Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI)
Dispatch
September 8, 2024
If you have announcements to pass onto the DEI Committee, please email it to dei@lwvtucson.com. The next issue of The DEI Dispatch will be September 22, 2024.
LWVGT DEI Policy - adopted November 6, 2021
League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson (LWVGT) is fully committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion in principle and in practice. LWVGT aims to build a participant base that is representative of all dimensions that make each individual unique. Our aim is to be inclusive, affirming, and welcoming of all identities. We intend to ensure that each individual has access to the same opportunities to grow, contribute, and develop within the organization. Diversity, equity, and inclusion are central to the organization's current and future success in engaging all individuals, households, communities, and policymakers in creating a more perfect democracy.
| DEI Meeting
Wednesday, September 11
6 PM
| Welcome to new and returning members of the Committee.
DEI Meeting Opening Guidelines for Decorum: Welcome to a gathering of League members who are pursuing the League’s commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion in principle and practice. Our process for respectful discussion is by asking questions and actively listening with kindness, sensitivity, and openness. We acknowledge that we are each learning and searching.
Announcements and Updates
- DEI Outreach – Nancy Norton
- DEI Book Discussions – Mike Kloehn
- DEI Tours – Pam Burris
- National Day of Racial Healing – Victor Bowleg
DEI Five Minute Connection – (5 minutes) – Yolanda Herrara, President Sunnyside Neighborhood Association
Speaker - Anthony Avatar, Jr of the NAACP Youth Council
Anthony Avatar Jr. is a senior at BASIS Tucson North. He currently serves as president of the NAACP Youth Council and chair of the education workgroup at the Governor Youth Commission.
Announcements:
Next meeting - Wednesday, October 9 at 6 PM |  |
Anthony Avatar, Jr
NAACP Youth Council
Anthony Avatar, Jr. is a senior at BASIS Tucson North. He currently serves as president of the NAACP Youth Council and chair of the education workgroup at the Governor Youth Commission. He is deeply involved in community service. From cleaning up garbage in his local community, volunteering at his school, and helping out at the diaper bank, Anthony is committed to making a positive change in his community. Furthemore, Anthony is also deeply invested in social justice, political science, and international affairs. He has regularly given speeches advocating for voting rights and civic engagement, was a founding member and current co-leader of Students for Unity; a community service club that discusses ongoing public policy and political matters; and he has repeatedly argued for the need of American leadership on the global stage particularly in regards to international development. Finally, Anthony cares deeply about the rule of law and hopes to become a lawyer. He has served as president of his Mock Trial team, helping lower the cost of entry for the club, and over the summer shadowed attorneys working in Major Crimes and Domestic Violence as part of the High School Enrichment Academy. |  | | Tour
Tucson Chinese Cultural Center
1288 West River Road, Tucson
Thursday, September 19
10 AM
Lunch provided
Limited to 20 attendees
For more information and to register
| | The DEI Outreach Committee
| |
DEI Book Discussion Group
Next Meeting
Thursday, October 3
6 PM
The DEI Book Discussion Group will meet on Thursday, October 3 to discuss For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide (1997) Shange, Ntozake. This group will meet on the first Thursday of even-numbered months. There will be a discussion host for each meeting who will provide discussion questions. For more information email dei@lwvtucson.com
Scheduled book for December 5 - Baldwin, James. The Fire Next Time (1963; Vintage reissue, 1992)
The DEI Book Group is beginning to discuss titles for 2025.
| LWVAZ DEI Committee Meeting
Wednesday, September 19
6 PM
via Zoom
The speaker at the State DEI meeting this month will be a woman you should know Dianne Post. She will lead a discussion on: The Third Reconstruction and the Battle of the Alphabet (DEI, CRT, KKK, BLM) tying the past to the current and the evolution of the civil rights movement and the evolution of the battle against it.
Here is a little background on Dianne Post:
Dianne Post has been an attorney since 1980. For more than 18 years, she represented battered women and molested children in family and juvenile court. In 1998, she shifted to international human rights law.
She has lived in five countries (Russia (Moscow and Far East), Cambodia, Hungary, Algeria, Kenya) and worked in fourteen others for short periods of time. She is Legal Director for Secular Coalition for AZ. Locally she is active in the NOW, and ERA Task Force Az and a Commissioner on the Arizona Commission on African American Affairs. She is currently representing Randolph residents in their settlement with SRP. She also has a pending case at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights regarding the pattern and practice of U.S. judges giving custody and unsupervised visitation to abusers in family law cases and is still fighting for compensation for two cases she won for the Roma in Kosovo.
She has published six law review articles, more than three dozen manuals, more than three dozen articles in five countries, columns in ten publications, six short stories, four of which have won prizes, and two books. Her substack is: https://diannepost.substack.com
|  | | 2025 National Day of Racial Healing
Planning Meeting
Saturday, October 19
1:30 PM
LWVGT Office
800 N. Swan, Suite 126, Tucson
The National Day of Racial Healing takes place annually on the day after Martin Luther King Jr. Day. The observance grows every year as people across the country work to create connections and share a sense of belonging. The League of Women Voters of Greater Tucson and the YWCA of Southern Arizona are again partnering on an event to celebrate NDRH. This year’s event will be held on Saturday, January 18, 2025.
If you missed the event last year you can view a video recording on the League website at Members/You Tube Library/click videos and it is the first two videos in the fourth row down. View NDRH 2024
|
African American Museum
of Southern Arizona
Tea
Saturday, October 12
Amethyst Room, PCC Downton Campus
For more information or if you are interested in attending email
| Randolph Hispanic Heritage Day
Randolph , Arizona
Newman & Kennedy St.
Saturday, September 21
4 - 9 PM
Live music, food trucks, speakers, arts & crafts and more!
(Take I -10W to the Eloy exit (exit 211), then AZ-87 N to Randolph, AZ)
| | Let's All "Disagree Better"
Nobody's Fool:
Why We Get Taken In
and
What We Can Do About It
Thursday, September 19
5 PM Tucson Time
We're all susceptible to misinformation, often spreading it unknowingly. While stopping it entirely is impossible, we can learn how deception works, recognize the signs, and empower ourselves. Join this virtual talk with Professor Dan Simons, co-author of Nobody's Fool: Why We Get Taken In and What We Can Do About It.
Sponsored by LWVUS and National Institute for Civil Discourse | | NAACP Freedom Fund Luncheon
Saturday, October 5
11 AM
Casino Del Sol
For more information or if you are interested in attending email
| | You receive this email as a member of the LWVGT DEI Committee. If you no longer wish to receive the DEI Dispatch email dei@lwvtucson.com | |