DCSGP Testimony
Testimony of David Schwartzman, DC Statehood Green Party, Town Hall Meeting with UN Special Rapporteur Mr. Doudou Diene, June 5, 2008
Testimony given by David Schwartzman
Given to Dr. Diene, the Special Rapporteur on Contemporary forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia
Given on Thursday, June 5, 2008
I am honored to participate in this historic event. Our Petition for D.C. Statehood and Human Rights spells out the critical issues related to Dr. Diene?s visit to the District of Columbia. We demand that the U.S. and District governments be held fully accountable for the systematic violation of human rights of our residents.
I will now read a summary of our Petition, initiated by the DC Statehood Green Party and Standup for Democracy in DC Coalition in 2002:
Whereas, the U.S. government continues to deny the residents of its capital, the District of Columbia, the same political rights enjoyed by citizens of our nation's fifty states,
Whereas, only statehood will give us self-determination on the same terms of equality with other U.S. citizens, that is permanent legislative, budgetary and judicial autonomy as a state, as well as full voting rights in Congress including two voting Senators,
Whereas, the denial of our political rights is a racist assault on our majority African American and Latino District population, as well as on minorities throughout our nation, by precluding the possibility that our voting delegation to Congress, including two Senators, would be people of color, and this denial is a violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination,
Whereas, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child are being violated in our nation?s capital,
Whereas, our residents continue to be subjected to a program of corporate-driven Structural Adjustment including the erosion of democracy, privatization of municipal services and property, inadequate funding of basic social services including education, gentrification and lack of affordable housing for our working class majority, toleration of persistent poverty of a large fraction of our children, shockingly low life expectancy and high infant mortality for our African-American residents, destruction of our only public hospital, inadequate income security, the nation's widest income gap between rich and poor, and the heavy weight of corporate financing of our established political leaders corroding our democratic process,
Whereas, the just attainment of our political, social, and economic human rights can only result from national and global solidarity with our local struggles,
We the undersigned petitioners urgently request a full hearing by appropriate UN Committees to consider the grievances outlined in this petition.
I now present our Petition and documentation with newly 2000 signatures collected online to date, to our honored visitor from the United Nations, Dr. Diene, the Special Rapporteur on Contemporary forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance.
(For Full Petition text go to: www.dcstatehoodgreen.org/statehoodnow/)
Documentation submitted:
Income Inequality and Life Expectancy in the District
Why do District residents have the lowest life expectancy in the nation? Because high income inequality translates into bad health!
Re: Income Inequality Growing, January 30, 2006 UNDERNEWS Progressive Review, Sam Smith
The CBPP report cited also gives data for the District of Columbia, showing that DC has the highest income inequality in the nation, compared to any state. The ratio of the top fifth to the bottom fifth of family income for DC was in the early 2000s 12.4, with the next highest inequality being New York and Texas, with ratios of 8.1. The ratio of the very rich in DC, the top 5% to the lowest fifth was 21.9, with Arizona being the closest with 14.2. And the income gap has grown in DC from the early 1990s. The statistics for DC are cause for urgent concern, particularly because of the close connection between income inequality in a community and bad health of its lower income residents. (Note that these ratios are computed differently from previous published studies, now income is of families, including the impact of taxes and tax credits, and public benefits not included in previous studies). A summary of the CBPP/EPI report for DC, plus recommendations to address it are found at: http://www.dcfpi.org/1-26-06inc.pdf.
UNICEF Ranks U.S., Britain at Bottom in Child Welfare Survey
By David McHugh Associated Press Thursday, February 15, 2007; A17 Washington Post
BERLIN, Feb. 14 -- The United States and Britain ranked at the bottom of a U.N. survey of child welfare in 21 wealthy countries that assessed subjects from infant mortality to whether children ate dinner with their parents or were bullied at school. The Netherlands, followed by Sweden, Denmark and Finland, finished at the top of the rankings, while the United States was 20th and Britain 21st, according to the report released Wednesday in Germany by UNICEF, the U.N. children's agency. One of the study's researchers, Jonathan Bradshaw, said children fared worse in the United States and Britain -- despite high overall levels of national wealth -- because of greater economic inequality and poor levels of public support for families. "What they have in common are very high levels of inequality, very high levels of child poverty, which is also associated with inequality, and in rather different ways poorly developed services to families with children," said Bradshaw, a professor of social policy at the University of York in Britain. "They don't invest as much in children as continental European countries do," he said, citing the lack of day-care services in both countries and poorer health coverage and preventive care for children in the U.S.
Separation Between Rich, Poor Widening in D.C., Study Finds
By D'Vera Cohn Washington Post Staff Writer Friday, January 27, 2006;
http://money.aol.com/bw/general/canvas3/_a/say-aloha-to-long life/ 20060913114809990001
Say Aloha to Long Life, Business Week Online
By Catherine Arnst
Residents of Hawaii have the longest life expectancy of any state, and D.C. denizens the shortest, according to a new Harvard study Life expectancy in the U.S. varies widely, based not on how much you earn or how good your health insurance is, but on where you live. A new study by Harvard University researchers found a gap of more than 35 years between the longest-lived group of Americans?Asian American women in Bergen County, N.J., with an average life expectancy of 91 years?and the shortest, Native Americans in a cluster of rural counties in South Dakota, at 66.6 years. The only other major industrialized nation with such a large "longevity gap" is Brazil.
District of Columbia Worst Places to Live Longer Life Expectancy: 72 years | State Ranking: 51
The following is based on the Murray et al. study:
http://medicine.plosjournals.org/perlserv/?request=getdocument&doi=10.1371/journal.pmed.0030260 (Go to the end of the article to find a downloadable Excel file with the data, including DC).
Here is what I came up with in calculating the life expectancies at birth for Black men and women in DC for 1999, which is apparently the latest data now available:
From the US Life Tables 1999 NVSS 50, #6, 3/21/02, CDC: (All M F for each category) All Races White Black 76.7 73.9 79.4 77.3 74.6 79.9 71.4 67.8 74.7 Assumed DC in 1999 was 60% Black and the remaining 40% having the average national life expectancy (see above) (60% from District of Columbia Population and Housing Trends, Issue Fall 2005, Fig. 3, DC State Data Center, by Joy Phillips, Robert Beasley and Art Rodgers) From Murray et al., 2006, PloS Medicine: DC in 1999: Life expectancies at birth: M: 67.6 F: 76.2 From a weighted average I derived: Life expectancies at birth: Black Men: 63.4 or 10.5 years lower than national average Black Women: 74.1 or 5.3 years lower than national average
David Schwartzman
(Tax & Budget, Legislative Agenda Coordinator DC Statehood Green Party, dschwartman@gmail.com)
Published online at:
The DC Statehood Green Party Legislative Agenda for 2007-8
http://www.dcstatehoodgreen.org/testimony/testimony.php?annc_id=184§ion_id=1
