Asheville, NC City Council Votes 7-0 for “Reparations,” Apologizes for Role in Slavery

Since the death of George Floyd, calls for reparations have become more mainstream.

Now, city councils across the United States are taking more extreme measures to "apologize" for their roles in slavery.

According to Fox News:

North Carolina’s Asheville City Council apologized for its role in slavery and racial discrimination, voting unanimously to provide reparations in the form of community investments to help Black residents.

The council voted 7-0 on Tuesday night on the measure to mitigate racial disparities. The reparations will not provide direct cash payments, as some have suggested, but will provide investments in housing, health care and career growth in Black neighborhoods.

Councilwoman Shaneika Smith, who is Black, said the council had gotten emails from those "asking, 'Why should we pay for what happened during slavery?'"

"[Slavery] is this institution that serves as the starting point for the building of the strong economic floor for white America, while attempting to keep Blacks subordinate forever to its progress," said Smith, as reported by the Asheville Citizen Times.

The resolution calls on the city to create a Community Reparations Commission to make concrete recommendations of where to funnel programs and resources.

"The resulting budgetary and programmatic priorities may include but not be limited to increasing minority home ownership and access to other affordable housing, increasing minority business ownership and career opportunities, strategies to grow equity and generational wealth, closing the gaps in health care, education, employment and pay, neighborhood safety and fairness within criminal justice," the resolution reads.

"Hundreds of years of black blood spilled that basically fills the cup we drink from today," said Councilman Keith Young, who is one of two African American city council members and spearheaded the proposal.

Many immigrants come to the United States with $0, yet are able to find success in our country.

This suggests that reparations will not solve any disparities between various demographics.

Instead, we must promote hard work and creativity as some of the solutions for success.

Ensuring that everyone has access to the same opportunities will do more for minorities than reparations ever could.

The move has sparked backlash from some residents.

While the specifics of the mandate are not clear, it is suggested that direct payments will not be made to black citizens of Asheville, NC.

Instead, the city appears to be planning to invest only in areas or businesses where black residents face disparities.

According to the USA Today:

"The resulting budgetary and programmatic priorities may include but not be limited to increasing minority home ownership and access to other affordable housing, increasing minority business ownership and career opportunities, strategies to grow equity and generational wealth, closing the gaps in health care, education, employment and pay, neighborhood safety and fairness within criminal justice," the resolution reads.

The resolution calls on the city to create the Community Reparations Commission, inviting community groups and other local governments to join. It will be the commission's job to make concrete recommendations for programs and resources to be used.

Councilwoman Sheneika Smith, who is Black, said the council had gotten emails from those "asking, 'Why should we pay for what happened during slavery?'"

"(Slavery) is this institution that serves as the starting point for the building of the strong economic floor for white America, while attempting to keep Blacks subordinate forever to its progress," Smith said.

Councilman Vijay Kapoor, who has often split with Young and Smith on police and budget issues, said he supported the measure for moral reasons. But he said skeptics could look to the "practical reason": data showing showing large disparities between African Americans and other Asheville residents.

"We don't want to be held back by these gaps," Kapoor said. "We want everyone to be successful."

The council allowed an hour of public comment on the measure. Many who were not able to speak before the vote waited for another hourlong comment period afterward, pushing the meeting late into the night. Most were in support.

Rob Thomas, community liaison for the Racial Justice Coalition, which led the push for reparations, thanked the council.

"This is a really, really good gesture as far as the foundation of what we can build," Thomas said. "The potential of what can come out of this document is amazing."

Increasing generational wealth — something African Americans were deprived of through economic and regulatory discrimination — should be the focus, he said.

It was also important that the county's government join, Thomas said, to ensure issues weren't lost between the county and city.

The Buncombe County's Board of Commissioners is not clearly behind the reparations measure, though it has a 4-3 Democratic majority.

Many citizens across the country are concerned as talks of reparations become more mainstream.

For example, do descendants of solders in the Union have to pay reparations? What about immigrants? Or white people whose ancestors never owned slaves?

How can we ensure that only direct descendants of slaves get reparations?

These are serious questions that demand serious answers.

But instead of trying to find real solutions, our politicians seem more intent on virtue signalizing to those on the fringes of the political spectrum.