NCTimes.com

October 21, 2006

By: DAVID STERRETT - Staff Writer

SAN DIEGO ---- Dozens of black San Diego County residents said Saturday during a town hall meeting that their community has poor access to education, inadequate health care and problems with police brutality.

More than 150 people, including several from North County, discussed the challenges facing local blacks during the meeting in San Diego hosted by the state's black legislative caucus.

The group of California legislators is meeting with black residents around the state and studying the social, political, economic and cultural conditions of the community to determine "The State of Black California," as the report will be called.

The legislators plan to present their findings in January and propose a package of reforms to improve the lives of blacks, said California Assembly Majority Leader Karen Bass, (D-Los Angeles) who ran the two and a half-hour meeting at the Educational Cultural Complex.

"It went great, and we heard about the issues," Bass said after the meeting. "The black community in San Diego is not apathetic."

Bass said the issue of police brutality against blacks came up more at the San Diego meeting than at similar events in Sacramento and the Imperial Valley.

Sharon Elise, an Encinitas resident and sociology professor at Cal State San Marcos, said "police harassment is probably the No. 1 issue throughout San Diego" for black residents.

"Every member of my family has experienced police harassment," said Elise, who added this probably has not happened to most white families. "The (state government) needs to be more aggressive identifying discriminatory practices and punishing them."

Elise said blacks are not given the same chance as their more privileged white counterparts to pursue higher education, and she supports reinstating some form of affirmative action in California to help more blacks go to college.

Public universities and colleges in California can't give preferential treatment to a person based on their race, sex, color, ethnicity or national origin under Proposition 209, approved by voters in 1996.

"We need to reimplement some form of affirmative action," said Andrea Guerrero, who is with the Equality Alliance of San Diego County.

She said there needs to be more blacks in college preparatory classes and standardized tests need to have less influence on which students get admitted to universities.

Black students need more access to the top teachers and schools, said Reginald Owens, president of the North San Diego County branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.

"Education is the key," said Owens, who said parents need to get involved in their children's schools.

He said blacks also need to make health care more of a priority.

"We as the African-American community don't do all we can to take advantage of health care initiatives," Owens said.

But the state government has to provide more health care opportunities and resources for blacks, said several of the speakers at the meeting.

For example, Ramon Murray, who is with the Center for Social Support and Education, said he is the only black man in the entire county certified to administer HIV tests.

"The problem is if many black guys don't see another black guy, they won't get tested," Murray said.

In addition to education and health care, residents said there needs to be more programs to help blacks own businesses, and the state needs to do more to help people leaving prison reintegrate into society.

Bass told the audience that the black population is increasing very slowly in California, and blacks are becoming a smaller share of the California population because other races are increasing at a faster rate.

Bass said blacks made up less than 7 percent of the state population and less than 6 percent of the San Diego population in 2000.

There are 164,000 blacks living in San Diego County, but only 20,300 in North County, according to estimates from the San Diego Association of Governments.

The regional planning agency estimates there are 1,026 blacks in Carlsbad, 20 in Del Mar, 435 in Encinitas, 2,816 in Escondido, 10,214 in Oceanside, 858 in Poway, 1,459 in San Marcos, 75 in Solana Beach and 3,466 in Vista.

"We are really spread out," said Owens, who added that blacks in North County have similar issues to those expressed by residents of San Diego.

Since blacks make up such a small portion of residents, many blacks said they need to work with other ethnic groups that are discriminated against, such as Latinos.

There are nearly 900,000 Latinos in San Diego County, according to the regional planning agency.

"We need to ally ourself with that majority," Owens said referring to Latinos. "We need to work together to advance both groups."

Contact staff writer David Sterrett at (760) 901-4067 or dsterrett@nctimes.com.