WGBH Radio; The Callie Crossley Show

I'm Kelly Crossley and this is the Calla Crossley Show. Spending cuts proposed by Mayor Menino to jeopardize public safety throughout the city's high crime neighborhoods. Plans to hand out pink slips to police liaison could undo nearly 20 years worth of work serving as an intermediary between the cops and the coroner. A breakdown in safety and trust could be the end result when civilian liaison are let go. Come September 9 of 10 civilian positions will be slashed when funding runs out. We'll look at how this could affect the dynamic between law enforcement and life on the streets. We top off the hour with a study and sisterhood through poetry and prose. A new install of GI examines the familial bond. Up next on the callee Crossley Show from safer streets to celebrating sisters. First the news. From NPR News in Washington I'm ready to ski. Secretary of State Hillary

Clinton promises the U.S. is ready to help earthquake damaged Chile in any way the country requests. Clinton arrived in Santiago today to meet with Chile's president and deliver much needed satellite phones. And Clinton said more aid is coming. We are sending aid. Water purification units. They're on their way. We have identified a mobile field hospital unit with surgical capabilities that is ready to go. Clinton never ventured much farther than the Santiago airport which appeared largely unaffected by the massive earthquake. Saturday's quake killed at least seven hundred twenty three people. Chilean troops are still trying to control looting in the city of Concepcion. Toyota executives are in the middle of another congressional grilling over the company's recall of more than 8 million vehicles. Today a Senate hearing is the third in seven days. Lawmakers want to know whether the company and federal safety regulators responded quickly enough to deal with cases of sudden unintended acceleration. The panel's

chairman Senator Jay Rockefeller says Toyota's corporate culture needs an overhaul somewhere along the way. Public safety took a backseat. And corporate profits drove the company's decisions. If Toyota wants to remain successful and regain consumer confidence and trust it needs to find this balance once again. Toyota drivers have reported 52 deaths linked to unintended acceleration since 2000. Toyota also announced today it's repairing more than a million vehicles worldwide for potentially leaking oil hoses. Republican Senator Jim Bunning of Kentucky continued today to block legislation that would temporarily extend unemployment benefits and funds for federal roads inspectors that expired Sunday night. As NPR's David Welna reports even an appeal from a fellow Republican failed to sway Bunnings one man stand until today only Senate Democrats had tried bringing up a bill passed last week by the House that would extend the expired benefits. This morning Maine

Republican Susan Collins joined that effort on the Senate floor. I ask unanimous consent that the Senate pursy to the immediate consideration of H.R. forty's 691. But as he has done numerous times Kentucky Republican Jim Bunning objected to bringing up the temporary extension bill. The question I've been asked mostly is why now or why not now. Bunning chided both Democrats and fellow Republicans for trying to pass legislation that would add to the deficit. Just weeks after the Senate voted not to pass bills that aren't paid for. David Welna NPR News the Capitol. On Wall Street at this hour the Dow Jones Industrial Average is up twenty six points at ten thousand four hundred thirty. The Nasdaq is up ten points at twenty to 83. This is NPR News. Supreme Court justices are weighing the reach of the Second Amendment today in a case focusing on Chicago's ban on handguns. A gun rights advocates want the court to extend a 2008 decision

striking down a gun ban in Washington DC a federal enclave. The court ruled then the second amendment gives individuals a right to possess guns for self defense and other reasons but the decision only applied to federal laws such as the District of Columbia's two U.S. envoys have arrived in Beijing for talks on a recent bilateral frictions in issues where the United States seeks China's cooperation. China recently suspended military ties and threatened sanctions over U.S. arms sales to Taiwan. NPR's Anthony Kuhn reports from Beijing. U.S. Deputy Secretary of State James Steinberg and senior director of Asian affairs on the National Security Council Jeffrey Bader are the highest ranking U.S. officials to visit China since the recent controversies. The two are expected to meet with Foreign Minister young teacher and other leaders both the North Korean and Iranian nuclear issues are expected to be on the agenda. China's Foreign Ministry reiterated today that the Iranian nuclear issue could still be solved through negotiations.

