The Leadership Forum brings together approximately 60-65 area community leaders on an annual basis. Meeting over a period of four months, leaders learn about and discuss public policy issues that challenge the community, such as race relations, crime, health care, and economic development. Community leaders must be nominated to attend the Leadership Forum and in order to graduate from the program, these leaders must go through an extensive training. Now in its 32nd year, MAC has successfully g raduated more than 1500 people. One of the most persistent and difficult problems community leaders must address is the problem of race.
Attitudes abou t race and experiences with racism influence our perspectives on community issues.
The Leadership Forum provides an option for how to handle discussion of difficult community issues. Louisiana A fter an unsuccessful bid for a St. Bernard Parish Council seat, Louisiana candidate Debra Coleman Warner has become embroiled in a legal dispute with the local School Board. The controversy took place when Warner sued the School Board and other sc hool officials in May 1996 for violating her privacy rights when they published material that revealed Warner believes the Holocaust never occurred. Warner claims that the School Board violated her rights, as well as contributed to the defeat of her candidacy, when a school employee released a 1992 letter to a teacher in which Warner denied the historical validity of the Holocaust. Attorneys for the School Board intend to argue that Warner has publicly expressed racist and anti-Semitic views in the past, so privacy laws do not apply in the case.