Response to
Harry Franqui-Rivera's
"Gutting the Funding of the
Center for Puerto Rican Studies
is Unwarranted and Indefensible"
By Howard Jordan
The NiLP Report (July 2, 2017)
True, but just like our elected officials are to be held accountable so to must the Centro as well. Since I have never received any funding from El Centro in 15 years as an educator, I can be more dispassionate.
Your analysis appears to one-sided, ignoring some of the controversies that have beset El Centro over the last three decades. I have been both supportive and critical of El Centro on a variety of issues. The funding should not have been cut, but El Centro for some time was too deferential to the political class in our community as well fawning over Speaker Mark-Viverito and Congress member Nydia Velazquez.
The City Council must engage in some introspection but so too must our research institutions to make sure they link their research to the central issues in our community. I am old enough to remember the eras of Directors Frank Bonilla, Juan Flores, Gabe Haslip Viera. Our research institutions have to be held accountable as well.
For example, the silence of the Dominican Studies Center, Mexican Studies, Haitian Studies, which when they were mere small organizations enjoyed the support of Puerto Rican organizations, remaining mute as a fellow center falls prey to patronage politics is deafening. As is the silence and "no comment" of the Centro Director and the City Council.
I can well remember sadly those progressives that now occupy these political spaces opened by the struggle of the Puerto Rican people now prefer to hob knob in the world of insider politics and foundation fund raising. I would like to know of the City Council candidates vying for the term limited City Council Speaker position, which one will pledge to restore the Centro funding to equity?
Perhaps the saddest chapter of this novela is that a person like Angelo Falcón, President of the National Institute for Latino Policy, who has often been ostracized by El Centro has to be the person to defend this institution. Ain't that a kick in the head?
Howard Jordán
is the host of The Jordan Journal on WBAI-99.5FM New York every Friday from 3-5pm (EDT). He is Chair of the Behavioral & Social Sciences Department at the Eugenio de Hostos Community College (CUNY). He can be reached at [email protected].
In response to