Posted on 01/10/2005 3:42:35 AM PST by kattracks
(CNSNews.com) - The independent agency charged with promoting equal treatment for all Americans regardless of race, sex, ethnicity or disability and with investigating related violations of federal law is under new management for the first time in more than a decade. The incoming leadership inherits what the General Accounting Office once characterized as "an agency in disarray."
For the first time since Jimmy Carter was president, Mary Frances Berry was not an official participant in a meeting of the United States Commission on Civil Rights (USCCR). It was also the first USCCR meeting under new leadership since 1993 when then President Bill Clinton appointed Berry, a professor of civil rights history in Pennsylvania, as chairwoman.
Incoming commissioner and new chairman Gerald Reynolds marked the beginning of his tenure by looking forward.
"I have as a goal to create an environment where we can discuss issues that intersect with race, ethnicity, sex, disability; it's extremely important that we discuss these issues in an atmosphere of trust," said Reynolds, an energy attorney from Kansas City, Mo.
"We need to assume that the person sitting across the table from us, who disagrees with our position, is a good man or woman who merely has a different point of view," Reynolds told his fellow commissioners and a conference room packed mostly with staff members and a few reporters.
New vice-chairwoman Abigail Thernstrom noted that such an atmosphere has not existed during the previous four years she has served on the commission.
"This has been, as everyone knows, an acrimonious time. There's been a lot of warfare on this commission," Thernstrom recalled.
"I think it's been needless; there's no reason why the atmosphere should be so charged," Thernstrom continued. "We all are devoted to the same goal and that is of racial, ethnic and gender equality in this country."
As the Cybercast News Service previously reported, Thernstrom and the other Republican-leaning members of the USCCR clashed with Berry and her supporters on the panel over a number of issues:
- Draft reports were regularly not made available to minority commissioners prior to their public release;
- Agendas and witness lists were routinely not provided to minority members in advance of hearings and other meetings;
- Press releases were issued in the name of all commission members, without a vote having been taken authorizing the releases, or the contents having been disclosed to minority members;
- Draft documents and research data were provided only to commission staff, minority commissioners were denied access; and
- commissioners were forbidden from communicating with members of the staff. They were directed to communicate only with the staff director who, minority members asserted, routinely ignored their inquiries.
A 1997 report by the General Accounting Office (GAO) called the commission, "... an agency in disarray, with broad management problems." Congress has conducted numerous investigations of the USCCR and then-President Ronald Reagan fired Berry back in the 1980s for mismanagement only to have her reinstated by a federal court.
Berry, Reynoso and Edley out, Reynolds and Taylor in
President Bush replaced Berry when her term ended on Dec. 5, 2004. Berry claimed her term extended until Jan. 21, 2005. Then-Staff Director Les Jin's employment with the commission was terminated when he disputed White House letters informing Berry and former commissioner Cruz Reynoso that their terms had ended and they had been replaced. Berry and Reynoso then submitted "letters of resignation" that became effective immediately. Commissioner Christopher Edley, another of Berry's strong supporters, resigned effective Jan. 3, 2005.
Congress appoints four members of the commission. The president appoints the remaining four and, with the concurrence of a majority of the commission, chooses the chairman, vice chairman and staff director. Ashley L. Taylor, Jr., an attorney from Richmond, Va., was appointed to replace Reynoso. A replacement for Edley has not yet been named.
The USCCR's new staff director, Kenneth Marcus, told commissioners at Friday's meeting that Berry's departure does not mark the end of the agency's troubles, or examinations by the GAO and Congress.
"Overall, the picture is not good," Marcus said. "The agency is now, managerially and in terms of financial controls, at a low point, lacking many of the basic internal controls that most agencies have and are expected to have."
Marcus said many of the problems are described in prior audits from the General Accounting Office, the agency that recently changed its name to the Government Accountability Office.
"The GAO's reports paint a portrait of an agency that was allowed to run out of control, with little financial control, weak management and little accountability," Marcus said. "They are a wake-up call for this agency, that we must implement substantial change and reform in order to meet our fiscal responsibilities and restore public trust and confidence."
The new staff director noted that Congress had recently requested a large volume of documents from the USCCR in order to conduct its own inquiry into the agency's management structure and financial condition.
"I have no reason for confidence in the extent to which congressional requests have been complied with in the past," Marcus explained, adding that his attempts to remedy that situation are being hampered by the former staff director, Les Jin.
"He has refused to engage in any communication with me concerning the condition of the agency," Marcus explained. "In many instances, staff report to me that certain actions material to the financial status of the commission were within the knowledge of Mr. Jin and are not known to them."
