Business
Top-ranked political strategist Fredrick Hicks gets things done
ROLLINGOUT.COM — For Fredrick Hicks, politics is more than a prestigious profession or means to earn a paycheck.
By Terry Shropshire
For Fredrick Hicks, politics is more than a prestigious profession or means to earn a paycheck. Like red blood cells, politics runs in his veins. It’s a way of life — his raison d’être.
“Politics is my ministry,” said Hicks, founder and CEO of Hicks Evaluation Group (HEG) LLC, a political consulting firm in the Atlanta area. “This is my way that I get to impact the world. This is how I can change lives every single day.”
Hicks, 41, and his company have amassed a vast portfolio that includes more than 200 political campaigns in Georgia and throughout the country and an astounding 93 percent winning clip during his illustrious career.
Chances are you have benefited from Hicks’ work even if you have not heard his name. He has led campaigns across north Georgia, including races at every level in Cherokee County. He was a key player in the renaming of Spring Street to Ted Turner Drive in downtown Atlanta. He helped elect the first-ever African American district attorney in Henry County, the first African American and woman mayor of Douglasville, and many of the judges and the district attorney in DeKalb County. He also managed the campaign for transit advocate Republican State Sen. Brandon Beach and collaborated with leaders who have changed the landscape of the Atlanta region.
Speaking of change, Hicks managed the first and only successful MARTA expansion campaigns, totaling more than $3 billion. Additionally, he helped lead the city’s $250 million infrastructure campaign as well as campaigns that improved waterways, roads and bridges and installed traffic lights and bike lanes throughout the city.
“What makes us the best at what we do is that we work with both Democrats and Republicans openly. We are the leading nonpartisan political consulting firm,” said the south Georgia native, who graduated from high school in Alaska and is an alumnus of Clayton State University, located about 20 miles south of downtown Atlanta, and Florida State University in Tallahassee. “The reason why we are like that is that we go beyond the red and blue, beyond race, and we focus on what exactly people care about.”
Hicks believes Atlanta has helped to facilitate his successful marriage of skill and opportunity.
“Atlanta is great. It’s the Black mecca. It’s a place where you can connect, make something of yourself and really build something,” said the father of two. “Other cities, such as New York and San Francisco, have an entrenched class that really doesn’t let you in. In Atlanta, if you have a gift, you can make room for yourself and really become something.
“What is really special about Atlanta is that you have all-Black everything,” Hicks added. “You see Black leadership, Black excellence, up and down the line. You have a strong, private Black middle class. This gives us the opportunity to be thought leaders and engage our brothers and sisters in movements for social justice and social equality.”
Follow Hicks on Instagram and Twitter via @hicksreport, Facebook @HEG, and visit his website at hickspolling.com.
Activism
Oakland Post: Week of May 22 – 28, 2024
The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of May May 22 – 28, 2024
To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.
Business
Banning Menthol Cigarettes: California-Based Advocacy Group Joins Suit Against Federal Govt.
A California based non-governmental organization, The African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council (AATCLC), has joined two other public health advocacy groups in a second lawsuit against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the agency’s inaction on issuing a final rule banning menthol cigarettes.
By Edward Henderson, California Black Media
A California based non-governmental organization, The African American Tobacco Control Leadership Council (AATCLC), has joined two other public health advocacy groups in a second lawsuit against the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the agency’s inaction on issuing a final rule banning menthol cigarettes.
The suit, filed by Christopher Leung of Leung Law, PLLC on behalf of the AATCLC, Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) and the National Medical Association (NMA) comes more than seven months after the FDA’s established date for finalizing a new rule against menthol cigarettes.
“We are a group of Californians, although we have expanded now. We were formed in 2008 to inform and direct the activities of commercial tobacco control and prevention as they affect African Americans and African immigrants in this country,” said Carol McGruder, co-chair of the AATCLC.
McGruder was speaking during a press briefing April 2 organized to announce the lawsuit. with representatives from the ASH, NMA and other organizations.
“Menthol cigarettes have had a devastating and disproportionate impact on the health of Black Americans,” said Yolanda Lawson, President of the NMA. “Smoking related diseases are the number one cause of death in the Black community.”
