An amusing line in the Rhino

I saw an amusing article in the Rhino Times about the candidates for the upcoming city council elections. It went something like this: "Ed Whitfield is a 60's radical which doesn't translate into many votes in this millenium."

I guess that I have to admit that I am proud of having been an active part of the most significant period of social change in this country since the civil war. Their reduction of me to only being a "60's radical" leaves out the last four decades or so of my life, though.

During that time I was Chairman of the Greensboro Redevelopment Commission for nine years, the Chairmain of the CommunityAdvisory Committee for the Basic Skills Program at GTCC, Chairman of the Board of Directors for the Triad Minority Development Corporation, on the Advisory Committee for the Multi Modal Transit Center, on the Technology Advisory Committee for the new public library, a member of the Enterprise Communities Task Force, on the Citizens Task Force for the Prevention of Crime and Violence, on the Greensboro Community Initiative -- looking into issues of education, on the Advisory Committee for the Electronics Program for the School of Technology at A&T State University and a few other things that I hardly remember.

I have been busy since the 60's and I stay busy now. The spirit with which I approach my current activism, however, is the spirit that I inherited from the 60's. It tells me that when something is wrong we need to think hard and work hard to change it. I am looking forward to carrying that spirit with me onto the Greensboro City Council.

Ed

It's All Official Now

The filing deadline for the upcoming City Council Elections has ended. I will be running for the District 2 seat now held by Claudette Borroughs-White along with three other candidates. I am really looking forward for this opportunity to articulate a vision for the future of our community.

I think this is the time for this campaign to be successful. I first ran for this seat in 1983, the first year of district elections, against my friend Katie Dorsett. During that campaign I got to put forth some views of ways that the city could become more involved in housing issues that later became city policy. In the years following I spent ten years on the Greensboro Redevelopment Commission and was Chairman for nine of those years.

Since rotating off the Redevelopment Commission, most of my work in the community has been around education issues, volunteering a lot in elementary schools, as well as peace and justice issues broadly chairing the Greensboro Peace Coalition.

I have had the good fortune of being a regular columnist for the Carolina Peacemaker and have tried to use that forum to help facilitate some forward thinking on where we are as a community and how we fit into the world.

I am really looking forward to this campaign.

HERE WE GO!