City Council - Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission

Biography

Biography

Biography

The Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission is still working to identify meeting dates, locations and times. Unless otherwise noted below, please check back for updated information or contact us for questions.

Meeting Schedule

Resolution 21-886, passed by City Council on June 16, 2021, established the Saint Paul City Council Legislative Advisory Committee on Reparations appointing Veronica Burt, Trahern Crews and Yohuru Williams as the conveners and Theresa Cunningham, Lynette Harris, Amber Jones, Benjamin Mchie, Nick Muhammad, Jessica Nickrand, Jose Perez, Khulia Pringle, Vic Rosenthal and Jerry Thomas as members. 

The Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee met for 1 year: July 2021 through June 2022. The committee produced a written report for the City Council and presented its recommendations on Wednesday, June 15, 2022.

The Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee reported back to the City Council with:

• Draft Ordinance to Establish the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission, as a permanent standing commission of the city  Draft Ordinance
• Companion Report with commentary and supplemental information Companion Report  
• Slide deck providing an overview of the LAC's work Presentation Slides

Once established, the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission will recommend actions to address the creation of generational wealth for the American Descendants of Chattel Slavery and boost economic mobility and opportunity in the Black community. 

The City Council received this information and proceeded to implement the recommendations, culminating in the establishment of this Commission in January 2023.

Resolution 21-77

Title

Committing to racial healing through the exploration of reparations for American descendants of Chattel Slavery Living in Saint Paul.

Body

WHEREAS, the institution of slavery in the United States, beginning in 1619 and continuing through 1863, enriched American industries, commercial and financial corporations and transformed the newly established United States into an international economic power through the oppressive, dehumanizing and torturous system of enslaved Black labor; and

WHEREAS, after slavery ended in the US, the slaveowners were compensated for the loss of their slaves, but those who had been held in bondage were never compensated for their labor, despite the promise of “40 acres and a mule”; and

WHEREAS, although slavery was illegal in Minnesota, Dred Scott and Harriet Scott were in bondage at Fort Snelling as well as other African Americans who were used for enslaved labor by US Army officers, which was in violation of the Northwest Ordinance of 1787 and the Missouri Compromise of 1820; and

WHEREAS, in the aftermath of slavery, African American citizens of this country continued to face brutal discrimination, as evidenced by Jim Crow, forced segregation, mass atrocities in Tulsa and Rosewood, the lynching period and to this day, mass incarceration; and

WHEREAS, in Saint Paul, systemic discrimination was perpetrated through redlining and racial covenants, access to housing, environmental injustice and the removal of Saint Paul’s Rondo neighborhood - the center of Saint Paul’s African American business, residential, spiritual and cultural life - for the construction of Interstate 94; and

WHEREAS, the pervasiveness of structural institutionalized racism in Saint Paul and all of American society has led to overwhelming black-white disparities in every area of endeavor, from housing to education and employment, business investment, economic prosperity, health and wellness, including life expectancy and infant mortality; and

WHEREAS, according to the November 2020 edition of the New England Journal of Medicine, reparations are now widely considered to be the most effective means of breaking down the societal structure related to power, money and access to resources, and indeed may be the only solution that can be applied intergenerationally that “would be an investment in the future and in reducing disparities that have been intractable for generations”; and

WHEREAS, local and state governments throughout the US have demonstrated a commitment to address these disparities by creating programs to generate public and private sources of funding, including dedicating tax revenues from enterprises that have historically profited from targeting African American consumers and other forms of discrimination that have fueled black-white disparities; and

WHEREAS, the tragic killing of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police officers has led to local, national and international reckoning of the immorality of the racial hierarchy that exists under our so-called democratic institutions, and the founding values of this nation, “that all people are equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness;

NOW THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the City Council of Saint Paul does affirm that there can be no further delay in engaging all of Saint Paul in a process of racial healing and righting these wrongs; and be it further

RESOLVED, that the City Council of Saint Paul, does herein apologize and commit to making amends for its participation in and sanctioning of institutional racism against the American descendants of chattel slavery; and be it further

RESOLVED, that the City Council of Saint Paul does herein apologize and commit to making amends for Dred Scott being held in bondage at Fort Snelling and its enforcement of institutional racism and its accompanying discriminatory practices; and be it further

RESOLVED, that the City Council of Saint Paul apologizes and commits to making amends for allowing the construction of Interstate 94 to destroy a vibrant Black community and successful Black businesses; and be it further

