Equal Time: An icon’s example inspires conversations and action on reparations

Featured at Roll Call

Known for his work in the courtroom and the classroom, Harvard Law School’s Charles J. Ogletree Jr. is being memorialized by the many he mentored, including former President Barack and first lady Michelle Obama. One of his students, civil rights attorney Areva Martin, was particularly inspired by his work to restore the justice historically denied to so many, including the victims of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921.

Martin represents more than 700 survivors and descendants of Palm Springs Section 14 in their quest for reparations after their community was racially targeted, burned out and bulldozed by the city of Palm Springs, Calif., in the 1950s and 60s. In this episode of “Equal Time,” Martin, an author, activist, attorney and media personality, joins Mary C. Curtis in a conversation some Americans would rather avoid. Is resolving America’s unpaid debt to many of its citizens necessary before the country can move forward?

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Sep142023 TAGS: , , , ,

Fear should not be a deal breaker when debating tough topics

Featured at Roll Call

Is healthy debate a thing of the past? You know, when people can disagree without being disagreeable, respect one another and work toward a solution that might involve compromise.

You’d be forgiven for giving up on the concept or thinking it never existed, especially as discussions of what books should or should not be on school library shelves turn into school board shouting matches with teachers subject to interrogation or relegated to the sidelines. And don’t even try to have a civil chat on where COVID-19 may have originated or what could be the most effective treatment. That’s the best way to start a fight while ignoring the next pandemic that could be right around the corner.

That’s why it was interesting to talk with the directors of “The Big Payback,” which premiered on PBS in January. Erika Alexander and Whitney Dow didn’t exactly choose an easy topic as the subject of their documentary. The two are traveling across the country, with recent stops at historically Black colleges and universities in North Carolina, to foster debate and perhaps understanding of reparations, a topic that could charitably be called controversial and one that’s been making recent headlines.

The film spotlights the push by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, for HR 40, which would establish the “Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans.” The bill, named after the post-Civil War broken promise of “40 acres and a mule” to the formerly enslaved, itself has a long history: It was first proposed in 1989 by then-Democratic Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, who died in 2019.

In the film, the congresswoman’s fight on the federal level is paired with the ultimately successful effort of Robin Rue Simmons, a former alderwoman in Evanston, Ill., whose community advocacy targeted the very real racial discrimination in housing laws and policies — history that determined current disparities in her city, history that could be documented with facts and figures. That the solution eventually reached was criticized by some for its narrow focus, for being too much or too little or much too late, is also the point.

It was, however, a start for Evanston, and it happened only because of healthy debate.

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Mar232023 TAGS:

Virginia Elections Recap

Featured at WHUR

If you’ve never seen a political pummeling on election day before… you now know what one looks like.  All you have to do is turn to Virginia’s election results.  Republicans ran the board from the governor’s race all the way to the house and have the political clout to do pretty much what they want once they take office.  What happened and why?

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Nov042021 TAGS: , , , , , , ,

Pairing leadership with justice: Is that so hard, Washington?

Featured at Roll Call

It was an example of leadership and justice. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, fresh off surviving a recall vote, was not laying low but standing in front of cameras, signing a bill that would return prime property in Manhattan Beach — known as Bruce’s Beach — to descendants of the Black couple who had been run off the land they owned close to a century ago.

It turns out the very white Manhattan Beach was not always that way; the transformation was not by coincidence, but by design.

“As governor of California, let me do what apparently Manhattan Beach is unwilling to do: I want to apologize to the Bruce family,” said Newsom, as reported in the Los Angeles Times. He then handed the signing pen to Anthony Bruce, whose great-great-grandparents, Willa and Charles Bruce, had once turned the lovely stretch along the water into a needed getaway for African Americans, complete with lodge, cafe and dance hall.

Newsom wasn’t standing alone, literally or otherwise. Behind stood activists with organizations such as Where Is My Land, co-founded by Kavon Ward and Ashanti Martin, who have worked hard and know that the meaning of the word “reparations,” so feared in some circles, is merely “the making of amends for a wrong one has done.”

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Oct072021 TAGS: , , , , , , , ,

Black Issues Forum: Looking Ahead to 2021

Featured at PBS

As the Electoral College formalizes the election of President-Elect Joe Biden and COVID-19 vaccines begin to rollout in NC and across the country, can we expect a turning point after what’s been a contentious year? We also discuss the growing trend of reparations in North Carolina with journalist Mary C. Curtis, Morrisville Town Councilman Steve Rao, and NCCU professor Brett Chambers.

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Dec222020 TAGS: , , , , ,