Join us for the next in our series of monthly community discussions. Free of Charge – Light Refreshments Served

7 p.m. Wednesday, June 6, 2012

Doors open at 6:30 pm

at the Two Thirteen Building

213 S. Wheaton Avenue, Wheaton, IL

From Employee to Serf

Tim Bell, Senior Organizer for the Chicago Workers’ Collaborative (CWC), will discuss why temporary workers have become the largest labor force in the State of Illinois; what lures major corporations to convert permanent jobs to temp ones; how our immigration and incarceration systems feed the temp industry’s growth; and, how the Chicago Workers’ Collaborative is organizing temp staffing workers and community, faith-based and union allies to fight for permanent jobs.

The DuPage Coffeehouse provides a time and a placefor people to regularly and respectfully share theirdreams and concerns about our communityand how we can improve it for generations to come.

Registration for this discussion is available at

www.dupagecoffeehouse.org

Sponsored by the DuPage Coffeehouse Planners – an independent group of citizen. Not sponsored by any other organization.

Free and Open to the Public – Light Refreshments Served

NOTE THAT LOCATION CHANGED to

Metropolitan Family Services at 222 E. Willow, Wheaton

7 p.m. Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Doors open at 6:30 pm

222 E. Willow, Wheaton, IL

Beyond Poverty

Candace King, Executive Director of the DuPage Federation on Human Services Reform, will explain what services are part of the social safety net , who’s eligible and who’s not, how the changing demographics of DuPage impact the availability of safety net services and the demand for these services, as well as who’s responsible for providing and paying for the services.

Space is limited: RESERVE YOUR SEAT

 The DuPage Coffeehouse provides a time and a place for people to regularly and respectfully share their dreams and concerns about our community and how we can improve it for generations to come.

Coffeehouse – May 2, 2012

Beyond Poverty

When the “Safety Net” Fails

Small Group Discussion Summary (4 Groups)

Questions to Discuss:

1. Do you agree there is a need to offer human services in DuPage County?

2. What are your concerns?

3. What can we do about these concerns?

GROUP 1

Question 1:

Yes – these services are essential

Question 2:

Depressing statistics

Where the $ will come from

Attitude is negative to anyone in need

Question 3:

Too many government entities in Illinois – consolidate

Wasted $ in the County

Community education

Hospitals “give” to clinics – maybe more

GROUP 2

Question 1:

Yes, we do agree.

Question 2:

Disconnection with people in need if you have enough

It was always obvious to those who knew; however, it was hidden

Skill development assistance to help them in need to improve; i.e., responsible way to manage money and resources; accountability for their conduct; changes in behavior; day care assistance while parents attending classes.

Question 3:

No answer provided.

GROUP 3

Question 1:

We agree Human Services are important and it saves money and improves the community.

Question 2:

Need to improve systems, automate, get rid of stacks of paper (State) DHS too much inefficiency

There is evidence that there are already changes; i.e., unemployment – good model and good website.

Question 3:

We need a progressive state income tax. A movement to write Amendment is at work.

Center for Tax Accountability

Ralph Martare – good resource

State of Illinois Budget – Judy Barr Topinka –

all figures now transparent

Department of Human Services needs updating

Need more funds in public transportation

Need more offices of Dept. of Human Services

GROUP 4

Question 1:

Yes, agree great need in DuPage County

Question 2:

Bureaucracy is big problem to simple, efficient answers

New fees (due to lower tax revenues) create barriers to access by those in need

DuPage County representatives do not want to raise taxes – they feel that is what the residents desire.

Question 3:

When a person in need qualifies for one benefit they should automatically be signed up for additional benefits without completing more paperwork (reduce bureaucracy)

One could volunteer for literacy because being able to speak English is very important

Contact your elected officials at all levels of government!

Join us on the first Wednesday of every month for our DuPage  Coffeehouse discussion series on topics of concern to our community.      The discussions are always free and open to the public.  Light refreshments provided.
Join us this  month for:

Kathy Kelly presents: U.S. Exceptionalism to the Golden Rule

6:30 pm Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Kathy Kelly Follow-up

U.S. Exceptionalism to the Golden Rule

How do you describe U.S. Exceptionalism?

Is it justifiable?

What can we do about it?