Yesterday a State Department spokesman said that both the U.S. and China wanted to limit fallout from the disputes and get relations back on track as soon as possible. Anthony Kuhn NPR News Beijing. South Korea's Hyundai may be benefiting from Toyota's recall woes. Today announced its February sales were up 23 percent from a year ago. GM is also seeing a boost. General Motors says February sales rose 11 and a half percent from the same time last year. I'm Renee Doge Blonsky NPR News from Washington. Support for NPR comes from the Melville charitable trust supporting efforts to find and fight the causes of homelessness on the web at Melville Droste dot org. Good afternoon I'm Calen Crossley and this is the Calla Crossley Show to lend your voice to the conversation give us a call. We're at 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. That's 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. You can also e-mail us at Cal

across the show at WGBH dot org. Spending cuts proposed by Mayor Menino could jeopardize public safety throughout the city's high crime neighborhoods. In September the Boston Police Department will cut civilian police liaison positions. For a look at the importance of community policing and what this could mean to urban areas throughout the state we are joined by Jack Green Irish Schlosser and Carrie Neji pull Vick. Jack Green is a professor at the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University is director of planning and community affairs at Dorchester House. And Carrie Negroponte is a newcomer advocate at the Chelsea police department. Listeners What did this mean for your neighborhood police officers how could the absence of liaisons complicate your work and your relationship with the community. Give us a call at 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. That's 8 7 7 3 0 1. Eighty nine seventy. Or e-mail us at Carey. Kelly Crossley talk show at WGBH dot

org. Jack Green Irish lost her net. Carrie Nejame welcome. Thank you. Now let me start with you Jack Green because you're at the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University and I think you have a overall picture I think when people hear this and they hear community policing in civilian liaison it sounds like an extra and in a time of tough tough economic times and belt tightening You know people say Well something's got to go. And why not send the police back to the cruisers and eliminate these positions and put that money back into just law enforcement. Tell me why that's why that doesn't work or why you think it's not a good idea. Well we actually got away from that over the last 20 years because it didn't work. Police officers isolated in their patrol car without much contact in the community without any understanding of.

The dynamics of the community and without any real understanding of what kind of information is the community does not increase the ability of the police to prevent crime in fact it may actually make things worse. Police officers who are walking in neighborhoods with community liaison and even without them are in face to face contact with businesses with residents with religious and social leaders know the children and the youth in those neighborhoods. If we're going to focus our efforts on trying to prevent crime we need very dramatically to have a face to face presence of the police and community liaison people in neighborhoods. If we want to abandon prevention then we go back to an old model which is if you call and we will come. And that hasn't served safety very well in any community because that's just the defacto admission that we don't come until after the crime has already occurred somebody has already been injured and there's some harm is already present there. Public safety requires that we try to prevent those things from happening and I think community policing and

all of the things that are attendant to it including the use of street workers which by the way has been in major cities for the last 50 years in one form or another is extremely important in making face to face contact with residents and businesses of the pur. This is a crime prevention. I was last year at Dorchester House and you've been there for 17 years Jack Green just said 20 years ago we learned the lesson. You know that it didn't work really didn't work well without somebody being in contact with the community and folks knowing who lived in the community tell us how it's made such a difference in your community. Well first let's focus on the two areas that are for from our perspective the most of most impact in this domestic violence issues and youth violence in our in our community our community is is largely a Vietnamese community vie Health Center which 110000 patients visits last year. Thirty three percent of our patients are Vietnamese. There's a huge

cultural and language barrier and it's cultural because people don't well they fear the uniform. You know you call 9 1 1 the uniform show up and who's going to talk to the police. We have two Vietnamese liaison who've been in the community for the one who's been with them for 16 years the more than 10 the Vietnamese kids will talk to these people. The parents can speak their language and they can talk to these people. We have a domestic violence issue where a woman's been battered who she going to talk to is she going to talk to the excuse me white officer who pulls up to the door. No she's going to talk to somebody who she who she can. RELATE TO THIS IS WITH THE there's been an increase in youth violence in our neighborhood there's been an increase in an overabundance of immigrant women who are murdered in domestic violence. These are issues that our community liaison zer able to bridge the gap between our community and the uniformed police even with community policing a civilian liaison says

are essential to making that work. And you've seen the difference. We have a caller I want to go to in just a second but I just want to make it to the point from even though the increases in some of these areas of violence have gone up in your community. But the difference is made when you have that civilian liaison absolutely they get absolutely OK I'm going to take a call now from Paul in Dorchester go right ahead. I could have to know. I was never tired. Watch the police officer and I worked with Juliette in between Tran Kernan. So you went for a number of years actually the whole climate for trial was at the station. What has she still isn't the whole time that I was there. I work with her and it was quite an experience in that back and when she first came we knew nothing of everything these community we do nothing of their customs their ways of doing. Business sure handling situations and with the help of troponin I don't want to go into the city into great praising trauma on the you

and great light because I could go on for hours. You know what I do what I can give her what I she taught us things very basic things that made a lot of sense once it was explained to us. For example be talk about the interaction between the police officers in the Vietnamese community. Indeed the police were counted the people that lived there would terrify them. They would not trust them boring because usually it was bribes or corruption in some form or another was involved so they didn't think we could be of much up. So they're not used to your face and you're being around and that made a difference. I'm sorry I didn't I said they got used to seeing you around and that made a difference. That also came in in conjunction with him right going out and doing. We did a lot of proactive stuff that was that was there to try to head off problems and that is that the key proactive principle at work. Unity was the essence of community believe it to be dealing with these incidents

