ONE volunteers Paul Avion and Betsy Avila (ONE USC) have just announced that on January 14, 2009, Los Angeles approved and signed a resolution to become a City of ONE.

The resolution, signed by Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, City Council President Eric Garcetti, and seconded by ALL 16 council members, concluded as follows:

“NOW THEREFORE IT BE RESOLVED, that by adoption of this resolution, the Los Angeles City Council along with the Mayor, City Attorney and City Controller do hereby declare Los Angeles to be a ‘CITY OF ONE’ and encourage everyone to recognize the devastating impact extreme poverty and global AIDS have around the world and take action to bring about change.

“I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing resolution was adopted by the City of Los Angeles at its meeting held January 14, 2009.”

These signatures make Los Angeles the latest in some 120+ cities who have signed the ONE resolution, meant to further awareness of the extreme poverty and preventable disease that continues to affect ONE billion people.

The resolution was passed due to the efforts of volunteer Avion, who has been in contact with Mayor Villaraigosa’s office since September, 2008. (And is currently working with Governor Schwarzenegger’s office to have California declared a State of ONE.)

This exciting opportunity was entrusted to him by 2008 SoCal Field Organizer Betsy Avila, whose encouragement and guidance he credits with having made it possible. The resolution was also made possible by the work of Cecilia Cabello, Legislative Deputy of the Office of Council President Eric Garcetti, who believed in the resolution and guided it internally to realization. (Everyone at ONE thanks you, Cecilia.)

Volunteer Paul Avion (whose band Par Avion is an upcoming SPIN.com pick), is also actively engaged in creating fashion-music shows to help support ONE in the Los Angeles area. A recent fashion-music show was featured in the ONE blog on August 28th.

(http://www.one.org/blog/2008/08/28/one-at-the-echo-on-sunset/)

More about his efforts to combine music, fashion and charity can be found at www.brightlightsla.com, and through the ONE Los Angeles blog, onecampaignla.wordpress.com/.

Congratulations to the entire ONE L.A. Team and ONE USC!

- Paul Avion, Betsy Avila and ONE@USC

This time, ONE@USC decided to attend this event in hopes of learning more about projects and opportunities the school can offer to get more involved with stopping the spread of preventable diseases in Africa.

For this event, USC Trustee Dave Dornsife and his wife Dana put together a presentation for attendees on their initiative to provide programs which will facilitate the transportation and drilling of clean water, providing–through their extensive and admirable efforts–the ability for thousands of impoverished families in countries like Niger, Ghana, Mali and Ethiopia to prevent diseases that often arise as a result of unsanitary water and lack of hygiene. Mr. and Mrs. Dornsife gave us a bit of insight into their program and described some of the background which preceeds their work:

The struggle for survival is incredibly difficult in many African countries. The Sahara Desert is expanding, and the average life span of residents ranges from 46 to 48 years. In 2006, Mali and Niger were in the bottom three of the 177 countries ranked in the United Nations Human Development Index. A major contribution to this difficult existence is the lack of clean drinking water. Additionally, two serious illnesses arise because of the lack of clean water: trachoma, a bacterial infection that eventually results in blindness, and guinea worm, a water-born parasite that causes debilitation and pain.

During the presentation, the couple addressed these illnesses with vivid photographs to describe them, causing some discomfort in the audience but definitely sinking in some very real truths. They showed us some photographs of a girl’s operation for the removal of the guinea worm that had been slowly growing in her leg, feeding from her own energy to strengthen its own system. The next slide showed a woman who had chlymadia, traditionally an STD but if left untreated and unwashed, can develop on the eyelid and eventually cause blindness by turning the eyelashes inward so they scratch the cornea.

I apologize for the graphic nature of the entry, but it seems that we can only shock people into doing the right thing if they
a) get informed
and
b) are shown the harsh reality of the situation.

The most astounding part of the presentation was the following:
Diseases such as chlymadia could be prevented with two simple spoonfulls of water distributed across the eyelids. That’s all these people need to prevent these horrible, diseases that torture and mark their lives of water. Two spoonfulls of clean water.

It was an amazing experience to learn of the events that have transpired in Nicaraguan from someone who is at the forefront of political activism. She opened my eyes to the injustice women face everyday in Nicaragua. The organization, Nicaraguan Women Against Violence, has engaged itself in many battles in order to bring justice to women, and 9 of the members are now facing jail time for their struggles. The trial is unfounded and unjust. It is the type of injustice that those who dare to contradict the authority of Daniel Ortega, the president of Nicaragua, are faced with.

Mayra Sirias mentioned the poverty of the people of Nicaragua. It is a country that has seen a lot of violence and conflict and this has had a severely detrimental effect on the standards of living of the Nicaraguan people. One of the most interesting points she brought up was about the economic blockade that Reagan enforced during the Sandinista revolution of the 1980s. This was very destructive to the economy of Nicaragua and the effects are still felt today. This is an example of how American diplomacy had caused poverty and hunger in a foreign country.

Thankfully, people like Mayra Sirias are working to improve the lives of Nicaraguans.

