Our imaginations have been purposefully limited by white supremacy, so when watershed moments like the Bruce's Beach initiative happen, a common retort I'd hear is, "It's a one off." It's always jarring to experience comments like these, especially coming from folks who look like me. Why would they want or expect Black folks getting their land returned to them to be a one-off? What purpose do criticisms like this serve? When I reflect, I think the function of them is to try and humble me, a hyper-visible, unapologetically fierce Black woman. I'm not sure why anyone would want to intentionally humble a Black activist doing work in service of her people. But guess what? I did it again and it made the front page of the LA Times.
My assignment is clear but scaling this work has been anything but simple. There are countless moving parts, egos to manage, and not to mention, our work is chronically underfunded. When I began Where Is My Land after Justice for Bruce's Beach, I was embarking on uncharted waters. Now, with Ebony Beach Club (nearly) under our belt, I am affirmed in the journey I began four years ago. The city council's unanimous vote to begin the restitution process has breathed new life into myself and into my team.
Silas White's main purpose with the Ebony Beach Club was to build community. I like to think his spirit is smiling somewhere after witnessing how the community that was stolen from him, rallied for justice around him. It breaks my heart that he is now an ancestor, unable to see how his daughter, Connie, never relinquished hope, even as she entered her 9th decade on earth. Silas White deserved so much more. And we're coming for it all!
Ebony Beach Club
In case you missed it- Santa Monica City Council voted unanimously to move forward with the White family’s restitution claim. With Councilwoman Caroline Torosis at the helm, agenda item 16L was introduced and endorsed by both Jesse Zwick and Gleam Davis. Now approved, the motion directs the City Manager and City Attorney to both research the White’s claim and report back with recommendations within 90 days. We are demanding that these recommendations include financial compensation, and transference of the land at 1811 Ocean Avenue. Their story was also featured on the front page of the LA Times, TWICE!
The Matthews Family
We're back in Huntsville, Alabama with the Matthews Family! Carrie Matthews was unlawfully kicked off her land by greedy, conniving lawyers who lied about a key document for decades. Now, commercial properties like Aldi, Valvoline and more stand on her land. Head to our social media platforms and check out their campaign!
Russell City Descendants for Restorative Justice
Russell City was once a beacon of Black independence and self-determination. Established in 1853, the town was a haven for Black, Latino, Californio, Mexicali, and Latinx residents as it was one of the few areas, they were allowed to live due to redlining and restrictive covenants that prevented them from renting or buying homes in other cities. Despite a lack of infrastructure and external support, Russell City residents were self-sufficient and cultivated a community where culture and arts flourished. In 1963, Hayward City and Alameda County declared the city was a “blight,” condemned it, and evicted all its residents.
Both Hayward and Alameda County have issued apologies for the harm and created commissions to determine what repair should look like. Last month, the Hayward City Council held a working meeting to receive survivor recommendations and public comment.
Stay tuned for more updates and calls to action as we resume their campaign! This moment is crucial and we have to remain vigilante to ensure the Russell City Descendants for Restorative Justice receive land back and financial compensation.
With another huge milestone under our belt in Santa Monica, our impact is undeniable. This work wouldn't be possible without your generous donations, large or small. Help us to continue scaling this work and impacting the lives of Black families across America.
We have a new fiscal sponsor and are now able to accept tax-deductible donations again!
Angela Glover Blackwell is Founder in Residence at PolicyLink, the organization she started in 1999 to advance racial and economic equity for all. Under Angela’s leadership, PolicyLink gained national prominence in the movement to use public policy to improve access and opportunity for all low-income people and communities of color, particularly in the areas of health, housing, transportation, and infrastructure. Angela is also the host of the Radical Imagination podcast and Professor of Practice at the Goldman School of Public Policy, University of California, Berkeley.
Prior to founding PolicyLink, Angela served as Senior Vice President at The Rockefeller Foundation. A lawyer by training, she gained national recognition as founder of the Urban Strategies Council. From 1977 to 1987, Angela was a partner at Public Advocates. Angela is the co-author of Uncommon Common Ground: Race and America’s Future, and she authored The Curb Cut Effect, published in the Stanford Social Innovation Review in 2017.
As a leading voice in the movement for equity in America, Angela serves on numerous boards. She advised the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve as one of 15 members of its inaugural Community Advisory Council, and in 2020 was appointed by California Governor Gavin Newsom to the state Task Force on Business and Jobs Recovery. She is the 2018 recipient of the John W. Gardner Leadership Award, presented by the Independent Sector, and in 2017, she received the Peter E. Haas Public Service Award from the University of California, Berkeley.