before they mushroom or evolve into situations where you've got a homicidal beating or something worse. So what would you say Paul to somebody who says you know this feels like a little bit of an extra in a time of economic downturn and we got to cut somewhere and this might be the place. But what I would say to him Do we want to repeat history again. We want to repeat history again we want to believe immigrants coming to this country who are left there they're preyed upon by a variety of different people. Les is someone there for them to help guide them through the system. Well what these people do the price of that is the barkeep to not believe a bargain actually. Thank you so much Paul for your call. I want to turn to you Carrie now because you are a civilian liaison in Chelsea and your background is in conflict resolution so does what Paul just said resonate with you. Oh definitely I think what he said is exactly what we experience in Chelsea Chelsea is known as a gateway to immigrants and refugees and so my specific

position is working with the newcomers that are coming into Chelsea because what we found is that there's definitely a disconnect between the officers and the newcomers who are coming in and so it's really great to have someone there able to help with the cultural misunderstandings as well as working with newcomers to show to show them the police are actually there to help them. And when you talk to people in your community and say listen walk with me or be with me and the police are not the enemy. Well initially what kind of response do you get. People don't believe you. And so it's really a lot of them learning by seeing a lot of outreach efforts taking the officers into English classes taking the officers to community meetings and showing them the officers are really there to help them. They're friendly they're outgoing they're they're they're there to protect them. Now back to you Jack Greene at the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University. Why is it that in in economic downturns the tendency

is to go toward law enforcement even though we've heard these testimonials from people working with the police and even a retired police officer saying this is the way to go. But you know I think what. The problem is is that we we gravitate to measuring the effort rather than the outcome of things. And so what we find is it's easier to count the number of calls for police services or the number of arrests made in the community and it's much harder to count how people feel about the police whether they trust them whether they're going to go out and intervene in their own neighborhoods to make them safe whether or not they're going to work to prevent criminality among their own children and neighbors children all of those things are part of the social safety net that's out there. But the the the government only really measures a very small part of that which is how many times of the police get called and how many times do they arrest somebody. But while that's important I certainly wouldn't throw that away it's important that those things happen. It's not that's not about preventing things that's about responding to things and reacting to things and

Prevention is always much more difficult to measure because of the absence of something happening. Nonetheless from your collar and from the last two people's vote it's very clear that in the criminal justice world the police world trust is a really important thing in neighborhoods. You said that before this these programs people had zero trust in the police. Absolutely and in fact maybe they had less and less trust I mean when you're in the 60s and 70s and even into the 80s when the police were largely in patrol cars with their windows up riding around going from one call to the next they had virtually no contact with the public and the contact that they had was almost always negative. So the tendency was to say well the public is negative and so I might as well treat everybody that way because that's all I'm saying. As police officers got out in the community beads went to community meeting some of the some of the idea of going to language classes actually meeting with people who live in those communities.

We find as we should find that the pretty predominant number of people in any community are law abiding people who want to have a safe environment to work raise their children recreate and do things in the neighborhood. So we have to actually spend some time supporting the forces of good in the community rather than simply chasing the force of the bad in the community. We're going to leave it there until we come right back on to continue this conversation. We're talking about community policing with Jack Green. Ira Schlosser and Karen Egypt public Jack Greene is a professor at the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University. Ira Schlosser is director of planning and community affairs at Dorchester House. And Carrie NeJame is a newcomer advocate at the Chelsea police department. We'll be back after this break. Stay with us. The.

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Why. Eighty nine point seven. I share your distress but there is an entire generation that essentially sees politics and policy as a bunch of old white guys shouting at each other. Why eighty nine point seven because it's public radio from Boston that you won't hear anywhere else. Eighty nine point seven dollars each. This is a nine point seven. WGBH Boston NPR station for trusted voices and local conversation with the take away the Diane Rehm Show and the Emily Rooney show explore new voices with us all day long here on the new eighty nine point seven. WGBH. Join the WGBH Celtic for a contribution of one hundred twenty dollars. Membership comes with a whole host of benefits including two complimentary tickets to join

me for a St. Patrick's Day Celtic sojourn. More details at WGBH dot org slash Celtic. I'm Cally Crossley and this is the Calla Crossley Show we're talking about community policing and what will happen to high crime when police liaison are let go. Let us know how this could affect your neighborhood. What is your relationship with the police department. What is your perception of the police. Police officers if you're listening would like to hear how the absence of these positions will affect your work. Give us a call at 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. That's 8 7 7 3 0 1 89 70. You can also e-mail us at Cal across the show at WGBH dot org. Now we've heard that in September 9 out of 10 civilian positions are going to be eliminated and what's kept them going thus far is the stimulus money really and that's going away in a state grant that's being cut as well from the budget. So I thought Carrie maybe we could let our listeners know exactly what you do in your job.