The lawsuit also follows the FDA’s 15-year delay in creating national policy that would ban cigarettes made with compound menthol, a minty substance that cigarette makers infuse into their tobacco products, making them more addictive and harmful.
Despite significant reductions in overall smoking rates in the US, smoking among poor, less educated and marginalized groups remains high. Every year, 45,000 Black Americans prematurely die from tobacco-caused diseases. An estimated 85% of them smoked menthol cigarettes.
“This disproportionate use of menthol cigarettes among Black Americans is not a coincidence,” Dr. Yerger continued. “I was one of the first tobacco documents researchers out of UCSF who exposed the tobacco industry’s systematic, predatory marketing schemes to dump highly concentrated menthol cigarette marketing into urban inner-city areas.”
In 2011, the FDA’s own scientific advisory committee concluded that the “Removal of menthol cigarettes from the marketplace would benefit public health in the United States.”
If the sale of menthol-flavored cigarettes is indeed banned, the FDA projects a 15.1% drop in smoking within 40 years, which would help save between 324,000 to 654,000 lives.
As a result of the Plaintiffs’ first lawsuit, the FDA made the landmark determination to add menthol to the list of banned characterizing flavors in cigarettes.
On the contrary, tobacco-aligned groups in the past have argued that banning menthol cigarettes would be impact federal and state budgets with the loss of nearly $6.6 billion in cigarette sales taxes. Menthol cigarettes account for over one-third of the U.S. cigarette market.
Other arguments from tobacco-backed groups include unintended consequences of a ban such as increased policing in Black and Brown communities due to contraband cigarettes. However, health advocates have dismissed this claim stating the ban would apply to companies that make or sell menthol cigarettes, not individual smokers.
By law, the United States has two months to respond to the lawsuit. The feds can respond to it or file a motion to dismiss.
If the suit is successful, the FDA would have 90 days to make a final ruling.
Business
Cal. Supreme Court Could Strip Gov and Legislature of Power to Raise Taxes
On May 8, the California Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act, a measure that has already been approved for the November ballot. It calls for restricting the state Legislature and Governor’s ability to increase taxes without statewide voter approval. California business owners back the measure while Labor unions have rallied in opposition to it.
By California Black Media
On May 8, the California Supreme Court heard oral arguments on the Taxpayer Protection and Government Accountability Act, a measure that has already been approved for the November ballot. It calls for restricting the state Legislature and Governor’s ability to increase taxes without statewide voter approval.
California business owners back the measure while Labor unions have rallied in opposition to it.
Gov. Gavin Newsom and legislative Democrats have petitioned the Supreme Court to remove the proposal from the ballot since the California Constitution requires a constitutional convention to ratify the ballot with a two-thirds majority vote in the legislature.
Democrats and labor unions stated that the ballot measure could limit state and local funding thus crippling the state’s ability to produce new sources of revenue. A reduction in revenue may result in government programs and initiatives being underfunded,” they say.
Legislative Democrats also argued that the measure’s economic impact will make it harder to resolve the state’s budget deficit.
Business owners and company leaders advocating for the ballot measure stated that the tax initiative can help form new checks and balances on taxation and attract companies to invest in California creating more jobs.
President of the California Business Roundtable Rob Lapsley, a supporter of the tax initiative, said that people are fed up with the state’s high taxes.
“This gives the people of California the right to vote on future taxes, and voters are going to support it if it’s on the ballot,” Lapsley said.
Opposers of the tax initiative, mainly labor unions and state workers such as teachers, police officers, and firefighters, have aligned with Legislative Democrats to reject the tax law.
Executive director of Service Employees International Union California Tia Orr said the tax law was created to benefit wealthy corporations and deceive the average taxpayer.
“I want to make it clear that the ‘Taxpayer Deception Act’ let’s wealthy corporations, who can afford expensive campaigns, to block taxes on their industries while regular Californians, regular people, shoulder more of the cost of critical services,” Orr said.
The California Supreme Court is expected to make a ruling on the future of the initiative by June 27 this year.
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