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After $250,000 Funding, Atlanta’s Fulton County Follows California With 1st Reparations Task Force Meeting

After $250,000 Funding, Atlanta’s Fulton County Follows California With 1st Reparations Task Force Meeting

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The first meeting of the Fulton County Reparations Task Force, Feb. 2, Atlanta City Hall, Atlanta. (Photo: Twitter, screenshot)

Georgia’s most-populous county, Fulton County, has followed California by approving $250,000 to study reparations and held its first reparations task force meeting on Feb. 2.

The task force is scheduled to meet on the first Thursday of every month. Fulton is Georgia’s only county with more than 1 million inhabitants and Atlanta is the state capital. The population is 44.9 white and 44.7 percent Black or African American.

The $250,000 proposed budget for the reparations task force was approved during a Jan. 18 Fulton County Board of Commissioners meeting in a 4 to 3 vote, according to a Fulton County press release.

The task force was first created in 2021 to study the feasibility of giving reparations to Black residents in the county, according to FOX 5.

In 2020, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed landmark legislation to study reparations for Black residents in the state. In 2021, the first-in-the-nation task force to study reparations for African Americans was created.

The task force is an advisory body to the board of commissioners and investigates and provides recommendations on initiatives and policies that will offer repair and stabilization of the local African-American community, Atlanta News First reported.

According to Fulton County officials, “qualitative and quantitative data will allow the Task Force to critically examine the ways slavery, Jim Crow, and Urban Renewal denied African Americans opportunities to acquire personal, political, and economic autonomy.”

“Considering this is the birth county, city, and state of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., prior to his assassination, reparations for slavery were one of Dr. King’s top priorities,” said Task Force Advisory Board Vice Chair Marcus Coleman. “With that understanding, Fulton County is on the right side of history for monetarily honoring the continuation of his work.”

The public will also be able to weigh in on the feasibility study and offer input and recommendations.

The task force has nearly 5,000 documents on the impacts of slavery and eminent domain.

The Fulton County Reparations Task Force is scheduled to present its final report to the Board of Commissioners in October 2024, WSB-TV reported.

The first meeting of the Fulton County Reparations Task Force, Feb. 2, Atlanta City Hall, Atlanta. (Photo: Twitter, screenshot, https://twitter.com/TheJalston/status/1626569325757751296)