Committees and empty words are not reparations. Black Asheville needs land, resources, power and the defunding of the police

Above: part of the 1937 map that redlined Asheville. All but one of the areas marked in red are Black neighborhoods, tagged in the ensuing decades for demolition and marginalization

In response to the widespread narrative I would like to clarify that no, Asheville city council did not pass reparations. As a Black Ashevillian, I am annoyed that we are even talking to city council at this point. They have not passed reparations, and no one should believe they did. Without clear actions, the reparations promise is nothing more than empty words, and city hall has made it clear that they are unwilling to take action. Reparations in Asheville would start first and foremost with meeting the list of Black Asheville Demands. As cities all over the country move to abolish the corrupt police entity, the demands made by Black Asheville Demands Collective should be met with ease.

The Asheville Police Department must be defunded and the funds must go directly into the hands of Black communities. But city hall has not committed to defunding the 30 million dollars, for a department that’s already the largest per-capita of any city in the state. As stated in Black Asheville Demands, “50% of the APD’s budget should be invested in long-term safety strategies including supporting Black startups/business, eliminating the racial opportunity gap in Asheville City Schools, and funding an all-civilian oversight committee with the power to hold the APD and individual officers accountable.”

The narrative being echoed by compliant media and liberal gentry around council’s “decision” to pass reparations dismisses the work of Black abolitionist locals who have been pushing for structural change for generations. It makes it seem as if we are just coming to terms with the need for reparations when the need has existed since slavery.

This tale makes it seem as if somehow Asheville is just becoming aware of its racism when it has been aware all along. The resolution lacks accountability, and quite frankly seeks to erase that which will not be forgotten. It’s also crucial to note that gentrification has already cast aside many outspoken and revolutionary people of color. Many Black people have been violently displaced by the “beautification” of Asheville, seen both in past decades and recent years. The city’s resolution apologizes for urban renewal, yet their actions remind us urban renewal never ended.

There are many instances, just in the past few years, when local officials clearly could have made simple choices to help Black people but instead chose to perpetuate harm. Some examples that come to mind:

• Ordering the police to attack protesters during the Black Lives Matter protests.

• Actively refusing to seek justice for Jerry Williams, who was murdered at the hands of Sgt. Tyler Radford

• Allowing business to reopen during the COVID-19 pandemic and putting service workers and residents at risk for the sake of the tourism industry.

• Allowing evictions during a pandemic, that will disproportionately affect Black and Brown people.

In late May and early June we saw many of Asheville’s people come out and face a harsh crackdown (harsher than white residents are used to) for defending Black lives. People are rightfully angry about their treatment, but we also have to consider the harm Black people experience every day of their lives.
So while there was justified outrage around the mayor’s decision to allow armed police to commit war crimes against the citizens of Asheville in our streets, people must be reminded that the reason they were there being tear gassed by police is because Black people are being murdered by the police. This treatment is no different and many times less severe than the interactions marginalized people are used to having with police.

Black Asheville also demands that white supremacist monuments such as the Vance monument be removed. Immediately. The city has spent thousands of dollars covering a monument (dedicated to an architect of Jim Crow, built as part of the violently racist 1898 campaign) rather than tearing it down. The council moved to assemble a task force that will spend time and effort deciding how to handle the monuments when the community has already decided that they must go.

Someone that called in to a recent council meeting mentioned a road name spooks branch road. (spook is a racial slur) Why hasn’t that changed already? The answer is simple. These symbols of power are in place for a reason they empower some and perpetuate trauma on others.

There is clearly a conflict of interest here. Maybe some of the council is directly or indirectly invested in and or benefiting from structural racism. Maybe they are being controlled or loyal to the white supremacist, wealthy business people, and the police, rather than the citizens of Black asheville and their allies. Otherwise why would they drag out the simple decision to remove these monuments and defund the police.

Council meetings do not look the way they should if our goal is to serve the people of Asheville, including the Black community. Officials thank the police chief instead of ordering him to resign. Voices are limited and censored as the council works to restrict live comments to crush dissent. The council continues to draw out the process around things that can be addressed in a matter of minutes. If they actually wanted to.

