30 minutes away from me...

[IfasehunReincarnated]

Mo. Town Denies Unmarried Couple Permit

1 hour, 7 minutes ago

BLACK JACK, Mo. - The city council has rejected a measure allowing unmarried couples with multiple children to live together, and the mayor said those who fall into that category could soon face eviction.

Olivia Shelltrack and Fondrey Loving were denied an occupancy permit after moving into a home in this St. Louis suburb because they have three children and are not married.

The town's planning and zoning commission proposed a change in the law, but the measure was rejected Tuesday by the city council in a 5-3 vote.

"I'm just shocked," Shelltrack said. "I really thought this would all be over, and we could go on with our lives."

The current ordinance prohibits more than three people from living together unless they are related by "blood, marriage or adoption." The defeated measure would have changed the definition of a family to include unmarried couples with two or more children.

Mayor Norman McCourt declined to be interviewed but said in a statement that those who do not meet the town's definition of family could soon face eviction.

Black Jack's special counsel, Sheldon Stock, declined to say whether the city will seek to remove Loving and Shelltrack from their home.

[WombanAuset]

Well alrighty then..maybe they should just get married on paper now..i mean they are basically married..3 children n all

[Revolutionary_Student]

I got's to get 'hood on this one because... AY YO!... DAT AIN'T RIGHT!!! WHO ARE THEY TO SAY ONE CAN'T LIVE SOMEWHERE THAT HE/SHE WORKS TO PAY BILLS ON THE BASIS THAT YOU ARE NOT MARRIED?!!! DOES'T ANYONE ELSE SEE WHAT'S WRONG WITH THIS?

Afrikans, I suggest we all send letters, emails, and fliers, to the president and congressmen and let them know that we DO NOT APPROVE. STRENGTH COMES IN NUMBERS... WE MUST DRAW THE LINE SOMEWHERE!!

I'm going to look into getting some contact info and I'll post it up. LINK UP SOULJAHS!!! UHURU!

[CreatorsCollege]

Well alrighty then..maybe they should just get married on paper now..i mean they are basically married..3 children n all

Greetings Beloved Sister!

State marriage is "permission." What the "State" is essentially saying is that couples require the "State's" blessing to be married, and by extension the "State" has the power to ENFORCE MARRIAGE. RESIST.

THIS IS TYRANNY.

Not to be crass, but do you know the history of the word F.U.C.K.?

Fornication Under the Conscent of the King! Yes, once upon a time British "subjects" required permission from the king to have sex.

If you compare and contrast the social, economic and political model of the "west," it is no different that what europeans know and have always done. They are regressive in their approach and call is 'civilization'.

Marriage Licenses are a 20th century phenomenon. It's design is for political and economic control.

FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION IS AN UNALIENABLE RIGHT. It could also be agrued that this is a 10th Amendment issue -the freedom to contract which supercedes the Constitution.

I can only guess that these folk are after marriage license revenue, and the license to bond and borrow money against to finance their municipal corporation.

Incidentially, gay marriage is being normalized for the same purposes. (Let's try to keep the thread on point about "marriage" 'State Style')

[CreatorsCollege]

What's up with the notion of "occupancy permit?" Reminds me of reconstruction and Jim Crow laws against African residency in certain areas/places.

Let's everybody bone-up on our various State Constitutions.

[Revolutionary_Student]

THIS IS TYRANNY.

Not to be crass, but do you know the history of the word F.U.C.K.?

Fornication Under the Conscent of the King! Yes, once upon a time British "subjects" required permission from the king to have sex.

I was aware of this and that is exactly what they're doing!

[Revolutionary_Student]

I found this story on yahoo news.

...Black Jack prohibits more than three unrelated people from living together. City officials ruled that Shelltrack and Loving, who are not married, and the three kids, one of them Shelltrack's from a previous relationship, fit that description.


"This ordinance is outdated. We are a family," says Shelltrack, 31. "There's a mom, there's a dad, there's three children. We are a family." Whether Shelltrack, a stay-at-home mom, and Loving, 33, who works for a payroll-administration company, are married "should not be anybody's business, if I pay my taxes, if I'm able to buy the house," she says.


Now, under threat of a lawsuit from the American Civil Liberties Union and an investigation by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, the city is set to vote today to broaden the law just enough to allow the Shelltrack-Loving household to live in town.


"It's nothing unusual to have these particular type of laws. Basically it's to prevent overcrowding," Mayor Norman McCourt says. Legislating morality, he says, "was never the intention."


Nationally, definitions of "family" in zoning laws are widespread and are generally designed to prevent fraternity houses and boarding houses in single-family neighborhoods. Black Jack city attorney Sheldon Stock says more than 80 of the 91 municipalities in St. Louis County, which surrounds the city of St. Louis, have similar restrictions.

Few enforce them, however, says Tony Rothert, legal director of the ACLU of Eastern Missouri. "We're not aware of any other city that has recently tried to deny an occupancy permit to a family," he says. "It's been happening in Black Jack a couple times a year."


