ATLRepair AtlantaReparations Study Commission

Study · Case study · 12 min read

National Landscape: Major Reparations Efforts

Dozens of localities, seven states, one federal bill, and a hostile 2025-26 climate. A working brief on the efforts most relevant to Atlanta, with a link to FirstRepair's comprehensive national map.

By late 2024 at least forty U.S. localities had opened reparations initiatives (Economic Policy Institute count); FirstRepair's national tracker now lists 54 initiatives among 168 organizations.[1][2] This brief is not that comprehensive inventory. It covers the efforts most relevant to Atlanta's design decisions, one paragraph each.

The actual map

FirstRepair (the nonprofit founded by Evanston's Robin Rue Simmons) maintains an interactive national tracker at reparationsresources.com: a map and a sortable table of 168 organizations, including 54 initiatives and 114 movement partners, with budgets and disbursements per effort.[2] As of mid-2026 it records about $151.4M in committed budgets and $15.6M disbursed across tracked initiatives.[2] For anything not covered below, start there.

Cities in one paragraph each

  • Evanston, IL: first funded program; ~$7M paid to ~300 people; a cannabis-tax shortfall forced a second revenue stream; now the case testing whether such programs are constitutional, with the Justice Department joining the challenge.[3][4] Full brief.
  • Chicago, IL: the 2015 Burge package (never challenged); a 2024 mayoral apology and 40-member task force whose citywide "Repair Chicago" survey and hearings ran through mid-2026 against a $1B deficit.[5][6][7][8] Full brief.
  • Asheville/Buncombe, NC: the first in the South; dissolved 2025 after a DOJ letter, $6.4M unspent.[54][9][10][11][12] Full brief.
  • Tulsa, OK: $105M private Greenwood Trust, plus the mass-graves investigation and DNA program that identify victims and their descendants.[13][14] Full brief.
  • Providence, RI: $10M of ARPA money; race-neutral eligibility that white residents could meet ("It's not reparations... it is an anti-poverty program," as one local advocate put it); under 3% spent in year one; sunsets with its federal dollars.[15][16][51] It shows the tradeoff plainly: a design safe from lawsuits can stop feeling like reparations to the community it was meant for.
  • Detroit, MI: the strongest voter mandate in the country (80% approved a 2021 ballot referendum) and one of the roughest processes: four year-one resignations, public infighting, and repeated extensions, followed by a 558-page report with ~100 recommendations (Oct. 2025) covering cash for descendants, $40K/$30K housing grants, and a Reparations Administrative Office.[17][18][19][20] Its council-president sponsor became mayor in 2026; implementation now rests on her.[21]
  • St. Louis, MO: executive-order commission; 27 public meetings; a 124-page report recommending up to $25K for people displaced from Pruitt-Igoe and Mill Creek Valley (groups defined by documented harm).[22][23] The sponsoring mayor called direct cash unconstitutional, then lost re-election, and the work went dormant, a warning about tying a commission's existence to one executive.[24][25]
  • Boston, MA: chose to study before acting; missed its research deadline by ~3 years; the harm-quantification economist voted for in January 2025 was still unhired 18 months later; recommendations now due 2027.[50][26]
  • St. Paul, MN: small and built to last, a permanent, ordinance-chartered commission for descendants of chattel slavery; $250K budget including a $175K contracted harm report; $50/meeting participation stipends; accepted a $100K church donation.[27][28] It is modest in scope but permanent and steadily funded.
  • Kansas City, MO: asked for $510K and has received roughly $350K; report due 2027; leaders openly unsure it will lead anywhere.[29][30]
  • Amherst, MA: $2M pledged over ten years against shrinking cannabis-tax revenue; eligibility covers all Black residents; a UMass-run community survey set priorities.[31][32]
  • NYC: per its lead agency, the first to run a truth/reconciliation process and a reparations study simultaneously (2024 local laws), with $500K granted to community groups for the truth network.[53][33][34][35]
  • San Francisco: recommended the largest sums anywhere ($5M per person) and delivered the least: an apology, a defunded office, and in December 2025 a Reparations Fund signed with $0 in it, an empty donations fund that at least keeps the structure in place.[36][37] A program-integrity scandal in an adjacent equity fund is now cited by opponents nationally, which has made audit design a reputational issue for every program.[38]

States

  • California: the deep study, the apology, the first state reparations agency (2025), zero direct payments.[39] Full brief.
  • New York: nine-member commission (incl. economist Darrick Hamilton); 200+ hours of hearing testimony; report deadline moved to 2029 at the commission's own request, citing federal anti-DEI attacks.[40] Its commissioners obtained legal protection from the state (indemnification), which other commissions have noted and asked for since.[40]
  • New Jersey: when the legislature stalled, a nonprofit stepped in. The NJ Institute for Social Justice convened a 60-member Reparations Council (Rutgers/Princeton co-chairs) that produced a 244-page report with ~100 recommendations on Juneteenth 2025, anchored by the nation's largest wealth gap ($643K per household).[41] It shows the work can move outside government when government stalls.
  • Maryland: the nation's only Black governor vetoed the commission ("now is not the time for another study"); the legislature overrode him in December 2025; 2026 legislation proposes stretching the deadlines to 2028.[52][42][43]
  • Colorado: a study of racism's toll on Black Coloradans run by History Colorado, the state historical society, with a $785K appropriation; the law avoids the word "reparations."[44]
  • Vermont: a general truth-and-reconciliation commission, report due 2026.[45] Massachusetts: still in committee.[46]

