TS Radio: Whistleblower's! The USDA Hour

Whistleblower's! is brought to you in coordination with Marcel Reid and the Whistleblower’s Annual Summit, in Washington D.C., July 30-31, 2018

Hour #1 : Lesa Donnelly

Lesa returns to update us on the women of Forestry Service who have been molested, raped and abused by co-workers and supervisors, to get relief from USDA secretary Sonny Perdue.  As it is, Mr. Perdue has been less than forthcoming on these issues as have been his under-secretary's, even those designated to handle this specifically.

Hour #2:  Corey Lea

The Georgia Chapter of the African-American Agriculturalist Association's addresses the refusal of the USDA  Secretary of Agriculture to allow hearings from African-American farmers but does allow their Caucasian counterparts to have hearings.

The Cowtown Foundation Inc., a Tennessee Corporation that specializes in the rights of minority farmers at the administrative level, was part of a protest that took place on April 25, 2018, in Albany, Georgia.

Bios:

Corey Lea: from Tennessee.  He has been responsible for filing several petitions in the Court of Federal Claims on behalf of Black Farmers in order to hold USDA accountable for its discriminatory practices which have gone on for decades

Lawrence Lucas, Founding member and President Emeritus, of the USDA Coalition of Minority employees since May 1994.

Lesa Donnelly lives in Anderson, California. She is a California native.

She worked for USDA, Forest Service, in California (Region 5) in administrative and collateral fire positions from 1978 to 2002, retiring in 2002 under a settlement agreement.

Lesa currently works as a paralegal, representing Federal employees in civil rights matters ad federal employment matters.