• The really big idea

    Is it audacious of us to believe that a single civic action can change Baltimore? In the 1960’s, construction of The Highway to Nowhere (The Highway, Route 40 East & West) displaced thousands of West Baltimore residents. The Highway is 1.5 miles long—a two minute ride with 3.5 miles of blank, 30-foot walls that block […]

  • We are the experts we seek

    Our society teaches us to seek out “experts”— to fix our cars, heal our bodies, manage our relationships, resolve our conflicts.  You’d think we can’t do much for ourselves.  We’ve created a “nation of clients.” Remember the commercial that shows a big-bellied man sitting at the lunch counter with massive indigestion?  The message of the […]

  • Protect our children

    My audacious idea is that we all commit to protecting and nurturing our children. Protecting our children requires responsible parenting. It is unacceptable that any child lives in a home where he or she is not wanted and cared for. It is up to us as a community to show all children that they have […]

  • Eliminate the concept of fatherless in our communities

    Just the other day I received an email from a young man whom I worked closely with while I was directing a Beacon School in the heart of Harlem during the early 1990’s. Victor was writing to invite me to a book signing for Bandana Republic, an anthology of poetry and prose by gang members […]

  • Stopping the war on drugs

    More than two decades ago, the rush to enact federal mandatory minimum drug sentences was driven in part by the drug-related death of University of Maryland student Len Bias who had been a first round NBA draft pick of the Boston Celtics and was thought to have died from an overdose of crack cocaine. At […]