Tag: Georgia

Georgia and English-Only Driver’s Tests

By MB

On April 2, 2009

The Georgia legislature, as usual, is focuing on the important stuff:

Georgia would require that new drivers take a written license test in English under a bill being considered by state lawmakers, and the proposal has some employers and immigrant advocates worried it would keep people unfamiliar with the language from being able to work.

The measure is the latest in a series of English-only legislation around the country, but Georgia is believed to be the only state that would have a law requiring that drivers take the written test in English without a translator or other aid.

I would just like to point out that when I moved to Georgia as a teenager – a teenager with a fairly solid grasp of the English language – I had a pretty hard time understanding what in the hell half the people were saying.Â Â More than once, I needed a translator to understand the teachers – apparently “Green Witch” is that place in England where they tell the time, and “licks” are what the principle does to you when you’re sent to the office.Â Â We’re not even going to touch syntax.Â Oh, and as to the importance of the driving test itself?Â This is how mine went:

Tester: “Hey, it says here you live at 193 Little Joe Court [No, really.].Â Do you know Alex?”

Me: “Yeah, he lives across the street.Â Cool guy.”

Tester: “Yeah, cool guy.Â Pull around the side and park the car.”

Passed on the spot.Â So I suggest Georgia focus less on trying to compete with South Carolina for The Most Militantly Ignorant State in the Nation Award and more on fundamental needs like, oh, not running out of water because no one can think more than a month or two ahead.

RIP Millard Fuller, Co-founder of Habitat for Humanity

By MB

On February 3, 2009

In Personal, Society

Millard Fuller, co-founder and long time hands-on manager of Habitat for Humanity, died today.Â He was 74.

From its beginning in 1976, headquartered in a tiny gray frame house that doubled as Fuller’s law office, Habitat grew to a worldwide network that has provided shelter to more than 1.5 million people.

Habitat home buyers are required to work on their own houses, investing what the Fullers called “sweat equity.”

Preaching the “theology of the hammer,” Fuller built an army of volunteers that included former U.S. presidents, other world leaders and Hollywood celebrities.

One of Habitat’s highest-profile volunteers, former President Jimmy Carter, called Fuller “one of the most extraordinary people I have ever known.”

[ . . . ]

Jeff Snider, executive vice president of Habitat during the early ’90s, recalled Fuller as a man driven by his commitment to the destitute. Once, Snider said he suggested setting aside some of the money Fuller raised.

“He had one and only one response, which was, ‘The poor, Jeff, need the money now,'” he said. “So we ran the place full tilt, on the edge all the time, and it was stressful — but he was right.”

In another life, I spent a decent amount of time working with community service programs in Americus, Georgia, and I had a couple of chances to meet with Mr. Fuller. Â Â He was one of those people you remember, and I do so fondly.Â Â I was terribly disappointed to read, in the obituary, that he did not always live up to my expectations of him, but that doesn’t change the incredible work that Habitat for Humanity has done in the US.Â Â Habitat is head-and-shoulders above the rest of the field as the best example of the positives that faith-based initiatives can offer.Â Â Mr. Fuller deserves remembrance and thanks for that.