Reparations for Black Californians Could Include Tuition and Housing Grants, Task Force Says

California’s Reparations Task Force on Wednesday released its first of two reports detailing the state’s history of slavery and racism, while also recommending how lawmakers might begin a process of redress for Black Californians by offering subsidies like housing grants, free tuition and minimum-wage increases.

The 500-page study describes decades of state and federal government actions that harmed Black Americans — from slavery to more recent redlining, mass incarceration, police actions and the widening wealth gap between Black people and white people.

After a Minneapolis police officer killed George Floyd two years ago, sparking nationwide protests, Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2020 signed legislation establishing the task force to study and develop a plan for reparations in the state. The law gave “special consideration” to Black residents in the state who are the direct descendants of enslaved people.

The task force report proposes dozens of recommendations, including that the Legislature “implement a comprehensive reparations scheme.” The final details — including the exact monetary amount of compensation and the number of Black Californians eligible — will be in a second report due to the Legislature by July 2023.

The task force recommends establishing 10 new state government offices to oversee administration of reparations, including an Office of African American/Freedmen Affairs to help people file claims for compensation and an Office of Freedmen Genealogy to help people prove their eligibility.

From slavery to the KKK

It’s unclear how many people would qualify for reparations. The task force estimates that, despite California’s antislavery constitution, about 1,500 enslaved Black people were living in the state in 1852.

After slavery was formally abolished in the United States, California became a breeding ground for the Ku Klux Klan. The report details how in the 1920s the KKK hosted more events in California than it did in Louisiana or Mississippi. In Los Angeles, the police department teemed with KKK members. In Kern County, klansmen routinely beat and kidnapped Black and Latino residents.

The report also references numerous instances of segregation and restrictive housing covenants across the state. And it describes the wholesale destruction of several Black neighborhoods and cities.

In the 1950s, for instance, San Francisco razed the Fillmore, a Black business district, destroying 883 businesses and displacing about 20,000 people from nearly 5,000 homes.

The task force proposes that people who lost homes to government seizures, urban renewal projects, freeway construction or racist attacks be eligible for housing grants and zero-interest loans.

Its recommendations aim to not only address specific instances of violence or prior harm, but also to support future generations of Black Californians.

The proposed Office of Freedmen Education and Social Services would offer free tuition to Black students in private K-12 education and those pursuing higher education in the state. It would also ensure that school curricula reflect a more “expansive discussion of the experiences of Black Americans in a way that is accurate and honest,” the report states.

The task force also proposes raising the minimum wage, requiring health benefits and paid time off, and other workplace protections for workers in agriculture, hospitality, food and domestic industries where there are large numbers of Black workers but fewer worker protections.

Black Californians seeking reparations would be able to file a claim through the Reparations Tribunal/Redress Administration, which would accept or deny requests.

A national example

“Without a remedy specifically targeted to heal the injuries that colonial and American governments have inflicted on 16 generations of Black Americans and dismantle the foundations of these systems,” the report reads, “the ‘badges and incidents of slavery’ will continue to harm Black Americans in almost all aspects of American life.”

Kamilah Moore, chair of the task force, said the report is the first government publication providing remedies to institutional racism against Black people since the 1968 Kerner Commission, a federal study commissioned by President Lyndon Johnson in the wake of a string of racial uprisings that erupted in cities across the country.

“This report is extremely timely and urgent. I hope that people use this not only as an educational tool, but as an organizing tool,” Moore said.

“It is not only useful for people living in California, but for community members, constituents and organizers throughout the United States … to champion the causes of the African American community wherever they are.”

In March, the task force voted to limit reparations eligibility to African Americans who are either direct descendants of enslaved people, or descendants of freed Black people living in the U.S. before the end of the 19th century.

The task force is the only statewide initiative examining reparations. Cities such as Asheville, North Carolina, and Evanston, Illinois, have initiated reparations proposals at the local level, but at the federal level, a bill that would commission a study on reparations — HR 40 — remains stalled in Congress.

This summer, partner organizations such as the California Black Power Network and the Black Equity Collective will host public listening sessions throughout the state about the report findings. The task force will reconvene its hearings in Los Angeles in September.