Who owns Representatives Amash and Huizenga?
The mid-term elections are over a year away, but politicians never wait around to raise money to keep their seats in Congress.
The Center for Responsive Politics now has the most recent FEC filings for the 2018 election, since the end of June. It’s always instructive to see who is funding candidates. In fact, one could say that those who currently contribute the most to political candidates essentially own them.
Campaign funds are not just to get politicians into office, they are a means to have access and to get politicians to decide on policy that is in the best interest of those making the contributions.
We looked at the current political contributions in the 2nd and 3rd Congressional races and here is what we found.
Representative Bill Huizenga, the incumbent, is running against Rob Davidson. According to the most recent data, Davidson has raised only $8,923, compared to Huizenga, who has raised $548,232. This is a seat that the Republicans have controlled for a long time and the 2018 election will not likely alter that reality.
Huizenga sits on the Capital Markets, Securities, and Investment Subcommittee and the Monetary Policy and Trade Subcommittee. Therefore, it is not surprising that the primary contributors to his current election campaign are entities from the banking and financial sectors. 
Representative Justin Amash, in the 3rd Congressional District, is being challenged by Jeff Thomas. However, it isn’t much of a challenge, since Thomas has only raised $3,541, compared to the $140,160 that Amash has raised.
Unlike Rep. Huizenga, Rep. Amash receives a significant amount of contributions from more ideologically driven entities. One of the largest contributors is the DeVos-owned entity known as the WindQuest Group. Other groups on the list are Young Americans for Liberty, the Cato Institute and the DKT Liberty Project.
It seems clear that since there is no parity in fundraising between Thomas and Amash, that Amash is assured to maintain his seat for the 3rd Congressional District. As they say in the political world, campaign contributions are the mother’s milk of electoral politics.
We recently conducted an interview with artist Richard Kooyman, someone who has been critical of ArtPrize from the very beginning. Richard and his partner began a campaign to boycott ArtPrize, a campaign which you can find at this link https://www.facebook.com/groups/600028213541598/.
What made you decide to want to organize such a campaign?
ArtPrize/DeVos Resistance was organized by myself and Melanie Parke after the election of Donald Trump. We began the group when Betsy DeVos, one of ArtPrize’s founders choose to work for Trump, but our objection to the ArtPrize model began the very first year after it was announced.
As artists we felt boycotting an art event involving Betsy DeVos is an important political statement and it’s something artist’s could easily do. We started a Facebook page and a Twitter account. Both of these were blocked right away by ArtPrize.
We are calling for a boycott of ArtPrize by artist and viewers. We feel that if more people know about the connection of the DeVos’s to ArtPrize they wouldn’t want to attend an event that ultimately benefits the pocket book and cultural cache of Betsy DeVos and her family. Boycotting is a direct action that can have an important effect and it doesn’t cost you time or money. In fact, boycotting ArtPrize will save you time and money!
As an artist, what do you find objectionable about ArtPrize?
There are two heads to this snake called ArtPrize. One is the politics of the people behind ArtPrize and their view of Art, and the other is the event model itself. The two are intimately ensnarled.
The history of Dick and Betsy DeVos’s political activism is both religious and capitalist. There has been a lot written about them online. Janet Reitman wrote a great piece for Rolling Stone where she unpacks this really well.
There is this thread of privatization running through all of their political agenda. They have this belief that anything will be better off if it can be taken out of the governmental realm and privatized. The DeVos’s see the privatization of everything from schools to culture as an economic opportunity but also a way to control these things and to profit from them in the process. From the start ArtPrize was promoted as a return to “democracy” in the arts. They even called it “part social experiment”. The Grand Rapids Press quotes Betsy Devos as saying, “Dick and I share our son’s vision for encouraging everyone to explore the arts in a truly democratic way.”
From the onset that just smelled wrong to me. There is no inherent democratic quality to art. Art just is. You don’t “democratically” experience art. You experience it. It’s important to note that people like the DeVos’s aren’t advocating for “democracy” in banking or real estate or even when it comes to voting, so it beg’s the question why are they so concerned with “democracy” in the Arts? I can only guess that to the DeVos’s there is an element of controlling culture in the ArtPrize model which they liked. Culture like political opinion can be controlled if you have enough money and power and dictate the terms of engagement. And I think they didn’t want Institutions like the NEA, which they have wanted to eliminate for years, setting the narrative for culture. They want to set the narrative and they want to make money in the process.
