Professional dancers Mauricio Zenteno and Paulette Machicado are offering three weeks of free ballet classes in their Ardsley studio for tots and youth, as well as adults. They have a special class for youth with autism, down syndrome and other challenges. August 5th through 24th. All details at https://alayadance.com/classes/free-classes/

++PLEASE CIRCULATE WIDELY++

Call to Action: Palestinians Refugees in Lebanon Demand Dignity!

Refugees across camps in Lebanon are rising up! The Lebanese Ministry of Labour’s new mandate forbids refugees from working in the country without work visas, heavily impacting Palestinian, Syrian, and other refugees. The new mandate has led to mass firings and a crackdown on refugee workers, as well as mass protests and strikes across the camps. 

This decision comes on top of already existing laws that discriminate against refugees and ban Palestinians from working in the 72 regulated professions, including medicine, public transit, farming, and fishery. Refugees are now demanding to live with human dignity. Their demands include:

• Grant Palestinian refugees clear legal status guaranteeing civil, economic and social rights;

• Amend Lebanese labor laws to cancel the work permit requirement for Palestinian refugees and end their exclusion from regulated professions

• End ongoing discrimination against Palestinian refugees in a range of areas, including allowing them to own property.

In order to stand with refugee workers against the decision, here is how you can support our call to action:

1. Call or email your local Lebanese Embassy or Consulate in Turtle Island/USA to demand a repeal of the law and dignity for Palestinian refugees.
   
   

2. Join us in solidarity with refugees in Lebanon this Monday, July 29th at 4:30 PM at the Lebanese Embassy at 9 E 76th St, NY. RSVP to the action here.

GENDA Know Your Rights Training at WESPAC

The Gender Expression Non-Discrimination Act (GENDA), which historically passed in January 2019, protects New Yorkers who identify as Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming/Non-Binary (TGNCNB); by including gender identity and expression to existing human rights law. This covers the following domains:

• Housing

• Employment

• Education

• Public Accommodations and Healthcare

• Equal Access to Credit

• Freedom From Harassment

You can learn more about how GENDA impacts the lives of those who identify as TGNCNB by attending this training at WESPAC on Wednesday, August 21st at 6pm.  Free parking upper level.  RSVPs required.  Free and open to the public:

https://www.thenation.com/article/noura-erakat-justice-for-some-book-review/

https://highlandscurrent.org/2019/07/12/social-activist-reflects-on-decades-of-advocacy/

Conflict Resolution Facilitators Needed at the Westchester County Jail

On the weekend on May 31 to June 2, the first conflict resolution workshop was held for women at the Westchester County Jail.  Nine women who had been accused or everything from misdemeanors to violent crimes sat in a classroom together. This workshop was led by the Alternatives to Violence Project to help the women deal with the conflicts in their lives. All women participated fully, speaking about themselves positively, brainstorming violence and nonviolence, sharing a conflict they solved nonviolently, using I messages, and doing role plays. When asked at the end of the three-day workshop what they will take away with them, they responded the importance of listening, assertiveness, actual tools to use when they find themselves in a conflict situation, affirmation and a better understanding of themselves.

The Westchester County Jail, in Valhalla, New York, is exemplary in providing programs and preparing prisoners for reentry.  Programs and counseling begin on entry to the facility and continue through their stay. The Administration fully supports these efforts and enthusiastically welcomed a new program into the facility.

AVP, begun in 1975 by inmates at Green Haven Correctional Facility, helps people build conflict resolution skills by working on communication, listening, community, and tools to resolve conflict by using exercises and role plays rather than lectures. The intense emotional focus used in dealing with conflict and anger is interspersed with “Light and Livelies”. 

AVP needs more facilitators to meet the needs at the county jail. There will be an AVP Basic Workshop in Scarsdale on August 9-11. For more information on the Westchester County Jail Program contact Jacqueline Labatt-Simon at [email protected].

The Alternatives to Violence Project conducts workshops in the community and prisons.  All facilitators and participants are volunteers. For information on AVP, go to www.avpny.org