RESOLVED, that the City Council of Saint Paul calls on all organizations and institutions in Saint Paul that have advanced and benefited from racial inequity to join the city in these apologies and invites them to address racism within their own structures and programs and to work with the city to more comprehensively address systemic racism; and be it further

RESOLVED, that the City Council of Saint Paul calls on the State of Minnesota and our federal delegation to initiate policymaking and provide funding for reparations at the state and national level; and be it further

RESOLVED, that the Saint Paul City Council commits to use its authority to establish, within the next six months, a legislative advisory committee to work with the Administration to create the roles and responsibilities for a new city commission to be known as the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission shall be empowered to make short, medium and long term recommendations to specifically address the creation of generational wealth for the American Descendants of Chattel Slavery and to boost economic mobility and opportunity in the Black community; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission, as envisioned,  will make significant progress toward repairing the damage caused by public and private systemic racism in the City of Saint Paul, and will issue a report for consideration by the city, which will focus on but not be limited to strategies to grow equity and generational wealth, closing the gaps in home ownership, health care, education, employment and pay, and fairness within criminal justice among the American descendants of chattel slavery.

Resolution 21-886

Title

Establishing the Saint Paul City Council Legislative Advisory Committee on Reparations.

Body

WHEREAS, the Saint Paul City Council adopted Resolution 21-77 on January 13, 2021 committing to racial healing through the exploration of reparations for American descendants of Chattel Slavery Living in Saint Paul; and

WHEREAS, Resolution 21-77 specifically

apologized and committed to making amends for –

its participation in and sanctioning of institutional racism against the American descendants of chattel slavery

Dred Scott being held in bondage at Fort Snelling and its enforcement of institutional racism and its accompanying discriminatory practices

allowing the construction of Interstate 94 to destroy a vibrant Black community and successful Black businesses

called on other to take action, including –

all organizations and institutions in Saint Paul that have advanced and benefited from racial inequity to join the city in these apologies and invites them to address racism within their own structures and programs and to work with the city to more comprehensively address systemic racism

the State of Minnesota and our federal delegation to initiate policymaking and provide funding for reparations at the state and national level

committed to establish a Legislative Advisory Committee –

to use its authority to establish, within the next six months, a legislative advisory committee to work with the Administration to create the roles and responsibilities for a new city commission to be known as the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission

described the role of the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission which

shall be empowered to make short, medium and long-term recommendations to specifically address the creation of generational wealth for the American Descendants of Chattel Slavery and to boost economic mobility and opportunity in the Black community

will make significant progress toward repairing the damage caused by public and private systemic racism in the City of Saint Paul, and

will issue a report for consideration by the city, which will focus on but not be limited to strategies to grow equity and generational wealth, closing the gaps in home ownership, health care, education, employment and pay, and fairness within criminal justice among the American descendants of chattel slavery

WHEREAS, under Section 3.01.8 of the City Charter, the Council has the authority to establish a legislative advisory committee for no longer than one year to bring forward policy and legislative recommendations for Council consideration on reparations; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council establishes the Saint Paul Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee effective June 19, 2021 - also known as Juneteenth, the day which honors the end to slavery in the United States and is considered the longest-running African American holiday; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council appoints Veronica Burt, Trahern Crews and Yohuru Williams as conveners of the Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council appoints Theresa Cunningham, Lynette Harris, Amber Jones, Benjamin Mchie, Nick Muhammad, Jessica Nickrand, Jose Perez, Khulia Pringle, Vic Rosenthal and Jerry Thomas as members of the Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council determines it is in the public interest to provide a nominal stipend to support to these community advisors who bring valuable perspectives and whose presence builds public trust, ensures transparency and accountability; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council establishes a $50 stipend per meeting for the advisory committee conveners and members which is intended to help defray expenses associated with providing service to the committee for their time and effort spent participating; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council will provide professional and clerical staff support to the work of the Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee; and be it further

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council charges the committee with developing the policy proposals and enabling legislative proposals for the establishment of the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission - whose mission it will be to recommend actions to address the creation of generational wealth for the American Descendants of Chattel Slavery and boost economic mobility and opportunity in the Black community; and be in finally

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council requests a written report from the Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee no later than Friday June 10, 2022, which shall be presented to the City Council Wednesday June 15, 2022 at 10AM and the Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee disbanded thereafter.

Resolution 22-117

Title

Report back from the Saint Paul Legislative Advisory Committee on Reparations.

