Jane Grover's quiet but convincing voice at the beginning and end of the meeting won the day. She not only pointed out that the Commission had no legal authority. When other members voiced support for the declaration and others implied that they thought the declaration could be re-written, she argued that honing a declaration acceptable to five or more alders was a time consuming effort doomed to failure and quietly insisted on a vote that the declaration be formally withdrawn, which it was.
I know I’m late to the party, but here’s my two cents’ worth. Not sure why Karla is still on this Board, her term expired. But given she is, I am not at all surprised at this. Any chance she can get promoting “equity” so her name gets in the paper she is taking. It will help her LinkedIn when she graduates and is looking for a job.
We have many problems in this city. One of them is not the lack of places people have to voice their opinion on federal government action (or inaction). We as a city have no business getting involved. The amount of anti-semitism I have seen since 10/7 is astounding. This does nothing to quell that. Dan Biss and I actually agree on something at long last.
Jane Grover was my alderman for years, I never found her particularly responsive. But at least now she is a quiet voice of reason, and usually reason doesn’t stop Pied Piper Karla. I’m glad to see it appears to have done so in this instance. So much virtue signalling.
The equity commission is a joke anyway. As is the ethics commission. Much ado about nothing.
I wonder if Ms Thomas has on her LinkedIn equity platform her commitment to affordable housing evidenced by the $19,000/mo AirBnB she operates in the “majority minority “ 2nd ward?
Tom, this noticing this bit from your article upon a re-read: "The meeting kicked off with a few statements from commission members in favor of the resolution and noting that all commission members had agreed to the statement. "
Leaving Jane's objection aside, If someone said "all commission members had agreed to the statement," wouldn't that mean that the open meetings act was violated? How would anyone know what the other members thought unless they met outside the meeting last night?
Their lack of transparency is troubling. If you look at the most recent agenda they are working on a "Racial Equity Policy Scorecard" which would entail the commission reviewing ALL policies and projects of the city government on a nebulous "racial Equity" scale largely outside of the view of the public.
I served on a commission once and the OMA absolutely applies to commissions. After I posted, I checked the handbook the city gives out to commission members and they define a meeting as: "A meeting is any gathering of a majority of a quorum of a public body, held to discuss public business, whether in person or by video or audio conference, telephone call, electronic means (such as, without limitation,electronic mail, electronic chat, and instant messaging), or other means of contemporaneous interactive communication."
If the city's website is accurate, the commission has 9 members, so a "majority of quorum" would be 3 members.
So, say, if a copy of the resolution was circulating among 3 members via email, that would have constituted a "meeting." FOIAing for their emails related to the resolution would be interesting.
This is good to know and you saved me having to read another IL statute.
One thing would be that they would probably reject the FOIA for being "pre decisional" - you're not allowed to FOIA things that are drafts and work going into a bigger product. But if it involved all members, I'm not sure how that works. They'd probably fight me. Let me think about how to do this.
The colleges and universities that were issuing proclamations on this, that, and the other issue for years suddenly found themselves tongue-tied after 10/7 and decided to no longer issue statements on political or social issues that do not directly impact their core mission. I will get over my bitterness about the double-standard because the “no statements” policy is the right one. I will urge the City of Evanston and all of its affiliated bodies to adopt the same policy.
There is an odd duality with this - on one hand it's absolutely stupid from a core mission standpoint to issue statements like this. It will have the effect of pissing in the ocean. On the other hand, there were 130 public comments, across all viewpoints, so there is an argument to be made that citizens need outlets for voicing opinions on this subject to the government. I think it should probably be done in an open house by our federal house rep (Jan) but she's been mailing it in for decades.
People have opinions about all sorts of things and many venues for airing them. I don’t see how that translates into *city government* taking sides on a war in the Middle East. Agreed though that if people want to have political impact, write your Congress person. I did.
One question I have about the "130 public comments" is how many people were there because they were objecting to the Equity Commission's stunt in the first place? As Svetlana said, there are plenty of places to air your opinions. And the city government is not really the appropriate forum. It would be like going to the UN to get them to condemn the Ryan Field zoning change.