The other head of the snake is the event model itself. It’s unsustainable for artists. It’s a pay -to -play model that takes advantage of artists as free content to capitalize off of. Let’s be honest, the real purpose behind ArtPrize isn’t Art, it’s the economic development of Grand Rapids businesses, many of which are owned by the DeVos family. I don’t think the DeVos’s really are interested in Art. They want to use artists to make money. Rick DeVos said as much. He once said that initially he wanted to have a film festival but realized it would be too expensive to put on so he decided to do an art competition. After ArtPrize8 the ArtPrize team televised a wrap up of the event and the first thing they started talking about was that ArtPrize made a record $28 million dollars. It seems it’s the most important selling pitch to them. ArtPrize has charts and diagrams that can tell you how many people came, and how far they walked, and how many hamburgers they ate, but they never tell you how much it costs the average artist to do ArtPrize.
ArtPrize makes $28 million dollars and yet they have the audacity to charge artist an application fee. ArtPrize will brag how they give out almost $200,000 in grants to artists but just do the math. $28 million vs. $200,000. The NY artist John Powers once called ArtPrize a “scrum for a prize”, which it is. It dangles this big carrot in front of artists, who have a hard enough time surviving in the world. It’s a model that uses us for their own financial gain and it’s not right.
Some people argue that since it is so successful, the majority of people really must love it. How do you respond to this?
It doesn’t really matter if a lot of people like it. In Spain lot’s of people like bullfighting, but that doesn’t make it right. Lot’s of people voted for Trump. That doesn’t mean they made the right choice.
ArtPrize is an example of the success of today’s neoliberal politics. ArtPrize is bright and shiny. You can buy swag. It has large crowds. It feels like something big is going on. It’s got that perfect aesthetic balance of cutting edge along with soft puppy dogs. But like most neoliberalism the harsher realities behind the scene aren’t always visible. Most people walking around don’t realize that these artists paid to apply, paid to make the work, ship their work, paid to be in GR for 19 days, and then had to ship it all home again, all while area businesses made $28 million dollars. People don’t see that aspect of ArtPrize.
There is this long standing myth that visual artists should be willing to show there work for free because it’s good exposure. That is changing. Organizations like Working Artist and the Greater Economy (W.A.G.E.) are arguing that visual artists need to be paid for what they provide society. Doctors, realtors, even politicians don’t work for free so why should artists. The people that attend ArtPrize for the most part are not an art buying crowd so ArtPrize should be more sensitive to the fact that they are getting all this content for free.
The other thing I hear over and over is how great ArtPrize is for children’s art education. How ironic, that the DeVos’s, who are the main driving force behind the destruction of our children’s public education, which includes art education, now proudly boast how great it is that a school class gets to spend one day looking at art downtown as a class trip. It’s sick. It’s an example of them controlling culture for their personal gain.
What are some of the important things that you think people should know about the DeVos Family?
A lot of artists and people who go to ArtPrize just don’t know about the political activism of the DeVos family and terrible things they have done to our society. More and more people are becoming aware now that Betsy DeVos is Secretary of Education but many don’t realize the millions of dollars these people have poured into political campaigns and PAC’s that want to eliminate a women’s right to choose, or their long term attack on public education, unions, and environmental regulations. The poisoning of the Flint water system happened because Rick Synder became governor put there by the DeVos’s. Betsy DeVos’s parents were the driving money behind California’s Prop 8. Her brother is the corporate mercenary Eric Prince, founder of BlackWater.
And the majority of people have no idea that Dick and Betsy DeVos gave a bunch of money to start the DeVos Institute of Arts Management which is now at the University of Maryland. Why does a extremely evangelical couple who made billions of dollars selling soap want to start an institute on the east coast that trains people in the administration and management of our arts institutions? I contend it’s about controlling culture.
Also the death of the NEA can be traced back to the DeVos family. For years they backed Peter Hoekstra as congressional representative in their district. They also backed Rep. Dick Armey from Texas. Both of these men were the driving force behind the campaign to eliminate the NEA back in 1996. And they have succeeded. We have basically no meaningful public support of the arts today because of the political influence of the DeVos family.
One claim that ArtPrize makes is that they make art more democratic with their voting system and that they have brought art to the masses. What is your take on this point?
Well the funny thing about ArtPrize’s initial “social experiment” is that it didn’t take them long to realize it wasn’t working too well for them and they were forced to change it. I think ArtPrize saw this populist idea of a public vote as a way of snubbing their noses at the his/herstorians, art writers, artists, and curators who spend their lives studying and working in the field of art. You don’t just wake up one day as an artist or an art historian or art writer. It takes a life time of knowledge building. ArtPrize wanted people to believe that Joe the plumber’s opinion on art was just as valid as all of the knowledge that experts have. The DeVos’s political activism doesn’t like experts. They don’t like expert scientists or expert historians. It’s too hard to push your own religious and economic agenda through if you have to deal with someone who is an expert. It’s too difficult to tear down environmental regulations aimed at corporate pollution if you have scientific experts to deal with. It make it more complicated to push your belief that a viable life begins at the moment of conception if you have those pesky scientific experts telling you it doesn’t.