Resolution 22-928

Title

Accepting the report of the Saint Paul Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee.

Body

WHEREAS, the Saint Paul City Council adopted Resolution 21-77 on January 13, 2021 committing to racial healing through the exploration of reparations for American descendants of Chattel Slavery Living in Saint Paul; and

WHEREAS, Resolution 21-77, the Saint Paul City Council committed to establish a Legislative Advisory Committee to create the roles and responsibilities for a new city commission to be known as the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission; and

WHEREAS, under Section 3.01.8 of the City Charter, the Council has the authority to establish a legislative advisory committee for no longer than one year to bring forward policy and legislative recommendations for Council consideration on reparations; and

WHEREAS, the Saint Paul City Council adopted Resolution 21-886 establishing the Saint Paul City Council Legislative Advisory Committee on Reparations on June 16, 2021; and

WHEREAS, the Saint Paul City Council charged the committee with developing the policy proposals and enabling legislative proposals for the establishment of the Saint Paul Recovery Act Community Reparations Commission - whose mission it will be to recommend actions to address the creation of generational wealth for the American Descendants of Chattel Slavery and boost economic mobility and opportunity in the Black community; and

WHEREAS, the Saint Paul Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee presented its proposed draft ordinance and companion report to the City Council’s Organization Committee on June 15, 2022;

RESOLVED, that the Saint Paul City Council hereby gratefully acknowledges the substantial efforts of each of the committees conveners: Veronica Burt, Trahern Crews and Yohuru Williams;  as well as the significant contributions made by each of the advisory committee members: Therese Cunningham, Amber Jones, Benjamin Mchie, Nick Muhammad, Jessica Eleanor Nickrand, Jose R Perez, Khulia F Pringle, Vic H Rosenthal, and Jerry J Thomas; and be it

RESOLVED, the Saint Paul City Council hereby accepts the report of the Saint Paul Reparations Legislative Advisory Committee.

Convener Biographies

Veronica Burt, Convener, is a Social Entrepreneur and Principal of 600 Strategies – a boutique Community Development Consulting Service that integrates a multitude of approaches in helping clients achieve valuable social, economic, and environmental outcomes.  She has worked with a variety of grassroots, non-profit and government entities on matters of racial & social equity, housing, jobs, business development, youth engagement, neighborhood and transportation planning. Veronica is a student of African American history and has long been a proponent of the reparation’s movement upon reading Randall Robinson’s book The Debt:  What America Owes to Blacks.  Over the years, she’s had the privilege of working with national activists including Chicago City Alderman Dorothy Tillman who passed one of the 1st city level policies on the matter.  Veronica looks forward to bringing forth healing and transformation for American Descendants of U.S. Slavery as she shares her skills and experiences with the work of the Legislative Advisory Committee.

Trahern Crews, Convener, is a native of Saint Paul. He is the co-founder and lead organizer with Black Lives Matter Minnesota, and he is the chair of the Green Party of Minnesota and chairs the party’s media committee. He is Chair of the Green Party of the U.S. Reparations Working Group and Co-Chaired the Saint Paul Recovery Act Steering committee to get the Reparations Resolution passed. From 2014 to 2015, he served as spokesperson for the Saint Paul Green Party (4th Congressional District) Campaign Manager for Marcus Walker for Senate 2012, Campaign Manager for Lena Denise Buggs For MN State Representative. Formerly, he served as the community liaison at Dayton’s Bluff Community Council connecting residents with the resources Dayton’s Bluff Community Council and the City of Saint Paul has to offer. He also worked closely with the Neighborhood Development Committee. Trahern Crews taught Black history and Urban Agriculture at Truth Academy and has mentored Black youth at New Lens and Gladiator Records.

Dr. Yohuru Williams, Convener, is Distinguished University Chair and Professor of History and founding director of the Racial Justice Initiative at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota. Dr. Williams received his Ph.D. from Howard University in 1998. 

Dr. Williams is the author of Black Politics/White Power: Civil Rights Black Power and Black Panthers in New Haven (Blackwell, 2006), Rethinking the Black Freedom Movement (Routledge, 2015), and Teaching beyond the Textbook: Six Investigative Strategies (Corwin Press, 2008) and the editor of A Constant Struggle: African-American History from 1865 to the Present Documents and Essays (Kendall Hunt, 2002). He is the co-editor of The Black Panthers: Portraits of an Unfinished Revolution (Nation Books, 2016), In Search of the Black Panther Party, New Perspectives on a Revolutionary Movement (Duke, 2006), and Liberated Territory: Toward a Local History of the Black Panther Party (Duke, 2008). He also served as general editor for the Association for the Study of African American Life and History's 2002 and 2003 Black History Month publications, The Color Line Revisited (Tapestry Press, 2002) and The Souls of Black Folks: Centennial Reflections (Africa World Press, 2003). Dr. Williams served as an advisor on the popular civil rights reader Putting the Movement Back into teaching Civil Rights. 

