Ticker tape

Jet, May 7, 2001 by Simeon Booker

Confidential: Setting an inspirational record, 17-year-old James A. Tolbert II, a straight-A high school student, has received scholarship offers totaling more than $1.1 million. Attending the Grace Brethren Christian school in Clinton, MD, since he was 2, the Black teen virtually created the miracle his mother, a retired D.C.

teacher, once prayed for ... His district being squeezed by neighboring GOP areas and becoming the only one in the state with declining population, St. Louis Rep. William Lacy Clay, Jr. asked the GOP-run Missouri Senate to give him the Democratic precincts belonging to House minority leader Richard Gephardt. The proposal of the son of ex-Rep. Bill Clay has set off political controversy ... Twenty-one Black law enforcement officers, including two women, were killed in the U.S. in the line of duty during the year 2000. They will be among those honored May 21 at special ceremonies at the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial in D.C ... The key issue of the Congressional Black Caucus Health Braintrust is passage of a bill introduced by Reps. John Conyers and Donna M. Christian Christensen to permit uninsured individuals to obtain coverage under Medicaid Programs for prescription drugs, substance-abuse treatment and mental health services ... The new White House Associate Director for Public Liaison Angela Sailor is already at work to recruit more minorities for the GOP. She and Michael Steele, the first Black to head the Maryland GOP Committee, addressed the party's first national meeting ... Filing an employment bias law suit against the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. in D.C., Mary Elizabeth Bass spent months processing her own case because she couldn't find a lawyer. Finally, Atty. David Shapiro helped her win $300,000, the cap set under federal law. Now Bass intends to become a trial lawyer.