In 1999, an unmarried couple with 3-year-old triplets, Duane Carpenter and Doris McKinney, were denied an occupancy permit in the town. "The easiest resolution to cure the situation would be for them to get married," McCourt wrote to the ACLU at the time. "Our community believes this is the appropriate way to raise a family." -Revolutionary Student says: Once again, who are "they" to say what's appropriate when it comes to raising a family where there is no evident danger or threat involved?-


In 1986, a Missouri appeals court upheld a similar law in Ladue, an affluent St. Louis suburb, after it was challenged by Joan Kelly Horn and partner Terrence Jones, who lived there two years with seven children from previous marriages before the city ordered them out.


"It was, 'Get married or move out,' " says Horn, who later served in Congress in 1991 and 1992. "We were both pretty appalled." The couple married in 1987 - on their own timetable, Horn says. They divorced in 1999. -Revolutionary Student says: And this is why most people don't want to get "married" on paper; because the probability of divorce is so high. Divorce court is not a walk in the park.-


Missouri housing laws, like those of at least 18 other states, do not prohibit discrimination based on marital status.


Manassas, Va., adopted a law in December defining family as immediate family members only - not nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles and cousins. Enforcement was suspended after public protest and objections from the ACLU.


The Provo, Utah, City Council is debating whether to define a family as people related by blood, marriage, adoption or other legal ties.


In Black Jack, the proposed new law would include in its definition "two unrelated persons" with children belonging to either or both.


Black Jack residents who oppose changing the law say Shelltrack and Loving should have done their homework before buying a house.


"They've gotten into a situation and it doesn't fit them," longtime resident Corliss Bonner says. "So their solution is, change the situation. That's not an adult approach."


Larry Hensley says Shelltrack and Loving should conform or move.-Revolutionary Student says: UTTER TYRANNY!- He says that's what he did 20 years ago when he moved from neighboring Florissant, which barred him from keeping bees in his backyard.

"Any law that can prevent the morality of the towns from going down is good. You might have a house with 10 or 15 people living in it. Two or three different so-called families in one house," he says. "I don't know what the big deal is about getting married."-Revolutionary Student says: It's a HUGE deal when you try to force two people against their own will to do so!-

The topic of marriage has come up between Shelltrack and Loving. About three years ago, he proposed, and she said yes. But the couple has set no date for the wedding. Instead, they saved for a bigger house.

"We're happy with the way our lives are," Shelltrack says. "We don't feel that a piece of paper is going to change it. It's not going to make us better parents. It's not going to make us better neighbors."-Revolutionary Student says: And that's the bottom line.-

[IfasehunReincarnated]

What's up with the notion of "occupancy permit?" Reminds me of reconstruction and Jim Crow laws against African residency in certain areas/places.

Let's everybody bone-up on our various State Constitutions.

IN Missouri occupany permits are used to ensure that people are living in a home or apartment that meets or exceeds health and building quality standards. BUT...in many cities and muncipalities you can not live in a home with someone w/ a different last name. That is no more than two last names can be on the permit. Why? So they also keep track of people that break occupany permits by putting too many people in more than one house... for example, have 12 kids, a grandmother and mother and father living under one roof.

It also helps cities and landlords keep track of how committed people are to maintaining a mortgage or rent payment with one another, so they dont end up with unused housing stock or unpaid debt to landlords and mortgage companies. I understand all that, with a background in comm. development, but its still punitive towards people that dont want to participate in western paper trails.

The system is flawed because its used to penalize people that participate in state marriage. And of course its used silently by the religious right to hurt people that dont marry by standards.

[Revolutionary_Student]

Write to congress regarding this "law".

[Nia Maishani]

Tyranny and SWINDLING indeed!

So what if I wanted (or NEEDED) to keep a couple of unrelated friends/roommates under the same roof in order to maintain?

It never ceases to amaze me the myriad calculations they sit around getting paid to concoct to snatch the rug out from under us, just when we get comfortable thinking the very BASIC rights we (are supposed to) have are secure. This is why I always say that as long as we continue to live amongst them and under their law, we have to be certain that we have souljahs on every Board, Council & Commission, and a part of every law-proposing/making body, in order to block some of these oppressive measures they get passed.

[WombanAuset]

Hey...nobody's on my side *crying* ..nah for real..i learn something every day here

[Nia Maishani]

Hey...nobody's on my side *crying* ..nah for real..i learn something every day here

Sistar WombanAuset,

Actually, we are probably on the same page *somewhat*. I am personally very much against the social ill of our people "shacking up" with no real intention of committing to one another (or one party has no such intention), especially when children are brought into the picture. In my humble opinion (which I won't try to force onto anyone else), SOMETHING should be done to officiate the union, ceremonially, in which the couple lets one another, their family and their community know in no uncertain terms that their union is official, sacred, divinely ordained and committed as far as they both are concerned--not simply a loosely designed/defined relationship of convenience. However, I don't feel it is any of the gubment's bidness to force that upon anyone or to be the dictator of what's what in that regard. I don't intend personally to ever desecrate any union of mine through any western marriage ceremony or legalities--though I will definitely have an Afrikan-centered, Afrikan-headed, Afri-spiritual officiation.

Moreover, this new law bulljive looks to my trained eye (the 3rd) like the meanderings of fascistization. Eaaaasing up on us. Always remember: western or amerikkkan laws are NEVER--EVER--in OUR interest, but only/always serve the interests of the establishment.