Dr. Williams has appeared on a variety of local and national radio and television programs most notably ABC, CNN, MSNBC, Aljazeera America, BET, CSPAN, EBRU Today, Fox Business News, Fresh Outlook, Huff Post Live, and NPR and was featured in the Ken Burns PBS Documentary Jackie Robinson and the Stanley Nelson PBS Documentary: The Black Panthers. He is also one of the hosts of the History Channel’s Web show Sound Smart.  A regular political commentator on the Cliff Kelly Show on WVON, Chicago, Dr. Williams also blogs regularly for the Huffington Post and is a contributor to the Progressive Magazine. 

Dr. Williams's scholarly articles have appeared in the American Bar Association’s Insights on Law and Society, The Organization of American Historians Magazine of History, The Black Scholar, The Journal of Black Studies, Pennsylvania History, Delaware History, the Journal of Civil and Human Rights and the Black History Bulletin. Dr. Williams is also presently finishing a new book entitled In the Shadow of the Whipping Post: Lynching, Capital Punishment, and Jim Crow Justice in Delaware 1865-1965 under contract with Cambridge University Press.

Committee Member Biographies

Theresa Cunningham has been deeply committed to civic service, affordable housing, and small business development in the non-profit & public sectors. She is a retired public servant of the City of Minneapolis; where she worked for over 40 years helping to provide safe, decent, and affordable housing. In hindsight, she didn’t realize this work would be her life-long career path and an area of public service and importance responsible in meeting so many peoples’ primary need for shelter.  She was born and raised in the old Rondo community of St. Paul, MN as a Hutchinson.  As far back, as she can recollect, she lived in numerous locations within the historic Rondo Community.  She lived on W Central and N Kent St, just above the old Hollow Playground in Cornmeal Valley.  She moved from there just around the corner to Fuller Ave. and Dale St. in the late 1950s which was referred to as Oatmeal Hill.  After her mother’s untimely death in 1960, she moved deeper into the Midway area where she has been a native most of her life, except for a short period when she moved to Minneapolis; married and divorced.  She then raised her three children as a single mother in Rondo.  Her children changed the course of her life.  They have followed the path she has forged for them; to put God and honor first and to work hard and be a contributing member of society.  They are kind, hard-working, independent individuals who serve our community.  They have blessed her with 8 grandchildren, who are the light of her life and promise a true legacy of family staying together.

In her 40+ year work history for the City of Minneapolis, she worked first for the Minneapolis Housing and Redevelopment Authority (MHRA), which morphed into the Minneapolis Community Development Agency (MCDA) and was finally absorbed by the Community Planning and Economic Development (CPED) division of the City of Minneapolis.  She worked in all facets of real estate development and finance from single and multi-family housing, construction of public service facilities, to various planned unit developments.  In addition, she administered numerous forms of financing for the creation and implementation of shelter housing facilities for the homeless.

After retiring in 2018, she pursued her life’s passion of gardening, since the age of seven. She recently completed the Ramsey County’s Master Gardeners Program at the U of M and now volunteers in helping to beautify and maintain various neighborhood gardens in the historic Rondo community of St. Paul.  She spends most of her free time with her family and life-long, close friends: enjoying life and watching plants grow. 

She is honored to help define appropriate restitutions for African American descendants of chattel slave families that were stolen and forced to sacrifice their lives, families, loves, liberties, strengths, and imaginations for the growth of America.  She is eager to help in fostering the ‘American Dream’ and the unrealized promise of the “forty acres and a mule” for our families which we are so late in receiving.  She prays this work is honorable, bears good fruit, and fosters a legacy for African American families for generations to come.

