Mayors Organized for Reparations and Equity facts for kids

Mayors Organized for Reparations and Equity (MORE) is a group of mayors from cities across the United States. They are working together to create programs that would pay reparations to the African American residents of their cities.

The group was announced on June 18, 2021. This was timed to celebrate the first time Juneteenth was recognized as a national holiday. Juneteenth marks the day when the last enslaved African Americans in the U.S. were told they were free. Mayors from big cities like Los Angeles and Denver, and even the small town of Tullahassee, Oklahoma, joined the group.

What is MORE's Goal?

The main goal of MORE is to help African Americans who are descendants of people who were enslaved. The group wants to start small reparations programs in different cities. These small programs would act as tests or models. The hope is that these models could be used to create a larger, nationwide program in the future. A national program would aim to close the racial wealth gap, which is the difference in wealth between white and Black families that exists because of past unfairness.

To do this, the mayors agreed to create local groups of Black leaders to help guide their city's efforts. The mayors also promised to support a bill in the U.S. Congress called the H.R. 40. This bill suggests creating a special group to study the idea of reparations for the whole country.

How Would Reparations Work?

Most of the mayors in MORE said that reparations would not be direct cash payments to people. Instead, the money would be invested in Black communities. This could mean funding for schools, health programs, or businesses in those areas.

The mayors were still figuring out how to pay for these city programs. They estimated that a full national reparations program could cost as much as $12 trillion.

Quinton Lucas, the mayor of Kansas City, explained why he felt this work was important. He said that Black communities have historically received less investment and faced many challenges. These challenges were caused not just by slavery, but also by later unfair practices like segregation (keeping people of different races separate) and redlining (denying services like bank loans to people in certain neighborhoods).

Mayor Lucas said, "it is essential that we find an opportunity to address and to right historical wrongs."

History of the Group

The idea for MORE came from Eric Garcetti, who was the mayor of Los Angeles at the time. The group was formed partly in response to the Black Lives Matter protests that happened in 2020.

MORE started on June 19, 2021, with 11 mayors. The first members were from cities like Los Angeles, Denver, Providence, Austin, and Kansas City. Former mayors Garcetti and Michael Hancock of Denver were the co-chairs.

Before MORE was created, some cities and states had already started taking steps toward reparations:

• Asheville, North Carolina: In July 2020, the city council voted for reparations. They decided to invest in areas where Black residents faced disadvantages.
• California: In September 2020, the state created a commission to study reparations.
• Evanston, Illinois: In March 2021, Evanston became the first U.S. city to pay reparations. It gave some Black families $25,000 grants to use for housing costs. This was to make up for unfair housing practices in the past.

Later Actions by Member Cities

After MORE was formed, some of its member mayors continued to work on reparations in their cities.

• In April 2022, Mayor Tishaura Jones of St. Louis signed a bill creating a reparations fund. City residents could choose to donate to this fund when paying their property or water bills.
• In August 2022, Mayor Jorge Elorza of Providence proposed a $10 million reparations plan for his city. The money came from federal funds given to cities to help recover from the COVID-19 pandemic.
• In July 2023, Mayor Quinton Lucas of Kansas City created a 13-member commission to study reparations for his city.

By late 2023, some of the original mayors had left office. The official website for the MORE group also stopped working.

Member Mayors

The following mayors were members of the MORE coalition. Some joined later or "inherited" their membership from the mayor before them.

See Also

• Movement for Black Lives
• National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America

External Links

• MORE website, archived on Juneteenth 2021