Up next
Is She Sick? Health Update
San Francisco residents lined up at a city board meeting last night to share their full-throated support of a wide-eyed reparations plan that would award every black resident $5million, wipe their personal debt, guarantee $97,000 incomes for 250 years and $1 homes.
But no one at the emotional meeting where residents burst into song and begged to be made ‘whole’ asked was how the struggling, debt-addled city might pay for it.
Reparations are being considered in various Democratic cities around America as a means of providing compensation to the descendants of enslaved African-Americans.
Many say they are owed not just for the time their ancestors were enslaved, but also for generations afterwards, because African Americans have been incarcerated at disproportionately higher rates than white Americans.
The proposals put forward in San Francisco last night are among some of the most generous to be heard to date.
Those who advocated for them last night did so whole heartedly. One sang a verse from the 1964 Civil Rights anthem by Sam Cooke, A Change is Gonna Come.
The Board of Supervisors who heard the suggestions last night can vote to adopt some or all of the recommendations.
Sgt Yulanda Williams, the president of the police association Officers for Justice, told the board: ‘My dad always taught me never to beg. And I am not begging you today. It is time for you to do the right thing and provide us with reparations: make us whole’
Of the 11 people on the board, one – Board President Shamann Walton – is African American.
The board will not decide on whether or not to adopt the recommendations until later this year, once the committee which put forward the draft plan has submitted a final report.
Another meeting has been scheduled for September.
The board however signaled its enthusiasm for the plan last night.
‘If you look at the (draft) report, you’ll see so many examples of how black folks were done wrong here in San Francisco, and all of that can really be traced back to the negative effects of slavery,’ Walton said last night.
Sgt. Yulanda Williams, the president of the police association Officers for Justice, told them: ‘My dad always taught me never to beg. And I am not begging you today.
‘It is time for you to do the right thing and provide us with reparations: make us whole.’
Tinisch Hollins, vice-chair of the African American Reparations Advisory Committee, alluded to those comments, and several people who lined up to speak reminded the board they would be watching closely what the supervisors do next.
‘I don’t need to impress upon you the fact that we are setting a national precedent here in San Francisco.
‘What we are asking for and what we’re demanding for is a real commitment to what we need to move things forward,’ she said.
Encouraged by the San Francisco African American Reparations Advisory Committee (AARAC), which offered a free lunch for all attending, the mostly black crowd told how racist policies affected their ancestors and their own lives.
The AARC, a 15-member panel, was convened in December 2020 amid soul-searching after George Floyd’s death and given two years to come up with proposals for reparations.
Their 60-page draft plan was published in December 2022.
Among the 100 recommendations were payments of $5 million to every eligible black adult, the elimination of personal debt and tax burdens, guaranteed annual incomes of at least $97,000 for 250 years and homes in San Francisco for just $1 a family.
To be eligible, a person must be over 18 and ‘have identified as black/African American on public documents for at least 10 years’.
They also must fit two of eight criteria – among them, being born or migrated to San Francisco between 1940-96, and having 13 years of proof of residency; or being able to prove descendancy from someone enslaved before 1865.
Other criteria include being ‘personally, or the direct descendant of someone, incarcerated by the failed War on Drugs’, or proof of being ‘displaced, or the direct descendant of someone displaced, from San Francisco by Urban Renewal between 1954 and 1973.’
In June a final plan will be revealed, and then potentially voted on. The AARC disbands in January 2024.
On Tuesday, Board members – some of whom had, in the weeks leading up to the meeting, expressed skepticism – were unanimously supportive of the plan.
The requirements for black San Francisco residents to be eligible for the payments. They must meet two of eight
San Franciscans lined up on Tuesday to share their views on the proposal – all in support
Attendees had been encouraged to air their views by the AARAC, which staged a rally ahead of the hearing
Some said they were shocked at critics, who said it was financially ruinous.
‘Those of my constituents who lost their minds about this proposal, it’s not something we’re doing or we would do for other people.
‘It’s something we would do for our future, for everybody’s collective future,’ said Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, whose district includes the heavily LGBTQ Castro neighborhood.
Supervisor Myrna Melgar said, prior to the hearing, that she felt the reparations committee had done ‘exactly what we asked them to do.’
‘This report is good. I am ready to accept it,’ she told The San Francisco Chronicle.
‘That doesn’t mean that we’re approving the $5 million for every person.
‘But I think it’s important for us to acknowledge that, as a city, we have not done right by some of our citizens.’
Even supporters of the plan, like Melgar, admit they have not worked out how to fund it – but insist that does not make it unreasonable.
‘I push back against people who think that’s too much or think that’s ridiculous,’ Melgar said.
‘This is all well documented in history. We know that people were systematically excluded from educational opportunities, home ownership opportunities, everything down the line. How much does that cost? How do we quantify that?’
Supervisor Shamann Walton, middle left, speaks during a special Board of Supervisors hearing about reparations in San Francisco on Tuesday. Walton first proposed the plan in February 2020, and Tuesday marked the first public hearing to discuss a reparations proposal unveiled in December
Activists calling for reparations staged a rally on Tuesday ahead of the 3pm Board of Supervisors meeting, at which the public could share their views
Aaron Peskin, the chair of the Board of Supervisors, has previously said the $5m idea is unworkable.
‘San Francisco doesn’t have the financial wherewithal, even if we thought it was good policy, to get into the reparations payment business,’ he said.
‘But that should not truncate a conversation about ways that this society and its government should address past ills.’
He told the paper he did not think lump-sum reparations payments were feasible, but felt some of the other ideas were interesting.
‘That is the bigger, harder conversation, and I think that we would be doing a disservice if we got lost in the politics of a one-and-done reparations payment,’ he said.
At least two of Peskin colleagues, Supervisors Joel Engardio and Hillary Ronen, have previously expressed similar views, telling The Chronicle that they thought the city probably couldn’t afford $5 million individual reparations payments.
Aaron Peskin, chair of the Board of Supervisors, has said he thinks the $5 million-per-person lump sum is impossible – but he is open to some of the other 100 recommendations
On Tuesday, Tinisch Hollins, vice-chair of the AARAC, alluded to those comments.
‘I don’t need to impress upon you the fact that we are setting a national precedent here in San Francisco,’ Hollins said.
‘What we are asking for and what we’re demanding for is a real commitment to what we need to move things forward.’
The idea of paying compensation for slavery has gained traction across cities and universities.
In 2020, California became the first state to form a reparations task force and is still struggling to put a price tag on what is owed.
The idea has not been taken up at the federal level.
In San Francisco, black residents once made up more than 13 percent of the city’s population, but more than 50 years later, they account for less than 6 percent of the city’s residents — and 38 percent of its homeless population.
The Fillmore District once thrived with black-owned night clubs and shops until government redevelopment in the 1960s forced out residents. One man on Tuesday wore a Fillmore t-shirt.
Critics of the plan say the payouts make no sense in a state and city that never enslaved black people, and taxpayers who were never slave owners should not have to pay money to people who were not enslaved.
Supporters say that view ignores a wealth of data and historical evidence showing that long after U.S. slavery officially ended in 1865, government policies and practices worked to imprison black people at higher rates, deny access to home and business loans and restrict where they could work and live.
John Dennis, chair of the San Francisco Republican party, said he does not support reparations, and called the city’s current conversation ‘completely unserious’.
The $5m lump sum payment ‘seems ridiculous’ he said.
He added: ‘It also seems that this is the one city where it could possibly pass.’
