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Stylist, beauty shops, hair, Frontliners, LA, Los Angeles, Connect Black

How 9 Black Women Are Taking Care Of Their Hair In Quarantine

Going to the salon is an event for many black women. The salon is a place of community, therapy, and ritual for a hair strand that is often overlooked and mistreated. On a recent episode of Blackish, youngest daughter Diane has her first experience in the salon where she also receives her first relaxer and is immediately brought into the day-long epic that is common at a black beauty salon. Black Girl Church, a documentary about black women and their relationships to beauty supply stores and the salon experience, treats the experience as a near-religious ceremony and a sanctuary for one of the most marginalized communities. And in late 2016, #BlackSalonProblems began trending on Twitter as women shared their horror stories, which mostly followed the same plot. (Who knew everyone would want a straight look like Beyoncé’s but always ended up looking more like James Brown?)

But when COVID-19 shut down all non-essential businesses—salons and black beauty stores among them—many black women were forced to take matters into their own hands. “Eighteen hours to braid my hair?” Makeup artist and producer Diamond Hawkins said in an email to ELLE.com. “Not a big fan of that!”

To echoe Hawkin’s sentiment: I am also not a big fan of that. I’ve never had to do my own hair before, but the pandemic has forced me to tirelessly learn how to install twists without the help of a stylist, who has the touch that I just don’t possess. For some of the women we spoke to, dealing with their hair amid the crisis has proven to be yet stressor, while others have found joy in spending timewith hair masks and curl treatments rather than heat and chemicals.

Below, nine black women share how they are dealing with their hair during a global pandemic—plus offer resources and advice, if you’re struggling at home, too.

Source: -cont to read- https://www.elle.com/beauty/a32213253/black-women-hair-coronavrius-covid-19/

los angeles, beaches, families, Frontliners, LA, face mask, Connect Black

Los Angeles County Beaches Open

Los Angeles County beaches are reopening Wednesday to limited activities in what amounts to a small but symbolic milestone in the effort to slowly ease stay-at-home orders implemented to slow the spread of the coronavirus.
Permitted activities will include running, walking, swimming and surfing. Group sports like volleyball are prohibited.

NOT PROHIBITED: picnicking and sunbathing, and their accessories — canopies, coolers and the like — will continue to be prohibited.


Face coverings will be mandatory for anyone on the sand but not for people in the water. Beachgoers will be required to practice social distancing by staying at least six feet away from other groups, the department said.

Beach parking lots, bike paths on sand, piers and boardwalks will remain CLOSE

VISIT FOR MORE INFO AND LIST OF ALL BEACHES:
https://beaches.lacounty.gov/ .

food, food bank,families, Frontliners, LA, Los Angeles, Connect Black

Need Food? Here are LA Food Banks

NEED FOOD?
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VISIT https://www.lafoodbank.org/find-food/pantry-locator/
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Enter your address to find your local food pantry. .
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Note: Pantry distribution dates and times are subject to change.
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CalFresh/LA County DPSS: If you have lost your job, or just need assistance, please apply for CalFresh and other benefits online by visiting the Your Benefits Now (YBN) website at www.dpss.lacounty.gov/ and clicking on the YBN logo to get started.
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Women, Infants & Children (WIC) Program: Go to www.phfewic.org/how-wic-works/apply-for-wic/
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Senior/Older Adults: For meals from LA County and City of LA, call 800-510-2020 .

food banks, food, families, Frontliners, LA, Los Angeles, Connect Black

LA County / SoCal Food Banks Sees Record Number Lines

In the last month, 2.7 million Californians have filed for unemployment. With stay-at-home orders in place until at least May 15, those numbers are expected to go up. More than ever, people need help, not just with making rent or keeping businesses afloat but with the most basic necessities — like food.

Nowhere is that clearer than at Southern California’s food banks and food pantries. Lines stretch out the door and snake around the block. Cars wait in mile-long queues at drive-through distribution centers.

“I’ve talked to people that have been in the food banking and pantry business for a lifetime, 30-plus years,” says Harald Herrmann, CEO of Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County. “No one’s ever seen anything like this.”

First off, what’s the difference between a food bank and food pantry?

The key difference is storage and distribution. A food bank is typically a non-profit that functions as a storage point — usually a big warehouse — for food donated by retailers, producers, restaurants and grocery stores. Food banks work with drivers to transport food to member agencies that distribute the food to people in need. These agencies can include meal programs, charities and distribution centers, known as food pantries, where people can receive groceries. Food pantries come in all forms. Some are tied to schools and some are mobile, traveling to neighborhoods that may not have a traditional food pantry.

Who’s showing up to get food assistance?

The short answer is everyone.

Second Harvest is seeing a broader variety of people requesting food aid. “It’s a population that we’re calling the newly vulnerable. It’s not just the working poor,” Herrmann says. He’s referring to two-income households that, due to a layoff or a furlough, have gone down to one income; families that relied on now-closed schools to provide some meal assistance for their children; and families that were at least a couple of paychecks away from needing aid.

“Just in [Orange] county alone, over 40% of our residents are tied to an industry that’s at high risk of layoff,” Herrmann says, referring to businesses associated with travel and hospitality.

“Our food has always gone to a range of people, everyone from families to seniors and veteran and college students,” says Genevieve Riutort, chief development officer of the Westside Food Bank in Santa Monica.

Now, she’s seeing a wave of people who are new to food banks and who have never needed aid before. Many were laid-off, furloughed or had hours cut at hospitality-related jobs. “Who among us doesn’t know someone who is now on unemployment and struggling to get by?” she says.

Source: https://laist.com/2020/04/18/socal_los_angeles_food_banks_coronavirus_epic_need_epic_lines.php

Dr. Chandra Ford, racism, african american, covid-19, families, Frontliners, LA, Los Angeles, Connect Black

Dr. Chandra Ford Explains Why Coronavirus Is Hitting African American Communities the Hardest

Although there is still so much medical professionals don’t know about COVID-19, preliminary data throughout the country point to racial disparities in the pandemic.

Recent Southern California numbers show African Americans account for 15 percent of the novel coronavirus-related illnesses and deaths, despite the fact that they only make up 9 percent of Los Angeles County’s population. Dr. Chandra Ford, Associate Professor in the Department of Community Health and Sciences at UCLA and Founding Director of the Center for the Study of Racism, Social Justice and Health, tells Inside the Issues that, initially, data didn’t seem to suggest high rates of illness in African American communities.

“In Los Angeles when we first started getting data, the data suggested that the highest rates of COVID-19 infection were actually occurring in the wealthier communities and that seemed premature to me and my colleagues,” she said. “In part because testing was not widely available to everyone and that seemed to reflect people who had access to testing and people who had traveled abroad.” 

Dr. Ford said the messaging in black communities has gone from seeing it as a virus that affects groups differently to stigmatizing why certain groups are contracting the coronavirus. She said lower-income communities aren’t able to easily access hospitals or high-quality health care.

Source: https://spectrumnews1.com/ca/la-west/inside-the-issues/2020/04/23/why-the-coronavirus-is-hitting-african-american-communities-the-hardest

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