The problem in ArtPrize’s “social experiment” came when a 13ft mosaic of Jesus with buffed up abdominal muscles won the grand prize. In the larger art world ArtPrize was seen as a bit of a joke because the public picked a horrendously schmaltzy piece as the grand prize. ArtPrize realized that if they really wanted to build a internationally recognized art event that maybe this public vote thing wasn’t the best idea after all. So
the next year they came up with this whole new narrative about exploring the “tension” between the public and a new juried vote. I’m thinking it pained the DeVos’s to have to do that. It went against everything ArtPrize was sent up to be about in the beginning.
I remember it being a pretty funny night on social media when Jesus won the grand prize.
Now ArtPrize seems to want it both ways. On one hand they create this narrative that your opinion is the most important thing and all you need to do is come to downtown and vote your feelings. And yet they also have been adding these educational aspects to the event to help people become better educated and to be able to think and converse better about art. This public vote thing is just a great big marketing pitch to get people to show up by creating this false affect of empowerment.
Why do you think so many artists chose to buy into an event like ArtPrize?
I don’t think that many artist do buy into it. I’m hoping the number who don’t will increase as more and more learn about the embedded interdependence between ArtPrize and The DeVos’s. I think this year the number of applicants is down to around 1400. That’s really not that many considering all the artists around the country.
Those that do attend may just not be aware of the political marriage between the DeVos’s and ArtPrize. I still get local artists who insist that the DeVos’s politics and ArtPrize are completely separate. That’s just not true. ArtPrize is listed as the primary project of the Dick and Betsy DeVos Family Foundation. Betsy listed it as her project on her personal foundation before she went to work for Trump and she served as a Director on the AP board until she went to Washington. The DeVos family still gives a lot of money to ArtPrize.
I believe in artists. I believe in their good hearts and I think that if most artists really knew about the DeVos’s and the facts, they wouldn’t apply.
What role(s) do you see art play in society and how does ArtPrize undermine these roles?
This is an important question to me. It’s the driving force behind why I have devoted so much time and attention watchdogging ArtPrize.
Art provides society with new ideas and it asks both new and age old questions. It is
the purest human action we create. When you come to a work of art, whether that is a painting or a dance performance, it’s not about you. It’s really about surrendering yourself, if only for a moment, to what the artist has done. T.S Eliot said art isn’t about self expression, it’s about the extinction of the self. You are getting the self and all your baggage out of the way, to be able to have this profound aesthetic experience.
ArtPrize could have decided to put on a purely aesthetic experience for people. And they could have decided they would pay artists to do this. Dick and Betsy could have afforded to do this without any outside help. If that was the case I would have less of a problem with the event.
But they don’t do that. Not only do they use artists for their financial gain but they intentionally scheme an aesthetics that resembles and extols corporate culture. They are saying don’t surrender yourself by learning from the artist. They are saying your personal opinion, is more important than what the artist wants you to think. From the beginning ArtPrize wasn’t about the pleasure of experiencing art, it was about saying everyone is going to be the judge of art. They are advocating not to surrender yourself to art, but to assert your personal opinion over art. Rick DeVos intentionally made a for profit contest, a commercial game, a circus, out of the aesthetic experience. That’s a shameful and ignorant handling of something that is very important and special to me.
Giving us the government take: MLive essentially copies what Homeland Security had to say about ICE raids in Grand Rapids this week
As many of you know, there were numerous arrests made in the Grand Rapids area by ICE agents, targeting the undocumented community.
MLive ran a story yesterday, noting that a total of 33 arrests were made since last Sunday. Well, at least we were all led to believe it was a story. What MLive posted yesterday, was essentially a re-print of a US Department of Homeland Security News Release on the 33 ICE arrests that took place in the Grand Rapids area this week.
Below, we put side by side the text of the US Department of Homeland Security news release (on the left) and the MLive article (on the right) to show how similar they are. The MLive story did not use all of the text from the Homeland Security office news release and they did move some things around, but MLive essentially did no reporting on this story and no verification of claims made in this article. It is difficult enough for people to trust the government, but here is an example of why you shouldn’t trust corporate media either.
Since at least last Sunday, Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers have been engaged in what they refer to as Fugitive Operations. Fugitive Operations is when ICE agents have a list of people they want to target who are undocumented, often with minor offenses like driving without a license.
These Fugitive Operations create a climate of terror in the immigrant community, which always experiences tremendous amount of fear. Some people don’t want to leave their homes for fear of being picked up by ICE agents. Parents fear that ICE agents will take them, leaving their children to come home and not knowing where there parents are.
I work with the Rapid Response to ICE team in Grand Rapids. We have been made aware of at least 6 cases of ICE agents taking people throughout the greater Grand Rapids area.
