Category: A Message From The Board - PACG - Progressive Action for the Common Good

Register for the 12th Annual PACG Potluck and Pie Auction - PACG Event

8/5/2024

Announcing the 12th Annual PACG Potluck and Pie Auction
Sunday, September 8th from noon to 3:00 pm

Longview Park
1300 17th ST
Rock Island, IL (map)

A Message from the Board

We have decided to do a Potluck and Pie Auction in place of the Picnic and Pie Auction this year. We are looking for volunteers. It's a busy time for all but this is an important signature event and we would love to see you. Save the date and let us know how you will help make this fun gathering a reality this year. Please register here.

Please register here.

Chip in to support PACG in "Birdies for Charity 2024" - A Message from the Board

4/9/2024

**Support PACG as Birdies for Charity 2024 kicks off!**

A Message from the Board

Birdie 2363 - Donate Here

2024-simplified-pledge-form_onepage-1.pdf
File Size:	262 kb
File Type:	pdf

Chip in for a chance to win in 2024!

Once again, this year PACG is participating in the John Deere Birdies for Charity drive! The John Deere Classic runs from July 1st through 7th this year. Here is some information from the Birdies for Charity website about what this means for us:

When you chip in to help area charities, you could win! But your favorite charity will be the real winner. That’s because participating charities receive 100% of the donations pledged to them in this program, plus a bonus from the Birdies for Charity Bonus Fund which is a guaranteed 5% match.

John Deere Classic week is always exciting. Not just for the tournament, but also for what the tournament means for charities. Since 1971, the John Deere Classic has delivered over $159 million to regional charities, most of it through its innovative Birdies for Charity program. No other event on the PGA TOUR does it better - and it's the generous and hardworking nature of this area that makes it happen!

Progressive Action Update readers, you can win a two-year lease on a new car by submitting your pledge donation by June 26th!

And whatever you give to PACG through Birdies for Charity increases your donation by 5% through their generous matching offer.

Click this link or the button to donate online to PACG! Our "Bird" is #2363
https://birdiesforcharity.com/donate?charity=2363 Then click Donate Now.

If you want to send a check, use a pledge form (or download the 2024 Simplified Pledge Form at the top of this page). Make your check out to Birdies for Charity and send it to 15623 Coaltown Rd, East Moline, IL 61244. Make sure to fill in Progressive Action for the Common Good as the Charity Solicited For and 2363 as the Bird Number.

Important dates:
Friday, June 26th: Pledges and Guesses for the Grand Prize Contest are due.
July 1st through July 7th: John Deere Classic Tournament Week

Ann McCluskey
Treasurer, PACG

Chip in for PACG here.

"I Am the Future" at the Figge - After Action Report

1/17/2024

I Am the Future showing at the Figge - After Action Report

PACG Board

On Thursday, January 11, 2024, over 80 people braved the cold evening to see our civil rights film I Am the Future: Standing on the Shoulders of the Past and to hear our Legacy Panel. The Figge Art Museum in Davenport was the perfect host for our event!

We were honored to have MacArthur Cotton from Kosciusko, Mississippi, a veteran of the civil rights movement in Mississippi, as our guest. He was one of the young organizers to help with the Freedom Riders campaign in 1961. Avery Pearl, Assistant Director of TMBC at the Lincoln Center and our young film star Abdur Howard, who stepped in to fill in for Aubrey Barnes, were also part of our Legacy panel. We were so proud to have such a diverse group across multiple generations to discuss civil rights!

Allison Ambrose did a wonderful job as facilitator for the panel discussion and question and answers. Each of our younger panelists did a great job of suggesting how to get young people involved in civil rights issues and voting. Mr. Cotton made the point that what they did in the 1960s to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 won’t work today. But our country is faced with some of the same threats to our democracy as the 60s and those will affect us all. Today we need to empower people to vote at every level of government, treat each other with respect and work together for change. What a great lead off for the Dr. Martin Luther King celebrations in the following days.

Read all about our I Am the Future film stars here. Read the details of our Legacy Panel here.

We were also happy to have youth from Project Renewal and the Youth Advocate Program (YAP) of the NAACP Davenport.

Ann McCluskey, PACG Treasurer reported, "I asked people what they thought about the event as they walked out. To a person, they were moved by it. It was a special night."

PACG Board Member Loxi Hopkins said, "People I talked to thought it was amazing. I felt sure the whole line of people sitting in front of me were principles or teachers. People spent a lot of time at the displays."

Reflecting on the event over the past few days, attendee (and mother of Legacy Panel member Abdur Howard), Daneca Walker said, "The response to a question directed to the Legacy Panel pointed out that activism needs to start with the young people. We can’t allow the normalization of unfair and inequitable treatment. We must teach our children to guard against this. Inequitable treatment begins to desensitize them to the issue of humans being treated humanly. Larger cities have more opportunities for the exposure. In smaller areas like ours the opportunities exist, one just has to be more intentional in their search. As adults, we move about this unforgiving world praying that each of our interactions are genuine and filled with positivity, but we are also smart enough to know that that notion isn’t realistic. Children interact with adults believing that whether the interaction was good or bad it must be okay because they are adults. The trust factor plays such a huge role. Diversity, equity, equality and inclusion are terms that young people can easily comprehend as individual terms, but society has difficulty understanding them collectively as they apply to humanity. They all equate to activism and civil rights - to Human Rights."

Thank you to our committee members Allison Ambrose, Ann McCluskey, Caryn Unsicker, Loxi Hopkins, Susan Leuthauser, Rael Slavensky, and Alta Price. PJ Slobojan for helped with registration and Jeannie Price worked on our graphics. Thanks to Rael and Glenda for the pictures.

