We all know what a huge rip off our health care system is.  But aside from just the extortion level pricing, the system is rigged so well it is nearly impossible for even a prudent and well informed consumer to navigate and avoid nasty billing surprises.  Just a few examples: You make an effort to go to an in-network hospital and receive one or more out-of-network bills from doctors or other hospital staff, often for astronomical sums of money, and were given no warning of such.  You receive over a dozen different bills from one hospital stay in our fragmented system, and they keep you in limbo for months, sometimes even a year or longer, after your procedure/discharge, not knowing if you will receive another unexpected bill.  It is rare that any medical provider will disclose prices for a procedure, etc. beforehand, and often will not make clear whether or not it is covered by insurance.   Come to our gathering, vent your frustrations, and tell your horror stories, or those of a family member or friend, in dealing with the shenanigans of our health care system, and then lets discuss how we can fight back.

Arguably, James Blue’s most ambitious project, this complex documentary was originally made in five one-hour episodes as an interactive public television series. The sixth episode, which summarized the series, will be screened. Blue and renowned architect Adele Santos take us on a tour of 1970s Houston, a divided city, growing in the midst of an oil boom. Skyscrapers going up, unemployment going down. One thousand new residents were arriving per week. But the filmmakers see two cities. Visible Houston is populated by well-educated citizens earning high wages with no state or income taxes. Invisible Houston, for whom the most basic city services did not exist, was inhabited by poorly educated citizens earning low wages. Blue was founder of Rice University Media Center and a leader in the movement to democratize media access and production across America, including Houston’s Southwest Alternate Media Project (SWAMP), a media arts organization founded in 1977. 

Please join us as we celebrate our National and Local Peacemaker Award Recipients!

Our National Peacemaker Award will be awarded to Chuck Collins, author and co-founder of Wealth for Common Good. Our Local Peacemaker Award recipients are Dr. Gerald Horne, Children's Prison Arts Project, and the Houston chapter of United We Dream.

ReUse, ReDuce, ReCycle Have a project in mind, but just need a few materials to make it happen? There is no such thing as "away". When we throw anything away, it must go somewhere! Finally, recycling and reuse of materials comes to Houston. Please join us for the upcoming Transition Houston meeting as we hear […]

On behalf of the European Union, the German Consulate General Houston, and TCADP, you are cordially invited to attend a special screening of the documentary film, “True Conviction,” followed by a panel discussion featuring Dallas County exonerees, Christopher Scott and Steven Phillips.

In light of the UNRWA funding crisis and the deteriorating humanitarian conditions, we're fundraising to provide emergency assistance, including employing 25 UNRWA counselors -- refugees themselves -- to provide psychosocial support to Palestine refugee children and families in the Gaza Strip who suffer from trauma due to repeated Israeli military assaults and the continued blockade.

The Dominican Sisters of Houston invite you to join us as we continue and deepen the conversation around race.