Citizens could easily organize discussion forums at a variety of places around town (library, community centers, Northwestern, etc...) I would actually be surprised if such events have not happened.
My main objection is having these members of a city commission totally hijack the commission for self-serving reasons.
The Equity Commission is such an embarrassment. I'm glad you gave the context about Jane Grover. She was always a smart and sensible voice on the council so I was curious how she would react to this stunt. If it were me, I probably wouldn't have attended or just left when Ruggie gave her legal opinion, but Jane is much more polite than I am.
The Commission is indicative of the vacuous performative politics that plagues this town.
A few months ago they were discussing the lack of affordable housing and you have a member of the commission loudly decrying the situation who at the same time is renting out a house in the 2nd ward for $650 a night on AirBnB!
The Fifth Ward school is the biggest and most reckless example of performative politics at all costs--lets bankrupt the district and degrade the educational experiences for kids to build a White Elephant whilst we are in a state of enrollment decline. Why are we doing it? To restore some nostaligic vision for a small number of people who don't like that their neighborhood has become more diverse.
I will say ... given that we had 130 public comments yesterday that there is clearly some need to have a platform where community members can discuss these issues in a public setting using their real names that is not a Facebook group within the bounds that come with rules of order, etc.
I still don’t understand the logical connection between having an opinion and needing a government-sponsored forum to express it. Church? Synagogue? Street corner? Your (or my) dining room? Sure! But government….
Yeah, I don't know the answer to this. I agree that I don't think it's local government responsibility but I also don't know what it should be. Our federal representatives have no interest in being part of these discussions and we're all just left to yelling into the void/facebook. Just more of an observation from me than a suggestion, I guess. Something to think about.
Tom, any word on which consultancy is going to profit off of the all-staff "DEIB" training that Turner announced the other day is going to happen next month? (Where did the 'B' come from? Is that a new thing?)
Such a waste of time and money. I am assuming this is happening during the ridiculous "school improvement days" when I have to arrange child care while the kids are missing school because their teachers are attending useless indoctrination sessions?
I should make a post about this, its not as bad as you might think. Last year, I spoke with a lot of teachers who attended the event and most gave me reviews saying it was alright. At this point, there are a lot of big professional development companies in the game (like Scholastic, etc) so most of the training is that. There were some Horton-friends in there last year, but I suspect they are gone now.
It is bullshit they do it on a Wednesday bs Monday or Friday, which is what the local private schools do. But at least the board did vote in this.
As for the B in DEIB, its been in there as long as I have seen it, so at least the past few years.
Why would they have to do this every year? It sounds like something you could incorporate into onboarding for new hires. At my work we have had these DEI things periodically and the messages are always the same and pretty simple: treat people fairly and be self-reflective in how you do it.
Also, I've never seen anyone change their behavior as a result of sitting through one of these trainings.
Does the district actually evaluate the effectiveness of these exercises?
The every year thing comes from the state and union professional development rules. If it wasn’t equity themed, it would be some other theme that is trending with the times. As for the effectiveness, they take a survey at the end.
This is different than like generic corporate DEI training (they also have that thru PEG), this one day thing is more like an annual professional development day. Its more like sessions from academics on how to better reach black kids when teaching math, etc. I should make a post on this.
There is a lack of spaces to discuss this topic without having my employer or child dragged into this, so posting here:
There is another petition regarding the Israel – Palestine conflict and the Evanston Equity and Empowerment Commission (EEC) circulating online. The petition and signatories will be brought to the City Council meeting on Tuesday, December 12.
The petition starts with a call that the Evanston City Council consider a resolution in support of a ceasefire. There are several other unrelated topics included in the petition, including a link to the recent EEC meeting video under the text “outpouring of racist vitriol”, text stating “we firmly and unapologetically stand in support of Darlene and Karla and their fight to bring this motion to the commission”, and calling the recent speaker input as “racist” attacks.
