What Do You Think?
-
Supreme Court Strikes Down Texas Abortion Law
The Supreme Court struck down a Texas abortion law Monday that advocates argued made it more difficult for women to receive an abortion. The court ruled the law placed an undue burden on women. The court’s opinion is available online here. Justice Stephen Breyer authored the court’s opinion. The court ruled 5-3. Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg… Read More
What Do You Think?
-
Florida Senator Knew I Was A Journalist Doing My Job. She Called The Police Anyway
What’s News In This Story?
Published: 8-9-18 at 4:25 PM EST
–State Senator Daphne Campbell (D-North Miami Beach) called the police on a RISE NEWS reporter for filming her during a Miami Shores Village Council meeting.
–A police report shows that Senator Campbell knew that the man filming her in the public place was a reporter.
–Campbell also called the police on a Miami Herald reporter earlier today while she was debating her primary opponent Jason Pizzo in North Miami Beach.
–The Executive Director of the Radio Television Digital News Association- an advocacy group for broadcast stations and online publications, blasted Campbell for trying to intimidate RISE NEWS.
———
Statement from RISE NEWS Publisher Rich Robinson:
“State Senator Daphne Campbell called the police on me for committing an act of journalism.
While we’ve known that this took place for over three months, we only received a copy of the police report today.
Coincidentally, Senator Campbell also called the police on Miami Herald reporter Sarah Blaskey today.
Update: @daphnecampbell called the police on me for “threatening behavior” at this event. Last time I checked, asking questions at a public forum was allowed. Don’t worry guys, cops didn’t think the complaint was credible.
— Sarah Blaskey (@Blaskey_S) August 9, 2018
In both cases, police did not take Senator Campbell’s claims to be credible.
On May 1, 2018, I attended the tail-end of a public meeting of the Miami Shores Village Council.
I knew that Senator Campbell would be there and I wanted to get some more b-roll shots of her in action in the community for possible use in future stories.
I filmed Senator Campbell interacting with members of the Miami Shores council and filmed her as she left the building.
I also filmed her while she was driven away in a car.
All the while, I stayed on a public sidewalk.
I’ve been trained to report the facts and hold the powerful to account.
I’m allowed to do all of this thanks to our nation’s First Amendment.
Senator Campbell doesn’t seem familiar with the protections for members of the press laid out in the Constitution, so she called the police.
The police didn’t seem to take her claims seriously.
Sen Campbell Police Report by Rich on Scribd
They never contacted me or reached out to RISE NEWS for information on this matter.
I’m a journalist who is working hard to create another way for South Florida to receive its news in this rapidly-changing media world.
I’ve been trained to report the facts and hold the powerful to account.
But I’ve also been trained to follow the law while doing it.
In 2015, I was one of a handful of young journalists to have been invited to the University of South Carolina’s Media Law School.
During that training program, we had a crash course in how to aggressively report while remaining on the right side of the law.
Like all trustworthy news organizations, RISE NEWS hems to a set of ethical guidelines laid out by trade organizations.
We follow those laid out by the Radio Television Digital News Association, Society of Professional Journalists and the Associated Press.
We will follow the law.
But we will not be silenced.”
———
Statement from Radio Television Digital News Association Executive Director Dan Shelley:
“The fact that any elected official would summon the police simply because a journalist is performing his or her lawful, constitutionally-guaranteed duty to seek and report the truth is as reprehensible as it is absurd.
While I certainly can’t read Sen. Campbell’s mind, it’s hard to draw any conclusion other than her calling the police on RISE NEWS Publisher Rich Robinson was direct retribution for previous stories RISE had responsibly reported regarding her admitted attempts to seek special treatment from Florida Power & Light in the aftermath of Hurricane Irma last year.
One of the most important jobs of journalists is to hold the powerful accountable.
We commend RISE and Robinson for doing just that in September 2017, and defend their right – no, their obligation – to report on the public activities of Sen. Campbell and other elected officials in the communities they serve.”
