Buzzworm news briefs

Public-transit ninja blogger strikes again

A warrior against smog: Paul Van Heden of Brainshrub.com uses his blog to get more people on the bus. photo by Jonathan Welch

The Internet is a slippery thing, isolating some people while inspiring unlikely connections among others. Some 2 million Chinese teenagers are addicted to it, according to a recent New York Times article. But there’s more to cyberspace than hypnotically clicking your mouse: Put a blogger activist behind the keyboard, and suddenly the Web is being wielded as a tool for making change in one’s actual (rather than virtual) community.

That’s what local blogger Paul Van Heden of Brainshrub.com hopes to accomplish with his online project, anyway. Van Heden launched his political blog in 2003, curious as to whether he could bring about change simply by broadcasting his thoughts (and Photoshopped images) online.  Now in its fourth year, the site draws 1,500 to 2,000 visitors a day.

In June, Van Heden used his blog to launch the Brainshrub Bus Project—an ongoing attempt to demonstrate that it’s possible to use the Asheville Transit System as one’s primary mode of transportation. By offering tips on traveling by bus and awarding “brickbats and laurels” to highlight city transit’s shortcomings and strong points, Van Heden aims to get more people using the system and encourage improvements to it.

Over the course of his blogging, the author of Brainshrub has unleashed a sort of alter ego. “I move through the city of Asheville quickly, efficiently and with minimal energy,” he writes in an Oct. 16 post. “I use the roads just as much as you do, only I haven’t needed to refill my car’s tank in six weeks. Six. Freaking. Weeks. In other words: I’m a public-transit ninja.”

Achieving liberation from an endless cycle of gas-tank fill-ups was a challenge at first, he concedes. “Becoming a public-transit ninja wasn’t an overnight process. It took a solid month to understand how the bus system worked, and another few weeks to internalize the habit so that it became second nature.”

For Van Heden, mastering public transit has had transformative side effects, not the least of which is a newfound respect for folks who don’t have the option of driving. “If you ride the bus, you will not be able to ignore the plight of the working poor,” he told Xpress. Due to the system’s design, a 10-minute drive can turn into a 40-minute bus ride, because the individual routes don’t link up with one another, he notes. But he doubts that the city will address this or any other problem until more people climb aboard—and the city starts viewing public transit “as a utility instead of a handout.”

To Van Heden, public transit is an obvious remedy for many social ills, including dependency on foreign oil, and pollution from unchecked traffic growth.

“All those people who are concerned about the war in Iraq and environmental issues just have to take the bus once a month,” he declares. “It’s like a vote with your butt!”

For more, visit www.brainshrub.com.

– Rebecca Bowe

Forum to examine N.C. company’s alleged role in “torture flights”

Plane spotting: Volunteer photographers track Aero “ghost planes” like this one, which the CIA reportedly uses to transport terror suspects. The company is based in North Carolina; the above photo was taken in Budapest. photo by Balazs Patyi, courtesy planepictures.net

Some of the most controversial aspects of the war on terrorism often seem to be a world away. But one of them—the Central Intelligence Agency’s so-called “extraordinary rendition” program—reportedly has logistical support in the Tar Heel state and may even benefit from state funding.

The Central Intelligence Agency’s post-9/11 secret program to abduct terror suspects and “render” them to foreign intelligence services for interrogation will be front and center at an upcoming forum sponsored by the Western North Carolina and UNCA chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union. Entitled “From Global to Local: Challenging Torture Flights and Other Abuses of Power,” the forum will examine the purported involvement of Aero Contractors Ltd., an N.C.-based contract air company, in the CIA’s delivery of suspects to countries where protections against torture are lax or nonexistent.

According to investigative reports by CBS News, The New York Times and other news outlets, the company, which operates out of the Global TransPark in Kinston and Smithfield’s Johnson County airport, has played a key role in the CIA’s rendition program. Aero’s planes and pilots allegedly ferried terror suspects kidnapped by CIA operatives in numerous countries.

