TS Radio Network: Whistleblowers! The USDA Hour

Join Lawrence Lucas this evening as he hosts Tracy Mccurity,  & Lloyd Wright. At issue is the recent meeting with USDA which was a disappointment to those who participated. The discrimination complaints continue to pile up while at the same time the USDA fails to do its job. 

Lloyd Wright:  For 37 years I worked at the USDA, leading the agency’s Office of Civil Rights under President Bill Clinton, and returning to serve in President Barack Obama’s administration. In 2009, I thought my charge was to resolve longstanding discrimination complaints. But I saw right away there might be a problem: There was not a single black face among the department’s senior staff. Though well-meaning, the end result of my return was little more than some rhetorical polish and reshuffled paper — too often the case in the fight for change.

Tracy Mccurity:  Black Belt Justice Center is a legal and advocacy nonprofit organization dedicated to assisting African American farmers, landowners and communities in the Black Belt region in efforts to retain and increase landownership; to create sustainable, land-based cooperatives and entrepreneurial businesses; and to ensure intergenerational and community wealth.  

Acres of Ancestry Initiative/Black Agrarian Fund is a multidisciplinary, cooperative ecosystem rooted in Black ecocultural traditions and textile arts to regenerate custodial landownership, ecological stewardship, and food and fiber economies in the South.