Chicago to spend $500,000 on a subcommittee to determine how to pay reparations
Chicago to spend $500,000 on a subcommittee to determine how to pay reparations
Mayor Brandon Johnson is backing the creation of a new subcommittee to study reparations and is agreeing to earmark $500,000 in his 2024 spending plan to fund the panel’s work.
Half a mil to put their thumbs up their asses instead of just literally giving that money directly as reparations 
Edit: I want to clarify, I fully support reparations, I'm just extremely frustrated knowing that, under liberal/bourgeoisie democracy, these types of efforts tend to get bogged down with means testing, and sometimes outright turn into thinly-veiled handouts to private corporations. All while the police budget is still increasing YOY.
That said, Evanston (city on Chicago's northern border) did actually manage to distribute "...$25,000 in no-strings-attached direct cash payments for those eligible. Black residents who lived in Evanston during a 50-year period of discriminatory zoning laws and their direct descendants receive priority for eligibility." So I don't want to encourage further reactionary criticisms such as mine towards this specific subcommittee if they are able to achieve at least some form of direct payments similar to Evanston's program.
inb4 they pocket the money and go “we’ll meet again next year to finish this”
No that's literally what they're doingAld. Stephanie Coleman (16th Ward), the chair of the Chicago City Council’s Black Caucus, said the subcommittee is likely to be part of the City Council’s Committee on Contracting Equity and Oversight, which is led by Ald. Emma Mitts (37th Ward). That panel will meet for no more than a year, and then transition to a full commission, Coleman told WTTW News.
Edit: I'm going to go back on this specific criticism, as has been pointed out by other commenters, this committee has voiced their intentions to model their program after Evanston, which began with means-testing assistance but had a 2nd phase which instituted "$25,000 in no-strings-attached direct cash payments for those eligible. Black residents who lived in Evanston during a 50-year period of discriminatory zoning laws and their direct descendants receive priority for eligibility."
There's still plenty to criticize around the inefficiencies and contradictions of reparation attempts under liberal democracy, but I don't want to direct my ire at efforts that actually accomplish some material benefit, at least if and until they demonstrate failure. In other words, we should agitate these efforts to do it correctly, and clown on them if they end up with some means-tested liberal nonsense, but not clown on them for attempting it all.
How does this imply they are pocketing the money and doing no work?
This is a major city taking a concrete step towards reparations and we're making unfounded criticisms that could be ripped right from
How do people think you go from supporting reparations as a concept to actually cutting checks and deciding who gets what? Are the people doing the work to get from concept to execution supposed to work for free?
This is what running a government looks like. Absent a specific critique about why this amount isn't needed, the takes objecting to this are just the reactionary "any dime the government spends on anything other than the end product is pure waste."
Permanently Deleted
"I'll believe the government can do good when I see it" is a core reactionary idea. Its another strain of
we have to purge from ourselves if we're going to sell people on a system of government that we think should directly provide housing, healthcare, education, jobs, solutions to climate change, etc.Really, how else would you go from concept to execution? Committes can be used to string people along, but they're also how you make big decisions in big organizations. Skepticism is warranted, but calling this nothing until the checks clear is not.
That's a fair point, it's just hard to not be pessimistic when the same city is still spending $2 billion on their police budget and $29 mil to a private company for tents to house migrants (instead of just expropriating some unoccupied office buildings).
I'm not against spending large amounts of time, effort, and money on planning and executing reparations, I just have very little confidence that it can be done under liberal democracy without it turning into some market-based, means-tested program that is most certainly not reparations, all while other systems of harm are still being funded by several higher orders of magnitude. I will word my criticisms better in the future so as not to come off like I'm criticizing the very idea of planning and distributing reparations.
Skepticism is warranted, but there are reparations being paid right now 45 minutes down the road in Evanston. It's not a pipe dream; there's an actual working example right there.
