Charleston Currents

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FOCUS: Daffodils to be planted Nov. 13 to remember holocaust

Staff reports | College of Charleston sophomore honors student Samantha Krantz is hoping to beautify the Charleston Holocaust Memorial in Marion Square by working Nov. 13 with volunteers to plant 1,800 daffodil bulbs as a living memorial.

You can join the effort at 4:30 p.m. Nov. 13 to remember the 1.5 million children who perished in the holocaust. The garden will be planted at the memorial, which was erected in 1999, “to remember those who were murdered in the Holocaust and to honor the survivors who came to South Carolina to rebuild their lives,” according to the college.

Krantz felt empowered to launch a living garden after discovering her family’s history with the holocaust, and traveling to Eastern Europe over the summer with College of Charleston Zucker/Goldberg Professor of Holocaust Studies Theodore Rosengarten, a press release said. Krantz is the recipient of the Klaper Fellowship in Jewish Studies, which charges recipients with bettering the Lowcountry.

by Charleston Currents · 10/24/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: How to join the region’s annual Day of Caring on Nov. 18

By Amanda Netsch, Trident United Way | Every fall, Trident United Way hosts its annual Day of Caring. It’s a community service day where thousands of volunteers from local businesses, civic groups and associations, in tandem with their colleagues and bosses, roll up their sleeves and get to work serving hundreds of nonprofit agencies and public schools.

Volunteers can be seen building, planting, cleaning, painting, reading and so much more. The impact volunteers make on the community through this one day is well over $400,000 in value of service hours alone (using the Corporation for National & Community Service 2014 volunteer rate) – but the impact does not stop there.

by Charleston Currents · 10/17/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: Beware of electronic scams after Hurricane Matthew

State of S.C. news release | People affected by Hurricane Matthew should be aware of potential scams that could come in the form of emails, phone calls, text messages, and others. Scams of this kind are often times used against individuals in areas that have recently been affected by natural disasters such as Hurricane Matthew.

by Charleston Currents · 10/09/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: Colour of Music Festival returns Oct. 19-23 with opera’s debut

By Lee Pringle, special to Charleston Currents | The 2016 Colour of Music Festival embarks upon an ambitious and stunning array of international classical musical motifs solidifying its place as the largest black classical music organization ever organized as it continues to draw inspiration from the grandfather of black classical music, Le Chevalier de Saint-Georges.

Few classical music enthusiasts are aware of the tremendous contributions of this African-French composer whose opera and classical masterpieces equaled or far exceeded those of his 18th century contemporaries. Although his compositions are highly recognized overseas, they gather little notice in the United States.

Today despite thousands of celebrated and prodigiously talented classical composers and performers of African descent throughout the world, their opportunities to grace concert stages of major American orchestras are rare to non-existent. The Colour of Music Festival is reversing this trend.

by Charleston Currents · 10/03/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: Register to vote by Oct. 8

Staff reports | As the mother of all debates is set for tonight between Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton and Republican nominee Donald Trump, you won’t be able to have your say at the polls Nov. 8 unless your registered to vote. The deadline to register in South Carolina is Oct. 8.

* Read the story to find out if you’re registered and, if not, how to get registered.

You might want to click the first link, especially if you haven’t voted in the last few elections, to make sure you haven’t been purged from voter rolls due to inactivity. [We suggest you check anyway, especially if you’ve moved in the last few years.]

According to the most recent information from the S.C. Election Commission, some 3,081,428 South Carolinians are registered to vote. In Charleston County, 274,547 people are registered to vote, the second largest number by county in the state.

by Charleston Currents · 09/26/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

We love just about everything about the Lowcountry's marshes.
What do you love about the area? (Copyrighted photo by Andy Brack.)

FOCUS: Take a walk on the wild side with SCELP

By Amy Armstrong, special to Charleston Currents | Almost 30 years ago, Jimmy Chandler set off for what he imagined to be a temporary phase of his legal career: the South Carolina Environmental Law Project (SCELP). A proposed oil refinery in Georgetown and impoundment of tidal marshes spurred him to focus his legal effort on protecting our natural environment.

He was joined and supported by the leadership at the Energy Research Foundation in Columbia, which “hosted” the organization for about nine years and until the Project became a public charity on its own. By then, the idea of moving back to private practice had already faded into the background as new challenges and emergencies kept cropping up after each new victory inside and outside the courts.

by Charleston Currents · 09/19/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: Two dozen authors to be at Saturday’s Black Ink book festival

By Stephen Hoffius, special to Charleston Currents | More than 25 African-American authors will gather at Burke High School on Sept. 17 to take part in Black Ink: A Charleston African-American Book Festival. The event will take place from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. and is free and open to the public.

Marcus Amaker, recently named the first poet laureate of the City of Charleston, is the keynote speaker. He’s excited about the festival: “Charleston could use more events that celebrate the literary arts.” He is the author of seven books, the most recent of which, Mantra, is also an app, featuring audio, video, and new poems. Marcus’s poems have been featured on the PBS Newshour, the Huffington Post, several journals, and poetry collections.

by Charleston Currents · 09/12/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

Depression-era photographer Marion Post Wolcott snapped this image in 1939 of tomato pickers on their lunch break in a field near Homestead, Fla. Charleston County once was home to a huge truck farming industry, which included tomatoes that were shipped to northern markets. Photo from the Library of Congress.

FOCUS: Toward a more truthful — and useful — Charleston history

By Charlie Smith, Special to Charleston Currents | When the Charleston County Planning Commission’s subcommittee on historic preservation announced last year that consultants had been hired to conduct the 2016 update of the Historic Resources Survey, I was initially very excited that we would finally be addressing some of our past failures to protect important historic sites and buildings throughout Charleston County.

Realizing that we did not have endless funds with which to work, we began to narrow the scope to a task that was feasible given our limited resources. I was initially not happy at all with the 1940-1975 time frame chosen for the limited study.

Charleston has a deeply-rooted complicity at every level in the atrocious politics of skin color …

by Andy Brack · 09/05/2016 · 1 comment · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: Cherny asks what would make your life better

By Dimitri Cherny, special to Charleston Currents | What one or two things could the federal government do to make your life better?

That’s the question I’ve been asking everyone I meet on my www.BIKINGtheLowcountry.us adventure. I’ve now traveled, by bike or canoe, more than 550 miles over 47 days and asked hundreds of people that question. We’re a very diverse group here in the Lowcountry — racially, ethnically, religiously, politically, ideologically, economically, educationally, and of all ages. But after asking this question of hundreds of people, we ALL seem to agree on five things.

1. Universal single-payer healthcare.
2. Quality debt-free public education.
3. Strengthening Social security.
4. Improving the veteran’s support system,
5. Getting money out of politics.

by Charleston Currents · 08/29/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news

FOCUS: Bridging the justice gap in Charleston County

By Alissa C. Lietzow, Charleston Pro Bono Legal Services | Most people know that when you are charged with a crime, you are guaranteed legal representation if you do not have the financial means to pay for it yourself.

In fact, many of you can probably recite the Miranda rights from having watched Law & Order:

“You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you.”

by Charleston Currents · 08/22/2016 · Comments are Disabled · Focus, Good news