is the same as you and I pay, with out all the loopholes only they can take advantage of is more than fair. And all that money is not being used to create jobs, if that were true then seeing how they are so much richer than they were 8 years ago, we should have more jobs than people. Trickle down economics has never worked.
And finally where are people forced to curb their speech against SocDems or face jail time. I have not heard, nor can I find an article or case of such. If you have one please link it to me. Thanks, it is always a enlightening to debate you.
Girl .. I don’t have time for a running gun battle with you because we can really carry on and I still have a little more work to do on campus.
But I challenge you. Put yourself in my Conservative Mind, and respond to your own post.
And as far as Detroit … it was a disaster even before NAFTA, and there is no hope for recovery.
Would have been nice to see the Koch tie to this. Which is where it’s coming from. And if a three hour drive is all that’s keeping you from a BOR meeting, I’d suggest you learn to car pool. If you think the Koch brothers care about prison reform just because they’ve trotted out some good PR on the issue, I’d suggest you take a hard look at their resume as assessed by Sourcewatch.