We talk a lot here about how social programs in the USSR and Warsaw Pact countries served as an immediate example of how things could be done better, and how that pressured capitalist countries to make concessions in the same direction. Reparations programs can work the same way. We've seen this effect with LGBT rights and marijuana legalization recently, too.
Salary and benefits for a 3 person team with a lawyer consulting will eat that up in a year easily.
Photo of the reparations committee in session
LMAO, yes! this is literally the first thing that came to mind.
How is Chicago going to pay for reparations and according to what criteria? Collective years lived in Chicago? Reparations to Japanese Americans came from federal funds as a counterexample. Clown show all around.
Those are exactly the questions this subcommittee will answer? How is using a committee to go from "reparations should be paid" to the specifics of how to pay them, and to whom, a clown show? How else would you do it?
Reparations for a national crime isn't something that should be decentralized to city councils and local governments.
How would I do it? How all the other governments do it worldwide. National apology first. Truth and reconciliation committee afterwards along with reparations on a federal level.
Chicago looking into it is theatrics. It's only entertaining. Not very useful and they know it.
there are valid questions about who gets reparations but yeah thats insane. edit im undeleting my comment because i needs to be said.
For sure, but at a certain point it's far more efficient to just split the money across all households in the bottom x% of income.
Also, they want this program to be similar to one in Evanston, which restricted the "reparations" to assistance for mortgages and home improvements. Leave it to liberals to tell black people they're only allowed to spend their "reparations" on improving property values
For sure, but at a certain point it's far more efficient to just split the money across all households in the bottom x% of income.
not looking for a whole thing im just mentally ill. but thats not reparations, call it something else. like from the naacp to the black panthers everyone calls for race based reparations. and before you start yes mlk called for the destruction of poverty as a hole but he did call for race based reparations. all reparations are race based reparations. reparations are payment for a specific crime that crime was slavery. reparations are also about healing the genarational trauma. if you look a poll on what black people actually want (the only peoples who opinions matter) https://www.pewresearch.org/race-ethnicity/2022/08/30/black-americans-views-on-reparations-for-slavery/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/11/28/black-and-white-americans-are-far-apart-in-their-views-of-reparations-for-slavery/ its clear black people want reparations in the form of cash payments and collage schollarships. frankly i couldn't even FIND a poll on non race based reparations because thast just NOT A THING im sorry but i feel crazy reading your comment it feels like im on reddit sorry lol ive had this exact conveo with so many redditors its crazy. im not looking for a debate or another "othello hate white people" saga but non race based reparations is NOT REPARATIONS ITS JUST FREE MONEY FOR POOR PEOPLE ITS NOT JUSTICE. call it what ever you want bout you cant say youre in favor of reparations and then be against reparations, i cant even FIND a respected black org that supports what your saying im over here trying to steelman your argument and I cant. this is the only issue that both black radical communist and black conservatives and basically most black people agree on. lastly in know this is the ramblings of a mad man im very mentally ill i cant let things go this doesnt matter we are never getting reparations anyway or anything in this goddamm country (i already fucking got my ancestors land in my fathers country) - nevermind im forcing myself to stop and walk away. sorry i just hate seeing this anti reparation shit on hexbear its not the first nor will it be the last time im sure. im not going to respond any more for the sake of my own mental health thank you.
Also it's kinda wild of the libs to look at the current situation of various minorities and think that "ah yes, we need official documents linking you to a slave ancestor" rather than just helping people without means testing. Because that's usually what the liberals are trying to do, it can be obvious that you had slaves in your family, but if you don't have the papers they get off on denying due to technicality. I've read through most reparations resolutions and it's depressing
i think the NAACP had a good solution https://naacp.org/resources/reparations
"Reparations would involve a national apology, rights to the cannabis industry, financial payment, social service benefits, and land grants to every descendant of an enslaved African American and Black person a descendant of those living in the United States including during American slavery until the Jim Crow era. 1965. Because slavery involved kidnapping, barbarism, and the stripping of language, culture and heritage, many Black people are unaware of their specific African heritage and which country in fact their ancestors were stolen from. The forged documentation, lack of documentation or non-existent documentation, from birth certificates to slave manifest, be it resolved that eligibility for these reparations requires the following: people that were born in the United States or naturalized citizens that have noted their Black heritage on the census, identify as Black on their birth certificate and/or have documentation of enslaved parentage in the United States, documentation of parentage residing in the United States prior to and during the Jim Crow era, and currently identify as Black American or African American. Identification of African-American heritage is both a biological and physical representation of being African-American on a daily basis."