Autumn Breon
Autumn Breon is a multidisciplinary artist who investigates the visual vocabulary of liberation through a queer Black feminist lens. Using performance, sculpture, and installation, Breon invites audiences to collectively imagine new systems that make current oppressive systems obsolete. Breon has created commissions for Frieze Art Fair and Target and her performance history includes Hauser & Wirth and the Walt Disney Concert Hall. She is an alumna of Stanford University where she studied Aeronautics & Astronautics. Breon is a recipient of Race Forward's Housing, Land, & Justice Artist Fellowship.
Eric Miller
Eric J. Miller is a professor and Leo J. O’Brien Fellow at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, where he teaches and writes in the areas of legal theory, reparations, and policing.
Professor Miller is an internationally recognized expert on reparations for Black people in the United States. He has testified before the House Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Continuing Injustice: The Centennial of the Tulsa-Greenwood Race Massacre in 2021; on HR40 and the Path to Restorative Justice in 2019; and on the Legacy of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade in Americain 2007. In addition, he has provided testimony before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on Reparation for Slavery and Other Forms of Structural Racial Discrimination in the United States, Washington, D.C., September 24, 2019.
Professor Miller was a member of the Reparations Coordinating Committee, and took a leading role in drafting the complaint in the pathbreaking federal reparations lawsuit on behalf of the survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921, Alexander v. State of Oklahoma. He is currently a member of Lawyers for Justice for Greenwood, and again took a lead role in drafting and arguing a reparations public nuisance lawsuit, Randle v. City of Tulsa.
Professor Miller received an LL.B. from the University of Edinburgh, and an LL.M. from Harvard Law School, where he was also a Charles Hamilton Houston Fellow. He clerked for the Hon. Myron H. Thompson in the Middle District of Alabama and the Hon. Stephen Reinhardt of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Representing the Race: Standing to Sue in Reparations Lawsuits, 20 Harv. BlackLetter L.J. 91 (2004)
Reconceiving Reparations: Multiple Strategies in the Reparations Debate, 24 B.C. Third World L.J. 45 (2004)
Professor Miller is currently working on a book entitled Demanding Reparations
Marc Phillipart
Marc was named executive director of the California Black Freedom Fund in April 2022, bringing more than a decade of leadership in advocacy working with grassroots organizations to build power for racial justice.
Prior to joining the California Black Freedom Fund, Marc led the Alliance for Boys and Men of Color. Under his leadership, the Alliance successfully advanced more than 100 state policies and established powerful partnerships with the California Senate and Assembly Select Committees on the Status of Boys and Men of Color and the California Funders for Boys and Men of Color. Through Marc’s leadership, the Alliance broadened its focus to include fighting for gender justice and ending intimate partner violence by addressing misogyny and patriarchy, as well as racial equity.
Through these experiences, Marc has gained deep campaign and policy expertise across a wide array of issues, including public health and violence prevention, police and prison abolition, education, the criminalization of youth, economic equity and poverty eradication, and voting and civic engagement. Marc serves on the board of directors for the California Immigrant Policy Center, Partners for Dignity and Rights, and Schott Foundation for Public Education, and is on advisory committees for the University of Southern California’s Equity Research Institute.
Patrisse Cullors
artist and abolitionist
Patrisse Cullors is a New York Times bestselling author, educator, artist, and abolitionist from Los Angeles, CA. Her work has been featured at The Broad, The Geffen Contemporary at MOCA, LTD Gallery, Crystal Bridges Museum, Second Home West Hollywood, The Fowler Museum, Frieze LA, The Hammer Museum, Vashon Center for the Arts, Joe’s Pub, Langston Hughes Performing Arts Center, and a host of theaters, galleries, and museums across the globe.
Cullors launched a ground-breaking Social and Environmental Arts Practice MFA program at Prescott College where she served as the Founding Director for two years. She is the co-founder of the Crenshaw Dairy Mart and has been on the frontlines of abolitionist movement building with Black Lives Matter, Justice LA, Dignity and Power Now and Reform LA jails. Her current work and practice is focusing on “Abolitionist Aesthetics,” a term she has advanced and popularized to help challenge artists and cultural workers to aestheticize abolition. Patrisse is also the founder of The Center For Art and Abolition- a trailblazing nonprofit organization dedicated to empowering abolitionist artists and leveraging the transformative power of art to catalyze social change.
Patrisse has won numerous awards for her art and activism. In September 2021, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors unanimously approved Patrisse’s appointment to serve as one of three Second District Arts Commissioners. Patrisse’s mission is to invite all of us to grow towards abolition through intergenerational healing work that centers love, collective care, and art.
Boston, MA: Clergyman and The Boston People's Reparations Commission call on local white churches, who often directly benefitted from the slave trade, to help foot the reparations bill
