The state-endorsed
California
Reparations Task Force is pushing to give every black resident $360,000 in
reparations
despite a major budget deficit.
In 2020, the
United States
Census Bureau recorded approximately 2.251 million black people residing in California, of whom 1.8 million had at least one ancestor who was a slave, Fox News
reported
, making the total reparations cost around $640 billion. It is unknown where the state will come up with the funds, however, as Gov.
Gavin Newsom
(D-CA) reported that California is facing a
budget deficit
of $22.5 billion for this coming fiscal year.
Chas Alamo, the state’s Legislative Analyst’s Office’s principal fiscal and policy analyst, appeared at the Reparation Task Force’s second in-person meeting, in which he proposed further steps that could be taken to fulfill the reparations plan. He proposed several different paths the task force could take to make reparations state law, including the creation of a new agency that would oversee the dispensation of reparations.
“The creation of a new agency would be initiated through the governor’s executive branch and reorganization process, but other options exist,” Alamo said, California Black Media reported. “Regardless of the path, to initiate a new agency or enact any other recommendation that makes changes to state law, fundamentally both houses from the state legislature would have to approve the action and the governor will have to sign it.”
The task force is due to submit a final report and its accompanying recommendations by July 1. The state legislature, which created the commission amid the fallout from George Floyd’s death in 2020, will then vote on the proposal, at which point it will be sent to Newsom to sign.
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So far, neither the panel nor any government agency has suggested how the reparations will be paid for.
Meanwhile, a separate, city-appointed reparations task force in San Francisco
recommended
giving $5 million in reparations to every black resident, which would total nearly $225 billion.
