Tuesday, Sept. 19, members of the Williamsburg Truth and Reconciliation Committee Laura Hill and Helen Casey-Rutland discussed the committee’s report at the 1607 Coffee Company. Committee members and individuals from the Williamsburg community attended the event.
The Historic Triangle chapter of the non-profit organization Coming to the Table and the Virginia Racial Healing Institute hosted the event. Hill leads both organizations.
Williamsburg City Manager Andrew Trivette presented the report to the Williamsburg City Council Monday, Sept. 11. Trivette and Williamsburg Mayor Doug Pons headed the effort to form the committee after the council passed Resolution #21-05 in 2021.
The committee’s report to the council identifies five broad recommendations with more specific action items. The categories are listed as “Build a 21st Century Triangle,” “Speak the Truth,” “Do the Work,” “Foster a Welcoming Community,” “Create & Support a Healthy Community” and “Name It. Claim It. Fix It.”
“You’ll notice that for every recommendation there are actions, areas of focus, you’ll see agencies,” Hill said. “These are agencies that we’re recommending that the City to work with, and then there are also outcomes, this is what we anticipate happen as a result of taking these actions, working with these agencies.”
The report lists dozens of organizations the committee thinks the City should engage, including the College of William and Mary, the College’s School of Education’s Community and Action Research Engagement lab, the College’s Office of Diversity and Inclusion, the College’s School of Education’s New Horizons Family Counseling Center and the Lemon Project.
“This process really began in December of 2020 when this initially included the idea of studying equity in the City was included in the Goals, Initiatives and Outcomes for that year,” Trivette said. “In July of 2021 the council took the important and impressive step of forming the Truth and Reconciliation committee.”
“This process really began in December of 2020 when this initially included the idea of studying equity in the City was included in the Goals, Initiatives and Outcomes for that year,” Trivette said. “In July of 2021 the council took the important and impressive step of forming the Truth and Reconciliation committee.”
Methodist pastor Helen Casey-Rutland ’83 laid out the basic goal of the committee.
“So, we wanted to hear the truth that people in the community had to share with us and then try to project some direction for the City to go in,” Casey-Rutland said. “And we were limited, of course, because we could only recommend that. The City has the power to do.”
Hill and Casey-Rutland said the committee heard from a diverse group of people, including individuals as young as 19 and as old as 92.
The committee consists of five Williamsburg residents, two at-large members and Williamsburg Vice Mayor Pat Dent, who serves as an ex-officio member. Trivette and three other city staff members support the committee and attend the meetings monthly.
Committee members include former Councilmember Bobby Braxton, who serves as chair, and Vice Chair Adam Canaday. Both are descendants of Williamsburg Bray School students and participated in the school’s moving ceremony in February 2023.
Associate professor of ESL/bilingual education Katherine Barko-Alva and former Councilmember Benny Zhang ’16 J.D. ’20 also serve on the committee.
This year, the council aims to implement two of the committee’s recommendation actions.
“We’re primarily focused on completing the GIO for this period, which essentially gives us about a year to accomplish two of the action items related to the TRC report,” Trivette said. “So the staff [recommended] thought [was that] that the City Council will take some time, perhaps over the next month, and come back to the City with direction on two of the ones that we’ve recommended or a different direction that you’ve thought of on your own.”
Trivette also said the term “advancement” was deliberately chosen to denote completing an action item because it does not solidify or complete a process, but rather, indicates an initial step.
“Hiring a DEI consultant, helping us to understand the organization, and do the work in terms of how we engage with the community, strikes me as a great opportunity,” Pons said. “And then of course, the African-American Heritage Trail, which is a project that’s underway.”
Councilmember and Director of Clinical Programs, Director of the Immigration Clinic and clinical associate professor of Law Stacy Kern-Scheerer emphasized the long-term nature of the goals.
“It really isn’t about like checking the box,” Kern-Scheerer said. “I look at many of these things and they are not something that we’re just going to do in a year and be like we accomplished that one and moving on to the next but really thinking about longer term and thinking about how these things may grow and develop and transform over time.”
Councilmembers Caleb Rogers ’20 and Barbara Ramsey ’75 emphasized the benefits of a student scholarship program, stating its potentially large impact on students.
This year, the African American Heritage Trail program received $357,000 of federal funding.
“You know, soon to come, hopefully. That’ll let us do the stage one of that trail would also be a very good, and, I think, quicker opportunity for investment,” Rogers said.
Assistant professor Aaron Griffith, who attended the Coming to the Table event, appreciated the conversation.
“I thought it was really informative,” Griffith wrote in an email to The Flat Hat. “The recommendations from the committee were excellent and look to really address many of the concerns of the descendent community in Williamsburg. I just hope the City takes these recommendations seriously and commits the resources to getting them started.”
“I thought it was really informative,” Griffith wrote in an email to The Flat Hat. “The recommendations from the committee were excellent and look to really address many of the concerns of the descendent community in Williamsburg. I just hope the City takes these recommendations seriously and commits the resources to getting them started.”
Griffith also gave recommendations to students at the College.
“I think students at William and Mary can first make themselves knowledgeable about the history of race in Williamsburg and William and Mary,” Griffith added. “I would, second, recommend that they get involved in the local work on racial reconciliation, which may just be attending the Coming to the Table and the Village Initiative meetings to listen to what’s going on in town. Students can also attend events and be aware of the work that the Lemon Project on campus is doing.”