At one point during the recent meeting council member Julie Mayfield asked, “So just to set the public’s expectations, the budget that we are going to have a hearing on and adopt in two weeks is not going to have any major shifts right? It’s basically a procedural step that we have to go through to allow us to start having the conversation we want to have, right?”

“That is correct,” city manager Debra Campbell replied

Julie Mayfield’s campaign for NC Senate states that her “focus is always on putting people and our environment first” among other things. I would ask Mayfield how this process around Black Asheville’s demands has reflected the values she claims to have in her campaign. It is not uncommon for politicians to make empty statements, and it’s not surprising coming from Mayfield, who rose to power pushing the Interstate 26 project that will further demolish Black communities. This is unacceptable considering the Black community has made clear their demands. We are not asking!

The situation in Asheville is not unique, The systems of governance here in America — as well as other colonized places across the globe — were designed like this on purpose. To serve the rich while keeping the masses at bay, for profit over people, to be sure anything people in power want done happens at the drop of a hat and to use “procedure” to stall while they navigate out of situations when the people demand something.

Just look at how quickly the decision was made to reopen restaurants, hotels and other revenue generating businesses during a global pandemic, at the expense of local lives.

Indeed, we cannot dismiss the role our city government has played in recent years with the Tourism Development Authority in perpetuating harm against Black Asheville through gentrification. There is lots of recent talk about the racist past here and the decades of damage from redlining, but this information is slowly being brought to light after years of suppression.

It is becoming common knowledge that Asheville has a history sickly rich in racism, but how has that history continued to impact the lives of Black people here today? We must acknowledge and address the way racism morphs and takes on new names and new forms. we must immediately address the harm that has been done and make changes that allow Black Ashevillians to secure their livelihoods.

Some might say “well what about the news headlines? The city already agreed to reparations!” If you take a look at what’s actually in the reparations resolution you will see no discussion of what the city actually plans to do. The reparations resolution provides a somewhat accurate list of the types of harm caused by structural racism. They go on to apologize for city government’s role in slavery, segregation and urban renewal, but apology without changed behavior is just manipulation.

The resolution says council will call on other organizations and institutions to work on the project. I will state once again: communities are already demanding simple motions they could take now to begin the reparations process, like defunding the police budget by 50 percent. At this point there is a national conversation around defunding the police, and while reparations are definitely long overdue, I fear that the resolution is being used as a distraction to try to please liberal ears with words while avoiding defunding the police, without which reparations are impossible.

The resolution goes on to explain that over the next year, a select group of individuals will discuss approaches towards reparations in the Black community. To assume there needs to be a group of government-appointed individuals to work on this over the next year is insulting to Black Ashevillians who have been thinking about these things for years as they navigate this city as everyday Black people.

This echoes white saviorism which is so commonly seen in predominantly white/neo-liberal institutions and organizations; when an institution chooses on their terms how to help a group of people and what a group of people needs rather than listening to the actual people and giving them what they need. Much of the language used in the document insinuates that a select group of people will be working to come up with solutions when the Black Asheville Demands collective basically already told the city exactly what we need to start moving forward.

Until we see stolen land returned, stolen funds and resources in the hands of Black communities and the end to the violence inflicted every day, government officials have no business using the word reparations. The reparations document entirely leaves out the issue of land and funds. These resources are a huge part of the structural issue that keeps Black people from accessing the same level of social mobility as white people. This is why redlining and gentrification happen in the first place, to disrupt black people from growing their wealth. All the while black people are exploited for free (prison slavery) and cheap (low wage) labor and white wealth continues to grow.

Some might view the giving of property and money to Black people as a “hand-out,” when it is really a way of trying to pay back a portion of a long overdue debt. Reparations are defined as the making of amends for a wrong one has done, by paying money to or otherwise helping those who have been wronged.

Colonial systems could never truly make amends for the physical, psychological and spiritual suffering they have caused to Black americans, descendants of a unique and brutal system of chattel slavery and continuous exploitation. To start with physical reparations in the form of property and funds is not a radical idea, but rather a necessary one.

There is a fear that people have of disrupting/dismantling the current systems. People are comforted by the idea of reform and the idea of making subtle changes when the root issues will remain. A start to reparations would look like immediately enacting the Black Asheville Demands in their entirety. If this cannot “legally” happen urgently, it is necessary and logical that we work against and even outside the law.