On Sunday, ICE agents attempted to apprehend a man on the northwest side of Grand Rapids. Fortunately, he knew not to open the door and then contacted people to come to his aid. For now, he and his family are safe, but they live in constant fear that ICE agents will find them.
Over the next few days, the Rapid Response to ICE team received several more calls about ICE agents taking people from their families and putting them in detention in Calhoun County at the Battle Creek Detention Facility.
Some people can request a bond to get their family member out, but the bond is usually set at $5,000. The Rapid Response to ICE team has been asked to help raise funds for some of these families.
Yesterday, I received a call from a pastor of a church in the Wyoming area. Another immigrant had been taken by ICE agents and his wife, who is also undocumented, now fears for her life. Fortunately, the church had volunteers stay at the home with this woman, so that she would not be alone and at risk of being taken by ICE.
The same pastor told me of several other cases in his congregation of immigrants who have either had a family member taken in the past week or have been given orders to appear in court for their check-in. If people don’t go to their check ins, they put themselves at greater risk of being detained and deported. However, we know that at more and more places around the country, when people do court check-ins, they are often being apprehended by ICE agents right after going to their appointment.
The immigrant community in Grand Rapids is under siege right now and we can not sit by idly and do nothing. There are numerous ways that people can be in solidarity with those most at risk of being targeted by ICE agents.
- You can be part of the Rapid Response to ICE. To be part of this effort, you need to attend a training. The next training is Tuesday, August 22nd from noon til 2pm at Plymouth UCC, located at 4100 Kalamazoo SE. Here is a link to the next next Rapid Response to ICE Training on Facebook, which provides more details.
- You can help us distribute these cards, which are in Spanish and English and provides information on what to do if ICE Agents show up at your door. Cut and paste this jpeg version of what we are handing out. If you want hard copies of the card, contact me at jsmith@griid.org.
- You can help us distribute these cards throughout the community and have conversation with your family, friends, co-workers and neighbors about the fact that every day people are being picked up by ICE agents, taken from their families and being out into detention.
- You can do what the pastor of the church in Wyoming is doing, which is to build relationships with immigrants and offer solidarity when you can, like the example of volunteers staying with the woman who was vulnerable to ICE agents. We need to look out for each other.
- You can offer hospitality or sanctuary for people who are being targeted. This is a big issue that we are facing is finding a safe place for people to stay, even if it is just for a few days. Talk to people in your congregation about becoming a sanctuary church in order to prevent more people from being taken by ICE.
- You can donate money to support legal fees, to help cover rent, groceries and other basic necessities for families that are being threatened by ICE agents. If you want to know where to send me, just ask me and I can share that information.
- You can also check out resources, like this Defense Against ICE Raids and Community Arrests Toolkit.
For those of us who are not at risk of being detained or deported, we need to step up and stand alongside those who are at risk and say, if you take them you are going to have to take us as well.
Media Questions directed at Betsy DeVos demonstrates that commercial news agencies really are stenographers to power
It is well known that politicians, and often those deeply involved in partisan politics, are trained to deal with the news media. Quite often public relations firms or consultants will provide training and offer ongoing advise on how to deal with controversial matters, how to respond to questions from the public or how not to respond to questions from the public, at least how not to respond to questions directly.
Politicians are often the masters of double speak, at least those that are well trained and know how to maintain control in circumstances that could be potentially disastrous.
Betsy DeVos has been around politics for most of her life. She was the chair of the Michigan Republican Party for many years, has been involved in numerous political campaigns and has sat on numerous boards for organizations that have state and national affiliation. She knows how to deal with the news media and has perfected the art of political double speak.
Yesterday, MLive posted an article with the headline, Watch Betsy DeVos weigh in on LGBTQ rights, budget cuts and protesters.
The post was based upon a “media session,” where Betsy DeVos answered questions from several Grand Rapids news agencies during her visit to Grand Rapids on Tuesday. The questions primarily had to do with current issues her office is dealing with and one that was completely independent of education issues. There are two questions/responses that I wanted to address, since they are both rather instructive in terms of how politicians respond to reporters.
The first response I want to look at has to do with the education budget and how or if DeVos would intervene if LGBTQ students were discriminated against.
As you can see, Betsy DeVos responded by saying that the education budget would “support the most the most vulnerable students.” The essentially repeats that the budget will focus on supporting students with the greater need, but never clarifies or provides examples of what that would look like. She then emphasizes the states role in making decisions on how best to use the dollars provided by the federal government.
It is hard to know whether or not the reporter who asked this question asked a follow up question or contested the Education Secretary’s response, since the MLive videos are cut off right after her responses. However, it is fairly common for commercial news reporters to not ask challenging questions and to often act as stenographers for those in power.
