EUGENE–The Martin Luther King Jr. remembrance at the University of Oregon this year features a gospel choir, a candlelight vigil and a panel discussion on the African-American experience in Eugene.

The College of Arts and Sciences, in collaboration with the UO, is sponsoring the free public event, "African Americans in Oregon: The Eugene Experience," at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 20, in Room 100 at Willamette Hall, 1371 E. 13th Ave. A reception will follow the panel discussion.

"We are fortunate to have on the panel a group of African Americans who have actively worked to make our community a better place," says Robert O’Brien, associate dean of social science in the UO College of Arts and Sciences.

Panelists include Willie Mims, a Eugene resident for more than 60 years; Lyllye Parker, whose family moved to Eugene in the early 1940s, when there were only three African-American families in the city; Ernestine Broadus, who was a Eugene resident when Parker’s family arrived; Larry Carter, who chairs the UO sociology department and has been active in the Eugene civil rights movement since the 1970s; and Charles Dalton, a long-time community activist.

Panelists will look at the African-American experience in Eugene from the 1940s to the present.

Racism is more wide spread in the Eugene-Springfield area today than it was 10 years ago, contends Carla Gary, director of the UO Office of Multicultural Affairs, who will moderate the panel discussion. Gary, who was assistant director of the UO multicultural affairs office a decade ago, returning this fall to head the office, says she sees a disturbing lack of progress in combating racism since then.

"I am, nonetheless, committed to the belief that we can make a difference if we are willing to ask difficult questions and deal with difficult issues," she says.

The panel discussion culminates a weeklong series of campus and community events, including a candlelight vigil with a cappella gospel singing Friday, Jan. 15, at the Amphitheater at the Erb Memorial Union, 1222 E. 13th Ave. The Associated Students of the University of Oregon are sponors of the vigil, which begins at 6 p.m.

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