Sens. Kearney, Williams are hosting Racial Equity Tour event on Tuesday
State Sens. Tim Kearney,
D-26 of Swarthmore, and Anthony Williams, D-8 of Philadelphia, are slated to host a virtual discussion on racial equity Tuesday, July
28 at 4 p.m.
In June, Senate Democrats announced a statewide “Racial Equity Tour” focused on solutions to end systemic racism. Kearney and Williams will be joined by a panel of criminal justice experts and racial justice advocates.
“We do have systemic racism in this county, and in this state. As a legislative body, we need to commit to dismantling the systems that have allowed Black people to be overpoliced, unfairly targeted, and over incarcerated for generations,” Williams said in a statement.
The panel includes Swarthmore College political science professor Keith Reeves, who is department chair and director of the Urban Inequality and Incarceration program at the College’s Lang Center for Civic and Social Responsibility;
Stefan Roots, a journalist and activist who is the founder and author of the popular Chester Matters Blog; civil rights lawyer Jonathan Feinberg; and Hans Menos, who is the head of the Philadelphia Police Advisory Commision.
Individuals wishing to attend the discussion can register at Kearney’s website.
“We are going to have community-driven discussions that focus on solutions to end systemic racism and reimagine public safety,” Kearney recently said in a statement. “I am hopeful the tour will lead to meaningful action, because this moment in history offers us a real chance to live up to our ideals and meet the promise of liberty and justice for all.”
The state Senate recently unanimously passed two bills that ban chokeholds, require police to adopt useof-force standards, and mandate reporting of use-offorce incidents. Gov. Tom Wolf signed the police reform bills into law on July 14.
The bills were pushed by state legislatures in response to the nationwide protests in the aftermath to the killing of George Floyd by Minneapolis police on May 25.
“Systemic racism is a complex issue,” Gov. Tom Wolf said last week. “It’s ingrained in our society. I’m not going to downplay the challenges we all face in eradicating it, but we have to find a way to eradicate it. We need to end racism.”