We do know that the education budget would negatively impact many vulnerable students, particularly Native Hawaiian, Alaskan students and some Special Education programs, which are to be eliminated. If the reporter knew this fact and if they practiced sound journalism, they would have challenged the Education Secretary on her response. A competent reporter would also know that the Every Student Succeeds Act was essentially crafted by the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).
The last thing about this response from Betsy DeVos is that she makes sure NOT to respond to the question asked about whether or not she will intervene if states discriminate against LGBTQ students. This is particularly where the PR/double speak training comes in. Don’t respond to questions you don’t want to answer, particularly questions that could lead to providing a mechanism for the public to hold politicians accountable.
This second video is really an example of a reporter internalizing the values of systems of power. The reporter does what real journalists should never do, which, in this case is to praise the DeVos Family for all they have done for Grand Rapids and West MI. The reporter also asks her about how it makes her feel when there are people in the streets protesting her. Wow! Talk about showing your bias.
The response that Betsy DeVos gives is also a great example of double speak. She frames the public protest of her policies as “people resisting change” and that what she is doing is to remain focused on doing what is best for all students. This response deserves an Orwellian award, since she not only refuses to acknowledge that there is significant public opposition to what she is doing as Secretary of Education, she took a potentially volatile question and stuck to her mantra of claiming to fight for all students.
In the end, both of these video responses provide us with invaluable examples of political double speak and they demonstrate that commercial news media is in no way interested actually practicing sound journalism.
Protestors confront Betsy DeVos during her visit to GRCC
Yesterday, about 40 people showed up to the Grand Rapids Community College to confront Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos as she toured a few buildings on campus.
The DeVos family has contributed significantly to GRCC over the years, which resulted in the former Davenport College on Fulton St. being named the DeVos Campus.
MLive had reported less than 24 hours ago that DeVos would be making a stop in Grand Rapids, thus making it difficult for people to turn out on short notice. 
DeVos was in Grand Rapids earlier that morning and visited with students at the Van Andel Education Institute, which is not a public education facility. It was a strategic move on the part of the Education Secretary to not announce her visit to the Van Andel Education Institute.
People involved in organizing today’s action began meeting near the GRCC campus at 12:30 and were under surveillance by the GRCC campus security and the GRPD, which had officers in cars all over the campus.
Once it was determined which building Betsy DeVos would be entering, those protesting lined up along Ransom Street in front of the GRCC campus. You can see people in the pictures that were there to confront DeVos and you can see law enforcement people waiting inside the parking ramp.
DeVos showed up in a white SUV with tinted windows, followed by another vehicle, also with tinted windows, before anyone realized it was her.
However, those who organized the protest were undeterred and went up to the campus and inside the building hoping to confront the Secretary of Education while touring the building. People were met by campus security who told them they would be arrested if they moved beyond a certain point, as you can see in the video here.
People with the group Socialist Alternative, then decided to go to the Godfrey St. campus of GRCC, since DeVos was headed there next. The group held the same large banner and was told by the GRPD that they could be on the property before DeVos’ vehicle showed up.
However, when the vehicle transporting Betsy DeVos showed up, people tried to block the entrance to the campus. The cops threatened to arrest them and those protesting did move, but not fast enough for the cops, since one of the people attempted to block the entrance was pushed and shoved.
Alex Kelley contributed to this article.
Johnson Center report on philanthropy fails to challenge the dominant narrative about wealth
The Johnson Center at GVSU, recently came out with a report on philanthropic giving in two communities. The report, Understanding Philanthropic Character of Communities, looks at philanthropic giving in Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids.
The report is rather academic and vague. More importantly, the report reflects the dominant narrative about foundations and philanthropy, which is to say they celebrate philanthropic giving without any critical analysis of what foundations represent.
My take on the role and functions of philanthropy are informed in part by several books which challenge the dominant narrative: The Revolution Will Not Be Funded: Beyond the Non-Profit Industrial Complex, by INCITE; Foundations and Public Policy: The Mask of Pluralism, by Joan Roelofs; and Under the Mask of Philanthropy, by Michael Barker. In addition, my own experience working within the non-profit industrial complex has informed me on how foundation funding impacts whats happens and what doesn’t happen in this community.
Philanthropy in GR: What Does Happen
According to the report by the Johnson Center, the bulk of the philanthropy in Kent County (for 2012) came from private foundations, not community foundations, as in seen in the graphic below.
The private foundations cited in the report are listed here on the right.
Most of these foundations, dominated by the DeVos family, are also part of the West MI Power structure. These families, besides having foundations, have tremendous economic and political power in the area and are known to influence local and state policy through their political contributions. Their political contributions are not factored into the Johnson Center report, which makes the report incomplete, since you cannot ignore the political contributions.
First, in the case of the DeVos family, their political contributions are much larger than the philanthropic dollars they give out on an annual basis.
