As Boston’s Task Force on Reparations continues to mull a path ahead, an area group of Black Bostonians is looking for $15 billion from the town as reparations for slavery and centuries of discrimination.
“It’s really difficult to put a right or wrong number on people’s lives, on lost labor that was given for free,” stated Edwin Sumpter, co-director of the Boston People Reparations Commission. “But as an initial number, an initial start, this would be a good number to look at in the city of Boston.”
The Boston People’s Reparations Commission was based by Rev. Kevin Peterson, head of the New Democracy Coalition, to mobilize the group within the push for money reparations. The fee is made up of 70 Black Bostonians and holds month-to-month conferences, Sumpter stated.
“Our ultimate goal is repair and reconciliation in Boston, a city plagued by racial strife,” Peterson stated in a launch Sunday night.
The fee’s suggestions name for the reparations to be damaged into three sections: $5 billion for money payouts to Black residents, $5 billion targeted on training gaps and anti-crime investments, and $5 billion for financial growth.
The fee follows the formation of the Boston Task Force on Reparations, comprised of 10 members, in 2022. The metropolis process drive was established by the City Council to check the legacy and impression of slavery on Boston and make suggestions for “reparative justice solutions for Black residents.”
Sumpter stated the 2 teams have attended one another’s conferences, and the fee appears to be like ahead to the duty drive suggestions. The fee isn’t on the lookout for an “us vs. them mentality,” he added, however to make sure the area people is represented within the reparations dialog.
“The important thing is that we’re both in this together, and at no point do we have to allow ourselves to be separated by any outside forces that could interfere with what’s the most important thing here, and that is to uplift, repair and make some reconciliation for Black Boston,” Sumpter stated.
Sumpter spoke on the enduring generational crime, homeownership, well being, training and different disparities that proceed to impression Black households in Boston.
“How about just the wealth gap?” Sumpter stated, citing the Color of Wealth report commissioned by the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston. “The average white family in Boston being worth some $200,000, and African American families just $8. How does that happen? How do you close that gap?”
A stronger Black group in Boston, Sumpter stated, is “stronger for the whole city.”
The metropolis is a great distance off in the direction of realizing and distributing money reparations, Sumpter stated, and the fee will proceed to interact the group within the reparations dialog.
“There’s still much more work to do,” stated Sumpter. “This in no way is the end of anything for us. It’s just the beginning.”
The fee could have its subsequent group assembly on March 23 in Dudley Cafe and can maintain a listening to with testimony from group members on May 18 within the Boling Building, with extra particulars on occasions out there on their web site.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”