The San Francisco reparations committee recently chose to propose a new plan to officials for the city which would seek to issue payouts to longtime black residents from the Northern California Metropolitan city to the tune of $5 million each while granting total debt forgiveness for being made to deal with multiple decades of “systemic repression.”
A report was submitted by the San Francisco African American Reparations Advisory Committee to the members of the Board of Supervisors just shortly prior to the start of the New Year, in which they attempt to address a number of public policies which were made to “subjugate” black people throughout the Bay Area city and seemingly includes a long list of type of financial compensation, such as a massive lump-sum reparations payment of $5 million which will be given to each eligible individual.
“Centuries of harm and destruction of Black lives, Black bodies, and Black communities should be met with centuries of repair,” claimed the committee chair, Eric McDonnell, to The San Francisco Chronicle. “If you look at San Francisco, it’s very much a tale of two cities.”
McDowell holds a seat on the panel alongside a group of 15 other members that were established by officials for the city back in 2021.
Any resident that qualifies for the payout must check two notable boxes from a long list of requirements, which include that all applicants must be at least 18 years old by the time the city chooses to kick off the proposal from the committee, have openly identified as either African American or black on all public documents for at least the last 10 years, and prove that they had been born between the years 1940 and 1996.
Additional requirements from the report included residents that have lived in San Francisco for at least 13 years or personally been incarcerated — or even the offspring of someone who had been directly targeted and imprisoned — as part of the War on Drugs that was started by U.S. Pres. Richard Nixon back in 1971.
The report explained that any African-Americans who currently earn less than the Area Median Income of $97,000 would also be given further supplements for a period of 250 years.
“Racial disparities across all metrics have led to a significant racial wealth gap in the City of San Francisco,” it exclaims. “By elevating income to match AMI, Black people can better afford housing and achieve a better quality of life.”
A recently released data set from the U.S. Census Bureau has expressed that black residents represent roughly 5.7% of the total population of the city.
Aaron Peskin, the president of the Board of Supervisors, explained to The Chronicle that he really hopes his fellow politicians step up to approve the plan.
“There are so many efforts that result in incredible reports that just end up gathering dust on a shelf,” exclaimed Peskin. “We cannot let this be one of them.”