The petition is not attributed but focuses heavily on Darlene and Karla Thomas. It is fair to bring them up by name as committee members and as factually referencing this petition. The issues are all framed in a way that any criticism of the EEC resolution, mandate, procedural adhere ... is immediately conflated as criticism of Black Women, and therefore, racist. Once a racist, your point of view is easily dismiss-able.
There were over 130 speakers and over 1000 community members that signed the other petition circulating, and it is disappointing but predictable that any disagreement with the committee is framed as a racist woman-hating attacks.
A loved one spoke at the meeting and this entire conflict has been keeping them up at night, making them physically ill at the thought of the death and destruction. But since they spoke at the meeting, they're an evil racist that is working to "derail the work of the Equity and Empowerment Commission."
I've had a bunch of people message me about this and I don't know, it doesn't strike me as that bad. Obviously the vitriol wording is just the standard Evanston Facebook keyboard warrior stuff but (I think) you gotta look past the "equity language" that gets attached to everything and the points.
- The original EEC meeting had people on both sides of the issue. It seemed like it was split down the middle, to be honest. Source: me but I haven't counted.
- The ethics compliant is just whatever but I think they make a valid point at the opposition using legal maneuvers (such as calling in the city counsel at the last minute) to silence the committee. I agree that that is pretty anti-democratic even if technically right in the long run.
- The suggested changes to the statement, I think, would probably be agreeable to most Evanstonians
- Evanston has passed resolutions like this in the past
I am not sure I understand why this is so inappropriate to debate - even if I think the original statement itself was dumb...
I will also say this: one side is soliciting people to sign a letter. The other side is soliciting people to sign a letter. It's almost like we should have some kind of mechanism where all of us can come together and sign one letter or the other and pick which thing the city should do.
Tonight at the city council meeting, these clowns tried to shut the meeting down by disrupting the proceedings after they were given time during public comment. All the stuff in the letter about the ethics complaints, etc, were all apparently unfounded according to city officials.
I am not sure what these people are trying to accomplish. They claim in the letter "The City has been silent on the immense violence carried out by the State of Israel against Palestinian civilians. This sends a message that the lives of Israelis matter and the lives of Palestinians do not. A failure to call for a Ceasefire and to condemn all loss of life in the region as unacceptable, does, in effect, contribute to existing inequities in Evanston, Illinois, the U.S., and around the world."
That is complete bollocks. Israel and Hamas are not waiting on the City of Evanston for messages to be sent. Failure to call for a ceasefire in a conflict thousands of miles away has absolutely zero impact on anything in the city, let alone "contributing to inequities in Evanston Illinois."
You know what does have an impact? When these clowns try and shut down a city council meeting where they are adopting a budget to keep city services running.
"Ms. Ruggie was on Zoom and indicated that it was the legal department’s view that the EEC did not have the authority to vote on such a resolution or send it to City Council."
'Who cares what the lawyer said. I have an OPINION.'
As an aside, and I can only speak to Washington state law, but I'm guessing Terry is right.
In our beautiful state it certainly sounds like this commission would have to be in compliance with our government transparency statutes. There's essentially two tracks: public records and public meetings. A very casual review of IL seems to show the same.
Neither here nor there, but here in Seattle I've had an uncomfortable conversation or two with groups like this who think a quorum can only happen after certain check boxes are checked, when the law is more a quorum can happen at any time. Then the checkboxes need to be checked.
Speaking purely in hypotheticals, I wonder if it might behoove a certain member of the public to nail down the City's position one way or another by asking for a record of the pre-meeting happening. If the City gives away the game with a 'no records' then that solves some thorny issues for a potential plaintiff and makes the City's case much more difficult
Part of the challenge I have learned here is that there is almost no recourse for citizens upon discovering an open meetings act violation. Your primary outlet is the Attorney General PAC office and they're currently still adjudicating cases I sent them more than a *year* ago and I suspect I'll never get a response. Unless you're willing to drag them to court, there's no other recourse and they know it.
