PRESS ROOM: Reparations United’s Defense of Evanston’s Restorative Housing Program

On May 23rd, the organization Judicial Watch filed a class action lawsuit against Evanston, Illinois, on behalf of six non-Black individuals over the city’s use of race as an eligibility requirement for a reparations program. The lawsuit suggests that Evanston’s Restorative Housing Program – ERHP is a race-based claim to address “societal discrimination” that happened 5 decades ago. As such, it is unconstitutional. Reparations United holds that not only is this untrue, but also holds the lawsuit should be dismissed outright. In 2001, coming out of the 2001 United Nations World Conference Against Racism, WCAR was held in Durban, South Africa. We moved into a new era of reparations activism. The participating nations at WCAR concluded that the Transatlantic Slave Trade, slavery (enslavement), apartheid (euphemistically referred to as Jim Crow segregation in America), and colonialism were crimes against humanity. This shift now allows us to base our reparations claims on the internationally recognized crimes of enslavement, apartheid, and colonialism. Reparations United holds that the Evanston Restorative Housing Program is a crime-based claim for apartheid housing policies, and as crimes against humanity, with demonstrated continued impact, the City of Evanston is proper to redress those crimes and impact with the Restorative...