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Tiger Bay applauds NAACP appeal
By BRYAN GILMER, Times Staff Writer ST. PETERSBURG -- St. Petersburg NAACP president Darryl Rouson lately has been calling for black residents in the city's poorest neighborhoods to demand that men in their neighborhoods stop selling crack cocaine. Tuesday, Rouson tossed some responsibility for improving the same areas into the laps of the city's powerful and politically active white residents -- and he managed to get a standing ovation from them. A few even inquired about joining the NAACP. "If we can stand up in our community and say stand up against drugs, guess what will happen when we come down to AmSouth Bank, Bank of America or City Hall and challenge you?" Rouson told the Suncoast Tiger Bay Club, which asks politicians and public figures hard questions over lunch meetings. "Some of you cannot escape or soothe your conscience by saying the problems are just the black community's," Rouson told the group of 125 in the ballroom of the St. Petersburg Yacht Club. "Your contribution to the state of affairs, wanton and willful in the beginning, is more subtle and indirect now, often characterized as a benign neglect, but more often disguised in the appearance of opportunity." The NAACP is recruiting members of all races, Rouson said, to model the kind of diverse leadership needed to address the serious problems of poor, black residents. And Rouson has been talking to a diverse group of people. He is being courted by Republicans and was singled out for recognition at a party fundraising dinner. "I came today not because I am a black leader, but because I am a leader in a community that happens to include black people," Rouson said. Rouson has disagreed pointedly with Uhuru activist Omali Yeshitela by calling for more policing and drug arrests while Yeshitela worries more officers will bring "police containment." But Tuesday, Rouson spent much of his time supporting the idea that Midtown's problems hurt everybody in the city and that everyone must help fix them. That was a main theme of Yeshitela's unsuccessful campaign for mayor. "When quality of life statistics are published nationally, they don't break it down in accordance to Northeast St. Petersburg, the Old Southeast or Pinellas Point," Rouson said. "It relates to and conveys an impression of the overall quality of life. Ask not for whom the bell tolls in Midtown -- it tolls for thee." He said the city has a history of breaking promises to poor black residents. He said he wasn't sure when asked why he thinks the Yacht Club, a gathering place for the affluent and the powerful, does not have more black members. (The club admitted its first black member in 1985.) Rouson said social class probably comes into play. Some black people simply don't want to join. And he couldn't resist poking fun at history. "It's just nice to be able to sit and eat at one of these tables," he said. "We have cooked food here for a long time, and we have fed you well." Rouson talked about Mayor Rick Baker's decision to fire former police Chief Mack Vines for using the term "orangutan" while discussing the arrest of a black suspect. Though the NAACP never called for Vines' firing, it supports Baker's decision, he said. The term evoked historical insults used against black people, Rouson said. "The motor of progress had been cranked up and we were moving down the highway of improvement, and we could ill afford a breakdown in trust between the African-American community and the Police Department," Rouson said.
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From the Times South Pinellas desks |