Here’s an interesting twist: after the meeting apparently the commissioners never turned off their mics. As some of the commissioners were wrapping up, people I know that were still there heard them making disparaging remarks about other commissioners & accusing them of throwing them under the bus...also referring to speakers opposed to the resolution with expletives; mocking the Jewish community and more. Not a good look for “equity” commissioners. 🙄
The thing is, as Carla Thomas said, “equity” as the Commission understands it is not about treating each Evanston citizens fairy. It’s about uplifting the marginalized and the oppressed. Punching down is not only acceptable but applauded. Jews belong to the privileged group and therefore are the oppressor class. Calling them names fits perfectly into the paradigm. I personally find the ideology that arranges people into a hierarchy of more or less oppressed groups and therefore more or less deserving of respect and compassion pernicious but we have to understand the mindset of (at least some of) the Commissioners.
The current strain of anti-racist thought that dominates our community now, as taught by Beyond Diversity and Kendi, I think is part of the problem. The philosophy of this program is so existentialist to skin color as the deciding factor in oppression, that when you something like Israel/Palestine, which doesn't map into to this framework, it doesn't make any rational sense. I think we witnessed this the other night.
Just to clarify, Carla did not say the above. She corrected one of the speakers who suggested that equity is fairness. The rest is me laying out the logic as I understand it.
I agree with you: the city should not take up "a controversial resolution that nobody even wants to put their name behind." I don't actually think any city business should be considered from anonymous sources - controversial or not. Thank you for covering this.
Jane Grover's quiet but convincing voice at the beginning and end of the meeting won the day. She not only pointed out that the Commission had no legal authority. When other members voiced support for the declaration and others implied that they thought the declaration could be re-written, she argued that honing a declaration acceptable to five or more alders was a time consuming effort doomed to failure and quietly insisted on a vote that the declaration be formally withdrawn, which it was.
I know I’m late to the party, but here’s my two cents’ worth. Not sure why Karla is still on this Board, her term expired. But given she is, I am not at all surprised at this. Any chance she can get promoting “equity” so her name gets in the paper she is taking. It will help her LinkedIn when she graduates and is looking for a job.
We have many problems in this city. One of them is not the lack of places people have to voice their opinion on federal government action (or inaction). We as a city have no business getting involved. The amount of anti-semitism I have seen since 10/7 is astounding. This does nothing to quell that. Dan Biss and I actually agree on something at long last.
Jane Grover was my alderman for years, I never found her particularly responsive. But at least now she is a quiet voice of reason, and usually reason doesn’t stop Pied Piper Karla. I’m glad to see it appears to have done so in this instance. So much virtue signalling.
The equity commission is a joke anyway. As is the ethics commission. Much ado about nothing.
I wonder if Ms Thomas has on her LinkedIn equity platform her commitment to affordable housing evidenced by the $19,000/mo AirBnB she operates in the “majority minority “ 2nd ward?
Do you guys have a link to this property?
https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/2042917
Tom, this noticing this bit from your article upon a re-read: "The meeting kicked off with a few statements from commission members in favor of the resolution and noting that all commission members had agreed to the statement. "
Leaving Jane's objection aside, If someone said "all commission members had agreed to the statement," wouldn't that mean that the open meetings act was violated? How would anyone know what the other members thought unless they met outside the meeting last night?
Their lack of transparency is troubling. If you look at the most recent agenda they are working on a "Racial Equity Policy Scorecard" which would entail the commission reviewing ALL policies and projects of the city government on a nebulous "racial Equity" scale largely outside of the view of the public.
https://cityofevanston.civicweb.net/document/384236/
Also, according to the Commission website, Karla Thomas's term ended months ago. What's up with that?
That's a good question. I'm not sure if the OMA applies here .. I don't think it does because they are not elected. Let me read the statute...