Since the allegations were first published in 2005, Aero’s shadowy operations have come under increasing scrutiny in North Carolina. Last November, 14 activists were arrested at the company’s Smithfield office when they attempted to deliver a citizen indictment for torture. And just last week, 22 North Carolina state legislators wrote to Attorney General Roy Cooper urging him to direct the State Bureau of Investigation to look into “credible allegations that Aero Contractors conspired to commit federal crimes” by transporting individuals who were kidnapped and tortured.

At the same time, the ACLU has filed a lawsuit against Aero and other parties on behalf of one of the abductees, Khaled El-Masri. A German citizen of Lebanese descent, in 2003 El-Masri was detained in Macedonia before a group of CIA agents allegedly beat, drugged and bound him before transporting him to Afghanistan, where he says he was held incommunicado in inhumane conditions for five months. He was released without being charged.

According to the legal complaint, the operators of the Aero flight that transported El-Masri to Afghanistan knew or should have known that he would “be subjected to prolonged arbitrary detention, torture, and other forms of cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment.”

Aero did not return phone calls from Xpress. Corporate records identify Aero’s president as Norman Richardson, a North Carolina businessman. Asked about his role with the company, Richardson told The New York Times, “Most of the work we do is for the government. It’s on the basis that we can’t say anything about it.”

Whatever Aero does, it appears to have benefited from state funding. The Global TransPark was created by the state of North Carolina in 1991 and is organized as nonprofit. State funds have been provided for construction, runway extension and operations. Gov. Mike Easley is currently chairman of the Global TransPark Authority, which provided land for construction of a 20,000 square foot hangar by Aero in 2004. Johnson County airport is a publicly owned facility that also receives funds from the state.

“It is appalling to think that our North Carolina state tax dollars are being used to sponsor torture flights,” says Azadeh Shahshahani, an attorney with the ACLU of North Carolina Legal Foundation who coordinates the organization’s Muslim/Middle Eastern Community Outreach Project.

Shahshahani will travel from Raleigh to join local ACLU members and UNCA Professor Mark Gibney for a panel discussion at the forum. In addition, two short documentaries—Outlawed: Extraordinary Rendition, Torture, and Disappearances in the ‘War on Terror’ and Stop the Abuse of Power—will be screened.

The free event will be held in the Grotto at UNCA’s Highsmith Student Union, at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 8. For more information, contact Alex Cury at 380-9687.

– Cecil Bothwell

NAACP takes it to the streets

Western North Carolina activists will be rolling down to Raleigh on Saturday, Feb. 10, for Historic K (Thousands) on J Street—a rally and street march sponsored by the North Carolina NAACP.

The event will celebrate the 98th birthday (on Feb. 12) of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People as a time when blacks and whites came together for progressive change. The gathering also aims to bring contemporary progressives together for a “People’s General Assembly” focusing on current justice issues in the state.

Jean Larson, co-chair of the Asheville chapter’s political action committee, already had 20 people signed up for the trip just one day after the chapter decided to participate and before any public announcements. “I’m hoping we’ll have to get another bus,” she said. And the local group may add its own touch to the Raleigh festivities: “I may take some of the drummers,” said chapter President John Hayes, referring to its musical contingent.

The local delegation will leave at 6 a.m. on Feb. 10 from the local NAACP office (91 Patton Ave.), returning late that evening.

In Raleigh, participants will start assembling at 11 a.m. for a noon program at Memorial Auditorium in the Progress Energy Center, followed by a march to the State Legislative Building on Jones Street. A number of statewide organizations are also taking part, including the N.C. Justice Center, N.C. Black Leadership Caucus, General Baptist State Convention, Democracy North Carolina, El Pueblo, the Southern Anti-Racism Network, N.C. Council of Churches and People of Faith Against the Death Penalty.