and yes means testing is stupid. black does not equal poor, were the Japanese internment camp prisoners means tested? were the italians?? was anyone else??
"ah yes, we need official documents linking you to a slave ancestor" rather than just helping people without means testing
The one city I know of that has actually started reparations payments -- Evanston -- is tying them to redlining and other discriminatory policies in Evanston and in the 20th century. I don't think it's means tested, either; it's not based on need, but on if recipients are "descendants of Evanston residents who lived in the city between 1919 and 1969 or suffered housing discrimination after 1969."
I’m so glad the USSR didn’t take OP’s approach of “planning Schmanning, we’ll ignore it because overhead is wasteful.” You can spend a lot up front and it’ll be costly but might actually happen and even finish somewhat on time, or try to save up front and never end up finishing and wasting a colossal amount of labor and resources.
Pop open a thread about the USSR or the PRC and you'll find plenty of people praising central planning and the role it played in rapid economic development, and you might also find critiques that amount to "you should have better examined the effects of trying to eradicate sparrows."
It's OK to be skeptical of government power, waste, and corruption, but deep cynicism about government ever being able to do anything right is a core reactionary belief.
Hasn't pretty much every single study of means testing ever showed it wasted more money than it saved?
Like what are the qualifications of these people, are they acting in good faith or are they going to be collecting a salary to make sure they don't accidently give any black people too much money?
I think there's a huge difference between criticizing central planning and critciszing how liberal think tanks distribute resources to poor people.
This isn't a think tank, and the one example of reparations we have (Evanston, right down the road) is not means tested.
This is the way lib world ends
This is the way lib world ends
This is the way lib world ends
Not with a bang but a subcomittee.I disagree, the new mayor actually seems willing to provide the basic apologies as reparations. It doesn't matter how much it costs as long as it is done.
Plus his general spending plan for Chicago 2024 seems to be very decent, he's an alright guy from what I can see.
decent except for his pledge not to defund the police. up 3%
Why should a union town pay for the south's crimes?
Plenty of crimes to pay for in the North, too. Look at how Evanston, IL did it:
The housing program is the first initiative in a historic plan to distribute $10 million in reparations to Black residents of Evanston, according to the resolution. The effort is to directly acknowledge and address the “historical harm” done to Evanston residents through “discriminatory housing policies and practices and inaction by the City.” The effort would prioritize descendants of Evanston residents who lived in the city between 1919 and 1969 or suffered housing discrimination after 1969.
Highlighting more recent discrimination seems like a good plan for a number of reasons.
Slavery was not exclusive to South, slavery was practiced in many northern states, even the nominally "free"
a union town
PMC parasites lol
"OK after paying thousands of consultants 6 digit salaries for years we've figured out how to distribute the funds your check for $8.64 will be in your mailbox in 8 to 10 months."
It's $500K. As someone else pointed out, salary and benefits for a small team will burn through that in short order. Evanston is making $25K restitution payments; this program is likely looking at something similar.
If there's an already established and working program why spend $500k on anything other than sticking it in that fund and expanding it.
Can I have half a million dollars to sit in on a meeting and go "yea we should do this too".
500k isn't a lot if it's actually being paid to somebody with good intentions, if it's going to three people to set up filters to figure out who doesn't qualify it's bullshit.
And historically thenoverwhelming majority of instances of this have been that latter.