Thanks to our co-sponsors Figge Art Museum, WQPT-Quad Cities PBS and WVIK-Quad Cities NPR. Our event was also made possible by the generosity of the following organizations, individual and anonymous donors:

100 Black Men of the Quad Cities, ASWAS, Inc, Diocese of Davenport, Friends of MLK Interpretive Center, Iowa State Representative Ken Croken, Metrocom NAACP #4019, Northwest Bank and Trust, One Human Family-QCA, Quad Cities Interfaith, Tracy and Ben Singleton and Smart Lexus of the Quad Cities.

Glenda Guster

Save the Date - "I Am the Future" at the Figge January 11, 2024

11/25/2023

Save the Date - I Am the Future at the Figge
Thursday, January 11th from 5:00 to 8:00 pm

Figge Art Museum
225 W 2nd ST
Davenport, IA (map)

A Message from the Board

Save the date for our next showing of I Am the Future at the Figge Art Museum in Davenport. We will have a social hour with light hors d’oeuvres and a cash bar from 5:00 to 6:00. The showing of our film will be followed by a Legacy Panel discussion featuring MacArthur Cotton and other civil rights activists, including those in our video. More details will follow.

We also need volunteers to help with this event.

Glenda Guster

A tribute to Cath Bolkcom

11/21/2023

A tribute to PACG co-founder Cath Bolkcom

A Message from the Board

by Alison McGaughey

In my latest column, read about a woman whose grassroots work had a hand in helping a certain former Illinois senator make his way to the White House.

And if you’re on the right side of the book banning debate, I promise her story will downright give you the goosebumps.

If you already know Cath Bolkcom, I hope this interview and OFFICIAL QUAD CITIZEN QUIZ will teach you something new. As she bids farewell to the QC, (trading the Quads for the Twins, if you will), I hope you enjoy learning about Cath's life and appreciating all she has contributed to the QC. Read the article here.

PACG's Holiday Party - PACG Event

11/9/2023

Register for PACG's Annual Holiday Party
Saturday, December 2nd from 5:30 to 8:00 pm

A Message from the Board

Join us at the German American Heritage Center for a meal and help us celebrate another year of PACG's activism!

We will present the annual Dick Fallow Endowment for Social Justice award to a worthy, local recipient.

The main course will be catered, with vegan and gluten-free options. Please bring a side dish or dessert to share.

We also ask that you bring your own dishware, silverware and reusable napkin, if possible. This follows our PACG environmental principle of sustainability.

Although this event is free, we need you to register. Talk to your friends, register them and bring them along!

Optional Holiday Gift: This year we are supporting Quad Cities Alliance for Immigrants and Refugees (QCAIR). Please bring a wrapped toy for a child 6 months to 12 years of age. Securely label your gift with the age (and gender, if appropriate) of the child.

If you’re one of our many new members this year, come find out how much fun we progressives have during the holiday season!

There is extra parking available in the lot just east of the museum, where the YMCA used to be.

Please register here.

PACG Webmaster

PACG Holiday Party - Save the Date!

11/8/2023

PACG’s Holiday Party - Save the Date
Saturday, December 2nd at 5:30 pm

A Message from the Board

We will have a lot more details in next week’s Progressive Action Update. For now, just mark your calendars. We hope to see you there!

Announcing our new email address! A Message from the Board

10/22/2023

PACG’s new (easier) email address!

A Message from the Board

In 2005 when PACG was founded, there were few groups working on progressive issues in the Quad Cities, so it was important that our email address reflected our work. But all these years later it is time to simplify things for our members and community.

With that in mind, we have established a new Gmail address that is similar to our website’s. If you can remember PACGQC you can easily email us or check our online presence. And rest assured, if you use our old email address we will still get your message.

We are excited that we can continue to make things easier for all of us!

Glenda Guster

“I Am the Future” showing at the Putnam on October 22nd at 2:00 pm - PACG Event

10/10/2023

I Am the Future showing at the Putnam
Sunday, October 22nd at 2:00 pm

Putnam Museum and Science Center
1717 W 12th ST
Davenport, IA (map)

PACG Board

We will be showing our I Am the Future video as we continue to educate the community about the importance of being activists for civil rights. There will be activities for people of all ages and information tables from various local civil rights organizations. Our focus for this free event is on the family, especially children. Please come join us for this afternoon of fun! If you have questions please contact us at [email protected].

Wishing Grant Tietjen well! - A Message from the President

7/16/2023

Goodbye and Thank You! to Grant Tietjen

A Message from the President

PACG Board member, Grant Tietjen, has been in the Davenport area for ten years. He relocated to Iowa from Lincoln, NE to take a faculty position at St. Ambrose University (SAU) as an Associate Professor of Criminology in the Department of Sociology and Criminal Justice. For the past year at SAU, he was also the Assistant Program Director for the Masters of Science in Criminal Justice program. In 2017 Grant became involved with the Juvenile Justice Coalition of the Quad Cities, a group that PACG's Civil Rights Forum has supported for a number of years. This group has worked to promote sensible programs and ethical policies to protect our youth from unnecessary incarceration and undue harsh treatment.

In 2018 Grant was elected to the PACG Board of Directors, where he has served faithfully as an active member.

Grant will be moving to Tacoma, Washington where he has taken a tenured faculty position as Associate Professor of Criminology at the School of Social Work and Criminal Justice at the University of Washington - Tacoma. The position starts this fall. We will miss you, Grant, but we are so happy for you. Congratulations!

Glenda Guster