The Black Lens

01/13/2026

🖤👊🏾🙏🏾🤎 Salute for refusing to be seen as inferior. For NOT giving up your seat. Rest well Claudette Colvin.

01/13/2026

Speaking truth to power and reading the subtext of dominant culture responses are grounded in lived experience and hard-earned insight—not ideas derived out of thin air. These truths give rise to brave conversations that are necessary for understanding, accountability, and progress.

Such work should never be conflated with sensationalism or dismissed as a media splash.

Testimonies that challenge comfort are not performance; it is a civic responsibility.

Keep showing up Spokane. 👏🏾

01/13/2026

Resolution 2025-0123 passed.

Grateful. Proud. And hopeful.

Tonight, City Council voted 6–1 to pass resolution 2025-0123 reaffirming our community’s commitment to honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Juneteenth, two defining moments in our nation’s journey toward justice and freedom.

Thank you to everyone who sent letters, signed up to testify, shared messages of support, and showed up in solidarity. Your voices mattered. Your presence mattered. And this outcome reflects that.

I also want to thank Spokane City Council for affirming that MLK and Juneteenth remain essential to our collective story and values as a community.

This was never about politics. It was about standing up when our shared history and the holidays that honor it are diminished and choosing clarity over silence.

Onward. 🖤
President Lisa Gardner

01/12/2026

How well do we really understand money? Learn what wealth esteem is— register for this workshop. See flyer below.

01/12/2026

Art and R & B — let”sss gooo

01/06/2026

We continue to elevate the history and contributions of those who fought unapologetically during the American Civil Rights Movement. This is our history. We recognize the hard truths—not to be reshaped by revisionist history. We gather to pay homage to the sacrifices of some that benefited all.

Persistence, not permission.

01/06/2026

We are happy to see our Youth Connection writers doing great things in the community. Congrats to Anesu. Her latest piece titled “Style with substance: From overconsumption to good stewardship” is on blacklensnews.com where she talks about the impact of fast fashion trends. Congrats!

Click below for more:

https://www.blacklensnews.com/stories/2026/jan/04/style-with-substance-from-overconsumption-to-good-/

01/05/2026

Black history doesn’t disappear when it’s challenged—it stands. It doesn’t request~ it states ~ with boldness.

Not for permission but with persistence. Then. Now…and Next.

Not just for us. But for all.

When 15-year-old Claudette Colvin got on a Montgomery city bus on March 2, 1955, she had no idea she was about to change history. She was riding home after school when the driver told her to give up her seat. Claudette had been learning about the Constitution in school and the rights she was supposed to have, so when the driver told her to move, she refused. Police officers came onto the bus, grabbed her, and pulled her outside. They charged her with disturbing the peace, violating segregation laws, and assaulting the officers, even though she had only been sitting still.

In her 2009 memoir "Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice," Claudette wrote about her painful experience. She said that she felt isolated. In the months after the arrest, she became pregnant as an unmarried teenager and believed this made her more open to harsh judgment from the public at the time. In Chapter 7 of her memoir, Claudette said, "When I heard on the news that it was Rosa Parks, I had several feelings: I was glad an adult had finally stood up to the system, but I felt left out. I was thinking, Hey, I did that months ago and everybody dropped me… But on the other hand, having been with Rosa at the NAACP meetings, I thought, Well, maybe she’s the right person—she's strong and adults won’t listen to me anyway."

On December 16, 2021, a judge in Montgomery, Alabama cleared her juvenile record and said what happened to her was wrong. Today more people are learning her story and honoring her courage. Claudette Colvin helped change America when she was only 15 years old, and her stand became part of the case "Browder v. Gayle" that ended bus segregation in Montgomery. Today, she is 86 years old, and she was born on September 5, 1939. Her story reminds all of us that even a young girl who refuses to move can help move the world forward.

(Photo: Courtesy of Claudette Colvin / Nicole Bengiveno / The New York Times)

01/05/2026

Place anchors memory. It tells us what mattered, who mattered, and what a community chose not to forget.

Quincy Square, more than a location in Bremerton, is a landmark paying homage to a cultural architect. It stands as a collective act of accountability to history, honoring Quincy Jones, whose genius shaped music in America—and moreover, the world.

This space represents intention, effort, and remembrance.
It affirms that Black contribution to culture and lifestyle is not incidental—it is unmistakable, distinct, and foundational.

History is not only what is written in textbooks.

It is what we mark.
What we name.
What we preserve in public space.

What has been codified has been protected and passed down.

We have a duty to preserve the legacies that shaped our communities with the same care and priority.

This is how memory lives.
This is how legacy is preserved.

Uneraseable.

It is up to us.

Read the article here:

https://www.blacklensnews.com/stories/2026/jan/04/qa-quincy-jones-square-memory-made-visible-and-the/

01/05/2026

Dyslexia doesn’t just affect literacy.
It affects mental health.
Discipline outcomes.
Graduation rates.
And how students see themselves in the world.
Too often, we intervene after the damage is done.
After confidence has been stripped.
After labels replace understanding.
This documentary asks a different question:
👉 What if we recognized dyslexia before harm takes root?
Because dyslexia is not a lack of intelligence.
It is a difference that too often goes unseen—and unsupported.
🎬 Documentary Screening
📍 The Magic Lantern
📅 Tuesday, January 27th
⏰ 6:30 PM
This is about awareness.
This is about changing outcomes.
Your presence matters.
Your advocacy matters.
👉 Share the flyer. Check out the trailer.

01/04/2026

MLK Day Is Black and American Lineage. Two things can be true at the same time.

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day exists to honor Black American struggle, leadership, and sacrifice in the fight to end legal enslavement and state-sanctioned racial violence in the United States. It is a holiday rooted in specific history, not abstract inspiration.

When “I Have a Dream” is stripped from its context and repurposed to argue colorblindness, neutrality, or comfort, it becomes distorted. Dr. King did not dream of silence. He did not dream of erasure. He did not dream of equality without accountability. He spoke directly about anti-Black racism, economic exploitation, militarism, and the moral failure of a nation that benefitted from Black suffering while denying Black humanity.

To dilute MLK Day into a generalized celebration of “unity” without naming Black Americans is to erase the very people whose blood, labor, organizing, and lives made progress possible. Solidarity requires truth. Honoring Dr. King requires clarity.

On Monday, January 12 at 6 p.m., Spokane City Council will vote on a City Hall Resolution affirming this clarity.

We do not have to dilute the distinct reality of Black American struggle and sacrifice to be inclusive.

Before the City Council vote, read powerful insights from 2025 Woman of the Year Kerra Bower and Spokane NAACP President Lisa Gardner on why clarity around MLK Day, Black history, and collective memory matters.

Black history is American history. Inclusion does not require dilution.

Kerra Bower:

https://www.blacklensnews.com/stories/2026/jan/04/in-her-words-false-neutrality-is-not-baseless-it-i/

Lisa Gardner:

https://www.blacklensnews.com/stories/2026/jan/04/lisa-gardner-let-your-voice-be-heard-on-mlk-day-ju/