Two members of Detroit’s reparations task force are stepping down just seven months after the voter-authorized group first convened to develop recommendations for addressing historic discrimination against Black residents. 

Co-Chair Lauren Hood and Maurice Weeks, who was appointed to represent Southwest Detroit’s District 6, resigned Saturday two hours into the group’s first public meeting since August. The resignations reflect frustrations between committee members who have struggled to make progress amid a perceived lack of internal processes and support from Detroit’s City Council, which was responsible for appointing members but does not have a defined oversight role. 

Hood said Saturday that she doesn’t believe the kind of healing needed will come from the political sector and that she is going to “try to do this work elsewhere,” where there can be “joyous” aspirations about the future.

“It doesn’t feel like that and I don’t know how to make it like that,” Hood said of the task force. “What I was hoping that my leaving, our leaving, can put in motion is some support that would make this as successful as it could be.”

The 13-member task force, which first met in April, now has three vacancies. Beloved Detroit activist and executive committee member Rev. Dr. JoAnn Watson, who advocated most of her life to establish a reparations commission at the federal level, died July 10. Hood and Watson made up half of the four-member executive committee that led the group. 

Hood said it’s up to the council to decide whether replacements will be appointed, but is not required to. The Saturday meeting at the Northwest Activities Center had about about 60 participants overall, including in-person and online attendees.

Co-Chair Keith Williams said he learned of his colleagues’ intention to resign Friday night. 

“To me, no one person is bigger than the mission of reparation because the mission should be about bringing relief to the thousands of Black people who suffer from racist practices of the past,” Williams said in a statement provided to BridgeDetroit on Saturday. “This is not the time to blame anyone because this is sacred work and we must finish the job that the citizens of Detroit voted for.”

Hood and Weeks had considered resigning in August but decided to stay at the urging of City Council and community members.

“The people of the city really deserve a reparations task force that is run smoothly and professionally,” Weeks said in a statement. “Unfortunately, at this time, I don’t have the capacity to serve on the task force in this form. I remain passionate about reparations for Black Detroiters and will continue to work with advocates across the city, the council, and members of the task force to repair the harms done by centuries of brutal systemic anti-Black racism.”

Council President Mary Sheffield appointed the executive committee and introduced the resolution which put “Proposal R” on the 2021 ballot. Sheffield made it clear that she’s not in charge of the group when a resident complained about the behavior of one task force member during an October City Council meeting.

In a statement Saturday, Sheffield noted the task force was designed to be community-led and not have the council involved in the day-to-day.

“City Council has done our part by appointing members in a timely fashion and by ensuring funding was secured and appropriated to help facilitate the Taskforce’s work,” she said. “City Council continues to be available for any assistance or guidance the Reparations Taskforce needs.”

The independent nature of the group has been described as both important for providing flexibility, as well as a disadvantage when it comes to establishing procedures for studying reparations programs. The task force must release recommendations to the council within 18 months of its first meeting, setting a target of October 2024.

“There are certainly things that council can do to set this task force up for more success going forward,” Weeks said. “I have communicated some of those things, many of them have come up in public comment, and I welcome more conversations on that topic.”

The task force shifted from a monthly to a quarterly public meeting schedule at the end of August. Meetings continued behind closed doors in the meantime. Sheffield said in October that the three-month “pause” was decided so the group could hire an administrative assistant to help the group set up meetings, conduct research and hire consultants.

At the time, Sheffield said the administrative position could perform those tasks “so that it’s not placed on council or our office to do it.” The council allocated $350,000 to the task force to pay for facilities, consultants and other expenses. 

A posting for the administrative job, offering a pay range between $60,000 and $92,000, was listed earlier this year. It attracted 30 candidates and six were determined to be qualified and interviewed, but none were hired.

The task force has struggled to find venues to host public meetings. The August meeting was broadcast online through one of the members’ Zoom accounts, which required a passcode that was sent out roughly halfway through the meeting. 

A link to Saturday’s virtual meeting was non-functional. Residents who wished to tune in had to manually input a meeting ID number on Zoom, but the additional step wasn’t properly noticed to residents.

Williams said he commends Sheffield for giving the task force the necessary resources to be successful. 

Despite its challenges, the task force has made some progress in its first seven months. Subcommittees were formed to study issues like housing and health care. The task force is also partnering with the University of Michigan Poverty Solutions research group to identify past harms against Black Detroiters. 

U-M is expected to release a report in spring 2024, which will serve as a guide for work to address harms identified by researchers. The task force found reparations commissions in other parts of the country started their process by creating similar reports. 

Saturday’s meeting included presentations from Paul Jones III, an urban planner and Detroit native who now lives in Boston, and Hilanius Phillips, the city’s first Black city planner. Both have been outspoken critics of the I-375 Reconnecting Communities Project, which aims to replace the aging state freeway with a six-lane boulevard. The project also promises to link east side neighborhoods that were significantly altered by the freeway’s construction, which also resulted in the outright destruction of the Black Bottom and Paradise Valley neighborhoods. 

Detroit Planning Department Director Antoine Bryant said the city will create a framework plan to guide future land use, zoning and community amenities. It will also consider “restorative” programs to address the impact of I-375 on historic Black neighborhoods. 

Jones said Saturday that MDOT hasn’t made a clear commitment to equity in the planning process and the design does not restore neighborhoods or “meet the city’s most critical transportation needs.”

“We’re not reconnecting anything because the city was so prolific in destroying Black neighborhoods,” he said. 

“Black Detroiters on the national scale already navigate some of the most dangerous roads,” said Jones, adding “the most dangerous roads are state roads, under MDOT’s jurisdiction.”

If the 375 design focuses on giant parcels of land downtown, the work would likely go to developers with a lot of money rather than Black Detroiters. The “historic exclusion of Black Detroiters downtown” has to be addressed, he said.

The task force traveled with Bryant and a group of city officials and Detroit community groups to St. Paul, Minnesota, for a conference on how federal highways were laid over Black and brown neighborhoods.The construction of I-94 split a historic Black neighborhood in Minnesota in a similar fashion to I-375.

In a November interview, Sheffield said residents are concerned about the I-375 redesign project’s lack of a reparations component. She’s looking into ways to restart the process to factor more community feedback into the design. 

“Quite honestly the amount of negative feedback we’ve heard from stakeholders, the lack of community engagement and just overall disapproval of what’s being proposed is a concern,” Sheffield said. “I’m trying to understand how we stop this thing. Do we have the ability to do so? It seems like it’s really moving (forward) but a vast majority of this community does not support it.” 

The task force is accepting public feedback at reparationsdetroit2023@gmail.com. 

The ballot initiative, adopted with support from 80 percent of voters, states the city will establish a committee to make recommendations for housing and economic development programs.

A 2021 report from the City’s Legislative Policy Division notes programs could focus on initiatives to combat the effects of segregation, redlining, urban renewal initiatives, gentrification, unjust incarceration and other forms of racial discrimination that negatively impacted Black residents.