Odessa Brown Sickle Cell coordinator Emijah Smith holds her 3-month-old son, Marcel, at the Odessa Brown Children's Health Fair on July 14. The fair featured information on the important roles that nutrition, exercise and dental care play in keeping children healthy.

Seattle City Council members are tackling one of the most urgent issues facing the city – a lack of affordable housing.
Councilmembers Sally J. Clarke, chairwoman of the economic development and neighborhoods committee; Richard J. McIver, chairman of the finance and budget committee; and Tom Rasmussen, chairman of the housing, human services and health committee, will hold a community forum and discussion on affordable housing from noon to 2 p.m. Friday, July 20 at City Hall, Seattle City Council chambers, 600 Fourth Ave., second floor.
Representatives from for-profit housing developers, the Office of Housing and council staff will answer questions and discuss the issue of affordable housing.
Some questions to be explored include: How does the private market create housing? How is housing affordability defined in Seattle in 2007? What tools does the city have to develop affordable housing? What other things should the city consider doing...

Every 33 minutes, a student in Washington State will drop out of school and nearly one in three students in our state will not receive their diploma. Those numbers are not acceptable according to Communities in Schools, the nation's largest dropout prevention organization.
Shaun Alexander, Seattle Seahawks running back, agreed to become the national spokesman for the organization to help keep students in school. Alexander will work with Communities in Schools on a national level...

Higher income does not protect Blacks and Hispanics from receiving mortgage loans with above-market rates, a new study by a group pushing for reforms to lending laws says.
The report, released last week by the Washington D.C.-based National Community Reinvestment Coalition, concludes that in 2005 Blacks in 179 metropolitan areas were at least twice as likely as Whites to receive expensive loans.
In the Seattle area, African Americans were more than two and one half times more likely than Whites to receive a high-cost mortgage. Seattle ranked 151st out of...

The Soul Sistas bicycling club hit the road July 14, for their 204-mile ride from the University of Washington campus in Seattle to Holladay Park in Portland.
The group camped out overnight and their families clocked the miles, every inch of the way.
"This will be my first time and I can hardly wait!" said a very enthusiastic Damaris Pearson, a career counselor at Seattle's Franklin High School, before the race.
Elenora Northington and Stephanie LaBoo trained and encouraged the group...

Counties across the state must establish a deadly use of force planning authority, according to a law passed at the midnight hour of this year's legislative session.
"What will happen in the planning process, they will find out there is not an equal standard across the state when a controversial shooting happens," said state Sen. Margaret Carter, D-N.E. Portland, a sponsor of the bill, SB 111-C.
Each county's planning authority will consist of the district attorney; the sheriff; a non-management police officer and a private citizen, both selected by the district attorney and....

Democratic presidential frontrunner and New York Sen. Hillary Clinton confirmed to the Los Angeles Sentinel in an exclusive interview this week that she has hired two high-powered and influential African Americans to help run her historic race for the White House and she's assembling a team of African American advisors across the country.
"I want to have as inclusive and diverse a campaign as I can because that's the way I want to govern," Clinton said. "We just want to do things right." Clinton announced that Chicago-based banker and longtime friend Bob Nash would soon become her deputy campaign manager. Previously, Nash had worked as the director of White House personnel for President Bill Clinton for six years.

WASHINGTON (AP)  Fast-food waitress Fawn Townsend of Raleigh, N.C., knows exactly what she is going to do if her salary goes up with Tuesday's increase in the federal minimum wage: start saving for a car so she can find a second job to make ends meet.
"My goal personally is to get a vehicle so I can independently go back and forth to work and maybe pick up extra work so I can have that extra income, because minimum wage is not cutting it," said Townsend, who is 24 and single. "Being a single person, you can't pay all your bills with one minimum wage job."
Many lawmakers, along with advocates for low-wage workers, are celebrating the first increase in the federal minimum wage in a decade. Yet many acknowledge that raising it from $5.15 an hour to $5.85 will provide only meager help for some of the lowest paid workers.
About 1.7 million people made $5.15 or less in 2006, according to the Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
"The reality for a minimum wage worker is that every penny makes a difference because low-wage workers make the choice between putting food on the table and paying for electricity or buying clothes for their children," said Beth Shulman, former vice president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union.
"Saying that, it's clear going up to $5.85 is not enough to really make sure that people really can afford the things that all families need," said Shulman, author of "The Betrayal of Work: How Low-Wage Jobs Fail 30 Million Americans."

ATLANTA -- A young man sentenced to 10 years in prison for having consensual sex with a teenager must wait weeks more behind bars while the state Supreme Court decides his fate. The state Supreme Court is expect to issue two key rulings after hearing arguments in the case of Genarlow Wilson before a courtroom packed with his supporters....

From left to right: Timothy Washington (background) of PO Soul Entertainment Ministries; Aminah Parks, 4; Jermaine Atherton, also of PO Soul Entertainment Ministries; and Jaylon Benjamin, 13 (background) clear litter near Jefferson High School on July 7, during the second annual "Stop Pointing a Finger and Lend a Hand Community Restoration Project," founded by PO Soul Entertainment Ministries and sponsored by several local businesses.