Asheville, NC proposes cash reparations for black residents for 'racial and gender equity'

A reparations commission in a North Carolina town has proposed cash payments with "no strings attached" as part of a program they'd like to see the town implement and wrote that it would be a "tool for racial and gender equity.” 

Asheville, North Carolina's 25-member Community Reparations Commission has recommended projects that they want local leaders to support for reparations in the town, per ABC 13.  

There are a total of four reparations projects that the commission has proposed that local lawmakers take into consideration, this includes a "Guaranteed Income Pilot Program" as well as others for reparations. The proposal states that the program would "Fund a guaranteed income program as a way to ensure basic needs are met for individuals with low-incomes and assets."  

This would consist of "monthly, cash payment given directly to individuals. It is unconditional, with no strings attached and no work requirements," the proposal describes.  

"A guaranteed income is meant to supplement, rather than replace, the existing social safety net and can be a tool for racial and gender equity," it also adds. 

The proposal claims that this program will benefit those "who have been harmed by historic, systemic, and ongoing wage and employment discrimination" in the town. The harm it says that initiative would alleviate is the "discriminatory wages paid in every sector of the local economy regardless of credentials and experience" who are black as well as the "disproportionate unemployment rates and reduced opportunities to fully participate in the local job market" in the black community. 

The reparations program would "join 100 other cities" that have something similar as defined by the Mayors for Guaranteed Income program. Other cities in North Carolina that are enrolled under the Mayors for Guaranteed Income program include Durham, Kinston, Carrboro, Hillsborough, and Ahoskie.  

When ABC 13 reached out to Durham, the city said that its income program was to give money to those who are getting out of prison and is used "to evaluate guaranteed income’s effects on recidivism and re-incarceration, employment, economic security, and income volatility, as well as physical functioning, mental health, stress, and coping, parenting, housing, and interactions with other institutional systems."

Dozens of cities across the country are enrolled in the Mayors for Guaranteed Income, according to its website.