Second, a great deal of money contributed by the DeVos family, and to a lesser degree other foundations on the list, provide significant amounts of funding to groups that promote policy that dismantles various forms of social welfare, such as public funding for schools, pensions and services which the state previously provided. Therefore, when foundations give money to non-profits, this money then seeks to fill a gap that they created through their influence in the policy arena. For instance, since public education spending has been reduced in Michigan for more than two decades or diverted to charter schools, the DeVos family can contribute significantly to private education programs like Potter’s House or Believe 2 Become, which is a way to introduce faith-based/entrepreneurial education into the Grand Rapids Public Schools. The result is that foundations, like the various DeVos foundations are often seen as very generous with the money, when in fact they use their wealth to create a social crisis and then fill the void with funding that they can control the outcomes with.
At the end of the Johnson Center report there are three areas of investigation on philanthropic giving: art, downtown development and education. We have already addressed the educational component to some degree, so lets look at arts and downtown development.
In regards to Kent County, the only philanthropy discussed in the Johnson Center Report is ArtPrize. The report states:
For all the controversy ArtPrize has engendered — whether over the quality of art selected through public voting, the “popularity contest” aspect of the public awards, the political activities of the DeVos family, or the rejection of specific works of art — ArtPrize is an undeniable success.
Calling it a success is not a very objective term, since the report never provides any clarity on how ArtPrize as been an undeniable success. Do they mean for the public, for the downtown businesses or the artists?
The other area the report looks at is on downtown development. You can see from this graphic here, how much foundation money and how much public money was put into various projects. It is important to note that these are projects initiated by Grand Action, which was created by Dick DeVos and other members of the local power structure, as a means to generate more revenue for their downtown assets – hotels, bars, restaurants and private parking lots.
Challenging the dominant narrative about foundations and philanthropic contributions
As was mentioned earlier, a critical view of foundations and philanthropic contributions is important, especially if we want to challenge the dominant narratives of class privilege.
There are five major critiques to this dominant narrative:
- Foundations are a way of creating tax havens for those with high levels of wealth and only a small percentage of the money in foundations actually is spent.
- Foundations are great PR for the capitalist class. Foundation giving distracts the public by getting us to praise those with wealth for their generosity, instead of critically examining how those who have foundations “made” their wealth.
- Foundations also engage in forms of population management. Charitable contributions are often a way to put the attention on those who are experiencing poverty, instead of those who created poverty and social inequality. Plus there is the added benefit of making people feel ashamed of being the recipient of charity, instead of realizing their collective potential to organize as a social movement.
- Foundations have directly influenced the culture of non-profits in three important ways. First, there are always conditions, limitations and pre-determined outcomes for foundation giving. Second, foundation giving almost always makes it so that you cannot participate in work that seeks to transform society or to get at the root of systemic problems. Third, non-profits most often follow a corporate model that is both hierarchical and with boards of directors, which are often times made up of people who are in positions of power.
- Lastly, foundation giving limits our ability to be imaginative about how to collectively work for change.
A few weeks back a local DJ with 95.7FM, posted a piece entitled, 10 Reasons NOT to Move to Grand Rapids. 
The posting got lots of attention and was the latest in a series of “lists” that Grand Rapids loves to boast about. Of course, the post from Jojo Girard was really a list of the 10 reasons why people should want to move to Grand Rapids. The post had the usual cool city reasons, like beer, art, entertainment, great neighborhoods and the ever popular number one reason…….The People Seem to Be Happy All the Time.
Now, I realize that 95.7FM, like all commercial media, relies heavily on advertising dollars. Therefore, local radio stations certainly don’t want to spend much time talking about difficult issues in Grand Rapids, issues like racism, poverty, gentrification, the local power structure and spiritual violence. Advertisers like what the refer to as, a good consuming climate. Happy and superficial chatter on local media creates a fabulous consuming climate and it doesn’t alienate the business community.
In an attempt to respond to the superficiality of the 95.7FM post, I present the 5 Reasons why the 10 Reasons NOT to Move to Grand Rapids list is really Bullshit.
#1 – The 10 reasons list is Bullshit, because white people just don’t have to confront the ugly realities that communities of color do on a daily basis in Grand Rapids. White people can avoid having to deal with the structural racism that exists. White people don’t have to worry about being pulled over by cops the way black people do. White people don’t have to think about the fact that there are large sectors of the Grand Rapids community that live in constant fear of law enforcement agencies because of their status as immigrants. White People can go to the events in downtown, frequent a brewery or go to a Griffin’s hockey game because these places and events are almost always designed to cater to the needs of white people. Whether it is music, art, theater, sporting events or public spectacles like ArtPrize, white people don’t have to worry about not enjoying themselves, because all of the events are primarily for their benefit. This might be a reason why they seem so happy all the time.
