“ We Are What We Imagine. Our Very Existence Consists Of Our Imagination Of Our Selves. Our Best Destiny Is To Imagine, At Least, Completely, Who And What, And That We Are. The Greatest Tragedy That Can Befall Us Is To Go Unimagined.” -N. Scott Momaday
In 2017, Voices for Racial Justice, in collaboration with community partners, created the our mnisota policy agenda. We use mnisota in lieu of Minnesota to honor the original Dakota words Mni Sota Makoce, a term that, according to Dakota elder Chris MatoNunpa, translates to “land where the waters reflect the clouds.” We believe that our goal—racial justice and the end of all racial disparities—isn’t possible without first acknowledging the history of the land that we occupy: land which was stolen from Dakota people, people who had lived here since time immemorial and were killed or forcibly expelled in order for us to live here today.
2017 Racial Equity Agenda
Little of the 2017 our mnisota agenda was achieved during the 2017 legislative session. Of the issues named in last session’s agenda, the legislature passed the following proposals:
There were also a number of proposals that threatened racial equity, such as:
2018 Legislative Session
There is a lot of work to do in 2018 to cultivate seeds of racial equity in Minnesota. Our policy team will be watching closely the following bills and proposals:
Voices For Racial Justice New Direction in Policy
After being around for nearly 25 years, Voices thought it important to pause and hear from communities about the effectiveness of our policy tools. Our policy team will work in collaboration with community partners to determine how we are going to engage with communities and legislators in this review of our policy tools. This is important because after over a decade of grading legislators, we found that while the number of racial equity champions has increased at the Legislature, racial equity in Minnesota has not.
Voices for Racial Justice is on a journey to build creative approaches to grassroots policy that tend to the soil of our movements and that honor the culture and healing of our communities. We ask, what does grassroots policy look like that is life-giving, shifts culture, rooted in beauty, real governance, and bridges the divides within our communities? In response to these questions, we will hold space for communities of color and Indigenous communities to share their stories & experiences. These stories will move us through our commitment to center trust-building across issues and cultural groups in our movements. The values that will continue to inform our work during the 2018 legislative session are listed below. This is a broad agenda which sets an important framework that goes beyond this particular session:
Arts and Culture
Minnesota has a unique history of cultivating major artists who have influenced people all over the world. Legislators can build on this legacy by investing in the emerging artists of today who will influence the future. It is artists who allow us to heal and who give creative expression to what it means to be human. Our state must recognize how art and culture influence every aspect of life and support legislation that elevates the value of the arts in all of our communities.
Civil Rights
Minnesotans are proud of our state’s reputation of being one of the most progressive states in the union. But that pride is overshadowed by the dramatic racial and economic disparities in our state. Building a racially equitable state means working with communities of color and American Indian communities throughout our cities to restore integrity and trust in our civil rights institutions and police departments, and practices, including the right to protest. We ask legislators to pass bills that honor every person’s right to protest and that promote a climate of care and intergenerational respect in our communities.
Economic Equity
The health of our state’s economic future depends on the economic well-being of all Minnesotans. Given the epidemic of rental apartment conversions to market rate properties and “flipping” by speculative real estate firms, the state needs to respond with urgency to a chronic shortage of affordable housing options across Minnesota. U.S. Census data show that most communities of color in our state have median incomes significantly less than that of white Minnesotans. We ask legislators to promote economic opportunity by supporting legislation that offers technical support to assist entrepreneurs in launching or expanding a small business or a co-op, especially small business owners who are men and women of color, working class, veterans, and/or people with disabilities.
Education Equity
A statewide vision for equitable schools would include: increasing the number of teachers of color and American Indian teachers in K-12 schools in Minnesota, establishing government subsidized living wages for teachers, the creation of meditation and mindfulness programs in schools, ethnic studies pilot programs in K-12 schools throughout the state, programs that re-engage children who are no longer in school, and programs to enable elders from different racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds to work in schools. We ask legislators to support bills that make this vision a reality in our state.
Environmental Justice
We are in solidarity with indigenous voices and tribal nations across the world struggling to protect the sacredness of the environment. For example, state and national attention around water has increased in recent years. Water is the lifeblood of the universe that nourishes every person, every plant, and every community. Water can be still, it can be peaceful, but it can also be a powerful force for change. Just like us. We can transform, and in that process transform the environment around us. We ask legislators to support and pass bills that honor and protect the sacredness of water and the environment.
Health Equity
Everyone in Minnesota deserves to live in a community where the health and wellbeing of each individual should not depend on their race, identity, education, gender, place of origin, or where they live. In order to advance health equity, efforts need to be intentional in addressing structural racism. Therefore, health care policies must pay attention to the social determinants of health, and must be developed in partnership with impacted communities, including communities of color, indigenous communities, and incarcerated communities. We ask legislators to pass bills that support the health and wellbeing of all Minnesotans, including men and women who are incarcerated. Voices will be sharing a report on the impact of incarceration on health in the coming months.
Immigration Justice
Minnesota flourishes when people who come to our state from other countries are able to live in dignity and peace, and contribute to our economy, democracy, and culture. Yet immigration policies and practices continue to negatively impact immigrants disproportionately. Despite federal threats to immigration justice, including increased deportation and expansion of detention centers, Minnesota should take the lead in state level reform.We ask legislators to pass bills that make our state a model of immigration justice for the rest of the nation. Furthermore, we support the efforts of a recently formed multiracial immigrant coalition of peoples who are asking legislators “…to commit to a long-term relationship and partnership with Minnesota’s immigrant communities… As constituents and as community organizations, with directly impacted membership and who experience first-hand the implications of anti-immigrant policies, we urge [legislators] to include us in the decision-making process, and not to make any commitments bargaining with ours and our families’ lives without consulting with us first. Additionally, as a gesture of good faith to our communities, we request town hall meetings in our communities as we move forward.”
Justice for People who are Incarcerated
Minnesota’s correctional facilities continue to impact Native American communities and communities of color disproportionately. The rates of disparity for youth of color in the Minnesota justice system are both higher than national levels and more severe in magnitude than those of many comparable states. In order to advance justice in our state’s correctional facilities, we ask legislators to pass bills that: Treat people who are incarcerated as human beings, including offering nutritious food and adequate health care; reinstate the office of prison ombudsman as a way to give people who are incarcerated a way to address grievances; restrict the use of solitary confinement; ban placing youth in solitary confinement, as the federal government has already done; eliminate all private prisons in our state; and allocate more funding for alternatives to incarceration, including more funding for chemical dependency treatment, mental health treatment, and other forms of treatment.
Tribal Sovereignty
Minnesota is home to eleven tribal governments – seven Ojibwe Bands and four Dakota communities. Minneapolis has one of the largest urban American Indian populations in the country, representing a diverse array of tribal citizens from many of the 562 federally recognized tribes in the United States. Tribal sovereignty refers to the inherent rights of American Indian tribes to govern themselves and their lands, to define their own membership, and to regulate tribal commerce and other domestic relations. We ask legislators to pass bills that honor tribal sovereignty among American Indian communities in our state.