Evanston’s Reparations Committee is looking to gather information to move forward with a direct cash benefit program after City Council unanimously approved the creation of a one last month.
“We have sufficient evidence of City of Evanston policies and practices,” City Attorney Nicholas Cummings said. “What we don’t have is the research to show that a cash benefit would be a narrowly tailored remedy to those harms.”
He said that research would have to be done to quantify the amount of funds that would be needed to negate the harm done.
Cummings said he isn’t sure that the city would be able to afford the amount that would be due to eachrecipient, but that compiling the evidence would help make the case for the direct cash payments and hold up the program if challenged in court.
“I know it’s very difficult to try and quantify what kind of harm that is,” he said. “But if we had some number associated with it, I think we would be on solid footing to create a cash benefit program.”
Committee Member Robin Rue Simmons said she has been in contact with several groups who could handle that research and hopes to bring it to Cummings soon.
“It takes work even to get to this initial restorative housing program,” she said. “There’s a ton of work, research and that work needs to be done.”
For the direct cash payment element of the housing program, the committee does not have plans to police how recipients use their funds and will use an honor system trusting the funds are used for housing expenses such as rent or furniture.
“We don’t want any unreasonable oversight. It should be up to the recipient to use how they choose,” Simmons said.
Cummings said that oversight wouldn’t even be possible with the amount of available staff.
The committee is also looking to reestablish community working groups that were used when the program was first beginning. These groups, consisting of five to seven members, would work on three areas — housing, economic development and educational initiatives — to see how these issues can be remedied with reparations efforts.
Partial financials for the reparations fund were discussed by the committee during the April 6 meeting as well. According to Assistant to the City Manager Tasheik Kerr, $43,077.22 in donations has been made to the fund along with $524,822 from the real estate transfer tax. Fund amounts from the cannabis tax are not available due to there only being one dispensary in the city contributing to the fund, thus releasing that information would be considered a breach of confidentiality.
“The sooner that we get to distributing these funds to the eligible descendants, it’ll give us more credibility as a committee and also it will let the city staff be relieved of a policing policy of the recipient,” Committee Member Carlis Sutton said.
©2023 Chicago Tribune. Visit chicagotribune.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
—-
This content is published through a licensing agreement with Acquire Media using its NewsEdge technology.
The Democrats are desperately trying to buy the votes of the Blacks.
“the amount of funds that would be needed to negate the harm done.”
I.A.W. U.S. Census & FBI (Table 43a)
Black males make up about 7% of the U.S. population but every year commit ~56% of all the murders and ~64% of all robberies in the U.S..
But according to the this woke Democrat Party, these murders are the fault of the White slave owners 160 years ago.
but to the woke Democrats, Black slave owners and the Blacks that sold them into slavery has nothing to do with anything. It is all because some Whites owned slaves, NOW we all pay.
I assume this is Evanston Illinois, state not mentioned above? If so I guantee you that all the Illinois dead buried at Gettysburg are spinning in their graves that they died to free such illegitimate ideas, as if their spilled blood did not pay enough of the price to release and free what has turned out to be the evil spirits of self-interst that reflect nothing of the unselfish sacrived blood of the dead Northern Union soldiers who if they could see what these fools have done with their freedoms would have just stayed home in bed, instead of becoming the sacrificial dead that just empowered more unearned collective greed.
Reparations for something that was legal 160 years ago. Then there own people sold them,too.
The stupidity spreads to Evanston, Illinois. Where will the stupidity strike next?
Seeing how DEEPLY BLUE practically the entire state has been for 90+ years, i wonder, if it was THEM WHO SPREAD the libtard virus OUT TO Commiefornia!
Did Someone or Something Seize Control of the United States?
We are beginning to wake up from a nightmare to a country we no longer recognize, and from a coup we never knew.