At a time when the fight for racial justice and equality in America has more momentum than ever, we are grateful for the support the Daily Kos Community has shown over recent months in solidarity with the work of the Ella Baker Center to keep our communities safe.
For over two decades, the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights has organized every day to shift resources away from police, prisons and punishment and toward opportunities that build real safety: education, jobs, and health care. Named after civil rights hero Ella Baker, we have worked with Black, brown, and low-income people to build power and prosperity in our communities.
We are all too familiar with the tragedies of police and state violence that have carelessly taken away so many Black lives including George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade, Atatiana Jefferson, Oscar Grant, Dujuan Armstrong, Mario Woods, Steven Taylor, Willie McCoy, Aaron Williams, and many more.
The Ella Baker Center started in 1996 after Aaron Williams, an unarmed African American man, was murdered by San Francisco police officer Marc Andaya. Since then, we have worked to lift up the voices of families and community members most impacted by police violence and mass incarceration. Every day, the Ella Baker Center fights prisons and punishment at the local, state, and national level to reimagine a new model of public safety that focuses more on care over policing.
And this moment we’re in right now provides us the opportunity to take action in creating a model of safety that uplifts compassion and caring, not punishment and isolation. A model of community safety like Restore Oakland—an organizing and advocacy hub and job training center—that promotes economic opportunity, community advocacy, healing, and restorative justice for communities of color.
The Ella Baker Center’s advocacy looks like urging our local elected officials to divest from jails, criminalization, and policing, and instead prioritize investments in community health, opportunities, affordable housing, and justice.
In Alameda County, we work to:
On the state level, we advocate for legislation that abolishes abusive practices in prisons and jails, strengthens family connections, ends the economic burdens placed on people by mass incarceration, and reinvests in communities.
On the national level, we coordinate a network of grassroots organizations across the country to hold Night Out for Safety and Liberation (NOSL), community events to redefine what safety means beyond police and punishment.
The work we continue today builds on a history of success with the Ella Baker Center. For over two decades, we led a campaign to end youth incarceration in California and helped successfully close five of the state’s youth prisons. The Ella Baker Center continues that fight today, calling for real solutions to California’s youth prison problem.
We cannot continue to invest in policing and incarceration, systems that have historically criminalized and destroyed Black and brown lives in this country. Investing in community-based services and interventions like affordable housing, health care, education, and living-wage jobs keeps our communities healthy and safe.
Thank you, Daily Kos Community, for supporting this movement. To learn even more about our work, visit ellabakercenter.org.