A 14-point “people’s agenda” outlining future political action in the state includes such issues as:

• High-quality, well-funded, diverse schools for all children;
• Livable wages and support for low-income people;
• Health care for all;
• Redress of “racist history” (such as the overthrow of the biracial 1898 Wilmington government and the sterilization of poor, mainly black women, from 1947-77);
• Same-day registration and public financing of elections;
• Financial support for all historically black colleges and universities;
• Documenting and addressing state discrimination in hiring and contracting;
• Affordable housing and protection from predatory lending;
• Abolishing racially biased death penalty and mandatory sentencing, along with prison reform;
• Putting young people to work to save the environment and fight for environmental justice;
• Collective bargaining for public employees;
• Health care, education, workers’ rights and protecting immigrants from discrimination;
• Strengthening civil-rights statutes and funding enforcement agencies;
• Bringing our troops home from Iraq.

According to the NAACP’s Web site, the event seeks to “begin to shift North Carolia political action” and to “create a statewide network of progressive and civil rights community.” And on March 28, the Second Annual People of Color Legislative Day will be devoted to lobbying members of the General Assembly.

For the full text of the people’s agenda, go to www.naacp.ubernc.com. Bus tickets for the Feb. 10 rally are available for $20 roundtrip. To get one, stop by the NAACP office at 91 Patton Ave., Suite 101, or mail a check to P.O. Box 2881, Asheville, NC 28802. For more information, call the office (281-3066) between 10 and 4 on weekdays, or call Jean Larson (683-5548).

– Nelda Holder

You can get there from here: Asheville’s new emergency-transportation option

One of the biggest disincentives for commuters who might otherwise be tempted to use mass and other alternative transportation—from a bike to a carpool to walking—is, “What if?”

What if there’s an emergency at home or my child gets a tummy ache at school? What if my carpool driver has to work late or gets totally smashed at an office party? What if I have to work later than the bus schedules run?

How will I get home?

Asheville is offering a new way to assure a trip home for those who use alternative transportation and face an emergency. The Emergency Ride Home program is intended to eliminate the worry and potential hassle by reimbursing the cost of a cab-ride home.

“One of the hurdles we face getting drivers out of their vehicles is the fear that if they rode the bus or are in a carpool, they won’t have a way home if an emergency arises,” says the city’s transportation-demand management coordinator, Kathy Molin. “I consider it an ‘insurance policy’ of sorts. Commuters can now have peace of mind riding the bus or joining a carpool, knowing they can get to their families should an emergency arise.”

There are conditions: Participants must be 21 or older, must preregister, and must live or work in Buncombe County or work for an ERH-registered employer. In addition, an alternative mode of transportation must be used on the day ride is needed.

Approved alternative modes are: Asheville Transit—with a monthly or yearly bus pass or employer participation in the PASSport program; ridesharing; bicycling; or walking.

For additional information or to register, call 232-4564 or visit www.ashevillenc.gov/transit.htm. More details, and coupons that can be used for an emergency trip home, will be sent to those who register.

– Cecil Bothwell

We are one (economy): New chamber business awards

If you look at the economy of Asheville and surrounding areas, it’s easy to segregate the region into dominant sectors (health care, tourism, retail, and so on). But a new business-award program called “We’re for Business,” put together by the Asheville Area Chamber of Commerce and sponsored by Wachovia, aims to bring together the business community to celebrate not only its diversity but also its interdependence.

“We have tried to pull businesses together and be more cohesive,” says Carol Hensley, the Chamber’s assistant vice president of small business and entrepreneurship. “I think that it’s important that when you see the winners, the community will see a microcosm of what Asheville is all about. These awards mirror the community.”

The program is new to the Chamber’s slate of business-recognition awards and is designed to honor the achievements of area businesses, regardless of size or industry.

Awards will be presented in three categories: The “Over the Top” award, honoring stellar customer service; the “One for All” award, noting outstanding commitment to community; and the “Out on a Limb” award, recognizing an exceptionally innovative business. To level the playing field, each award will be presented in two categories: small businesses with up to 50 employees and large companies with 51 or more.

Though it’s a Chamber event, the general public is invited and urged to attend, Hensley says.

The awards luncheon will be held at 11 a.m. on Tuesday, Feb. 6, at the downtown Renaissance Asheville Hotel on Woodfin Street. The event costs $25 per person. To purchase tickets or get more information, call Hensley at 258-6116.

– Hal L. Millard