You know on a daily basis what's it like in the community that you serve in jail so you mention it was immigrants but specifically you're working with a lot of Iraqis voting. Exactly. So my position actually I'll mention is funded by MDH So it's it's funded for several years by M.G. which is a wonderful use of the last woman standing right here. It's actually a new program too it's less than a year old. Basically what I'm doing is working. I'm primarily focused on working with the refugee population in Chelsea. There are a lot of refugees being resettled by agencies in Chelsea so sort of there's two objectives as I mentioned before working directly with the officers sharing with them information about the different cultural characteristics of groups coming into Chelsea. And giving them information about where people are living that kind of thing on a day to day basis what should they. I mean when you handle this what's it like I don't think so. Yes when I'm receiving referrals from different agencies. If there's a

family that has some sort of issue maybe they just need to be referred to resources in the community so that's a part of it. Referrals about for example I got a phone call the other day from one of the resettlement agencies in one of their clients had been attacked and had his wallet and phone stolen and he was he was threatened that if he contacted the police that they would find him because it happened right outside his house and he was terrified he did not want to go to the police he did not want to report the crime. And he just didn't know what to do and everyone in his community was terrified at that time because of what happened. And so basically he and the resettlement agency gave me a call and asked if I could help him outside the station bring him into the station help him with giving a police report that sort of thing so it's really I act as a bridge between the police station which is scary for a lot of people and. And between what happens and then going into the police station where where was this guy

from that you were dealing with what culture what he is booted me. He's been living as a refugee in Nepal for many years and was recently resettled in Chelsea just a few months ago. And so he was the primary supporter of the whole family he was the only one that spoke English and he had all of his documents stolen. That kind of thing we're talking about community policing and looking down the road to the loss of civilian liaison in September with Kerry Neji public and I were Schlosser and Jack Green intervening at that point of contact right at that moment you know just what does that mean on a day to day basis. You know I ask that same question of the liaison in Fields Corner and I can I have an example I think that really speaks to it when there's an issue of domestic violence it was an occurrence the police show up at the door of the night when one gets called a uniform show up and they go away and that's it. In 2007. A woman who

had been abused by her husband for years was finally rescued and taken out of the home and put it in an apartment Cup a few months later when his was expired. The restraining order OK had expired. He shows up at her apartment goes into the apartment with a can of gasoline and a lighter finds what he think is his wife with her 14 month old baby napping on the sofa pours gasoline all over himself all over them. Lights them up and the baby was burned 30 percent of her body burned third third degree burns. Wasn't the wife it was the 66 year old nanny who was taking care of her the wife was not home at the time. None of these people speak English. The man set himself on fire. He barely survived. Two years later he's finally convicted of all counts of murder and assault and put in jail forever. In the meantime what happens to the wife. She's completely destroyed her but her baby is in the hospital for months going through major surgeries nine major surgeries at the age of 14 months old. She has a 5 year old who had to have surgery. The nanny was in the hospital for two months. She was burned over

25 percent of the body she had to have surgery. Who helped these people. It was tram tram tram trying who's our Vietnamese liaison worked with her got her through services she got to the district attorney's office she got them to go through court she got them resettled in another safe house. She was the one who worked with them for two years. It wasn't the officer who showed up when they got cold. This is a horrible story you probably saw in the paper. It finally got results so we're talking about building ongoing relationship. Absolutely this is building ongoing relationships and then she gets called by people in the community because they know she's there to help and she is the face of the police in Field's corner as far as of in the music community is concerned as is Lou. And I'm afraid I don't remember the third is a third woman has a Cape Verdean. I don't remember her name. She's there face of the police. And that's why the people have any trust of the police at all. What's going to happen when they're gone. We've had an there's been an increase in youth violence. Why. Because particular with Vietnamese kids ever since they eliminated the the language that you know the foreign language

allowance in schools the elimination of the bilingual education has been a huge increase in dropouts and holdbacks in youth. What are they doing going out on the street. Right right. Now you know we've spoken a lot in this discussion about communities that have language problems or cultural problems. I want to point out to people that part of this elimination means that in was a popular foot patrol in the Central Business District is going away I mean that this takes for many different forms that a school resource officers will be eliminated in other communities. So we're talking about a broad range of services and Jack Green to get back to the College of the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University. You make the point that each community is different and the civilian liaison have to work within the identity of that community. And that's important. Oh absolutely yeah in fact there are two very powerful stories that we're just told both have a connection in that the police were not trusted by either of the affected

