22-year-old college student thanks God for being chosen to join Boston’s repair task force
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A college student and activist has announced she is eager to “break our chains” after being chosen to join Boston’s slavery redress task force.
Carrie Mays, 22, is one of the youngest people on the committee, and she thanked God for the opportunity, adding that she was “blessed” to be a part of the “revolutionary opportunity to make transformative change.”
The University of Massachusetts student will join a body of 10, including two high school kids, to make recommendations to the mayor about whether the ancestors of black slaves in Boston should receive monetary reparations.
After she was chosen for the position, Mays wrote online: βI am beyond blessed, honored and grateful to have been appointed by the Mayor to serve on Boston’s FIRST REPAIR TASK FORCE.
‘I am so thankful that God has put me to do this job and for this revolutionary opportunity to make transformative change. For making national news known, for breaking the status quo and breaking our chains.
The college student organizes discussions about racism at her school and has spoken on the subject at national conferences. She has now thanked God for the opportunity to “break our chains” and join the task force in Boston.
Mays said he thought the Black Lives Matter movement should be about more than just policing, announcing that the “marathon continues” now that he has joined the task force.
The activist added: ‘This is not the end, but rather the continuation of a protracted struggle where Love inevitably wins and the ark of the universe tilts towards justice.
‘None of this would be possible without the resilience of our community. The good troublemakers, activists, and elders who came before me. My friends and colleagues in the fight for social justice and especially my ancestors.
‘To each and every person here to support. I see you. I value you and I love you. Thank you. The marathon continues.
The group of 10 will make recommendations in June 2024 “for truth, reconciliation and reparations addressing the City of Boston’s involvement in the African slave trade.”
High school students Damani Williams and Denilson Fanfan are the youngest members of the committee.
Mays has already done it gained local attention in his own right for his efforts to rally people at a Black Lives Matter protest in Boston following the death of George Floyd in June 2020.
She said the message resonated with her because police once held her family at gunpoint, which caused her personal trauma. Mays now organizes debates on racism at her school and has spoken on the subject at national conferences.
His social media profiles are also littered with messages supporting Black Lives Matter and throwing away his identity politics, with a pinned post on his Facebook profile demanding that the “whitewashed school curriculum teach black history beyond slavery.” “.
The task force will also include high school students Damani Williams, left, and Denilson Fanfan, right.
Mays has said that his family was once held by police at gunpoint, which caused him personal trauma.
The reparations proposal in Boston has already sparked a debate over whether monetary reparations should be paid exclusively to black Americans descended from slaves or whether they should include black immigrants who may still have suffered the impacts of so-called systemic racism.
The Boston reparations task force will be chaired by attorney Joseph Fester Jr, former president of the NAACP Boston Chapter and current member of the city’s Commission on Black Men and Boys.
That commission was established in 2021 to help advise the mayor and city council on “issues involving black men and boys,” according to the city’s website.
It will also comprise businessmen and academics, including L’Merkie Frazier, public historian, visual activist, and executive director of creative and strategic partnerships at SPOKE Arts.
Announcing the members of the reparations panel Tuesday, Mayor Michelle Wu said the ten task force members will guide the city’s response to the effects of slavery in the city.
‘For 400 years, the brutal practice of slavery and recent policies like the Red Line, the bus crisis and exclusion from city contracts have denied African-Americans pathways to build generational wealth, secure stable housing and live freely.
“Our administration remains committed to addressing longstanding racial inequities, and this task force is the next step in our commitment as a city to advance racial justice and build a Boston for all,” he concluded.
Fester added in a statement: ‘I am honored to be asked by Mayor Wu to chair this Reparation Task Force and serve with such distinguished people.
“We hope to determine recommendations for how we view Boston’s past as we chart a path forward for black people whose ancestors worked without compensation and who were promised the 40 acres and a mule they never received.”
City activists have called for reparations for years, dating back to the 1980s.
Supporters of reparations have cited the city’s history of segregated housing, as well as a post-Emancipation political economy that reduced opportunities for black Bostonians. The result, they said, is a wide wealth gap between black and white families that still persists.
The task force will now examine repair models and study racial disparities. It will also collect data on “historic damage” to black Bostonians. and hold hearings to collect testimony from black residents about the problems they have faced.
By 2024, the panel will make recommendations for reparations, as well as ways to remove policies and laws they say continue to harm black Bostonians.
It will also recommend how the city will issue a formal apology to the “people of Boston for committing gross human rights violations and crimes against humanity against enslaved Africans and their descendants.”
The task force will be housed within the City of Boston’s Cabinet for Equity and Inclusion and will soon be issuing a request for proposal for a research partner to assist with its mission.