North Carolina City Approves Reparations For Black Residents
As a way to apologize for its role in slavery and racial discrimination, North Carolina’s Asheville City Council voted unanimously to provide reparations in the form of community investments to help Black residents!
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The historic step was made this Tuesday following a 7-0 vote by the council for a resolution after years of slavery, discriminatory housing practices, and other racist policies throughout its history. Now, the reparations will not provide direct cash payments, as some have suggested, but will provide investments in housing, health care, and career growth in Black neighborhoods, according to Fox News.
The resolution calls on the city to establish a Community Reparations Commission to make concrete recommendations of where to funnel programs and resources. While speaking about the reparations, Councilwoman Shaneika Smith, who is Black, explained,
“[Slavery] is this institution that serves as the starting point for the building of the strong economic floor for white America, while attempting to keep Blacks subordinate forever to its progress,” said Smith, as reported by the Asheville Citizen-Times.
“The resulting budgetary and programmatic priorities may include but not be limited to increasing minority homeownership and access to other affordable housing, increasing minority business ownership and career opportunities, strategies to grow equity and generational wealth, closing the gaps in health care, education, employment and pay, neighborhood safety and fairness within criminal justice,” the resolution reads.
“Hundreds of years of black blood spilled that basically fills the cup we drink from today,” said Councilman Keith Young, who is one of two African American city council members and spearheaded the proposal. “It is simply not enough to remove statutes. Black people in this country are dealing with issues that are systemic in nature,” Young continued.
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