If you give someone a fish. . .

If you give me a fish, you feed me for a day.

I need some help on this, although I think I know the answer:

Is DWB still a traffic offense that will get you stopped by a police officer? For those who may not be aware, DWB is "Driving While Black." I'd only expand it to make it "Driving While Brown." Whatever shade.

My wife and I are involved with an organization called Quad City Interfaith - QCI for the remainder of this post. A large part of QCI's approach is to help the various congregations establish core groups of 10-30 members. Those groups are free to explore areas in which they may be able to, as the QCI mission statement says, create a more just society in the Quad Cities. QCI itself has four primary areas of concentration: immigration, education, employment and health care/transportation equity. The congregations' core groups may choose one of QCI's areas of focus, or they may pursue their own.

St. Mary's Catholic in Davenport had its first core group meeting last Tuesday. We discussed areas of concern, areas in which we could make a difference. It soon became obvious that the topics of immigration and racial profiling were on our minds and hearts.

We are aware of the limitations of organizations such as ours. To give one example, employment is a QCI concern. We know that QCI can't create a job. (Well, strictly speaking, QCI does create one: they hire an intern each year, usually from St. Ambrose University.) But while we know we can't create jobs, we can call attention to unfair hiring practices.

A picture in the newspaper tells a story without meaning to. There was a group photo taken of a work crew that was renovating a civic center in Rock Island. On that crew of ten or so people, not one was African-American. Seriously? Not one black person working on the MARTIN LUTHER KING JR. CENTER, for crying out loud? Maybe the contractor has a lot of crews working. I hope so. Maybe those crews do have some diversification. I hope so. But, symbolically, if nothing else - isn't there something wrong with this picture?

If you teach me to fish then you have fed me UNTIL. . .

Until the river is contaminated or the shoreline seized for development.

Anyway, racial profiling and immigration are on our minds at St. Mary's.

Is DWB still an offense that will get you pulled over?

Two cases in point:

• A black male, in his early 20s, was pulled over for not using a turn signal. I've seen lots of drivers that have not used turn signals. I have not seen a police officer pull anyone over for this failure. What makes this interesting is that this police cruiser had followed this person for some distance, through some turns. The driver, acutely aware of the DWB thing, was scrupulous about using his turn signals every time he needed to. So, was the failure to use a turn signal an excuse to pull this person over? Did the officer follow this person for that distance  just waiting for some offense?
• A Latino driver had an officer approach his car. The driver's offense? He was talking on his cell phone - in his parked car - in a legal parking place. After some time in interviewing this driver, the officer asked, "What are you doing here?" It was a rather nice housing development, and this person was seemingly rather out of place. No ticket was issued, but someone was harassed. I'm sorry - what else would you call it?

And do you think that a Caucasian would have been pulled over in either instance? I doubt that I would have been, and I'm not even all Caucasian. You just can't tell by looking.

I'm fully aware that there are always questions, and before we start screaming "Prfofiling!!!" we must be sure of the details. If you're driving with a taillight out anyone anywhere would be pulled over, and if you didn't have a valid driver's license when you got pulled over you'd be in a world of hurt, no matter who you are, no matter where you are, no matter when. But that wasn't the case in either of these instances.

So, my answer to "Will DWB still get you stopped?" my answer is, "Yes - in places and at times it happens."

And it's not right. Not ever. Not in any place.

So, our core group is setting up a meeting between our parishioners and members of the Davenport PD. We would like it to be a Q&A meeting, and we're exploring and discussing the format. We would have folks aware that if they are stopped despite their observance of law, there are things to do and not do - like, Get the officer's name and badge. They have to give that up. Get details and record them. Such as that.

QCI and our core group can't change the world. We know that. We can, and we will, strive to make our little corner of the world a more just place.

But if you teach me to organize then whatever the challenge I can join together with my peers and we will fashion our own solution.

Thanks for hanging out for a few. I'd love your reactions.