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Opinion: Department of Race and Equity Will Work to End Inequities of “Power and Privilege”

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By Dante J. James

 

 

The City of Oakland created the Department of Race and Equity in 2015, reflecting the city’s recognition and acknowledgment that racial disparities exist—they are systemic—and it is time to provide focus and support for their elimination.

 

 

The department is tasked with integrating the principle that Oakland is a “fair and just” city by eliminating systemic inequities caused by past and current decisions, systems of power and privilege and policies.

 

 

So what is social, and specifically racial, equity? It is when all people have full and equal access to opportunities that enable them to attain their full potential.

 

 

How do we know when we have attained this equity?

 

 

Equity will be attained when identity—such as race, ethnicity, gender, age, disability, sexual orientation or expressionhas no detrimental effect on the distribution of resources, opportunities, and outcomes for group members in a society.

 

 

To express it more simply, equity is realized when one’s identity cannot predict the outcome. In this city, this state and this country, it is clear that one’s identity, certainly one’s race, can absolutely predict the outcome.

 

 

Looking at the most impactful social indicators of success; it is not class, it is not gender, which are most decisive. It is race that is the ultimate predictor of the most detrimental outcomes in society.

 

 

Obviously there are exceptions. However as a predictor, we know that race will absolutely predict the disparity in school suspensions and expulsions, high school graduation, college graduation, home ownership, employment, health care, mortality rates based on zip code, incarceration rates, immigration responses, and many more indicators of social success.

 

 

We know that Black and Brown defendants are more likely than White defendants to be imprisoned for the same crime. Applicants with White sounding names are twice as likely to get a call back for an interview.

 

 

Black and Brown men are more likely to be stopped and searched than White men even though White men are more likely to be found with contraband and outstanding warrants.

 

 

Nationally, Black pre-school children are given nearly half of all out of school suspensions but make up only about 20 percent of the enrollment.

 

 

Suspension or expulsion lead to lower graduation rates, which lead to lower paying jobs, which lead to inability to have good credit, which lead to inability to get a good mortgage. The issues are systemic.

 

 

The new Department of Race and Equity will focus on the work of the city government to ensure it is providing its services in ways that do not exacerbate disparities based on race.

 

 

For example, in Oakland’s not-so-distant past, housing and employment policies, like elsewhere in the U.S., were explicitly racist. The effects of these past institutional policies and practices still influence, usually unintentionally, current public policies or practices, and create race-based inequity across our community.

 

 

The department will work to bring awareness and analysis to these disparate outcomes and help city departments find ways to approach their work with an equity lens and understanding of their impacts on community.

 

 

The work of the department requires the support of the communities it serves as it pushes this difficult conversation throughout city leadership and city staff.

 

 

These disparities did not occur overnight, and they will not magically disappear because the department now exists. The work begins now.

 

 

 

Dante J. James, Esq. is interim director of the city’s Department of Race and Equity. He is on loan from Portland, where he started and is director of its Office of Equity and Human Rights.

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Oakland Post: Week of June 4 – 10, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 4-10, 2025

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Remembering George Floyd

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing.

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Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)
Mural showing the portrait of George Floyd in Mauerpark in Berlin. To the left of the portrait the lettering "I can't Breathe" was added, on the right side the three hashtags #GeorgeFloyd, #Icantbreathe and #Sayhisname. The mural was completed by Eme Street Art (facebook name) / Eme Free Thinker (signature) on 29 May 2020. (Wikimedia Commons)

By April Ryan
BlackPressUSA Newswire

“The president’s been very clear he has no intentions of pardoning Derek Chauvin, and it’s not a request that we’re looking at,” confirms a senior staffer at the Trump White House. That White House response results from public hope, including from a close Trump ally, Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. The timing of Greene’s hopes coincides with the Justice Department’s recent decision to end oversight of local police accused of abuse. It also falls on the fifth anniversary of the police-involved death of George Floyd on May 25th. The death sparked national and worldwide outrage and became a transitional moment politically and culturally, although the outcry for laws on police accountability failed.

The death forced then-Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden to focus on deadly police force and accountability. His efforts while president to pass the George Floyd Justice in policing act failed. The death of George Floyd also put a spotlight on the Black community, forcing then-candidate Biden to choose a Black woman running mate. Kamala Harris ultimately became vice president of the United States alongside Joe Biden. Minnesota State Attorney General Keith Ellison prosecuted the cases against the officers involved in the death of Floyd. He remembers,” Trump was in office when George Floyd was killed, and I would blame Trump for creating a negative environment for police-community relations. Remember, it was him who said when the looting starts, the shooting starts, it was him who got rid of all the consent decrees that were in place by the Obama administration.”

In 2025, Police-involved civilian deaths are up by “about 100 to about 11 hundred,” according to Ellison. Ellison acknowledges that the Floyd case five years ago involved a situation in which due process was denied, and five years later, the president is currently dismissing “due process. “The Minnesota Atty General also says, “Trump is trying to attack constitutional rule, attacking congressional authority and judicial decision-making.” George Floyd was an African-American man killed by police who knocked on his neck and on his back, preventing him from breathing. During those minutes on the ground, Floyd cried out for his late mother several times. Police subdued Floyd for an alleged counterfeit $20 bill.

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Oakland Post: Week of May 28 – June 30, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of May 28 – June 3, 2025

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