Marcus assured the commissioners that steps had already been taken to ensure that future congressional requests would be complied with fully and in a timely manner. He also detailed difficulties in completing an ongoing audit of the agency's balance sheet for Fiscal Year 2004.
"I have also, within the last few weeks, heard from our auditor that, when they arrived at the commission, they found that there was no general ledger, whatsoever," Marcus said.
The USCCR's accounting was handled by the Bureau of Public Debt in the Treasury Department until the end of Fiscal Year 2003. At that time, the bureau notified the commission that it would no longer provide that service.
"Based upon our experience in servicing your agency, we believe there is inadequate management, control and oversight of your agency's funds," the bureau wrote in a September 2003 letter.
"In other words," Marcus said, "the commission's financial controls had deteriorated to the point last fiscal year, that another agency of the federal government refused to continue to service its account."
Marcus said despite the "enormous challenges and problems" the commission faces, he opposes calls to abolish the body.
"I believe that we have the opportunity, now, to demonstrate the strength of our resolve, the seriousness of our purpose and the fact that we have here persons who are of the seriousness, the dedication, the talent, intelligence, experience, industry and skill to show to America that there is another way of looking at civil rights," Marcus said.
Chairman Reynolds agreed.
"My view of civil rights begins with the notion that it's always been about expanding freedom," Reynolds said. "I think that the time has come for the nation and this commission to expand the conversation."
Reynolds said that means continuing the monitoring and reporting activities the commission has historically undertaken to expose discrimination.
"But I think it's extremely important that we recognize that that conversation has to include other people. We have to involve members of the community such as churches, community organizations and parents," Reynolds concluded. "Until we do that, the social ills that we see, especially in our urban communities, they will continue."
Cybercast News Servicewas unable to contact former Staff Director Les Jin for a response to the allegations contained in this report. He has no published telephone number and the USCCR was unable to provide contact information for him.
E-mail a news tip to Jeff Johnson.
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Indictments should follow, post haste.
Me wonders if Ms. Berry maybe was reluctant to leave because her successor may find out she had her "hand in the till" so to speak.
My bet is that they are lawyering up because of possible indictments for misappropriation of government funds.
This has been a long time coming and way overdue.
LOL! I see we all reached the same conclusion almost simultaneously!
I doubt Mary Frances had her hand in the till. She was just a totally incompetent bigot who insisted the commission find whites at fault in every decision it made. Her hatred of White people didnt allow her to get her job done. Others saw her incompetence and used it to get away with shoddy work, or were incompetent themselves. It was an agency run by hate and not by any effort to solve the racism it was supposed to be fighting.
Woo hoo! I've had it in for those guys after reading the terrible report they did on the 2000 Florida vote. What a biased piece of crap that was.
Justice Dept had to inform Berry that she could not use Federal monies for lawyers to fight Pres Bush. Should anyone wonder that Pres Reagan fired her for being obstinate? Of course she went to court and got her job back.
Berry, who is a registered Independent, says African Americans have not been respected by the Democratic Party and it is time to explore other options. "Democrats don't take Black voters serious enough," she says. "They want people to vote for them but they are not interested in having them help shape what they are going to do. We need a third party or something. Adhering to the Democratic Party isn't working." For the past 40 years, Blacks have given Democratic presidential candidates 82 percent to 94 percent of their votes. 'You think about how many votes Black people give Democrats yet Democrats weren't the first ones to make a Black person National Security Advisor. They weren't the first to put someone at the State Department. They weren't the first ones to do any of these things. That's why Republicans are smarter than they are." And Berry says publicly what many Blacks will only admit privately. "You have to beg the Democrats to do anything," she says. "Even when you look at Clinton, who was the most powerful Black person on the White House staff? The chief of staff wasn't Black. Neither was the deputy chief of staff. The National Security Advisor wasn't. The domestic policy adviser wasn't. None of the key people that he had over there were Black. He didn't have anybody in any job of major substance. And that was Clinton. The Republicans come in and they can easily find Black people who think just like them. They put them over there and everything is fine."
This Commission should be disbanded- it has no purpose which isn't already handled by other government departments like the DoJ. It is a political organization that serves no important function.
"For the first time since Jimmy Carter was President, Mary Frances Berry was not an official participant in a meeting..."
Praise Jesus!
They won't. Bush just wanted rid of these people, and that has been accomplished. Why unlease a HUGE Black Caucus, Jesse Jackson, NAACP, etc. stink at this time by pursuing Berry and her cohorts in crime? It would accomplish little and cause lots of problems. Now, Bush can remake the organization into something more positive and useful for this country. It would be better to dissolve it, but I doubt that will happen, either, for the same reasons.
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