Riots Possible Here Unless Changes Are Made, Panel Warns

The executive director of the Orange County Human Relations Commission warned Sunday that the recent Los Angeles riots could be a “snapshot” of Orange County’s future if its people don’t erase some of the racial barriers that divide them.

“We’re at a crossroads,” Russell Kennedy told a gathering of about 50 at Chapman University. “We have to decide whether we’re going to go toward isolation--by building higher walls to separate ourselves from each other--or toward embracing (ethnic) diversity.”

Kennedy made his remarks as part of a panel discussion on race relations in Orange County. Sponsored by the Interfaith Peace Ministry of Orange County and the Albert Schweitzer Institute of Chapman University, the discussion was inspired, organizers said, by the recent events in Los Angeles.

“We wanted to address some of our own problems before they explode here,” said panel moderator Don Will, director of the Peace Studies Program at Chapman and one of the event’s organizers. “This is a start; at least it opens the doors.”

In addition to Kennedy, the panel included representatives of three major ethnic groups in Orange County: blacks, Latinos and Asians. The other panel members were Shin H. Kim, a founding member and executive director of the Korean Family Counseling and Legal Advice Clinic in Los Angeles and Orange counties; Msgr. Jaime Soto, episcopal vicar for the Latino community of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange; and Fran Maribou Williams, a black professor of psychology at Rancho Santiago College and Chapman University.

For the most part the discussion centered on the theme of viewing ethnic and cultural differences as assets rather than liabilities.

“We need to instill in ourselves and our institutions a sense of compassion,” Soto said. “Our tendency now is not to approach others” who are different.

Williams expanded on that idea. “Unity will not occur unless we as individuals start working on ourselves and on our acceptance of others as just people,” she said. “We should see differences as opportunities for growth--a chance to form some sort of tapestry.”

Some panelists and audience members also alluded to various economic and social problems which they said contribute directly to ethnic violence.

“A case in point,” Soto said, “is that California needs to take a look at its labor and wage laws to see what changes need to be made.” He pointed to the current drywall workers’ strike as an example of one reaction to unfair labor conditions. He also mentioned what he called the “desperate housing situation” among many minorities in the county and the difficulty in obtaining quality educations.

“We haven’t found a way to see ourselves as Americans in the broadest sense,” he said.

When it was all over Will expressed satisfaction with the event, but said he saw the need for much more work to be done. “We particularly need to work on specific situations and ways for (ethnic) communities to work together,” he said.

As the next step in that process, he said, the Interfaith Peace Ministry is sponsoring a “Race Unity Day Picnic” on Aug. 8 at W. O. Hart Park in Orange.

The overall theme of Sunday’s discussion was perhaps best reflected in the comments of an audience member who identified himself as the husband of panelist Kim.

“I am a surgeon,” said Young Song Kim, who practices cardiovascular surgery in Garden Grove. “And underneath the skin, everyone is the same.”