Jonny Gammage Memorial Scholarship

==Insights==
At our May 2009 meeting, members of the Black and White Reunion's Coordinating Council affirmed their commitment to the Jonny Gammage Memorial Scholarship by setting aside $4,000 for law students who have demonstrated an interest in civil rights and social justice. Two winners of an essay contest will be presented with $2000 scholarships at the Summit Against Racism on Saturday, January 23, 2010.
The popular all-day Summit is held annually on the Saturday after Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. 
By making this commitment, members of the Black and White Reunion reasserted the organization's root purpose--the struggle for police accountability and against police brutality--established in the wake of Gammage's death at the hands of police in 1995.
The Black and White Reunion is reaching out to organizations that have participated in promoting the scholarship and reviewing scholarship essay entries in previous years. This is a shout out to our partners at the Pittsburgh NAACP, the Homer S. Brown Law Association, and the University of Pittsburgh and Duquesne University Law Schools. Now is the time to decide on the scholarship essay question for the coming year, and we seek suggestions from all of our partners. Please email Tris Ozark with recommendations: ozark@fyi.net. 
The 2010 event will be the Black and White Reunion's TWELFTH ANNUAL SUMMIT AGAINST RACISM! Organizations and individuals can best support the Jonny Gammage Memorial Scholarship by attending the Summit, making monetary or in-kind donations, and/or purchasing advertisements in the Summit's program booklet. Please save the date (1/23/10) and watch for future announcements. 
Black and White Reunion members worked with the Thomas Merton Center, One Hood, the Coalition Against Violence and others, and circulated a petition asking City Council to delay its vote on assault rifles for the Pittsburgh Police. On short notice, the groups gathered more than 100 signatures and presented them to City Council. Ultimately, we lost and the Pittsburgh Police now have much larger guns. Here is a New Pittsburgh Courier article where our members Mark Ozark and Tim Stevens articulate our position. Paradise Gray and Tim Stevens also appeared on KDKA radio to explain community opposition to arming the police--not just the SWAT teams--with assault weapons.
 
Our next Summit Planning Meeting is on Thursday June 18 at 7 PM at East Liberty Presbyterian Church. Everyone who has participated in prior Summits is a member of BWR and we ask you to joining our planning for Summit 2010 and the Jonny Gammage Memorial Scholarship. Please come to the meeting or contact Bob Maddock @ 412-322-9275