Government

Gov. Shows Support For Bills Addressing Va.’s Racial Disparities

NEW JOURNAL AND GUIDE — During the 2019 session of the Virginia General Assembly, Black lawmakers and their allies proposed a number of bills to address the economic, social and educational disparities facing Virginia’s African-American community. The members of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus have enlisted a reliable ally to make laws addressing those disparities a reality: Virginia Governor Ralph Northam.

Published

6 years ago

April 13, 2019

Web Staff

By Leonard E. Colvin

During the 2019 session of the Virginia General Assembly, Black lawmakers and their allies proposed a number of bills to address the economic, social and educational disparities facing Virginia’s African-American community.

The members of the Virginia Legislative Black Caucus have enlisted a reliable ally to make laws addressing those disparities a reality: Virginia Governor Ralph Northam.

Seven weeks ago, most of the state’s Black and white political leaders and civil rights advocates were calling for Northam’s resignation after images surfaced on his 1985 EVMS yearbook page of one white student in Blackface and another clad in a KKK costume.

He rejected calls for him to step down. And, unable to run for another term, Northam declared he would use his tenure to address issues of racial and economic disparities in the state’s racial legacy since slavery.

“I am going to do everything to really bring some good from these events which happened six weeks ago,” he said. “Actions speak louder than words.”

To that end, the Governor recently signed a number of bills introduced by members of the Black Caucus which will take effect July 1.

Among them, Northam signed a bill sponsored by Delegate Lamont Bagby, (Democrat-Henrico County) which will create the Virginia African American Advisory Board.

The board will be composed of 21 non-legislative citizen members appointed by the Governor, and at least 15 of the members must be African American.

The Secretaries of the Commonwealth, Commerce, and Trade, Education, Health and Human Resources, and Public Safety and Homeland Security will also serve on the board as ex-officio members.

Bagby said the board will be up and running after July 1, the beginning of the state’s new budgetary cycle. Members will be appointed by the Governor then.

“I am pleased to sign this bill into law, and I look forward to working closely with the members of this board to advance policies and legislation to promote the economic, social, educational, and cultural wellbeing of the African American community in Virginia,” Northam said.

The Virginia African American Advisory Board is charged with advising the Governor on developing economic, professional, cultural, educational, and governmental links between the state government and the African American community. Two other existing state boards, the Virginia Latino Advisory Board and the Virginia Asian Advisory Board, also serve to advise the Governor on issues affecting their respective communities in Virginia, including education, health equity, public safety, and minority-owned businesses.

Educational Spending Law

During the 2019 legislative session, Bagby said the Black Caucus got a head start by sponsoring a bill which addressed educational spending disparities. He said that the legislature provided additional funds for school divisions with large numbers of poor and at-risk children in rural and urban areas.

“This is one of the legislative victories which is long overdue,” said Bagby. “It will be charged to look at a number of issues including criminal justice, the impact of educational issues related to public schools suspensions, healthcare, minority access to the procurement dollars, our HBCUs, housing equity and creation of small businesses.”

In signing the bill into law, Northam said, “To build a more accessible, inclusive, and equitable Commonwealth, we must ensure the voices of all Virginians are heard, particularly those from underrepresented and historically disenfranchised communities.”

Non-payment of Court Costs Law

Northam also amended the state budget recently passed by the General Assembly to eliminate the suspension of driving privileges for nonpayment of court fines and costs.

This amendment would also reinstate driving privileges for the more than 627,000 Virginians who currently have their licenses suspended.

“The practice of suspending a person’s driver’s license for nonpayment of court fines and costs is inequitable – it’s past time we end it,” the governor said.

While signing the measure, Northam said, “A driver’s license is critical to daily life, including a person’s ability to maintain a job. Eliminating a process that envelops hundreds of thousands of Virginians in a counterproductive cycle is not only fair, it’s also the right thing to do.”

