ABOUT US

We are Lebanon County NAACP Branch 26AA in Lebanon County, Pennsylvania.  First established in fall 2020, we gained official branch status on February 20, 2021, and became a fully-fledged branch in August of that year.

At the current writing in January 2023, we are over 100  members strong, with a committed general membership and four active standing committees:  (1) Education, (2) Criminal Justice & Public Safety, (3) Voting Rights & Political Engagement, and (4) Legal Redress.     

Our general membership meets at 7 pm on the first Thursday of each month.  Most meetings are still on Zoom, but for 2023 we decided to hold four in-person meetings, on January 5, April 6, July 6, and October 5.  Our standing committees, where much of the real work takes place, have their own meeting schedules.  We also organize, sponsor, and lend our support to a variety of community events.  Who are we and what do we stand for?  Inquiries are warmly invited.

The following slate of candidates was elected to the Executive Committee for the 2023-2024 term:

Officers

•    President - Tony Fields, Sr.
•    Vice President - vacant
•    Secretary - Michael Schroeder
•    Assistant Secretary - Taelor Norwood
•    Treasurer - Flannery Amdahl (acting)
•    Assistant Treasurer - vacant

At-large Members

•    Ricky L. Bugg, Sr.
•    Lori Burrus
•   Alethia Hines
•    Scott Ney
•    Patricia Steely
•    Maurice Williams, Sr.

The Executive Committee meets at 7 pm on the first Wednesday of each month.

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People was established in 1909 and is the oldest, largest, and most prominent civil rights organization in the United States. It was formed in New York City by white and Black activists, partly in response to the ongoing violence against African Americans around the country. In the NAACP’s early decades, its anti-lynching campaign was central to its agenda.  During the civil rights era in the 1950s and 1960s, the group won major legal victories that were essential in bringing an end to Jim Crow and extending the promise of genuine equality before the law to all people.  Today, the NAACP has more than 2,200 branches and more than two million members nationwide.

In recent years, the NAACP has focused on such issues as inequality in jobs, education, health care, and the criminal justice system, as well as protecting voting rights.  It also has pushed for the removal of Confederate flags and statues from public property.

To learn more about the NAACP's history, you are invited to read  Patricia Sullivan's marvelous book, Lift Every Voice: The NAACP and the Making of the Civil Rights Movement (NY: The New Press, 2009), a preview of which is available on GoogleBooks.  To learn more about the rules and procedures that govern the organization, you are invited to download and read its Constitution and Bylaws, both linked below.  Also linked below is the NAACP's Civil Rights Reference Manual & Guide for Branch Legal Redress Committees.