people on the at the onset. And had there not been a community worker or a liaison person there the person from Boots. Would have not have reported the crime and maybe had been victimized again or the Vietnamese woman would have struggled even more than she already did trying to get medical and legal and other forms of help so poor communities that are recent recently immigrated or are culturally distinct or language distinct. Having someone who understands the intricacies of that are really huge. The police more often than not are largely from a kind of Anglo culture and when they end up in the home of an Asian family or a Sikh family or are the specific family they don't necessarily understand the rules of how the. Those individuals and families conduct their behavior so having people who are in the community liaison business they provide a

context which is really so import all policing happens at some local jurisdiction low some local X Y location and that location in every city has a context about it and police officer is better served if he or she has some knowledge of that context and that knowledge often comes from Community Liaison. But it's not just from Community Liaison. I mean the officers who have walked the beat. I think Paul was saying this to your earlier caller officers who have walked the beat and got out of the car and begin to see people in their natural living circumstances and begin to know them and get referred to them. Mr and Mrs whatever and they refer to the officer as Officer whatever you end up with a relationship there that is starting to build which is built on trust in the personal identity and in fact if I'm if I can interrupt you Professor Green I found this interesting post online referring to the Skip Gates arrest as a failure of community policing. But I'd

like to get your take on. And the writer says that the racially charged incident between Professor Gates and the Cambridge Police Department highlights the failure of community policing. If police were truly a trusted face in the community if there were a real relationship between the community and police this type of incident would not have happened. And this is Professor Henry Louis Gates at Harvard who was arrested on his porch became a national incident ended up at the beer summit at the White House. Anyway the writer goes on to say that Professor Gates has been living in the community for many years and at the very least should have been a familiar face to Sergeant Crowley the arresting officer. I wonder if you would you agree that this with the writer of this that this was a failure of community policing. But I think it was a failure I'm not sure it was a failure of community policing writ large. You know my sense is that the officers who responded to that particular incident and I think this is a little bit off the topic of today's discussion but the the officers who responded should have had a better sense of the context in which they were working. And I think all would agree that

both the heat of the moment and this contextual shift to put everybody in a disadvantage. Well that was my point actually is that you know just knowing you know the points that have been made here around the table are that knowing the police officers having the bridge to them makes a difference in what kind of reaction happens when there is an incident. Absolutely I mean it's a huge impact and an officer who works in a neighborhood that we have studies in policing that go back to the 70s on this very point that officers who work in communities and begin to identify with the problems and struggles of those communities they don't pass over behaviors they actually try to instill correct bad behaviors. But officers who are in that circumstance are much more likely did to advocate for the community to see the community as something worth supporting. That's really very important to government services at the end of the day should be there to help everybody in the community be more literate to be safe to be healthier to be more economically sound whatever that government agency is. And it just

seems to me that pulling away individuals who make that very important link bridges. Kerry was saying you know it's really unfortunate and you know the I guess the sad part of this community liaison people don't get paid a lot. Yeah yeah yeah so I was about to say I was about to say yeah right. Yeah. To me that even a lot of money but you know what I would I would just say this and fairness and you know what's Mayor Menino to do or anybody else faced with making cuts you got to cut somewhere and other people would say well listen libraries are being cut and other very essential services are being cut. So why not these these programs as well I mean you can see the position is I'm not advocating for the fact I I'm quite alarmed by the cutting of these positions. Personally but I'm trying to raise that as you know he's got a look at the entire budget. I just want to know from you what is what will it mean when you lose your perch. Your people who have been that bridge. Well in our community it's going to mean the complete loss of some

vital members of the community who really provide a service and maybe it's a little hard to measure all the time. But think of all the ways in which things are getting cut back you know would be. The mayor and the commissioner both speak to community policing. The district attorney's office says we want people to come forward we want victims to come forward they go to the community all the time to say we need people to come forward. Well they're going to cut the time line that they're cutting. Sounds agree it's this is short money. I mean it would it seems to me that the effectiveness of do you fear a more dangerous community. I do fear him. Well I fear a more dangerous community because people will will be more afraid to come forward to say I saw somebody do x y you know there's no prevention at all of the much less prevention. Jacqueline I just wanted to get you ask you this question and that is why should people outside of these communities care about this program. Care about these programs. I mean they're listening they're going oh ok that seems sad and you know no it's not a lot of money but I think there's a larger

issue here on the plate I wonder if you could address that. Well there's I mean there's several issues here I mean one is that you know communities that often need more of these services are communities. That have been unfortunately found themselves on many levels of disadvantage and you know in a democracy we're supposed to take care of the least among us as much as the most among us. But I think very importantly is that the more victimization that occurs in the communities and the more injury that occurs in any community affects the whole community at some level. When we report the Boston homicide statistics we don't just say that the Dorchester homicide the figure that the homicide statistics for the Back Bay it's the Boston homicide statistic. So it reflects on the entire community. Boston or Chelsea or whatever we're talking about at the pick Cambridge we're ever talking about a particular moment. So I think in one sense it's very important to recognize that you know prevention always goes to