I served on a commission once and the OMA absolutely applies to commissions. After I posted, I checked the handbook the city gives out to commission members and they define a meeting as: "A meeting is any gathering of a majority of a quorum of a public body, held to discuss public business, whether in person or by video or audio conference, telephone call, electronic means (such as, without limitation,electronic mail, electronic chat, and instant messaging), or other means of contemporaneous interactive communication."
If the city's website is accurate, the commission has 9 members, so a "majority of quorum" would be 3 members.
https://www.cityofevanston.org/home/showpublisheddocument/2828/636164987763100000
(see page 29)
So, say, if a copy of the resolution was circulating among 3 members via email, that would have constituted a "meeting." FOIAing for their emails related to the resolution would be interesting.
This is good to know and you saved me having to read another IL statute.
One thing would be that they would probably reject the FOIA for being "pre decisional" - you're not allowed to FOIA things that are drafts and work going into a bigger product. But if it involved all members, I'm not sure how that works. They'd probably fight me. Let me think about how to do this.
The colleges and universities that were issuing proclamations on this, that, and the other issue for years suddenly found themselves tongue-tied after 10/7 and decided to no longer issue statements on political or social issues that do not directly impact their core mission. I will get over my bitterness about the double-standard because the “no statements” policy is the right one. I will urge the City of Evanston and all of its affiliated bodies to adopt the same policy.
There is an odd duality with this - on one hand it's absolutely stupid from a core mission standpoint to issue statements like this. It will have the effect of pissing in the ocean. On the other hand, there were 130 public comments, across all viewpoints, so there is an argument to be made that citizens need outlets for voicing opinions on this subject to the government. I think it should probably be done in an open house by our federal house rep (Jan) but she's been mailing it in for decades.
People have opinions about all sorts of things and many venues for airing them. I don’t see how that translates into *city government* taking sides on a war in the Middle East. Agreed though that if people want to have political impact, write your Congress person. I did.
One question I have about the "130 public comments" is how many people were there because they were objecting to the Equity Commission's stunt in the first place? As Svetlana said, there are plenty of places to air your opinions. And the city government is not really the appropriate forum. It would be like going to the UN to get them to condemn the Ryan Field zoning change.
Citizens could easily organize discussion forums at a variety of places around town (library, community centers, Northwestern, etc...) I would actually be surprised if such events have not happened.
My main objection is having these members of a city commission totally hijack the commission for self-serving reasons.
The Equity Commission is such an embarrassment. I'm glad you gave the context about Jane Grover. She was always a smart and sensible voice on the council so I was curious how she would react to this stunt. If it were me, I probably wouldn't have attended or just left when Ruggie gave her legal opinion, but Jane is much more polite than I am.
The Commission is indicative of the vacuous performative politics that plagues this town.
A few months ago they were discussing the lack of affordable housing and you have a member of the commission loudly decrying the situation who at the same time is renting out a house in the 2nd ward for $650 a night on AirBnB!
The Fifth Ward school is the biggest and most reckless example of performative politics at all costs--lets bankrupt the district and degrade the educational experiences for kids to build a White Elephant whilst we are in a state of enrollment decline. Why are we doing it? To restore some nostaligic vision for a small number of people who don't like that their neighborhood has become more diverse.
I will say ... given that we had 130 public comments yesterday that there is clearly some need to have a platform where community members can discuss these issues in a public setting using their real names that is not a Facebook group within the bounds that come with rules of order, etc.
I still don’t understand the logical connection between having an opinion and needing a government-sponsored forum to express it. Church? Synagogue? Street corner? Your (or my) dining room? Sure! But government….
Yeah, I don't know the answer to this. I agree that I don't think it's local government responsibility but I also don't know what it should be. Our federal representatives have no interest in being part of these discussions and we're all just left to yelling into the void/facebook. Just more of an observation from me than a suggestion, I guess. Something to think about.
Tom, any word on which consultancy is going to profit off of the all-staff "DEIB" training that Turner announced the other day is going to happen next month? (Where did the 'B' come from? Is that a new thing?)
