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July 26, 2012

  • Ghana’s President Dies Suddenly

    Ghana’s President Dies Suddenly by Frederick H. Lowe President John Mills of the Republic of Ghana died suddenly on Tuesday at a military hospital, where he was being treated for an undisclosed illness, Martey Newman, his chief of staff, announced on Ghana’s official portal. “It is with a heavy heart and deep sorrow that we announce the sudden and untimely death of the President of the Republic of Ghana---his excellency, Professor John Atta Mills.

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  • Study: Blacks Find Few Places to Get a Photo ID in the Rural South

    Study: Blacks Find Few Places to Get a Photo ID in the Rural South African Americans who live in rural areas of Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia face significant challenges visiting department of motor vehicle (DMV) or county election offices to obtain state-issued photo-identification cards.

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  • African Union Elects First Woman Chairman

    African Union Elects First Woman Chairman by Frederick H. Lowe The African Union Commission, which is the administrative branch of the African Union, elected Dr. Nkosazana Clarise Dlamini-Zuma chairman at the organization’s meeting in Addis Ababa, Ethopia. Dr.

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  • Group Honors First R.I. Public School to Enroll Black Children

    Group Honors First R.I. Public School to Enroll Black Children The Rhode Island Black Heritage Society on Saturday will unveil a plaque at the former Meeting Street School, which in 1828 became the first public school in Rhode Island and one of the first in the nation to enroll African-American children as students.

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  • The NorthStar's Books

    The NorthStar's Books A Plaque And A New Biography Give Forgotten Black Opera Star An Encore by Frederick H.

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  • Foreclosures Hit Black Seniors Hardest

    Foreclosures Hit Black Seniors Hardest New America Media WASHINGTON, D.C.—The mortgage crisis has slammed every age group—especially the oldest Americans 75-plus -- and has hit Latino and African-American seniors and their families the hardest, according to a study being released by the Washington, D.

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  • Virginia Cops Fired After Expressing Desires to See Obama Dead

    RICHMOND, Va. (TriceEdneyWire.com) - Two White Richmond police officers have been fired for calling for the assassination of President Barack Obama during his campaign visit to the city in May.

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  • Olympics May Not Bear Out Promises

    Olympics May Not Bear Out Promises New America Media Three days of grassroots activism, petitions and popular pressure have resulted in a reversal of the British Olympic Association’s decision to deny press accreditation to The Voice, the UK’s only national, weekly newspaper for the black community. The Voice had been denied official media access to the Olympic Games, with organizers citing a lack of space, despite the presence of many black athletes on the British Olympic team, and despite the fact that roughly 700 press passes were set aside for UK media.

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  • 'God's Plan' to Kill?

    'God's Plan' to Kill? By Julianne Malveaux (TriceEdneyWire.com) - George Zimmerman, the Florida man who killed Trayvon Martin, told Fox News personality Sean Hannity that the events that occurred on Feb. 26, 2012 were “God’s will.

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  • Usher's Stepson Dies; Funeral Services Scheduled

    Usher's Stepson Dies; Funeral Services Scheduled Willie A Watkins Funeral Home Inc. will hold a viewing on Thursday, July 26, for Singer Usher's 11-year-old stepson, Kile Glover, who died two weeks after an accident on a lake.

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  • Sherman Hemsley

    Sherman Hemsley Sherman Hemsley, who played George Jefferson on the popular television sitcom The Jeffersons, died on Tuesday at his home in El Paso, Texas. He was 74.

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  • Sylvia Woods

    Sylvia Woods Sylvia Woods, who co-founded Sylvia's restaurant in Harlem with her husband, Herbert Woods, in 1962, was remembered during a more than two-hour service on Tuesday at Abyssinian Baptist Church.

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  • The NorthStar’s Week in Black History

    The NorthStar’s Week in Black History July 26 through August 1 July 26 1916 ----- Born on this date in Richmond, Va., Spottiswood W. Robinson, III was an educator, civil-rights attorney, judge and the first black person to be appointed to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia.

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Big Cheese Supplier Eats Crow

Leprino Foods Inc., a Denver-based federal food contractor, has agreed to pay $550,000 to more than 250 African- American, Hispanic and Asian individuals who were denied entry-level jobs at the company’s plant in Lemoore, Calif.

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs (OFCCP) entered into a consent decree to resolve charges of systemic hiring discrimination at the company’s Lemoore West facility, Labor Department officials announced on July 19.

An administrative law judge signed the consent decree, which settled allegations that Leprino gave select job applicants a pre-employment test called WorkKeys that discriminated against African-American, Asian and Hispanic job applicants.  

The OFCCP charged that WorkKeys created an artificial barrier to employment for some workers.

Leprino Foods disagreed. "We are proud of our diverse workforce and it’s important that we employ the best people to help ensure we produce the safest cheese and dairy ingredients of the highest quality," said Ted Wietecha, a company spokesperson."At Lemoore West alone, we produce over a million pounds of cheese every day. Hiring the best people, developing their capabilities and engaging them in the importance of their work are essential to our success. While we defend our use of WorkKeys as a pre-employment screening tool, we decided to enter into a mediation process to see if we could reach a mutually agreeable settlement."

The government said Leprino agreed to discontinue using the WorkKeys as a pre-job screening test.

Investigators from the OFCCP who investigated Leprino learned that the company violated Executive Order 11246, which prohibits federal contractors and subcontractors from discriminating on the basis of race, color, religion and national origin in their employment practices.

Since 2005, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farm Services Agency has awarded Leprino more than $50 million in contracts to supply mozzarella cheese and other dairy products to the federal government.

In their investigation, the OFCCP found that the WorkKeys exam was not job-related because it tested applicants’ skills in math, locating information and observation. Those skills are not critical to entry-level tasks of performed by on-call laborers, such as inspecting products, monitoring equipment, and maintaining sanitation at the facility, government officials said.

The financial settlement covers 253 workers who applied for, but were rejected for jobs between January 2005 and October 2006. The company also agreed to hire at least 13 applicants who applied for jobs during that period.

“I am pleased that we were able to reach a fair settlement in this matter,” said Patricia Shiu, director of OFCCP. “While employers can and should hire the most-qualified workers for the job, they cannot create artificial barriers to employment that unfairly block any individual from competing for good jobs.”

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