The NAACP coming to Cincinnati was a way, not only to repair the city’s tainted reputation, but also to address some of these deep-seated concerns.
By Zenitha Prince
Washington Bureau Chief
CINCINNATI (July 12) -- “Ten, nine, eight, seven…,” the crowd counted down to zero and then followed the drums’ call into the large hall of the Duke Energy Center, signaling that the 99th national convention of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People had officially begun.
Themed “Power, Justice, Freedom, Vote,” this year’s annual enclave, held July 12-17, kicks off a set of events leading up the association’s centennial, Feb. 12, 2009. “This year’s convention is a culmination and celebration of all the NAACP represents,” said National Board of Directors Vice Chair and Convention Planning Committee Chair Roslyn M. Brock.
Julian Bond, longtime chairman of the Board, said there was no better place for that celebration than Cincinnati. “We are so happy to be here in Cincinnati,” he said. “This is our 99th year and there’s no better place to celebrate our 99th year than in the city that played such an important role in the struggle for freedom.” He continued, “Cincinnati was like the Grand Central Station of the Underground Railroad. Some 50,000 freed slaves came over the river here.”
For locals, the NAACP’s presence here has even more contemporary relevance. In April 2001, racial tensions erupted into a violent uprising when police killed an unarmed 19-year-old man. According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, he was the 15th African-American killed by police since 1995.
And there were other problems, said Christopher Smitherman, president of the Cincinnati Branch of the NAACP. Infant mortality was “like that of Third World country” in the city and county, he said. And Blacks had been victims of an “economic apartheid,” that locked them out of the prosperity machine. “There’s this belief that there are no African-American businesses or they don’t have capacity,” Smitherman said.
The NAACP coming to Cincinnati was a way, not only to repair the city’s tainted reputation, but also to address some of these deep-seated concerns. “This is a tremendous win for the city,” Smitherman said. “The NAACP coming here was a good carrot that if we do business like this, everyone can prosper.”
But while the organization wielded a carrot, it also employed a big stick, like in 2002 when national leadership persuaded the local chapter to relocate their annual freedom dinner in support of a boycott of downtown in the wake of the riots.
“The national NAACP did a good job of pushing the envelope because, if they didn’t, [the city] would have done business as usual,” Smitherman said. “And, my fear was that if we had done business as usual, the chapter would have lost tremendous credibility.” The local branch president said it took “very intense work” to make this happen. The national leadership had already decided on Las Vegas as the site for the convention, when a delegation went to them in 2006 to make the case for Cincinnati.
But, perhaps, the hardest work involved persuading the local community that this could work, Smitherman said. He formed a partnership with grassroots advocacy groups, who were convinced the city wasn’t ready to change and assured them of his resolve that everyone would benefit from the estimated 9,000 conferees and $6-10 million that are supposed to pour into the city. “I worked very hard to negotiate and dialogue with the community. If I hadn’t, people would be outside holding signs. This could have easily gone bad,” he said.
The local NAACP made sure the businesses providing flowers, transportation, etc., were African American-owned. He even convinced officials to allow food vendors peddling more Black-friendly but hardly convention-like fare into the building; food like fried fish and greens (which Smitherman and his board actually sampled to ensure the highest quality.) “This is what inclusion looks like,” he said, gesturing towards the bustling exhibition hall, where vendors had set up booths. “I hope in the end our community applauds us. The most reasonable will say we’ve done a good job.”