An article in the Amherst Bulletin, June 11, reported that “Amherst officials are considering using money generated from adult-use marijuana sales in town to create a new account that would be used for offering reparations to Black residents.”
This source of funding strikes me as not a good idea. Why? Because it suggests that we as a community aren’t serious about reparations. By relying on marijuana sales we trivialize the significance of reparations, indeed a complex and controversial issue.
To properly fund reparations, the entire town needs to be involved in a way that the financial burden of funding is shared by everyone and shouldn’t be sidelined to a source that doesn’t represent. the whole community.
Lawrence Siddall
Amherst