Amber Jones possesses over ten years of community engagement, advocacy, & public policy experience in education, economic development, museums, & state government. She earned her bachelor’s degree in African American & African Studies from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, where she studied public history of Minnesota's African American communities 

Benjamin Mchie is an educational consultant, historian and founder of African American Registry (AAREG). Michie holds a B.A. in Speech Communications from Long Beach State University and is a Roy Wilkins Center for Social Change Fellow at the University of Minnesota (UMN). Mchie is the creator of African American Registery's Teacher's Forum subscription service. This online curriculum reform portal is working with E12 teacher's and post-secondary schools of education teaching programs. Also, AAREG works in the community through its Street Team Youth Programs. 

In 2017, Mr. Mchie was Minnesota Governor Dayton’s Martin Luther King Day Lifetime Achievement Award winner and in 2018, he spoke with the UMN Humphrey Institute at the 5th World Conference on Remedies to Racial & Ethnic Economic Inequality in Vitoria, Brazil. In 2019, he compiled tribal traditions for preservation in Mali, Africa. In September 2020 he received the Richard Olden Beard award from the University of Minnesota.  

Nick Muhammad is a Twin Cities transplant from Indianola, Mississippi. His journey has brought him from the cradle of white supremacy to the crown of white supremacy in Minnesota. He is a product and advocate for the American Descendants of Slavery ADOS/Black community. As Executive Director of the Black Civic Network (BCN) he is a strong advocate for reparations and repairing of the ADOS/Black families. Under his leadership they have authored the “ADOS Reparative Justice Fund” which is a bill to stabilize the ADOS/Black community and are strong allies in support of the “African American Family Preservation Act”. They are also the consultants on several State, County and Municipal initiatives to impact the ADOS/Black community. www.blackcivicnetwork.org 

Jessica Nickrand (she/her) works at a national non-profit as a patient advocate for children experiencing neurologic conditions and their families. She holds a BA from Michigan State University in Social Relations and Health Policy, and a PhD in the History of Science, Technology, and Medicine from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities. Her research focused on the intentional disinvestment of Black residents by local, state, and federal governments, and the subsequent negative outcomes in both healthcare and economic prosperity for Black families. In her research, she also found that this disinvestment also detracted from the city's overall prosperity, arguing that inequity and continued inequalities are expensive--it is through this lens that she approaches this work on reparations. She is from the Downriver community of Detroit and has lived in the Twin Cities for the past twelve years. Jessica lives with her husband Nick in the Summit Hill neighborhood. 

Jose Perez is a 21-year old R&B Artist and a first-generation youth-leadership expert with over 5 years of managerial experience. Born in the East side of Saint Paul, raised by a single mother of two, Jose sees himself as a product of his immigrant mother's American dream. 

Khulia Pringle has a B.S. Human Service, with a Minor in Human Service Administration. B.S. Social Studies. Graduate Certificate Secondary Urban Education with Licensure, AmeriCorp VISTA & AmeriCorp Promise Fellow Alumni. She is a former educator, and currently Brightbeam Activist & Midwest Regional Organizer with the National Parents Union and lead education advocate and organizer for National Parents Union MN. She firmly believes there is no such thing as other people's children.

Vic Rosenthal has a consulting practice focused on organizational development, capacity building, training and campaign development. Prior to this, Vic was the executive director of Jewish Community Action for nearly 18 years, building the size and capacity of the organization, and working on campaigns related to voting rights, racial justice, affordable housing and banking. Vic also was executive director of the Minnesota Senior Federation for nine years. Vic has been a community organizer for more than 40 years. He is the recipient of a Bush Leadership Fellowship and was one of 18 national recipients of the Ford Foundation’s Leadership for a Changing World award in 2004. Vic earned his Master of Public Administration at Rutgers University and his undergraduate degree at the State University of New York-Binghamton. Vic is also a member of Mount Zion Temple in St. Paul. 

Jerry Thomas, an American Of African Descent, was born and raised In St. Paul. He grew up as a child in the 60's. Racial unrest was prevalent and a daily occurrence at his junior high school. He remembers highway 94 being built destroying our affluent African American community. He overcame many obstacles his life, he’s a member of IBEW LU 110, and has been an electrician for 14 years. He is sincerely looking forward to being involved with pioneering reparations for our African American community.

A reference list containing scholarly and popular articles, books and additional source material on themes related to reparations was created in partnership by Saint Paul City Council and Saint Paul Public Libraries. 

The Inheritance Fund is an initiative of Mayor Carter which is part of a program that affords low-income families from Saint Paul’s historic Rondo Neighborhood the opportunity to rebuild wealth through homeownership.

The Inheritance Fund will be available through two City programs: the Downpayment Assistance Program and the Homeowner Rehab Program.