Governor Northam also included funding in his budget to address potential lost revenue from reinstatement fees to the Department of Motor Vehicles and the Trauma

Center Fund. While these bills ultimately failed, the funding remained in the budget.

Several states are addressing this issue, which impacts poor African Americans and Hispanic individuals the most, according to civil rights activists, who support such measures.

“Fundamentally, this practice of suspending one’s driver’s license without knowing their ability to pay and undermining the ability to potentially pay court costs in the future is cruel; and, it may even be unconstitutional,” said Delegate Cliff Hayes of Chesapeake. “Virginia knows better than to have such a practice. It’s time that we do better.”

Absentee Ballot Law

With his colleagues in the House, District 5 State Senator Lionell Spruill of Chesapeake and Norfolk, saw his legislation passed to abolish the policy where Virginians must give an excuse to vote using absentee ballot.

To avoid having it killed by a GOP-led committee, Spruill said he and its sponsors made a deal with the GOP lawmakers to have the bill not take effect until 2020, just in time to bolster voter turnout for the presidential elections.

Today, if a voter is to qualify to use an absentee ballot prior to election day, he or she has to give one of 17 reasons ,including doing business out of town.

But the bill passed in the House and Senate would do away with this policy.

Senator Spruill said this legislation is a “good start” until lawmakers can pass a law allowing people to vote at will prior to an election.

Lottery Winnings and Labor Laws

There have been no instances where a Virginian has won $10 million via the state or national lotteries.

But Spruill was among sponsors of a new law which will allow residents who win that much money through the lottery to remaining anonymous.

According to state law, people who shined shoes, were baby sitters, and/or kitchen aides did not qualify to be paid the state minimum wage.

Most of these people who held such jobs during the days of Jim Crow were African Americans who were targeted by the rule. Now according to Spruill, that policy has been abolished.

The few remaining shoe shiners must be paid the $7.25 state minimum wage.

Evictions Reduction Law

Northam signed one of State Senator Mamie Locke’s signature bills which would create a pilot program aimed at reducing eviction rates in Virginia.

The legislation is designed to reverse findings by a Princeton University research group which found that five cities, including Norfolk and Newport News in Virginia, have some of the highest eviction rates in the country.`

A pilot program will be launched next year in Richmond, Danville, Hampton, and Petersburg to reduce evictions in those cities. The law calls for the collection of data on the program’s effectiveness to help develop methods for preventing evictions around the state.

Managed by the city’s court system, tenants who meet certain criteria will be able to enter into a payment plan with their landlords to avoid a judgment of eviction.

Northam signed a package of bills aimed at reducing evictions by giving tenants more time to pay rent and fees ahead of an eviction notice and limiting the number of legal actions a landlord may file.

This article originally appeared in the New Journal and Guide.

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Activism

‘Jim Crow Was and Remains Real in Alameda County (and) It Is What We Are Challenging and Trying to Fix Every Day,’ Says D.A. Pamela Price

“The legacy of Jim Crow is not just a legacy in Alameda County. It’s real. It is what is happening and how (the system is) operating, and that is what we are challenging and trying to fix every day,” said D.A. Price, speaking to the Oakland Post by telephone for over an hour last Saturday. “Racial disparities in this county have never been effectively eliminated, and we are applying and training our lawyers on the (state’s) Racial Justice Act, and we’re implementing it in Alameda County every day,” she said.

Published

2 hours ago

November 2, 2024

Oakland Post

Exclusive interview with County D.A. Price days before recall election. Photo by Ken Epstein.

By Ken Epstein

Part One

Alameda County District Attorney Pamela Price gave an exclusive in-depth interview, speaking with the Oakland Post about the continuing legacy of Jim Crow injustice that she is working to overturn and her major achievements, including:

restoring and expanding services for victims of crime,
finding funding for an alternative to incarceration and/or prosecution for substance use and mental health-related misdemeanors and
aggressively prosecuting corporations for toxic pollution and consumer violations.

