Northampton Abolition Now (NAN) and Western Mass Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) co-hosted a city council candidate forum on Oct. 27 to ask the candidates for City Councilor At-Large about their plans to advocate for racial equity in Northampton if elected.
The at-large candidates who attended the forum were Jamila Gore and Michael Quinlan, along with about 45 community members attending via Zoom. This was the first of two city council forums, with the second featuring ward candidates.
Gore, an artist, activist and teacher in Northampton for 15 years, stated her goal to “make Northampton a flagship city in how it approaches a lot of racial and economic justice issues. ” She stressed the importance of “community building and taking care of each other instead of looking for the carceral state to take care of us. ”
Quinlan, a lifelong resident of Northampton and current City Councilor for Ward 1, said, “I’ve made it a cornerstone of my first term and pledge future service that I will always do my best to listen and learn.”
On the issue of housing insecurity, Quinlan referred to the new initiative of the Community Resilience Hub. “There’s a lot of discussion about it being resources for houseless people, but I think renters need to have access as well right through that same community hub.”
Gore said, “I really think affordable housing needs to be a forefront issue that the council deliberates over on a regular basis.”
Both emphasized the importance of funding and maintaining public transportation, especially as a resource for people who are unhoused.
When asked about their plans to address racial inequity in policing, Quinlan said that he was “the first city councilor to speak out in a public meeting, asking for the Police Review Commission,” and expressed his plan to make the development of a Department of Community Care, which would provide an unarmed response to non-violent emergencies as an alternative to policing, a focus of his service as at-large city councilor.
Gore also voiced support for the development of the Department of Community Care, stating that reimagining community safety will be a long process and that she would like to be a part of the council to help get that off the ground. She added, “Surveillance is a big part of the prison industrial complex, and that’s why in 2017, I got involved in council meetings that were fighting against having surveillance cameras in downtown Northampton.” Gore also made the proposal that revenue from Northampton’s many cannabis shops could go toward a reparations system for Black residents.
For one of the questions, the candidates were given a list of issues, and each chose one to address.
Quinlan spoke to Northampton’s relationship with the Nipmuc, Pocumtuc and other Indigenous people, stating the importance of working with local Indigenous leaders, to ensure that the council’s actions are not “performative or disrespectful in any way.”
As a teacher, Gore chose to address her concern about police in schools, saying that, “It doesn’t foster an open, educational, free and calm environment.”
One area where the two differed was in their responses to the questions posed about disability justice. While Quinlan stated his full support for peer-led response and trusting disabled/neurodivergent people’s needs and experiences over that of professionals, Gore emphasized more strongly the importance of deferring to mental health and medical professionals in cases of mental health crises, rather than just relying on peer-led support.
In his closing statements, Quinlan said, “The list of responsibilities our police carry is very long. Allowing them to focus on the most dangerous of those responsibilities is a good idea.”
Gore said, “We don’t need armed professionals leaving big footprints throughout our community and telling us where to go, what to do and how to interact with each other, especially in Northampton.”
Not all candidates were present at the forum. Three city council candidates — Jim Nash, Stan Moulton and Marissa Elkins — refused to participate in either forum hosted by NAN, citing concerns about bias. “Now that REAL (Racial Equity and Learning) is no longer hosting and has been replaced by an organization which has already endorsed candidates, I must respectfully decline to attend,” said Marissa Elkins, City Councilor At-Large candidate, in an email to NAN. NAN provided all candidates with the questions they planned to ask ahead of time and gave each candidate equal speaking time. “
The three candidates who declined or withdrew from the forum all cited the fact that NAN in particular has already endorsed other candidates as reason for not attending. “We support any candidate who shows a real commitment to racial and economic justice and we are strongly committed to productive, thoughtful public education around these issues,” said NAN in a statement.
In an email to The Sophian, Quinlan said, “While I felt that communication about the switch in sponsorship of the racial justice forums should have been better and more transparent, I decided to participate because I am devoted to representing one hundred percent of Northampton residents.”
Voting will take place Tuesday, Nov. 2.
