Come hang out with CAV every Thursday at 7pm for REAL TALK THURSDAYS.   Come discuss the REAL issues that need to be addressed in order for MILWAUKEE to reach it's greatness.  We are not only exchanging information and bringing forth research, we also are transforming conversations into actions.

Hope to see you there!

Bronzeville own's Poetry Unplugged at Soche Milwaukee!  Yeah, Bronzeville's back once again!

Make sure you come every Tuesday to see the nation's top spoken word artists and musicians do their thing.  Hosted by Kwabena Nixon with Cigarette Break.

8pm SHARP!
And it only costs $7.

With the green economy, green wave sweeping throughout the world, young people have yet another chance to make a difference.  Green economy equals opportunity to address global warming and poverty all at once. 

We need to develop a clearer understanding that giving jobs that most need doing, to the people who most need the jobs, contributes to improvements in quality of life.  If the green economy does not include the majority then it will fail causing Eco-apartheid.  There is a potential to generate $130 billion plus dollars in next ten years, which is enough money to heal the suffering of urban America through green economy. 

Check out this information from The Sentencing Project

• Drug Offenders in Prison and Jail Exceed Half Million; 1200% Increase Since 1980
• Record 905,600 African Americans Currently Incarcerated

  WASHINGTON, DC - The Department of Justice reported today that as of year end 2006, there were a record 2,258,983 adults in prison or jail in the United States, an increase of 2.9% since last year.  At yearend there were 7,211,400 persons under correctional supervision, including prison, jail, probation and parole, an increase of 2.3% in 2006.  One in 31 adults was under some form of correctional supervision.  An analysis of the new figures by The Sentencing Project finds that there are now more than a half million persons in prison or jail nationally for a drug offense.  From a figure of 41,100 prisoners incarcerated for a drug offense in 1980, there has been a 1200% increase resulting from the "war on drugs," leading to an estimated 532,400 drug offenders today.  This figure includes an estimated 249,400 persons in state prisons, 93,800 in federal prison, and 189,200 in local jails. 

Black Americans are more dissatisfied with their progress than at any time in the past 20 years, and less than half say life will get better for them in the future.

A poll released Tuesday by the Pew Research Center found that one in five blacks say things are better for them now than five years ago. In 1984, almost two in five blacks said things were better than they were five years earlier.

Less than half of blacks surveyed say they think life will get better, compared with 57% in 1986.

The Pew survey shows little change in race relations since the Jena Six story. One in four white people say they have a very favorable view of black people, compared with 17% in 1990. Meanwhile, 27% of blacks say they have a very favorable view of whites, a figure that has remained constant for two decades.

An independent panel is considering reducing the sentences of inmates incarcerated in federal prisons for crack cocaine offenses, which would make thousands of people immediately eligible to be freed.

The U.S. Sentencing Commission, which sets guidelines for federal prison sentences, established more lenient guidelines this spring for future crack cocaine offenders. The panel is scheduled to consider today a proposal to make the new guidelines retroactive.

Should the panel adopt the new policy, the sentences of 19,500 inmates would be reduced by an average of 27 months. About 3,800 inmates now imprisoned for possession and distribution of crack cocaine could be freed within the next year, according to the commission's analysis. The proposal would cover only inmates in federal prisons and not those in state correctional facilities, where the vast majority of people convicted of drug offenses are held.  (original content from Washington Post)

On Thursday, Oct 18th  at 7:00 PM Autumn Blaze tore down the stage at her show, Autumn Blaze presents After the Darkness. This special event featured performances from The CAV's own Muhibb Dyer and Kwabena Nixon, and also featured get ups from many of Milwaukee's top fashion designers.

This spoken word jamboree took place at the Scottish Rite Center (790 N Van Buren St) in downtown Milwaukee. 

When 16-year-old Preston J. Blackmer was murdered outside of his foster mother's home in Milwaukee in April of 2005 most people living in the midsized Midwestern city barely noticed. After all, death is almost an every-other-day occurrence in "Kilwaukee." Especially in Blackmer's neighborhood where teenage drug dealers often sell dimes, sacks of crack and weed to their extended family members to keep the fridge full.

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From cell phones to minidv Handycams, video cameras are everywhere.  So it's not surprising that an increasing number of police deparments are using video to catch bad guys. Although,  in this clip Bobby Drake explains that some police departments aren't playing fair.

On September 1st, over 500 people showed up to the CAV's 3rd Annual Put the Guns Down Festival.  Some people showed up for food.  Others came to see extremely talented young people perform in the talent showcase.  Some, like the Campaign Against Violence's Atone Bishop, came to take part in the "Hood Olympics."

WOW>>>>LOL!!

The Obama Girl strikes again. This time she links up with Spice Girl lookalikes to take on Rudy Giuliani and a wicked coterie of female supporters.

With this type of campaigning who needs organizers.

Hilarious.

Click the You Tube link to the left.

Mayfair loses money and youth get an extra hour to shop.  Score one for Milwaukee's youth!

On Thursday, August 15th the CAV attended a public hearing on the Wisconsin State budget at Serb Hall.   Folks from Urban Underground were also in attendance and repped hard for young people. We even got a shot out from 1290 AM's Casandra Casandra and The Milwaukee Labor Council's Shelia Cochran.

Are you waiting for the next great leader to save you? You better wake up!  We are the ones we are waiting for!! Peep this article by The League's Biko Baker about Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr.

In 1994 the African National Congress (ANC) took control of the South African Parliament after nearly fifty years of struggle against Afrikaner rule. The ANC, under the direction of former political prisoner and movement hero Nelson Mandela, promised to bring unity and equality to a country that had been ravaged by Apartheid, a system of institutional discrimination that was very similar to America’s “jim crow.”  Since then the ANC has been the most POWERFUL political party in Africa.

Today young voters are "pissed"  at the ANC.  Guess voter apathy is a universal concept.

Campaign Against Violence teams up with Top Class barbershop for a Fourth of July Picnic.