WS Chronicle

General Assembly is doing less for more N. Carolinians

To the Editor:

The final budget that state lawmakers will vote on in the coming days reflects missed opportunities for North Carolina. By pursuing more tax cuts, even as states like Kansas have reversed course and abandoned their own failed tax-cut experiment, leaders of the N.C. General Assembly have chosen to stay the course and continue to do less for more North Carolinians.

North Carolina’s leaders should put forward a budget that truly reflects the priorities of our growing state, including healthy and safe communities, quality educational opportunities and skills training, thriving communities, and broadly shared economic prosperity.

They should make a sustained commitment to rebuilding Eastern North Carolina after Hurricane Matthew rather than offering just a fraction of what is needed.

Instead, lawmakers have chosen to give even more benefits to the wealthy and profitable corporations.

As state leaders continue to dig their heels in on their failed tax cut experiment, it is time for leaders across the state to emerge and demonstrate the harm of another budget that is not worthy of North Carolinians.

Alexandra F. Sirota, Budget & Tax Center Director, Raleigh

Officer Yanez’s acquittal is  the norm

To the Editor:

The jury’s decision to acquit Officer Yanez [on June 16] does not negate the fact that Philando Castile’s tragic death is part of a disturbing national pattern of officers using excessive force against people of color, often during routine encounters. Philando Castile was one of 1,092 individuals killed by the police in 2016. Yet in most cases, the officers and police departments are not held accountable. While many officers carry out their jobs with respect for the communities they serve, we must confront the profound disconnect and disrespect that many communities of color experience with their local law enforcement.

Two Supreme Court decisions from the 1980’s allow officers to use deadly force when a reasonable officer on the scene could reasonably fear for their safety. These two decisions create an atmosphere where police violence is sanctioned based on what we think a hypothetical officer could have felt, even if, in reality, the officer was acting recklessly, had ill motives or was acting based on implicit bias. Taking another person’s life is the most extreme action a police officer can take, and consequently new standards are needed to better ensure that police killings happen rarely.

The ACLU will continue to fight for racial justice. We must end the prevailing policing paradigm where police departments behave more like occupying forces, imposing their will to control communities. This type of ‘us vs. them’ policing antagonizes many communities of color by casting a blanket of suspicion over an entire race, often under the guise of solving crime.

To build trust, we need a democratic system of policing where our communities have an equal say in the way their neighborhoods are policed. Collaboration, transparency, and communication between police and communities around the shared goals of equality, fairness, and public safety are the path forward.

Teresa Nelson , Interim Executive Director, ACLU of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minn.

Note: A jury in Ramsey County, Minnesota, found Officer Jeronimo Yanez not guilty of the 2016 killing of Philando Castile.