Such a waste of time and money. I am assuming this is happening during the ridiculous "school improvement days" when I have to arrange child care while the kids are missing school because their teachers are attending useless indoctrination sessions?
https://www.district65.net/site/default.aspx?PageType=3&DomainID=4&ModuleInstanceID=275&ViewID=6446EE88-D30C-497E-9316-3F8874B3E108&RenderLoc=0&FlexDataID=16361&PageID=1
I should make a post about this, its not as bad as you might think. Last year, I spoke with a lot of teachers who attended the event and most gave me reviews saying it was alright. At this point, there are a lot of big professional development companies in the game (like Scholastic, etc) so most of the training is that. There were some Horton-friends in there last year, but I suspect they are gone now.
It is bullshit they do it on a Wednesday bs Monday or Friday, which is what the local private schools do. But at least the board did vote in this.
As for the B in DEIB, its been in there as long as I have seen it, so at least the past few years.
Why would they have to do this every year? It sounds like something you could incorporate into onboarding for new hires. At my work we have had these DEI things periodically and the messages are always the same and pretty simple: treat people fairly and be self-reflective in how you do it.
Also, I've never seen anyone change their behavior as a result of sitting through one of these trainings.
Does the district actually evaluate the effectiveness of these exercises?
The every year thing comes from the state and union professional development rules. If it wasn’t equity themed, it would be some other theme that is trending with the times. As for the effectiveness, they take a survey at the end.
This is different than like generic corporate DEI training (they also have that thru PEG), this one day thing is more like an annual professional development day. Its more like sessions from academics on how to better reach black kids when teaching math, etc. I should make a post on this.
There is a lack of spaces to discuss this topic without having my employer or child dragged into this, so posting here:
There is another petition regarding the Israel – Palestine conflict and the Evanston Equity and Empowerment Commission (EEC) circulating online. The petition and signatories will be brought to the City Council meeting on Tuesday, December 12.
The petition starts with a call that the Evanston City Council consider a resolution in support of a ceasefire. There are several other unrelated topics included in the petition, including a link to the recent EEC meeting video under the text “outpouring of racist vitriol”, text stating “we firmly and unapologetically stand in support of Darlene and Karla and their fight to bring this motion to the commission”, and calling the recent speaker input as “racist” attacks.
The petition is not attributed but focuses heavily on Darlene and Karla Thomas. It is fair to bring them up by name as committee members and as factually referencing this petition. The issues are all framed in a way that any criticism of the EEC resolution, mandate, procedural adhere ... is immediately conflated as criticism of Black Women, and therefore, racist. Once a racist, your point of view is easily dismiss-able.
There were over 130 speakers and over 1000 community members that signed the other petition circulating, and it is disappointing but predictable that any disagreement with the committee is framed as a racist woman-hating attacks.
A loved one spoke at the meeting and this entire conflict has been keeping them up at night, making them physically ill at the thought of the death and destruction. But since they spoke at the meeting, they're an evil racist that is working to "derail the work of the Equity and Empowerment Commission."
It can be seen here: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdobL89fij6p645eaeVViPIe7WO4WTMthJlCwE4p8aq6xLvhA/viewform
I've had a bunch of people message me about this and I don't know, it doesn't strike me as that bad. Obviously the vitriol wording is just the standard Evanston Facebook keyboard warrior stuff but (I think) you gotta look past the "equity language" that gets attached to everything and the points.
- The original EEC meeting had people on both sides of the issue. It seemed like it was split down the middle, to be honest. Source: me but I haven't counted.
- The ethics compliant is just whatever but I think they make a valid point at the opposition using legal maneuvers (such as calling in the city counsel at the last minute) to silence the committee. I agree that that is pretty anti-democratic even if technically right in the long run.
- The suggested changes to the statement, I think, would probably be agreeable to most Evanstonians
- Evanston has passed resolutions like this in the past
I am not sure I understand why this is so inappropriate to debate - even if I think the original statement itself was dumb...