We are on borrowed time here in the United States in terms of reparations. Black people are disproportionately being murdered directly and indirectly by the state. We have suffered for far too long. The violent police entity treats us as if our lives are disposable. We need to break free from our relationship with the colonial power systems that our society operates within.

The road to reparations is one of collective liberation. Both white and Black people are suffering at the hands of a society built on racism. We are working towards collective healing. We must ask ourselves what we are willing to give up for this process. We must address our fears on an individual and collective basis and move into them with the confident and brave attitude of Black people who have been resilient in the face of fear since our country’s founding.

When I ask allies to consider what they are willing to give up I am really saying; we are in the midst of fascism, and crimes against humanity and the environment. This is an emergency. The worst is already here for lots of Black and Brown families. Genocide is already happening in many communities.

If you are able to actively sit in your home and say a genocide is not happening to me; my relatives are not being murdered at unprecedented rates,

I have clean water, fresh food, and resources in my community, that is a privilege. Many native communities and Black communities (my people) are already living in a post apocalyptic world with poverty violence lack of basic resources. Genocide is defined as the deliberate killing of a large group of people, especially an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Genocide and slavery are is happening in prisons, Immigrant detention centers, and impoverished communities all over the country and the world for the profit of the rich. This is nothing new.

As the wealth gap grows, those of us in places of privilege become more proximate to the impoverished than to those hoarding most of the wealth. For this reason I urge working people in places of privilege to acknowledge the closeness of our struggles and to fight for justice at our side as accomplices rather than allies. To give up something for change looks like making the statement, “I am willing to give up my safety and comfort and risk experiencing symptoms of a post apocalyptic world because I do not believe anyone else should be living in a post apocalyptic world in exchange for my comfort.”

To begin the reparations process here in Asheville, we must defund the police by 50 percent immediately. One counter argument to this process might be that all police are not corrupt and should not have their funding cut because of other officers’ actions. It might be a common conception that they protect the community. But many groups across the United States and this city do not feel protected by the police. Quite the opposite.

I must remind you that it is not the conduct of the police that’s exclusively the problem. It’s the existence of a police force at all. It’s the laws they enforce and the fact that they directly and indirectly uphold and enforce the systems of racism and oppression by protecting private property over human lives. We don’t need reform because we don’t need a kinder and gentler police force. We need to end this system of institutional violence that the police are a part of.

In the US the police force was developed to enforce property laws. At one point they were slave catchers, since slaves were a common form of property. As other more industrial businesses formed they protected the wealthy from labor organizers and uprisings. During segregation, the police upheld and enforced Jim Crow laws. Ultimately the police legitimate violence towards human beings for the purpose of restricting access to resources.

The beginning of reparations looks like making structural changes that will lead to healthy changes in our society, like defunding the police, dismantling colonial systems of law and militarization, decriminalizing drugs and sex work, freeing people from prisons and jails, investing in Black communities and providing money and property directly to Black people.

Here in Asheville it looks like putting power into the hands of indigenous, Black and Brown people to make decisions about how we use the land. Forming relationships in community and building trust.
Councils claims around reparations towards the Black community are empty and could be viewed as a distraction from more immediate actions like defunding the police. Until our community starts to see things happening like;

• Follow through on the Black Asheville Demands in their entirety.

• Closing businesses and schools amidst the coronavirus pandemic,funds from APD pumped back into the community.

• Property transfers from wealthy white beneficiaries — including local governments that seized land and community centers — to indigenous and Black communities

• Power over to indigenous communities to decide what can be done with the land. When we say land back in a native sense we live on the land but we do not own the land. We must make decisions that are based in a relationship with the land. We have 10 years to make extreme environmental changes , these will not wait for meetings and delegation.

• White people giving their positions of power to Black and Brown people, with the same pay rate (and I’m not just talking about these token people who you have in your pockets serving your agenda)

And much, much more, officials have no business talking about reparations.

Sincerely,

Comrade Black

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Comrade Black is Black, indigenous, and queer. They are native to the area pre-colonization, a North Carolina native born and raised, and a resident of Asheville for the past 6 years. They are a full time student and scholar and a volunteer mutual aid worker

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