NAACP Vancouver Vice President Jasmine Tolbert gives a presentation on systemic racism for the first of three listening sessions with Clark County Council, hosted remotely July 31.
The Clark County Council had its first of three listening sessions last week organized with local partner organizations to get a better idea of the effects of systemic racism in the county, with the council hearing what those organizations have seen and researched when it came to structural effects on people and communities of color locally.
Councilors and representatives from four organizations met remotely Friday, July 31, in what was largely a chance for council to hear from the groups that included the NAACP of Vancouver, the Clark County Volunteer Lawyers Program, YWCA of Clark County and the Southwest Washington League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC).
Listening session moderator Nancy Retsinas noted there would be “uncomfortable conversations” through the process, with the first session’s focus being on “laying the groundwork” for subsequent sessions that would allow members of the public to speak on their own experiences.
Retsinas set the stage of what systemic racism was — institutions in place in a community that unevenly distributed power and resources, leading to racial inequities. Those institutions “historically used race to justify policies and practices” that led to oppression of people of color, be it in education, law enforcement, courts or government.
It differed from other types of racism that were more overt, such as the use of racial slurs, Retsinas explained.
NAACP of Vancouver Vice President Jasmine Tolbert looked at systemic racism as “a generational condition” in Clark County, pointing as far back as the start of the 20th Century where there had been policies in place to prevent mixed-race marriages.
Tolbert said in the 1920s and ‘30s the Klu Klux Klan had a “strong presence” in Clark County, influencing the police and local politics. In the 1940s arriving African Americans faced housing barriers and also received threats, she added, resulting in the formation of the local NAACP branch.
NAACP Legal Redress Committee member Tim Murphy said that systemic racism in Clark County “was alive and well today,” pointing to police shootings, incarceration and school discipline. He pointed to a report from the state attorney general’s office that saw students of color were more likely to be expelled or suspended in Vancouver Public Schools, adding that Black people were overrepresented in the Clark County Jail population by nearly four times, making up 9 percent of the jail while only 2.4 percent of the county general population.
Tolbert said that there had been some “verbal” testimony of similar issues in school districts like Ridgefield and Battle Ground, though there wasn’t anything as detailed as the report on Vancouver.
Murphy said that for policing a focus on the war on drugs and “broken window policing” led to more law enforcement in communities of color, which he said could lead to public health issues such as addiction being treated more as criminal matters.
“Every statistical analysis of Clark County’s criminal justice system and its education system shows that racism on a system level exists,” Murphy remarked.
Murphy called Council Chair Eileen Quiring’s past comments denying that systemic racism was an issue in the county “ignorant and dangerous viewpoints, denying the existence of an indisputable fact.”
Quiring interjected, leading to Retsinas reminding participants that they “were here for dialogue, not debate.”
“We do not allow, even people who come forward for testimony, to make demeaning remarks,” Quiring said, though Murphy said his remarks were “descriptive.”
Councilor Gary Medvigy added that Retsinas’ moderating comments were directed at Murphy, not Quiring.
Going even farther back, Jeffrey Keddie, with the Northwest Justice Project, gave the dispossession of Native American lands throughout settlement of the United States as an example of systemic racism. Through legal proceedings the federal government was able to get a monopoly on native lands, in part through the concept of the “discovery doctrine” which benefitted white settlers.
“All of this occurred in our area as well,” Keddie said, bringing up the shrinking of lands for the Cowlitz Tribe to its current reservation west of La Center. He added that during the time of the Oregon Territory there were laws in place excluding Black residency in the territory.
Keddie said this resulted in a population of fewer than 50 Black residents in Vancouver before 1940. A surge in residents occurred during wartime, including many who were Black, though after a flood in 1948 housing options for those residents were limited, with only 500 remaining in the 1950 census.
Elizabeth Fitzgearld, with the Clark County Volunteer Lawyers program, mentioned there had been restrictive covenants agreed on by groups of property owners not to sell, lease or rent to specific groups based on race, creed or color. Those covenants were eventually determined illegal in the Fair Housing Act of 1968.
Regarding early childhood impacts on families of color, YWCA of Clark County Director of Services & Mission Impact Vanessa Yarie noted that income and timing restrictions for access to preschool and a lack of training for staff on conversations about race create inequities. She also touched on the effects of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) that occurred or would be exacerbated by systemic racism, mentioning a disproportionate number of Black and Hispanic children in the foster care system in Clark County.
Ana Sifuentes, bilingual outreach specialist for the organization, explained that for immigrant communities the fear of a negative change in immigration status or involvement from ICE may keep them from seeking legal action in situations such as domestic violence.
Clark County has a growing Hispanic population, as Washington State LULAC Director and founder of Southwest Washington LULAC Diana Perez presented numbers showing a change from about 16,000 to more than 39,000 between 2000 and 2014. Hispanic or Latino residents make up about 8.7 percent of the county’s total population.
Perez pointed to a report focused on professionals of color in the region that showed 74 percent of respondents reported some form of discrimination, with only 17 percent strongly agreeing their organization was supportive.
Southwest Washington LULAC President Ed Hamilton Rosales said that racism was a public health crisis, affecting health insurance, environmental health disparities and most recently-highlighted by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Regarding COVID-19, Hamilton Rosales said Hispanic people had rates of infection nine times higher than white people in Washington state, with Black rates three times higher. For Clark County, a quarter of cases were Hispanic individuals.
Clark County and partner organizations have two more sessions hosted remotely — one on Aug. 12 and one on Aug. 26. Both will feature public testimony on the effects of systemic racism, though the second of the two will not be recorded; a summary without identifying details will be made for the public record afterward.