#2 – Grand Rapids has the biggest wealth gap in the state of Michigan. There are over 600 millionaires in Kent County, yet there are thousands of people who live in poverty. Those who find the 10 reasons NOT to move to GR list so appealing is because they don’t have to think about all those individuals and families who are living in poverty. And even if they do think of those who live in poverty, they often believe that it is simply because of a lack of opportunity, that those who live in poverty simply aren’t applying themselves enough or because it is God’s will. The people who feel blessed to live in Grand Rapids don’t have to deal with those who live in poverty, at least not on a regular basis. All the new coffee shops, market-rate housing, clothing boutiques and entrepreneurs, indeed make Grand Rapids feel as if everyone is so happy all the time.
#3 – A fairly recent study states that in Michigan, you need to make $15.16 to afford rent. The 10 Reasons NOT to Move to Grand Rapids boasts that the choice of great neighborhoods to live in is too long. One of the neighborhoods they mention is the Belknap neighborhood, which has seen lots of new development in the past year. Of course, this new development has meant that numerous low-income residents have been displaced to make room for GVSU expansion and $300,000 condos. This gentrification and displacement is happening in numerous parts of the city, with developers receiving huge tax breaks at the public’s expense. To not acknowledge that there is a major housing crisis in the City of Grand Rapids only demonstrates race and class privilege.
#4 – A real reason to not move to Grand Rapids is because the people who run this city are vicious and narcissistic. We all know who these people are, since they have their names adorning buildings all over the place. The people who run this city, also use their wealth to influence policy at the state and local level to make sure that it will benefit their interests. The types of policy they push through often hurt working class people. Then these same people use their foundations to donate money to social service agencies to demonstrate how benevolent they are. The people who run this city also despise equality of any kind – racial, economic or LGBTQ equality. These people impose their will and their values on the rest of the community and then expect us all to bow down and treat them as great leaders and philanthropists.
#5 – The 10 reasons NOT to move to GR list includes all the great Mexican restaurants to chose from. This statement is in many ways a reflection of cultural appropriation. People love Mexican food, but couldn’t give a damn about Mexican people, especially the ones who work in kitchens or pick the food we eat for really shitty wages. This is so very much Grand Rapids, where we think we are so diverse, yet we do whatever we can to make sure that everyone who isn’t white, doesn’t have any power. Sure, there are a few Latino individuals who the power structure allows to make it, but most Latinos or people who are not white will never really be valued and treated with respect in this city, as long as we continue to practice managerial racism.
There are so many other reasons why this list of 10 reasons to move to Grand Rapids are bullshit? If you have some additional reasons you’d like to share, we’d love to hear them.
There were two things that were incredible about tonight’s community meeting hosted by AmplifyGR.
First, almost everyone of the the people who spoke during the roughly 80-minute public comment time, were critical of what AmplifyGR was doing, skeptical of the process or outright opposed to what AmplifyGR has in mind to do.
From the very get go, people were not mincing words about what they felt about AmplifyGR, Rockford Construction and the DeVos family. Community Activist LaDonna Norman told the AmplifyGR people sitting up front, “stop making our community look stupid.” Norman was referring to what AmplifyGR was doing and acting like they had nothing but good intentions. LaDonna then went on to name what was happening and that the whole thing was essentially, “DeVos owned. Everyone involved is bought and paid for by the DeVos Family.”
The facilitator then asked the audience how many people agreed with this sentiment. Lots of people clapped or shouted out. When the facilitator asked how many people did not share Norman’s perspective, there were only a few who spoke up. However, what was interesting is that the facilitator then said, that the response was evenly split. This kind of denial or attempt to control the narrative was thick throughout the night.
Another African American woman says she is currently homeless. She used to pay $500 a month for a 3 bedroom place to rent. Now she can’t find the same thing for less than $1,000 and actually is is 3 times the cost for what she used to find. She wants to stay in this community, in this neighborhood. She asks AmplifyGR if they are going to have real affordable housing that does not have all these restrictions.
Then there was a question about supporting existing black owned businesses in the neighborhood and how people did not want to see another Starbucks come in. AmplifyGR’s response was to focus on providing entrepreneurial support through Start Garden, which is yet another DeVos run entity.
Tempest Warfield, an afro-Latina, just made it plain when she given the chance to speak. She spoke passionately and called out who is running this process. She said that a lot of what this boils down to is race and class. “People want to just stay in their homes, but people are feeling bullied by the wealthiest family in the area. People want to keep their homes and leave a legacy for their kids. We do have purpose here, even if it doesn’t look like it to the DeVos family.” John Ippel, from AmplifyGR, responded by saying he gets it. Tempest came right back and said, “be careful about practicing white savior politics.”