Group 1

• Exceptionalism: Feelings of superiority, destined to lead, self righteousness,  manifest destiny, our good intentions.
• What to do about this:
  • Create a Department of Peace
  • Dismantle the military industrial complex
  • National humility
  • Modify Exceptionalism
  • Universal organization
  • Effects of this attitude:
    • Leads to military-industrial complex
    • Bleeds our nation
    • Worldwide enemies
    • Human cost of war

Group 2

• We have morphed into perpetual war.  Iran next.
• I feel helpless.
• We are fed a sanitized history in our schools.
• Our media is censored.
• Vote for candidates who do not support U.S. Exceptionalism.  Amending the constitution to get corporate money out of our elections.
• Find antiwar websites/emails: Tom Hayden; Glen Greenwald (Salon.com); DemocracyNow.org; Bill Moyers; Thom Hartman
• Work to end the practice of bombing without Congressional approval
• Protect “Whistle-blowers”

Group 3

• Restore Responsibility to Congress to Declare War
• Township Resolutions
• Get big money out of politics – Big money controls the government
• Reinstitute the draft for all
• Public awareness of the harm from our war efforts
• Let’s reveal the real motives for our involvement: oil, drugs, strategic positioning?

Group 4

• When will we ever learn?  Why do we feel so full of ourselves?  Why are we so special?  How do we fix it?
• Many people don’t want to understand what’s going on.
• Corporations are running the country.  It’s all about profit – guns and planes.
• Good people in office – run out.
• How do we get to the critical mass of people needed to affect change?

Group 5

• Are we Exceptional?
• Why?
• How do we fix it?

HOLD UP A MIRROR.  WE ARE BULLIES.  WE NEED THE WORLD COMMUNITY TO FORCE US TO CHANGE – just as we confront school bullies to observe the Golden Rule

FMG – Draft – 4/5/12

 
Two Thirteen Building
213 S. Wheaton Ave., Wheaton, IL

During part of the past winter, Kathy Kelly, a co-coordinator of Voices for Creative Nonviolence, lived alongside ordinary people in a working class neighborhood in Kabul.  She and the group she co-coordinates believe that “where you stand determines what you see,” and they are resolved not to let war sever the bonds of friendship between them and Afghan people whom they’ve grown to know through successive delegations.  Kelly, who has been to Afghanistan six times
since the spring of 2010, insists that the U.S. is not waging a
“humanitarian war” in Afghanistan.

Here are some videos supplied by Kathy Kelly:

a taste of Afghanistan!
chance conversation with a little girl

www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSjKrYDmBmk&list=UUqLgo4v6w-BJtv_00XTs70g&index=126&feature=plcp

the unequal value of an Afghan child

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CG6_zMH4NA&list=UUqLgo4v6w-BJtv_00XTs70g&index=62&feature=plcp

Y not dance

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtFABflsKHA&list=UUqLgo4v6w-BJtv_00XTs70g&index=2&feature=plcp

Here’s the flyer.  Please distribute widely.

Sponsored by the DuPage Coffeehouse Planners – an independent group of citizens.  Not sponsored by any other organization.

“Respectfully talking about today while listening for tomorrow.“

If We the People are sovereign, we must control the government. Corporations are created and chartered by the government which, acting on behalf of We the People, gives corporations privileges, not rights. Neither the government, without the consent of the governed, nor corporations have the right to rule over the people. Since corporations have gained the legal status of persons, corporations have accumulated rights and become rulers — in other words, they can tell the government what to do.

Read more…

www.dupagecoffeehouse.org/move-to-amend

DuPage Coffeehouse Move to Amend petitioner, Keith Klingman, recently proposed to the Naperville City Counsel that they pass a resolution to amend the US Constitution to state that a corporation is not a person and money is not speech, as has been done in several cities like New York City and Los Angeles and several states, including New Mexico.

• Naperville Sun Article covering Keith addressing the Naperville City Counsel
• Video of Keith addressing the Naperville City Counsel (Keith appears between the 22 and 26 minute mark in the video)

Occupy Naperville and DuPage Coffeehouse Move to Amend stages a mock funeral march for the death of the US Democracy in protest of the Citizens United Vs. F.E.C. ruling on its two year anniversary.

Don’t miss the Mic Check – The Attack of the Entities

Empty homes bring down home values and create the right conditions for crime and vandalism in our neighborhoods. Up to 90% of homeowners do not even appear in court to fight their foreclosure, but on behalf of those who do not – and more especially, as support for those that do – please consider attending this foreclosure hearing to observe how DuPage County Judge Robert Gibson is handling the foreclosure cases in his courtroom. My hope is that we can have several advocacy groups represented now, and in future hearings, to let the court know that all homeowners are being supported by our presence. Please also plan to attend the 7pm Wednesday, February 1, 2012 DuPage Coffeehouse Discussion, “The Foreclosure Crisis – What can we do?”,  213 S. Wheaton Ave., Wheaton, IL,  to hear more about this issue from the Executive Director of the DuPage Homeownership Center, along with my personal story regarding the frustrations involved with my own foreclosure.

Regards, Toni Boughner