those who need to most help. There are lots of people in many parts of the community that need less help in that regard. But when they need it they get it. And in this case we have circumstances where helping people traverse complex. Government settings and safety issues. By having someone on the ground helps them do what I think is a very good expenditure. I don't think the mayor or the police commissioner has any ill will in this process. I want to be very clear about yeah I don't think so either I think they're just trying to make tough decisions that make him very tough. And I really understand the complexity of that and they're both committed to community safety issues. But I would say that you know this is something I would give a second look to because I get I don't think there's any large savings to be accrued out of this. And I think the benefits way way exceed whatever the cost may be. And you ask about the IRA how it how it how it why we should all care. And there's the old story of the for the want of a nail the shoe was lost and for then the horse and everybody and

that one thing piggy backs off the other. And our community as. As the neighborhood improves as there's as there is a perception of less violence more businesses open up as more businesses open up. It raises the level of everybody's social well-being as people's social well-being improves their health improves. This is why it's important to us you know the health of the community is only as good as the as the welfare of the people. And if we allow the levels of violence to start going backwards people are going to say no I'm not going to move into a community with my business I'm not going to open my store over there and there won't be investments in the community and the investments in the community are what make of the whole city and then ultimately the rest of the state that much better. So yes we should all care and it's for exactly which Aqua's saying is because it's the it's the wants of the the neediest that keep us afloat. Carrie last word from you. What would you say you're in a fairly safe position if you're going forward with your program.

I mean I hope that my words the things I've said can show you how powerful a program like this can be. And without these programs I think in particular newcomer populations are further isolated in their communities and it's particularly important in places like Boston and Chelsea to have these programs. After all Boston is actually new Boston. You know in terms of you know what who are the people who are the face of Boston would you not agree. Well this is been a fascinating discussion I hope lots of people are hearing it and I think particularly our caller Paul who is a retired cop on the beat because I think it's important for people to understand that it's not just those of you who are proponents of the programs but also police officers themselves who have found this very very important as well. We've been talking about community policing with Jack Greene IRA Schlosser and Carrie Nejame public Jack Green is a professor at the College of Criminal Justice at Northeastern University. Ira Schlosser is director of planning and community affairs at Dorchester House. And Carrie Nejame public is a newcomer advocate at the Chelsea police department. Thank you all for joining us.

Coming up a literary tribute to the relationship between sisters. We'll be back after this break stay with us. Support for WGBH comes from you and from Stoneham theater presenting the dinosaur musical a family friendly musical even fossils will adore March 5th through 21st tickets and information at Stoneham theater org. That's Stoneham theater dot org. And from the members of the WGBH sustainer program whose gifts of five ten or twenty dollars a month make up the most reliable source of income for the programs you love on the new eighty nine point

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dot org you can win a DVD library that everyone at home will enjoy courtesy of the PBS online shop. Twenty titles in all including the best from Nova frontline and art there are rules and entry on line at WGBH dot org. Why is a nine point seven. Because the way some kind of run about a bare foot may be better for their bodies than running in shoes because you'll only hear Marco Werman and the world on the new eighty nine point seven. WGBH radio. Things. You're listening to Miss Celia's blues song by Margaret Avery from the movie The Color Purple and the song is about sisters. I'm Cali Crossley and this is the Calla Crossley Show to kick off Women's History Month we are joined by Jan Freeman. She is the director and founder of Paris press which publishes the work of female writers and unknown female

writers especially. She is also one of the editors of a new book titled sisters an anthology. Jan Freeman welcome. Thank you so much. Tell me how this project came to be. Well I had thought about the project for a couple of years. Every time I went to a family gathering I would return back to Western Mass and talk to my assistant and say you know we should do a project about sisters. And we'd start brainstorming and then get distracted by whatever project we were in the midst of. So we had a list. Of possible pieces to include for an anthology and kept putting it off and then a very good friend of mine's sister died very suddenly of breast cancer just two years ago and when she died I really wanted to give my friend a book that would in some way offer her some solace in a time of such absolutely terrible

grief. And there was nothing in print and the wonderful photo essay book Running Press published years ago about 10 years ago wasn't quite right in its tone and I went back into the office that day that I learned that Miriam had died and I said Okay Emily now we're starting and we literally started that day and began work on sisters. Now you have sisters and I have one sister you have two. I have two. How would you characterize the relationship. Yeah well there we go. OK. Thank you very much. I'm the oldest. I am too. Oh you are OK. There are two years between each of us and. HA Well I'll tell you a story from my sister one year when we were both grown and you know treating our parents to a Christmas holiday where they had to do nothing we were doing it all in visiting my sister in her new place and where she was living at the time somewhere in the