“Racial disparities in this county have never been effectively eliminated, and we are applying and training our lawyers on the (state’s) Racial Justice Act, and we’re implementing it in Alameda County every day,” she said.

Passed by the State Legislature, this law “is an extremely helpful tool for us to address the racial disparities that continue to exist in our system,” she said.

(The law addresses) “the racial disparities that we find in our juvenile justice system, where 86% of all felony juvenile arrests in the county are Black or Brown children.

“We trained the entire workforce on the Racial Justice Act. We are creating a data system that will allow us to look at the trends and to clearly identify where racism has infected the process. We know that where law enforcement is still engaging in racial profiling and unfair targeting and arresting, we’re trying to make sure we’re catching that.”

Many people do not know much about the magnitude of Alameda County District Attorney’s job. Her office is a sprawling organization with 10 offices serving 1.6 million people living in 14 cities and six unincorporated areas, with a budget this year of about $104 million.

Asked about her major achievements since she took office last year, she is especially proud of the expanded and renewed victims’ services division in the DA’s Office, she said.

“We have expanded and reorganized the entire claims division so that we are now expediting as much as possible the benefits that victims are entitled to. Under my predecessor, they were having to wait anywhere, sometimes as long as a year, to 400 days to get benefits.

“Claims had been denied that should not have been denied. So, we’re helping people file appeals on claims that were denied under her tenure,” D.A. Price said.

“Under my predecessor, (the victims’ service office) was staffed by people who were not trained to provide trauma-informed services to victims, and yet they were the only people that the victims were in contact with. We immediately stopped that practice,” she continued.

“We had to expand the advocate workforce to include people who speak Hmong, the indigenous language of so many people in this county who are victims of crime.”

More African Americans advocates were hired because they represent the largest percentage of crime victims and we hired a transgender advocate and advocates who speak Cantonese and Mandarin. “The predominantly Chinese American community in Oakland was not being served by advocates who speak the language,” said D Price

“We reduced the lag time from the delivery of benefits to victims from 300 to 400 days down to less than 60 days.”

She increased victim advocacy by 38%, providing critical support to over 22,500 victims, a key component of community safety.

Other major achievements:

She recently filed 12 felony charges against a man accused of multiple armed robberies, demonstrating her seriousness about prosecuting violent crimes
In October, a jury delivered a guilty verdict in the double murder trial of former Alameda County Sheriff’s Deputy Devin Williams, showing DA Price’s commitment to holding law enforcement accountable.
She recently charged a man and woman in unincorporated San Leandro with murder, felony unlawful firearm activity, and felony carrying a loaded firearm in public.
A. Price’s office was awarded a $6 million grant by the state for its CARES Navigation Center diversion program. In partnership with the UnCuffed Project at a Seventh Day Adventist Church in Oakland, the program provides resources and referrals for services to residents as an alternative to incarceration and/or prosecution for substance use and mental health-related misdemeanors.

“This is the largest grant investment in the history of the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office,” said D.A. Price.

She explained that the program now has a mobile unit. “We have washers and dryers. We have a living room. We have a television. It’s a place where people can decompress, get themselves stabilized,” she said.

The project has “the ability to refer people to housing, to more long-term mental health services, to social services, and to assist them in other ways.”

Her office joined in a $49 million statewide settlement with Kaiser Health Plan and Hospitals, resolving allegations that the healthcare provider unlawfully disposed of hazardous waste, medical waste, and protected health information. The settlement, which involved the state and a half dozen counties, resulted in Alameda County receiving $7 million for its residents.
DA Price charged a former trucking company employee for embezzling over $4.3 million, showing her commitment to tackling white-collar crime.
For the first time, Alameda County won a criminal grand jury indictment of a major corporation with two corporate officers that have been sources of pollution. “They had a record of settlements and pollution in this community, and they had a fire that constituted a grave danger,” she said.

