Activism

State Task Force Getting Closer to Identifying What Reparations Look Like

The five-member expert panel, appointed by the task force, is quantifying past economic injustices African Americans faced in the state and elsewhere, and determining what or how much compensation should be made to Black people living in California.

Published

2 years ago

December 26, 2022

Oakland Post

The five-member expert panel, appointed by the task force, is quantifying past economic injustices African Americans faced in the state and elsewhere, and determining what or how much compensation should be made to Black people living in California.

Economic experts for the California Reparations Task Force Dr. Kaycea Campbell, right, and Williams Spriggs, left, explain to the 9-member panel in Los Angeles that the group has “rough estimations” for five harms that could be used to determine compensation. CBM photo by Antonio Ray Harvey.

By Antonio‌ ‌Ray‌ ‌Harvey‌
California‌ ‌Black‌ ‌Media‌

The California Task Force to Study and Develop Reparations Proposals for African Americans will be conducting its last meeting of 2022 on Wednesday, Dec. 14, and Thursday, Dec. 15, at Oakland City Hall Chambers located at 1 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza adjacent to 14th Street.

The start time is 9 a.m. for both days beginning with one hour of public comment. The meetings will be live streamed via the official Task Force website or ETM Media on YouTube.

Task Force Chairperson Kamilah Moore says that the next meeting is of high importance “for a few reasons,” and will include an in-depth conversation about redress and repair.

“No. 1, we will begin to refine community eligibility standards (including residency requirements); No. 2, we’re inviting leaders from local/municipal reparations efforts from across the state to share their incredible work (i.e., Oakland, Los Angeles, Berkeley, Russell City, Palms Springs etc.),” Moore said in a written statement on Dec. 1. “No. 3, it will be the first-time task force members will collectively discuss and begin to determine what types of reparation proposals will be in the final report that will be released in June 2023.”

The task force’s two-year charge is scheduled to end in June 2023.

California’s AB 3121, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom into law in 2020, created the nine-member task force to investigate the history and costs of slavery in California and around the United States.

The law charges the Reparations Task Force with studying the institution of slavery and its lingering negative effects on Black Californians who are descendants of persons enslaved in the United States.

From the information they collect, the task force will develop reparation proposals for African Americans and recommend appropriate ways to educate Californians about the task force’s findings.

After the task force decided who would be eligible for compensation in March, the panel approved a framework for calculating how much should be paid — and for which offenses — to individuals who are Black descendants of enslaved people in the United States.

An expert panel reported to the task force in March that a “conservative estimate” of 2 million African Americans in California have ancestors who were enslaved in the United States. According to the U.S. 2020 Census, there are about 2.6 million Black Californians out of a total state population of nearly 40 million residents.

The expert panel includes William Spriggs, chief economist for the AFL-CIO and former chair of the Department of Economics at Howard University; Thomas Craemer, Public Policy professor at the University of Connecticut; Dr. Kaycea Campbell, CEO for Ventana Capital Advisors and Los Angeles Pierce College associate professor of Economics; Dr. William A. “Sandy” Darity Jr., director of the Samuel DuBois Cook Center on Social Equity at Duke University; and Kirsten Mullen, a writer, and lecturer whose work focuses on race, art, history, and politics.

All five experts participated on the first day of the two-day meeting held at the California Science Center in Los Angeles two months ago. Spriggs and Campbell attended the event in person, while the other three experts appeared virtually.

Campbell and her colleagues discussed with the task force the “models” to provide a “road map” that would determine how reparations would be “paid and measured.”

Milagro Jones, a participant at the Reparation Task Force meeting in Los Angeles, holds up a 500-page interim report that was submitted to the California Legislature in June 2022. CBM photo by Antonio Ray Harvey, Sept. 23, 2022.

The experts presented “five harms or atrocities,” down from the 13 they originally proposed, that could be used to determine compensations.

Campbell said the five categories under review will not be “exhausted” until they have received enough data to complete the process.

“This is not to say that other harms and atrocities are not important. As soon as, or if we get better data or more recent data, then we can, in fact, go through the process of what these look like,” Campbell said.