Midwest. And I arrived in all of my stuff and I said OK you're not doing it right do this do that do this do that and she said you know I'm really grown now. You can back up. I'm really good at that. It's been very interesting in terms of collecting pieces for the anthology and we were looking for humorous pieces as well. Basically short stories excerpts from some novels and poetry that would cover all the emotional elements as many as possible of the what happens between sisters and it is certainly a unique and intense relationship. That subject comes up over and over again. I was just last night I was looking at Wendy Wasserstein essay it's the first piece in the book and she's the younger sister and she talks about how her older sisters are you

know telling her what to do. But then there's like also a moment when they swap roles. And she she's usually the funny sister who's being taken care of and her sister her older sister Saundra is the serious one. And then ever so often her older sister is the really funny one and then. And she's the one taking care of the older sister so we flip the roles. But yes there seems to be a consensus that the Alpha older sister is not always appreciated. That's what I was. What I say. We're speaking with Dan Freeman who is one of the editors of SR's an anthology. There are 43 contributors to this book. It's poetry and prose. Some of the contributors are Dorothy Parker Simone de Beauvoir Barbara Kingsolver Alice Walker and Lucille Clifton and I get to Lucille Clifton because it's my favorite poet and I love the name. Well the name of her poem in this book is called Sisters and I'll just read a bit of it for our

listeners because I love it. Me and you be sisters. We be the same. Me and You. Coming from the same place. Me and You. And toward the end of it is we be loving ourselves be loving ourselves be sisters only where you saying I poet. I love that. And it's I feel so happy that Lucille offered that poem for us. I talked to her about the anthology and she let us specifically she recommended that we use that poem and I'm so happy that it's there. It's wonderful. I am impressed also about the way that you have divided the book into sections one section is called Don't tell mother which is familiar with any sisters and then another one in Sister sister and the last one is having our say which comes from the delayed you know exactly how many sisters are are two African-American women who were discovered if you will in quotes when they were well I guess they were in their 90s and then they lived to be the least 100

103 and the last Their book is having your say. Right. It was fun because the last piece the ordering of the anthology was very challenging how to figure out how all these pieces would fit together and it was wonderful to realize that the Delaney sisters would be just perfect at the very end of the book. They talk about their differences. You get both of their voices Bessie and saidI and they accept their differences and applaud each other and. It's just that it's the fullness of that relationship that of which we speak of what you speak. You know this book. I love this but I have loved so many pieces in your book but I love this one called twin bed by Anna Maria Jomo Jo mocha. Yeah this is the beginning of it. Sisters you'll recognize this tone. My sister Laura this Maria Treviso was born on January 15th 1962 in Havana Cuba and six months later was smuggled into Miami disguised as a heat blanket. But I had just recently been

overthrown and the revolution had everyone distracted. Castro was just settling in and no one thought to question the need for heat blanket in 90 degree weather. Her fugitive beginning marked the baptism of a lifetime of irreverence and trailblazing the eldest of five my sister was a natural born leader and recreational dictator. I love that line. And that's an example of Adam Maria the youngest sister talking about her older sister and that piece is so wonderful That's one of the few. There are only two pieces actually in the book both by emerging writers Anna Maria Jim Olga is an emerging writer and an actress and in fact she's going to be reading that in New York on International Women's Day at Madame X for a sister celebration there. And she wrote that piece for for the sisters collection as did Sippy killer who wrote an essay a personal essay Annamaria

as is fictional but based on her life and very very funny she's a comedian and a playwright and hits on just the history the funny parts of how she deals with her sister being of a very upper class suburban. Life style and Anna Maria is trying to impress her with having just been accepted into a new housing project that's for creative people and it turns out that it's it's actually just a housing project and she exaggerates everything just to impress her sister. And it's that's very real I mean we one of the things that's very interesting in Sisters is when you grow up even though there's the the dictator the older sister and the younger sisters who the older sister is trying to help along the way. How right most of the you know when I was 13 I was listening to Let her know that

right Carla. How they then can wind up in very different situations socially. Have one of the sisters my youngest sister is you know teaches anthropology is tenured has a chair at Emory and has a much more stable life than her older sister who's the idealistic publisher and I well I think that's because a lot of stuff is dumped on the older sisters I'm not going to go there right now. OK good to have that discussion with many others. Let me ask you this and now most of your work in the book is about birth sisters as well but they're right as we get older we often begin relationships with sisters not of our blood but whom we bring into our lives as a part of family. And I'm fortunate enough to be part of a couple of groups of women who function as my sister is in that way.