Attorney Walter Riley contributed to this article.

See Part Two

Oakland Post

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Activism

‘Criminal Justice Reform Is the Signature Civil Rights Issue of Our Time,’ says D.A. Pamela Price

Speaking about the destructive impact of mass incarceration, Price asked people to consider “how many children have incarcerated parents, where the practice has always been to isolate and eliminate connections between people who are incarcerated and their children and their families and the community. So, when we bring people home, they have no more connection.”

Published

2 hours ago

November 2, 2024

Oakland Post

“People have no idea what the vision is for the next district attorney, or where the office will go if I am, in fact, recalled, she continued. “I'm just running against a billionaire,” who does not show his face in public, she said. Courtesy photo.

“As long as our criminal justice system is stuck in the mentality and practices of the 1950s, our country is not going to move forward,” she said.

By Ken Epstein

Part Two

District Attorney Pamela Price, facing a recall that began before she took office in January 2023, explained in an exclusive interview with the Oakland Post how she came to dedicate her life to transforming a deeply flawed criminal justice system into one that provides equal justice and public safety for all and ends mass incarceration for African Americans and other working-class people.

She summarized her life experiences as someone who was “traumatized and radicalized” by Dr. King’s murder, joining the Civil Rights Movement full force, getting arrested when she was 13 years old in a civil rights demonstration, being tracked into the juvenile justice and the foster care systems, and making it as a foster kid from the streets of Cincinnati to Yale College.”

“I understand a lot of things about struggle, about sacrifice, about trauma and fortunately survived all of that, and as a survivor learned some important lessons, and I brought all of that with me into the law and have been able to become a civil rights attorney in Alameda County,” she said.

“That’s been the joy of my life; I’ve lived every lawyer’s dream,” she said.

“Years ago, when I first decided to run for district attorney, I realized that mass incarceration was so destabilizing to our communities,” she said.

She saw that the “criminal justice system has so many impacts on our community, the safety of our community, the stability of our community, the growth of our community, the direction of our community.”

“As long as our criminal justice system is stuck in the mentality and the practices of the 1950s … our society is going to be mired in discord, and we will not have social justice, racial justice, economic justice, none of the things that actually make our communities worth living in.”

It is crucial to address the needs of “young people in the juvenile justice system when they are more likely and able to be rehabilitated and redirected,” she said. Young people are much more able to be rehabilitated before the age of 18, really before the age of 26, and before they end up in an adult prison.

D.A. Price’s predecessor, Nancy O’ Malley, joined the D.A.’s office in 1984, where she remained for 39 years. She was promoted to a leadership position after just six years in the office during the era of mass incarceration when there was an explosion of prison construction in California.

“Prosecutors like my predecessor were the ones who filled (those prisons) up. She became a leader in the office around 1990. And what is very important for the public to know is that prior to becoming the district attorney in 2009, she was the chief assistant district attorney for 10 years under Tom Orloff.

“O’Malley worked very closely, hand-in-hand with him for the period of time that included the illegal conduct or the unconstitutional exclusion of Jewish people and Black people from death penalty juries.”

Commenting on the recall campaign against her, she said that had not a handful of multimillionaires and billionaires “put millions of dollars into this, we would not be having this recall. It is not a grassroots movement. It’s a platinum movement.”

“People have no idea what the vision is for the next district attorney, or where the office will go if I am, in fact, recalled, she continued. “I’m just running against a billionaire,” who does not show his face in public, she said.

If they successfully paint Oakland as a failed city, then hedge fund billionaires and real estate developers can come in and buy up the property cheap, she said.

Though D.A. Price has been bombarded by a massive tsunami of lies, slanders, and misrepresentation, she remains strong and positive because she is a woman of faith, she said.

“I’ve been saved and guided by (a) higher power since I was 13 years old. So, I’m not a new person to faith, and I’m grounded in that,” she said.