- Elisabeth Gustafson, ONE Member

Rise Your Hopeful Voice: Why We are Responsible for Third World Poverty, and How to Change it

It’s rare to see posts and articles about global poverty that approach the topic in a simple manner. It’s even more rare to see one that directly asks lets you know the way you’re involved and what you can do to help. (Unless of course you’re on a site direclty involved with poverty fighting orgs ).

I found the article helpful in articulating briefly all the issues that ONE talks about as well as offering some goals and solutions that we can all do. It avoids the traditional guilt trip found in articles about these issues and seeks to get readers involved. It event links you to ONE and Stand Up!!

Read through, reflect and discuss.

Not really.
Ever wanted to know what happens at a ONE@USC meeting but had no time to read an extensive description of what goes on? No worries, friends. Your amazing leadership team at USC is offering you with a unique insight into our weekly meetings with a brief, but impactful overview of our plans, ideas, debates, and final decisions on everything ONE@USC related! It’s a great opportunity to interact with your team on a more personal level, and possibly even decide if you want to get involved with the organization. Every Tuesday afternoon (for the exception of this past week), I will publish our “Meeting Minutes” agenda. Enjoy!

- Alida Fong, ONE@USC blog moderator

Meeting Minutes, Week of 09/30/08

ONE@USC Meeting 4:

9.30.08

1.      OCC Standing = 6^th Place.

2.      Stand Up Event:

a.       Bus issues: event still a go

b.      Advertising: flyers ready this week

                                                               i.      Tabling next week?

c.       Banner: Meeting this Thursday morning, 9am-11am; and possibly 2pm to finish

3.      2. Even this Friday:

a.       Egyptian theater, 5:30pm: Volunteers receive free ticket to see A Powerful Noise at 7:30pm

b.      Carpooling available

c.       RSVP with Betsy: dblacc@gmail.com

4.      Weekly Challenge!

a.       T-Shirt ideas and brainstorming

b.      Resubmitting last year’s designs

5.      Blogging: oneatusc.wordpress.com

a.       5 entries per week: meeting update, photo of the week

b.      Send any misc entries, comments, thoughts over to oneatusc@gmail.com

6.      Misc:

a.       Send me advisor contact info for email points!

b.      We will discuss the OCC list of challenges next week!

Temple Sinai of Glendale, CA – The Glendale Community Forum on Genocide in Darfur opened with Representative Adam Schiff adamantly stating that though we’ve spoken and said a lot about genocide, we’ve done very little to prevent and stop it. Having a panel of genocide survivors is an intense experience to say the least.

Father Vazken Movsesian, a descendent of survivors from the Armenian Genocide, took the stage first, stating firmly that we simply cannot allow genocides to become footnotes in history. He spoke of his travels to Rwanda and the women he met who were widowed by genocide, left alive only because it was assumed they would soon be wiped out by the AIDS virus, which they all had contracted.

In the midst of these heartbreaking stories, I was caught off guard by a single sentence. Mohamed Suleiman, a Rwandan Genocide survivor, mentioned that in Darfur people have stopped trusting their own government. Instead, they put their faith and trust in grassroots organizations and activists, because are the only group that can’t be steered in different directions by politics or be forced to ignore their concerns for human life. I was inspired by these words, knowing that our actions here can affect the lives of the people there. I was filled with a sense of responsibility, learning that their hopes rely on what we as activists can get accomplished.

The ONE volunteers directed a question to the panel, asking to what extent they believed extreme poverty and economic crises leads to atrocities of war and genocide. Both Suleiman and Rep. Schiff stated that although this isn’t always the case, extreme poverty in Africa specifically has a large impact on these resulting deaths.

“Poverty is the root cause of all problems,” stated Suleiman. Superficially, he continued, wars are fought about ethnicity and differences, but in reality, there is a competition for resources. Soldiers primed to commit genocide are told that the others have better resources, that they horde the best for themselves, and in these poor conditions, they have no choice but to believe this to be true.

Rep. Adam Schiff concluded by stating that education and an agricultural infrastructure are essential factors to help those in need gain self-sufficiency. Education is especially important to combat those forces of propaganda attempting to dehumanize others and to gain control over people’s actions through lies.

It was refreshing to hear those who’d suffered through these atrocities speaking of the need for more action from us, the grassroots volunteers. It’s also moving to think that our small actions such a call to a representative or a signature on a petition can move our government in the right direction toward stopping and preventing conditions brought about by extreme poverty!

Nare Ovsepian, ONE Member

As a constant commitment and response to each OCC weekly challenge, the “Trojan Poverty Fighters”, as our campus leader likes to call us, tackled the challenge to create a visible presence at one of the oldest and most valued Trojan traditions: USC football. Hey, supporting the fight against global poverty and cheering on one of the best teams in college football? Two great causes.

During each game break, ONE@USC took the opportunity to make presentations about ONE and pass out information to those who were interested in learning more. One adult present at the tailgate even commended us for “fighting for a worthy cause that made our generation even more worthy.” After getting a handsome amount of sign ups and getting everyone excited about beating poverty and the OSU beavers, we handed out white bands and posed for a group photo. Our photographer for the night posted the pictures up to document a very successful night for the Trojan ONE members.

Fight on, ONE!

Update: Even though we lost to the OSU Beavers, we’re sure as heck not going to lose this fight to eradicate poverty.

By: Alida Fong, ONE at USC Blog Moderator