Enlarge Ruth Montfort (left) and Stephanie Hand attended the community conversation on affordable housing.

Posted: March 22nd, 2012 Lakamar Austin

Neighbors, business owners and community leaders gathered Sunday, March 18, at Providence United Methodist Church to continue recent conversations surrounding affordable housing in Charlotte, and to discuss partnerships and projects available to curb housing solutions for the Charlotte's homeless population.

Nearly 30 attendees joined in roundtable discussions to share personal experiences and views.

Seated to my left was Ruth Montfort, a senior citizen from Charlotte. “I’ve been concerned about homelessness and the fact that people really can’t have a life if they don’t have a home, in particularly children. I cannot imagine not having a place to hang my toothbrush,” said Montfort.

To my right, Kay Read talked about walking to school as a child in Tennessee and feeling very safe growing up in her neighborhood. Across from me was Ron Miller, he was raised on a farm in rural Kentucky and attended a grade school with only 80 students.

To the right of Ron sat Stephanie Hand, associate pastor for Providence UMC and a Morehead City native, she remembers that within her neighborhood “there was a sense of community to help me and my generation grow up.”

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Posted: March 20th, 2012 Lee Howard

Here are stories that caught our eye recently...

In the past two years, nearly 70 homeless families in Charlotte have been able to leave overcrowded shelters and step into fully furnished homes, courtesy of a partnership of nonprofits and government agencies. Much of the credit goes to a volunteer group of 75 women from St. Gabriel and St. Matthew Catholic churches.

The Democratic National Convention announced that it plans to spend at least one-third of its money with businesses owned by minorities, women, veterans, people with disabilities and members of the gay community. The efforts include an online vendor directory to help local businesses land work during the DNC.

The Critical Need Response Fund began as a one-winter-only effort to help charities swamped by needy people. But it’s burgeoned into its fourth year, raising money for nonprofits that provide food, clothing shelter and warmth. The United Way, which took over the program in 2010, predicts this year's campaign will raise $100,000 to $300,000 for those in need.

Voices of Love is one of many gospel choirs in the Charlotte region. But what makes this choir unusual is that most of its members are homeless. A core group practices each week at Charlotte’s Urban Ministry Center.

Tim Alden Grant, Emilia Fuentes Grant, Adam Hobbs, and a whole cast of other locals, produced the Bad Romance: Women’s Suffrage video for Soomo Publishing. The video, which premiered recently to coincide with National Women’s Day, pays homage to Alice Paul and the generations of brave women who joined together in the fight to pass the 19th Amendment, giving women the right to vote in 1920.

Posted: March 16th, 2012 Amanda Pagliarini

The "Aunt Jemima" brand character sought to be a representation of the iconic Southern mammy in hopes of associating the pancake flour with good Southern cooking. This “Aunt Jemima” character was created in Manhattan by The J. Walter Thompson Agency.

According to Karen Cox and her recent book, “Dreaming of Dixie: How the South Was Created in American Pop Culture,” this packaging of stereotypical Southern culture has long been the norm. On March 12, a large audience gathered at Levine Museum of the New South to hear Cox talk about her new book, in which she concludes that Southern identity has often been produced, marketed and sold by non-Southerners.

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Posted: March 15th, 2012 Carla Hough

"You're not Tom Latimer," said a parishioner of St. Stephen United Methodist Church to the Rev. Donnie Garris. "No, I am not," Garris replied, as he relayed the occurrence to the congregation with a chuckle.

Taking over the pulpit from the Rev. Tom Latimer, the Rev. Garris left his usual spot at the predominately African-American Antioch Missionary Baptist Church to preach at St. Stephen, a predominately white congregation, as part of XChange Sermons, a project sponsored by Crossroads Charlotte and Mecklenburg Ministries.

Garris noted that three things he saw in the office of the Rev. Latimer led him to believe they weren't all that different. He saw volumes from the Interpreter series, which is his preferred series of Biblical commentary; books by one of his own favorite authors, C. S. Lewis; and perhaps the most comforting of the items as a die-hard Duke fan: the blue and white of Duke memorabilia.

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