[Air-L] FYI: HR 482 and SB 103 - attack on geospatial information, antiracism work, and affordable housing

Jack Jen Gieseking jgieseking at gmail.com
Tue Jan 31 20:30:31 PST 2017


Dear AoIR colleagues,

Colleagues and I just posted this collaboratively written email to various
geography lists. Please help us get the word out and encourage AoIR,
@theAAG (American Association of Geographers), and other disciplinary
groups (AAA, ASA, ASA, MLA, AHA, et al) to take action.

With you,
Jack

**

Dear Geographers,

We are writing to bring your attention to the US HR 482 and SB 103, which
are an attack on the collection, storage, and distribution of geospatial
information, antiracism work, and affordable housing (see below). The text
of the bill
<https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/482/text?r=117>,
“Local Zoning Decisions Protection Act of 2017,” will nullify HUD's 2015
“Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing” report to "have no force or
effect," and does so by eliminating the data to support social change.

In other words, the bill stands at odds with the pursuit of knowledge about
human geography, including census data. The bill would prohibit a
significant amount of the work we do on race, racism, and fair housing in
the US, as well as GIS research more broadly, all of which thwart work
towards social justice. A key section reads as follows:

SEC. 3. PROHIBITION ON USE OF FEDERAL FUNDS.
Notwithstanding any other provision of law, no Federal funds may be used to
design, build, maintain, utilize, or provide access to a Federal database
of geospatial information on community racial disparities or disparities in
access to affordable housing.

We encourage feedback, wisdom, and action among our respective lists, AAG
specialty groups, other collectives and collegial relationships, and the
AAG leadership. We ask you to share word about this bill with colleagues in
other disciplines and on social media, using the hashtags #datarefuge and
#datarescue when doing so to connect this issue to larger issues of public
data and public data collection erasure, obfuscation, and elimination. We
also encourage US citizens to reach out to your congressional
representatives or to organize from afar in solidarity to stop this bill.
Full links to the Senate and House bills are below.

Thanks to Euan Hague for bringing this to the CRIT-GEOG list's attention,
and for Reed Underwood's response.

Onward together,
Jack Gieseking, Trinity College
Emily Mitchell-Eaton, USCS
Hector Agredano, CUNY Graduate Center
Elizabeth R. Johnson, Hobart & William Smith Colleges
Naomi Adiv, Portland State University
Ryan Burns, University of Calgary
--
Jen Jack Gieseking
Assistant Professor of Public Humanities
American Studies Program, Trinity College
300 Summit Street, Hartford, CT  06106
www.jgieseking.org
www.peopleplacespace.org
@jgieseking <https://twitter.com/jgieseking>



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