And so I wonder is this something that can resonate with them as well. Yes it has. Apparently it has. It was a decision that we made early on actually and as we were thinking about the book in the shape that the book would take whether we would include a quote unquote sisterhood or focus it on family relationships and I made a very conscious decision of keeping it to the family because so few. Works have literature and even social science have given attention to the relationship between siblings and especially sisters. So I wanted to keep it focused in that way but in terms of people who are responding to the book I've received so many emails from women who have given this book to their best friends and they people are having sister celebrations now spontaneously which is really thrilling and gives it also a conversation.

Conversation starter. If there are sisters who have had you know problems in their relationship yes it opens up conversation in a way that's very unusual. I have one of the editors actually of the book Deborah bull talked about knowing somebody for many many years as a colleague and never even realizing that she had sisters and then when the book came out suddenly hearing about. About the stories about the sisters the relationships are so intense with sisters often that given the opportunity to speak about sisters most people will just dive in there once they see the book when I have had the book available at various conferences or celebrations. I have heard so many stories about people sisters that you could write another book. There could be definitely NOT all you have to. Yeah. We're speaking with Dan Freeman who's one of the editors of sisters an anthology which is a book

about celebrating sisterhood birth sisters. Now I have to say that the host of the show both before mine the Emily Rooney show is a twin sister. I don't know if you addressed that in the book or not that was important in August. There were a few areas that we really were desperate to make sure that we included in terms of the relationship between sisters What was the relationship between twins and I had a really hard time finding work about twins poetry or prose and then found this fabulous piece by Barbara Kingsolver that she offered to us that is actually an excerpt from The Poisonwood Bible that includes the relationship between twins That's just oh my god hysterical passage from that novel. I had that relationship is so complicated and I are like one person who we should have him really answer this next time you have to get her in the end though right. Really.

Because they often just respond so much you know in the same way or very different. Its I know many twins actions strangely and that bond Oh my gosh is such a profound complex bond and its the primary bond for my closest friend as a twin and no one hand holds a candle to her twin sister she. She has it and the world pivots round her twin sisters so its a very interesting relationship and if anybody has any suggestions of works that I should read for our next volume please send them to Paris Pret W. W. W. Paris press dot org because just in case we have another volume I definitely would be interested in reading more information about twins more stories about twins. Now I want to know what your sisters two of them think about this book.

They've been very enthusiastic. One of the I mean I mean I'm right they've got to watch my youngest sister from the very first moment was very excited about the book. And I told all of her friends in Atlanta and many of them we have dedication lines in the back of the book that help to support the press as a nonprofit and so to help support the publication of the book we offer dedication lines to people to that we printed in the book and several of her friends wound up getting dedication lines and she was she told her colleagues that her students and so she's at she's given away many many books she loves the book. My other sister who's in New York City actually has just stepped up and she's having a sister celebration which is exciting she's a psychoanalyst and so there's actually going to be an add a little kick sister reading on International Women's Day on the Upper

West Side in New York so. So this is fabulous timing for your book as Women's History Month an International Women's Day is Monday. I know. So I mean my dream is that people women and men also because men actually have been responding to the book as well. And only children respond to the book. It's not just for sisters it's for everybody because everybody knows sisters and it helps people understand sisters which is wonderful but yes my dream is that people everywhere around the country have these little sister gatherings in honor of International Women's Day on Monday obviously but they gather a whole guide for how to do that so one of the things about this Jan is that this is a book that never gets old because this relationship is you know it's I mean it's primal and primal and it changes. It changes at different times of your life think of the relationships that you know we have as kids and then as teenagers when sometimes.

The sisters swap boyfriends girlfriends I mean there are all sorts of interesting things that happened between sisters Julie glass is going to be reading at Porter Square on an International Women's Day and her wonderful wonderful novel is is included a portion of it in the book that she'll read from there. Well we're very excited to talk to you about sisters an anthology we're going to go out on a song that was sung by sisters Rosemary Clooney and her and her sister Betty Clooney and the song. It's sisters it was a popular song written by Irving Berlin in 1054 and appeared in the movie White Christmas. Jan Freeman thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me. Listeners you can catch contributors to sisters in Anthology next Monday International Women's Day at Porter Square Books that's Monday March 8th at 7 p.m. at Porter Square Books in Cambridge. You can keep on top of the Calla Crossley Show by visiting our website WGBH dot org slash Calla Crossley.

This is the Calla Crossley Show. Today's program was engineered by Jane pick and produced by Chelsea murders. Our production assistant is Anna white knuckle B. We are a production of WGBH radio Boston's NPR station for news and culture and lies serious issues. And all of the serious stuff comes between me and that. Sister. And. Sister. Sister Don't come between me and. I.