———
For third-party reporting on what happened, read this piece from the Miami New Times:
—Here’s Something Else To Watch—
Opinion: South Dade Needs Rail Not More Buses
RISE NEWS is South Florida’s digital TV news network. Sign up for our awesome email newsletter to make sure you never miss a story!
Have a news tip about this topic or something completely different? Send it to [email protected]
What Do You Think?
-
On The Whole, Americans Don’t Seem To Really Care About Homeless People
They sleep quietly, waiting in plain sight to be spotted or recognized.
Humans treated inhumanely out of ignorance, discomfort, or fear.
They see everything and yet everything overlooks them; they are the homeless of America.
In an article in The Atlantic, Stephen Lurie references a recent Gallup poll stating that, “just 2 percent of respondents said that the category of “Poverty/Hunger/Homelessness” constituted “the most important problem facing this country today.”
It is easy to say that homelessness is a sad and important issue in this country, but it is another thing to actually prioritize the lives of those in need.
We as a country do not take care of homeless people.
People are not interested in statistics regarding the homeless.
isidewith.com’s homepage for the most important topics of 2016 does not even include homelessness as a prioritized topic.
So does the country just simply not care about those in need, or is there a different problem in place?
Carey Fuller of the Huffington Post put it best stating that, “homelessness isn’t an invisible problem; it’s a highly ignored and marginalized problem which ends up making the problem worse for homeless people.”
We aren’t afraid to admit that there is a significant problem of homelessness in this country, but we are terrified to feel any form of personal responsibility for a homeless person.
Photo Credit: Karim Corban/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
A capitalist society often causes a perception that those in bad situations are responsible for their misfortunes.
The whole, “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” ideal is one that many Americans believe in, even if they themselves never had to do so in order to find success.
The problem isn’t always the homeless individual; the problem is a government and a society that does not see that individual as an equal American.
The problem is a system that is put in place to make rich people richer and poor people poorer.
A very famous video of a 2011 study at Harvard explained that 90 percent of Americans believe that economic wealth should be more equally distributed than they perceive it to be now.
Another part of the video plays into this idea describing the “American Dream”, and that people need motivation to work hard in order to achieve success and “keep our country moving forward”.
WATCH: Wealth Inequality In America
Like this? You can write for us too!
So maybe that’s it? Maybe it is easy to disregard the homeless because they are not perceived as helpful members of society?
Photo Credit: Victoria Johnson/ Flick (CC 2.0)
Well then let’s look at the numbers for this idea: Green Doors explained that the homeless visit emergency rooms more frequently and stay in hospitals for a longer period of time.
Here is what their study showed: “Each visit [for the homeless] costs $3,700; that’s $18,500 spent per year for the average person and $44,400 spent per year for the highest users of emergency departments.”
Moyers & Company published an article that found it costs $21,000 more to “ignore the homeless than it does to give them homes”.
These numbers come from the cost of medical attention, incarceration, shelters, etc.
So clearly this idea that leaving these people homeless is a cheaper option that actually fixing the problem is widely inaccurate.
The proven truth, is that helping the homeless find a permanent home is much more successful than ignoring them.
An NPR article declared that Utah reduced their chronic homeless population by 91 percent after instating their Housing First initiative.
The Utah solution focuses on putting people in stable housing situations first before dealing with other service needs. And people put into these homes are expected to pay monthly rent for them. But the mix of refocusing priorities and demanding accountability seems to have worked.
Granted, Utah is much smaller than states with a greater homeless population, but their work still proves that solving this problem can be done, and it can benefit everyone.
Personally dealing with the homeless on a day-to-day basis should not resemble an obstacle course of averting eye contact and speeding up ones pace when walking by someone; but it does, and it always will.
The only way to deal with the homeless and represent “American ideals” is to make poverty a prioritized topic, and create national conversation that works towards helping these individuals in a permanent and meaningful way.
If an individual can succeed of the help from family inheritance and support, homeless can and should be allowed to succeed with the help of the country’s support.
RISE NEWS is a grassroots journalism news organization that is working to change the way young people become informed and engaged in public affairs. You can write for us.
Cover Photo Credit: Moise Nicu/ Flickr (CC By 2.0)
What Do You Think?