Tag: Race Issues

Kanawha Community Dicusses Racial Issues

Members of the Kanawha County Community gathered at West Virginia State University earlier this week to discuss race and the ongoing battle for equality.

Community members, officials and students took part in a discussion at West Virginia State looking at different racial issues effecting West Virginia and Kanawha County. The discussion was organized by students and the American Friends Service Committee. 

“Taking Action for Racial Equality” was a discussion focused on finding ways to reduce racial disparities in the state. It was part of a series of events that began last November at the Summit on Race Matters in West Virginia that drew nearly 200 people. Takeiya Smith is a West Virginia State student from Charleston who said it was important for students to lead the discussion. 

“It means a lot to me because I’m from here and we’re not talking about changing things in the entire world, we’re talking about changing things right here in West Virginia, Smith said. “It makes me feel really good, I’m 21 years old and I know I’m doing something that’s extremely significant that matters and it’s really fulfilling.”

The forum focused on ideas generated at a June meeting at the East End Family Resource Center. That meeting generated possible community solutions to racial inequality in voter engagement, criminal justice reforms and investments in affordable housing on Charleston’s West Side. Eight issue teams presented solutions and then participants had the opportunity to pick team they wanted to join in order to take action.

Credit Clark Davis / WV Public Broadcasting
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WV Public Broadcasting
Breakout groups discuss issues.

Smith said each discussion of race in the region is a step in the right direction. 

“Having a victory on one racial justice initiative is not going to eliminate racism all over the country or all over the world,” Smith said. “But that’s ok because we’ve taken one more step toward where we need to be and that’s equality.”

 Among those issues was reinvestment in Charleston’s West Side where Reverend Matthew Watts said they just need others in the region to believe in the community. 

“The West Side is arguably West Virginia’s most challenged community. If we were a separate municipality we would be the 9th largest city in West Virginia with over 18,000 people,” Smith said. “We have the highest concentration of African America people of anywhere in West Virginia. There are over 4,000 children in one neighborhood. So we’re trying to bring attention to the West Side and how it can be a model community and how it can be transformed from the inside out.”

Other issues discussed including the Second Chance Employment Act which would allow for the expungement of one non-violent felony five years after time served in order to allow the person to have a clean record. And issues like LGBTQ safety and equality on West Virginia State’s Campus. West Virginia State will host another meeting in January to track the progress of the various actions teams assembled during the event. 

Summit Brings Racial Issues to Forefront

Over the past two days, dozens of people gathered in Charleston to have conversations organizers appropriately refer to as “racy.” The Summit on Race Matters in Appalachia pulled West Virginians from all areas, all backgrounds into the capital city to discuss how national racial tensions seen in places like Ferguson, Missouri, materialize right here at home. 

The two day event included keynote speakers, the viewing of a documentary and breakout sessions that allowed participants to begin a dialogue on racial issues in their communities.

Dr. Gail Christopher, Vice President of Policy at the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, gave one of the keynotes focused on the history of racial inequities and how it’s shaped different forms of bias. 

“We are dealing with a belief system that has found its way into institutions and into structures and that belief is an absurd notion of a taxonomy that can be applied to human value,” Christopher said.

That taxonomy was formed four centuries ago, she said, when a hierarchy of human beings was created based on not just color, but also culture and lifestyles.

“You have this embedded belief that there are different human beings on the planet who behave differently, who think differently, but most painfully, who deserve to be treated differently,” she told the group.

Rev. Ron English helped organize the event and served as its moderator. He said if we don’t discuss the subconscious beliefs that the races are different and the mistakes of the past, we can’t move forward as a society.

“As Maya Angelo used to say, when you know better you do better and that’s what the whole conversation here is trying to get at,” he said.

English hoped the event encourages similar dialogues in communities across the state to help citizens recognize their differences and similarities in order to work together to better West Virginia.

The next step for English in the conversation: he and other church leaders in Charleston are planning a day long discussion of race relations with members of the Charleston Police Department. That is scheduled for December 8.

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