Other people were asking about AmplifyGR’s commitment to elevating civil rights or asking would the new development cause zoning changes or property taxes to rise. The AmplifyGR folks didn’t directly answer those concerns, but the community made sure they answered, after several people shouted, “you didn’t answer the question.”
Allison Colberg, with the Micah Center, said there is a huge fundamental problem with the story that is being told. AmplifyGR is framing thing whole effort as “the AmplifyGR area,” when in fact it is not there area. Alllison provides a sharp analysis of what is going on through a White Supremacy lens – that the making of policy and other forms of systemic racism took wealth from black people. “The community should be in charge. We broke and it is based on a history. So put some duct tape on it and just listen.”
There were several other critical and challenging comments made by people throughout the rest of the evening, some from using the microphone, while others just shouted it out from their seats. Then Ken Miguel-Cipriano made an interesting statement that was also in the form of a question. He asked if the majority of people in the community were opposed to what AmplifyGR wanted to do, would they honor that is close up shop? Ken then said, “how about if 70% of the people opposed it?”
This brings us to the second incredible thing that was said during the meeting. The Executive Director of AmplifyGR, John Ippel responded by saying, “even if 70% of the community opposed this, we would just have to get back up and move forward and do it better.” You could heard several people in the audience gasp in horror and the level of arrogance they heard coming from the AmplifyGR person.
This sentiment from AmplifyGR, was affirmed at the end, when the facilitator ask the three men seated on stage what their take-aways were from tonight. Each of them responded by saying that they were looking forward to more community engagement and working with neighbors. It is as if they didn’t care that there was significant opposition at this second community forum.
Afterwards, there were lots of small conversations taking place and the ones this writer overheard reflected both the level of community opposition to the AmplifyGR project, as well as being shocked by the level of arrogance displayed.
This is far from being a done deal. The next meeting is September 7. We’ll keep you posted.
City of Grand Rapids hires PR firm with a long history of involvement with GOP politics
Yesterday, in an article on MLive, it was announced that the City of Grand Rapids has hired the PR firm of Truscott Rossman to assist them with developing a better communications strategy.
The City will spend $60,000 of taxpayer money for a 1-year contract with the largest PR firm in the state, Truscott Rossman. One of the reasons for bringing in the PR firm, according to the Mayor, was to help them develop a more comprehensive communications plan.
The MLive article gives an additional reason for bringing in Truscott Rossman:
“The city still has a $5,000 outstanding bill with Truscott Rossman from April, when the city hired them for emergency communications assistance. Guitar, the city’s spokesman, was on vacation when a video was released of police stopping five unarmed black youths at gunpoint as they were investigating the report of a gun, Guitar said.
The video and incident garnered national attention, and the city reached out to the public relations firm for help.”
In the PR world, this is a way of saying the PR firm was brought in to do damage control, especially since the video was a political embarrassment to the city.
The PR firm was started by John Truscott in 2001. Before that, Truscott was the Communications Director and Press Secretary for Governor John Engler. After the John Truscott Group was formed, they began working closely with numerous GOP campaigns in Michigan, most notably former Rep. Pete Hoekstra and the failed gubernatorial campaign of Dick DeVos in 2006.
The Truscott Group continued to be involved in various political campaigns. John Truscott was George W. Bush’s spokesperson in Michigan during the 2000 election and he was also part of the recount team in Florida. In addition, Truscott is the former chair of the Lansing Regional Chamber of Commerce.
In 2011, the John Truscott Group and Kelly Rossman-McKinney were the number 1 & 2 PR firms in the state. The decision was made that same year to create one powerhouse PR firm, now known as Truscott Rossman. Truscott Rossman now claims to be a bi-partisan PR firm, since Rossman used to work closely with Democrats. However, in 2013, the political consulting resource, Campaigns & Elections, named Truscott a top Republican Party influencer in Michigan.
One of the services that the PR firm offers is their annual Michigan Legislators’ Guide to Lobbyists and Reporters. The Truscott Rossman Guide is highly valued by politicians, reporters and lobbyists alike.
The Lobbying Guide has definitely had an impact. The Michigan Campaign Finance Network reported that it was a record year for lobbyist spending in Michigan for 2016, with $39.9 million being spent by corporations and other associations working to influence state legislators.
People would do well to be skeptical of the City’s contract with Truscott Rossman. One important book the takes a critical look at the PR industry is, Toxic Sludge is Good For You: Lies, Damn Lies and the Public Relations Industry. The authors of this book assert, that the PR industry “poisons the American democratic process by the nation’s professional spin doctors and exposes the bare-knuckled, invisible hand guiding and shaping public opinions.”
Edward Bernays, seen as the Grandfather of PR, was fond of saying this:
“The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country.”
We all should be wary of any part of the Public Relations industry, particularly one with a long history of working on behalf of some of the most powerful people in Michigan.
Grand Rapids Institute for Information Democracy 