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Posted: April 28th, 2011 Liz Barrett

On the evening of Friday, April 8^th at Winterfield Elementary off Central Avenue, students from three CMS elementary schools came together to celebrate the heritage of Latino culture through dance and to embrace the diversity of the Charlotte community. In its third year, Dancing for Diversity is the culminating event of a year long Latin American Women’s Association program called Padres Y Padrinos (Parents and Godparents) that focuses on mentoring and community building between Latino parents, children and their schools.

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Posted: April 27th, 2011 Greg Lacour

Some stories worth sharing this week:

• One of Charlotte’s longest-tenured local officials may be on his way out: Harry Jones, Mecklenburg County’s chief executive since 2000, is a finalist for the first professional manager’s job in Jefferson County, Ala., the state’s largest. Do you think it’s time for a change in county leadership?


• Some stunning (in a good way) news from the Levine Museum of the New South, which halfway through its 20^th-anniversary fundraising drive has raised nearly double its goal. It’s a remarkable feat considering how difficult it’s been for nonprofits and cultural institutions to raise money the last couple of years.


• Some stunning (in a bad way) news from Central Piedmont Community College, where budget cuts have forced the elimination of the executive director position at the college’s widely praised Center For Sustainability. Come July 1, Ernie McLaney – who has coordinated green programs at the college for more than five years – will be out of a job.


• Want to feel a little better about your fellow bipedal primates? Read this story about Charlotte’s “Mystery Man.”


• And here’s a lovely story about a couple whose common history, rooted in the Civil Rights movement, helped bring them together again in Charlotte after more than 40 years.

Posted: April 26th, 2011 Lee Howard

In his powder-blue shirt and brown corduroy jacket, the boyish, 32-year-old Rye Barcott hardly looks the part of a former Marine captain, let alone crusader for social and economic change in a Nairobi slum.

But Barcott, who lives in Charlotte, founded Carolina for Kibera, a nonprofit organization trying to promote leadership development, reduce poverty and establish a network of programs advancing health, ethnic cooperation, gender equality and economic empowerment in Kenya.

He was at Owen’s Bagel & Deli on Saturday to sign his book, “It Happened on the Way to War.” It chronicles his experiences as a young Marine who finds himself in war-torn Kenya, one hand holding a rifle and the other outstretched in peace. Barcott joined the Corps after graduating from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2000, then asked to be assigned to violence prevention in Africa because of a surfeit of lieutenants in the Middle East.

Barcott, a native of West Greenwich, R.I., acknowledged struggling with the duality of his missions. After stumbling through training at Quantico, Barcott learned to embrace his role as a leader of fighting men battling to maintain order in a pre-9/11 African nation fraught with civil war, violence and extreme poverty.

“The sheer volume and injustice of it can be overwhelming,” Barcott told the crowd of 30 or more who gathered to hear his presentation.

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Posted: April 25th, 2011 Greg Lacour

Joanna Ball had come with a friend of hers, someone who volunteers at Urban Ministry Center (UMC), who’d told her about an art exhibit at a Presbyterian church featuring paintings by homeless people. Ball was, you might say, intrigued.

By the time she’d taken in the 22 pieces hanging in the gallery at Warehouse 242, she was something else: impressed.

“I think the art’s fantastic, and there’s always a story behind it,” Ball said. “I like its connection to the community – like this guy over here, Chilly Willie?” She pointed to one of the pieces, a black-and-white portrait of a man with unkempt hair and a beard.

“He’s a homeless guy in Charlotte. He roams around my neighborhood on a regular basis, actually,” she said. “So the fact that this art ties directly to the life I live is indicative of its power.”

It’s one of the reasons why Steve Whitby, Warehouse 242’s creative director, called Tyler Helfrich of UMC a couple of months ago with the idea to hold an exhibit and art sale at the church. Warehouse 242 is an evangelical Presbyterian church that emphasizes art in worship and courts congregants who don’t feel comfortable in mainstream churches; Helfrich directs ArtWorks 945, the outreach and housing retention wing of UMC, which helps feed and shelter the homeless.

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