The city of Pittsburgh and the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work and Center on Race and Social Problems will host one of the largest race relation conferences to ever take place in the ­country. From June 3-6, the “Race in America: Restructuring Inequality” national conference will take place at various places around the university area.

LARRY DAVIS

“My goal was to put on the largest conference on the issue of race. There has never been a large number of scholars and experts on race together in one place at one conference,” said Larry E. Davis, Ph.D., dean and professor of Pitt’s School of Social Work and Director of the Center on Race and Social Problems. “We have some of the most prominent scholars in Pittsburgh and the country coming. I would not miss this conference.”

For years, Ora Lee Carroll, the East End activist who founded East Liberty Concerned Citizens Corp. as a vehicle to rebuild Pittsburgh’s Larimer neighborhood, would say she had battled enough politicians and was going to quit and go back home to the South.

But she would always try again, in her blunt, politically incorrect fashion to get funding for development projects—only to be rejected.

GROWING THE COMMUNITY—Convalescing ELCCC Board Chair Ora Lee Carroll is seen here potting plants during her Project Africa campaign.

“She would call people out in public when they didn’t come through for her, state reps, the mayor, the Urban Redevelopment Authority—she didn’t care,” said John Brewer, owner of the Pittsburgh Trolley Station Oral History Center. “So most of the time, they were not inclined to give her money.”

Toward the end of last school year, the Penn Hills School District was jolted by a series of incidents involving weapons in the schools—and Superintendent Joseph Carroll had to explain the district’s actions.

As the end of this school year approaches, the district is laying off teachers, has suspended an assistant principal for a racial slur, and has to answer a federal lawsuit filed by a former student who, as a senior, was suspended last year—and again, Carroll is fielding complaints.

SUPERINTENDENT JOSEPH CARROLL

Next year, he won’t have to—he is stepping down as superintendent. Carroll tendered his resignation at the beginning of the May10 school board meeting. The board accepted it in an 8-1 vote. It becomes effective July 9.

The African-American faith community has traditionally been absent from efforts to fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The church’s message has ranged from the denial of the epidemic and how it is impacting the Black community to the vilifying and ostracizing of those infected.

RENEE BEAMAN

However, through the work of organizations like Beautiful Gate Outreach Center in Wilmington, Del., this trend has turned in the opposite direction. The center, which is located in Bethel AME Church, works to eliminate the spread of HIV/AIDS and offers support for those with the disease.