I will also say this: one side is soliciting people to sign a letter. The other side is soliciting people to sign a letter. It's almost like we should have some kind of mechanism where all of us can come together and sign one letter or the other and pick which thing the city should do.
Tonight at the city council meeting, these clowns tried to shut the meeting down by disrupting the proceedings after they were given time during public comment. All the stuff in the letter about the ethics complaints, etc, were all apparently unfounded according to city officials.
I am not sure what these people are trying to accomplish. They claim in the letter "The City has been silent on the immense violence carried out by the State of Israel against Palestinian civilians. This sends a message that the lives of Israelis matter and the lives of Palestinians do not. A failure to call for a Ceasefire and to condemn all loss of life in the region as unacceptable, does, in effect, contribute to existing inequities in Evanston, Illinois, the U.S., and around the world."
That is complete bollocks. Israel and Hamas are not waiting on the City of Evanston for messages to be sent. Failure to call for a ceasefire in a conflict thousands of miles away has absolutely zero impact on anything in the city, let alone "contributing to inequities in Evanston Illinois."
You know what does have an impact? When these clowns try and shut down a city council meeting where they are adopting a budget to keep city services running.
"Ms. Ruggie was on Zoom and indicated that it was the legal department’s view that the EEC did not have the authority to vote on such a resolution or send it to City Council."
'Who cares what the lawyer said. I have an OPINION.'
As an aside, and I can only speak to Washington state law, but I'm guessing Terry is right.
In our beautiful state it certainly sounds like this commission would have to be in compliance with our government transparency statutes. There's essentially two tracks: public records and public meetings. A very casual review of IL seems to show the same.
Neither here nor there, but here in Seattle I've had an uncomfortable conversation or two with groups like this who think a quorum can only happen after certain check boxes are checked, when the law is more a quorum can happen at any time. Then the checkboxes need to be checked.
Speaking purely in hypotheticals, I wonder if it might behoove a certain member of the public to nail down the City's position one way or another by asking for a record of the pre-meeting happening. If the City gives away the game with a 'no records' then that solves some thorny issues for a potential plaintiff and makes the City's case much more difficult
Part of the challenge I have learned here is that there is almost no recourse for citizens upon discovering an open meetings act violation. Your primary outlet is the Attorney General PAC office and they're currently still adjudicating cases I sent them more than a *year* ago and I suspect I'll never get a response. Unless you're willing to drag them to court, there's no other recourse and they know it.
That's definitely the beauty of Washington. There are statutory damages involved!
Here’s an interesting twist: after the meeting apparently the commissioners never turned off their mics. As some of the commissioners were wrapping up, people I know that were still there heard them making disparaging remarks about other commissioners & accusing them of throwing them under the bus...also referring to speakers opposed to the resolution with expletives; mocking the Jewish community and more. Not a good look for “equity” commissioners. 🙄
I would be very interested in this audio. I just FOIA'ed a copy of this audio.
The thing is, as Carla Thomas said, “equity” as the Commission understands it is not about treating each Evanston citizens fairy. It’s about uplifting the marginalized and the oppressed. Punching down is not only acceptable but applauded. Jews belong to the privileged group and therefore are the oppressor class. Calling them names fits perfectly into the paradigm. I personally find the ideology that arranges people into a hierarchy of more or less oppressed groups and therefore more or less deserving of respect and compassion pernicious but we have to understand the mindset of (at least some of) the Commissioners.
The current strain of anti-racist thought that dominates our community now, as taught by Beyond Diversity and Kendi, I think is part of the problem. The philosophy of this program is so existentialist to skin color as the deciding factor in oppression, that when you something like Israel/Palestine, which doesn't map into to this framework, it doesn't make any rational sense. I think we witnessed this the other night.
Just to clarify, Carla did not say the above. She corrected one of the speakers who suggested that equity is fairness. The rest is me laying out the logic as I understand it.
I agree with you: the city should not take up "a controversial resolution that nobody even wants to put their name behind." I don't actually think any city business should be considered from anonymous sources - controversial or not. Thank you for covering this.