Reparations-focused panel urges Detroiters to ‘raise your voices’

Since the abolition of chattel slavery in 1865, there have been conversations about reparations for Black people who were harmed by the system.

For Kevin Dunn, that answer is simple: Cash. 

The Detroiter stressed to a reparations-focused panel that Black people have and continue to be exploited physically, mentally and spiritually – all the way down to their intellectual property.

“Reparations should consist of a culmination of incentives, including free healthcare, debt elimination, general tax exemption, land delegation and more. But the first and foremost important immediate incentive is cash payments,” Dunn told a crowd of about two dozen Detroiters in the basement of Church of the Messiah in Islandview.

Since the abolition of chattel slavery in 1865, there have been conversations about reparations for Black people who were harmed by the system.

For Kevin Dunn, that answer is simple: Cash. 

The Detroiter stressed to a reparations-focused panel that Black people have and continue to be exploited physically, mentally and spiritually – all the way down to their intellectual property.

“Reparations should consist of a culmination of incentives, including free healthcare, debt elimination, general tax exemption, land delegation and more. But the first and foremost important immediate incentive is cash payments,” Dunn told a crowd of about two dozen Detroiters in the basement of Church of the Messiah in Islandview.

Panelists for the two-hour event included Marcia Black, president of Black Bottom Archives, Janis Hazel, who serves as  treasurer of the Detroit Reparations Task Force as well as Khary Frazier, founder of Detroit is Different and Kim Faison, vice president of Detroit Future City. The event was part of a series, which will also include an August session on housing and home repair and a September talk on immigration issues.

Black told Dunn Tuesday that she’s “110% on board” with reparations in all forms, including federal, state and local, all of which, she said, have been complicit in the harm done to Black Americans.

Black noted while it’s still unclear what recommendations will come from the process in Detroit or whether they will be successful, “we all have our contribution.”

For Black, that’s her work with the community-driven effort to amplify the voices and experiences of Black Detroiters with digital storytelling, art and community organizing. 

“I’m deeply committed to using storytelling and archiving as tools,” she said. 

Frazier uplifted “the elephant in the room,” or avenues that could be pursued to help fund reparative actions in the city. Among them, he said, an increase in the tax rate paid by non-residents who work in the city and revenue sharing from entities like the Downtown Development Authority, which locks in tax dollars confined to the downtown.  

“We have pockets of money that will not (result in) residents paying more income or property taxes,” he said. 

Alisa M. Jenkins, a Detroit mother and grandmother, expressed her frustrations Tuesday and questioned how to “overcome the elephant in the room?”

“It’s not an elephant in the room anymore, it’s a demon in the room,” she said. “All your life, you’re paying taxes on whatever it is that you’re doing, whether you’re raising kids or opening up a new business. When you are family, that is a business, but you still are paying taxes, but to whom? 

“A lot of people fall short on having the things they need in life because of what you’re saying slavery. It’s not slavery anymore, it’s downright deceitful … and that’s the demon in the room that comes to kill, steal, destroy and deceive.”

Hazel worked for the late Congressman John Conyers Jr., who long pushed for reparations on the federal level, and talked Tuesday about her experience working with the congressman and her work as a lobbyist, urging Detroiters to “raise your voices.”

Detroit’s effort was inspired by a reparations commission in Evanston, Illinois, that created grants for Black families who lived through city-enforced housing discrimination in the 20th Century.

The task force’s first year was defined by multiple resignations, mismanaged meetings, private decisions and public spats between members. But the group has since bolstered its leadership and worked to improve public access and engagement while partnering with national experts and jumpstarting subcommittees.

Detroit is among 100 municipalities that have reparations task forces or commissions. The task force is working with scholars to finalize a report on harms caused by the city against Black residents and will host a listening session from 2-4 p.m. Aug. 3 at the Northwest Activities Center, 18100 Meyers Road in Detroit. 

Hazel spoke Tuesday of the group’s ongoing work and of her own experiences. Part of the task force’s research, Hazel said, is to find out all the harms that happened in Detroit.

“I went through K-12 in the Detroit public school system and I was harmed because of disinvestment,” she said. “So anyone who went through the Detroit public school system, you were harmed. And then, all of the other elements – our roads, infrastructure, our artistic cultural assets that we lost during the Black Bottom and Paradise Valley demolitions.”

Black said Detroiters are trying to reimagine a future where the harms they have and continue to experience do not have to exist.

“Having people sit at a table and say ‘You get to make a plan to decide what you want your future to look like’ is not something that we’re used to,” said Black, adding it’s critical for Detroiters to organize to be engaged and informed.

“In response to the very legitimate concerns about doing work that feels worthless because we may not get the things we ask for, it’s much more dangerous for us to not be active and to be asking the questions,” she said. “This idea that we shouldn’t ask for anything at all because nothing is possible won’t get us any closer in the future to what we’re looking for.”

Click here to read Malachi’s three-part series on reparations.