A panel of activists, researchers, community members, and other volunteers on Monday unveiled a new report with 189 “calls to action” to address the scourge of racial inequity in and around St. Louis, Missouri, illuminated by a year of protests following the police shooting death of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown last August.
Brown’s death at the hands of a white police officer galvanized new questions and demands over institutional racism in the U.S., with numerous agencies and nongovernmental bodies drafting their own reports and making their own recommendations on the factors that fuel Ferguson’s systems of oppression.
But the Ferguson Commission’s venture has been particularly anticipated, due in part to its solicitation of local residents and activists, rather than outside experts, to identify the complex elements at the core of those systems—and how to break down and rebuild them within the affected communities.
The report, entitled “Forward Through Ferguson: A Path Toward Racial Equity” (pdf), candidly addresses race as an issue to be confronted and worked through.
“[M]ake no mistake: this is about race,” the report states in its introduction. “Our primary audience for this report is the people of the St. Louis region. The report is directed to the average citizens whose daily lives are affected by the issues we explored, and whose lives will be impacted by the calls to action we make.”
“We believe that if we attempt to skirt the difficult truths, if we try to avoid talking about race, if we stop talking about Ferguson, as many in the region would like us to, then we cannot move forward,” the report continues. “Progress is rarely simple, and it rarely goes in a straight line.”
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