The experts made “rough estimates,” of property unjustly taken by eminent domain, devaluation of Black businesses, housing discrimination, the disproportion of mass incarceration and over-policing, and health inequities as the major harms.

Task Force Member Sen. Steven Bradford (D-Inglewood) released the following statement as clarification that the task force has not proposed that California compensate descendants of slaves with direct compensation for historical housing discrimination.

Bradford said, “Since its formation, a lot of misinformation and willful misrepresentation of the work from the Task Force has been released. The fact is that the Task Force has not completed its work and has made no formal recommendations to the Legislature. It’s important that we be deliberative and get this right because the nation is watching and it’s more than likely ours will be the model for all to follow.”

Members of the community and media are encouraged to visit the Reparations Task Force website and subscribe to the task force’s mailing list for updates at: https://oag.ca.gov/subscribe or call (213) 519-0504.

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Activism

The Best Advice for Raising Children: Discipline That Makes Sense

In his book Developing Positive Self Images and Discipline in Black Children, Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu suggests that primary aims for socializing Black children should be: establishing goals related to God and the church; familiarizing children with religious texts like the Bible or Quran; educating them of Black culture like Khemetic (Egyptian) Civilization; enlightening them about Black leaders like Malcolm X and Sojourner Truth; and teaching them to strive to be employers, not employees.

Published

2 days ago

May 13, 2025

Oakland Post

Headshot of Dr. William A. Thomas. Photo courtesy of Dr. William A. Thomas.

By William A. Thomas, Ph.D.

In many African societies, the primary aim of socialization is to raise children to be socially responsible and eventually provide economic support to their parents and extended families. Ghanaian philosopher Kwame Gyekye taught that children are raised to be respectful of the wishes of their parents and extended adult family members.

In his book Developing Positive Self Images and Discipline in Black Children, Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu suggests that primary aims for socializing Black children should be: establishing goals related to God and the church; familiarizing children with religious texts like the Bible or Quran; educating them of Black culture like Khemetic (Egyptian) Civilization; enlightening them about Black leaders like Malcolm X and Sojourner Truth; and teaching them to strive to be employers, not employees.

Effective disciplinary strategies appropriate to a child’s age and development teach them to regulate their behavior; keep them from harm; enhance their cognitive, social, and emotional executive functioning skills; and reinforce the behavioral patterns taught by their parents and caregivers.

Below are some specific guidelines for disciplining children.

Listen to what children are talking about with interest and show them you understand their feelings. Remember, children mirror and learn about their emotional selves by hearing their feelings reflected back to them. Staying on target also means avoiding labels. When children fail to do what is expected, discussing it is helpful rather than saying how stubborn, lazy, dumb, or bad they are. By the same token, more positive labels can be helpful.

Dependability is another essential component of the discipline process. When parents are dependable, their children learn what to expect and are helped to feel secure. When parents are consistent, children learn to trust, that is, predict their parents’ behaviors with certainty. A child thinks, “When I spill something, I will always be asked to wipe it up.” A child thinks, “If I use foul language, I will always be corrected.” A child thinks, “If I take something that doesn’t belong to me, I will always have to give it back.” The ability to predict with certainty leads children to rely on their parents and the village/community in which they live. Children feel safe when they know what to expect.

Conclusions

It takes a village/community to raise the divine gift that is the Black child. Parents look to therapists for guidance concerning a variety of parenting issues, including discipline. Keep in mind that evidence suggests that corporal punishment is both ineffective in the long term and associated with cognitive and mental health disorders. When parents want guidance about the use of spanking, a child therapist can explore parental feelings, help them better define the goals of discipline, and offer specific behavior management strategies. In addition to providing appropriate education to families, the Bay Area Association of Black Psychologists (Bay ABPsi) can refer them to community resources, like parenting groups and classes.

About the Author

Dr. Thomas is a licensed clinical psychologist with a private practice in the SF/Oakland Bay Area and Beaumont. He is a member of Bay ABPsi, a healing resource committed to providing the Post Newspaper readership with monthly discussions about critical issues in Black Mental Health. Readers are welcome to join us at our monthly chapter meetings every 3^rd Saturday via Zoom and contact us at bayareaabpsi@gmail.com.