Federal

H.R. 40 has roughly 1% odds by congressional forecasting sites,[47] and no federal commission was ever created by executive order. The Why We Can't Wait coalition, which includes Human Rights Watch, Color Of Change, the NAACP and N'COBRA, pressed the Biden administration for one through 2022;[55] no order was signed.[56] Planners generally advise against counting on Washington to deliver. What Washington has delivered is pressure in the other direction: the Buncombe letter, the Evanston intervention, withheld federal grants, and executive orders targeting "illegal DEI," the environment New York cited when it pushed its report to 2029.[10][4][12][40]

Patterns in the record

  1. Nearly every government commission missed its first deadline. The two that finished on time came from outside the usual government track: New Jersey's council was run by a nonprofit, and Tulsa's trust was driven by the mayor's office.[41][13] The lesson advocates draw is to design the timeline with checkpoints and planned extensions from the start.
  2. The funding that survived 2025-26 federal pressure sat outside the normal appropriations process, in private trusts, donation funds, and church money.[13][36] Money that had been appropriated but not yet spent tended to get frozen.[12]
  3. How a program defines who is eligible has mattered most in court. Designs built around a documented victim class or geography have not been challenged so far, while designs built around race or descendancy have drawn most of the lawsuits.[4][22]
  4. Commissions that leaned on outside consultants tended to stall. The ones with paid staff or a university research partner tended to keep moving.[26]
  5. Programs written into law have outlasted the people who championed them. Ballot mandates (Detroit, Greenbelt) and permanent ordinances (St. Paul) have continued operating through changes in office, while executive orders often did not.[17][48][27][24] Atlanta's own removal of the commission's sunset (25-O-1204) fits this pattern.[49]

References

  1. Economic Policy Institute (Adewale A. Maye), "Why we have to keep talking about reparations in 2025," epi.org (archived). Accessed July 2026.
  2. FirstRepair, "Mapping the U.S. Reparations Movement" (national tracker), reparationsresources.com. Accessed July 2026.
  3. Associated Press (via Fortune), "Trump's DOJ asks judge to halt first reparations program in U.S. history," June 17, 2026, fortune.com. Accessed July 2026.
  4. U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Public Affairs, "U.S. Justice Department Moves to Intervene in Race Discrimination Lawsuit Challenging Reparations Program in Evanston, Illinois," June 2026, justice.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  5. Block Club Chicago, "Chicago Police Torture Survivors Break Ground On Monument: 'More Work To Do,'" July 8, 2026, blockclubchicago.org. Accessed July 2026.
  6. City of Chicago, Office of the Mayor, "Mayor Brandon Johnson Announces Juneteenth Task Force Members," June 19, 2025, chicago.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  7. Block Club Chicago, "Black Chicagoans Weigh In At City's 1st Reparations Town Hall," April 10, 2026, blockclubchicago.org. Accessed July 2026.
  8. WTTW News, "Chicago Faces $1.15B Budget Shortfall in 2026, $146M Gap in 2025," Aug. 29, 2025, news.wttw.com (archived). Accessed July 2026.
  9. WUNC/NPR, "Asheville, N.C., Approves Steps Toward Reparations For Black Residents," July 15, 2020, wunc.org. Accessed July 2026.
  10. Asheville Watchdog, "U.S. Department of Justice threatens Buncombe County with investigation over reparations recommendations," Sept. 2025, avlwatchdog.org. Accessed July 2026.
  11. City of Asheville, "Community Reparations Commission" (board dissolution announcement, Resolution 25-229, Oct. 14, 2025), ashevillenc.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  12. Blue Ridge Public Radio, "'A place of fear:' Amidst federal scrutiny, Asheville candidates hedge on pushing forward landmark reparations endeavor," Feb. 26, 2026, bpr.org. Accessed July 2026.
  13. NPR, "Tulsa mayor wants private trust fund as form of reparation for Tulsa Massacre," June 3, 2025, npr.org. Accessed July 2026.
  14. Associated Press, "A World War I veteran is first Tulsa Race Massacre victim identified from mass graves," July 12, 2024, apnews.com. Accessed July 2026.
  15. CNN, "Rhode Island's capital city will spend $10 million in reparations, and it could benefit White residents," Dec. 3, 2022, cnn.com. Accessed July 2026.
  16. ABC News, "Providence establishes reparations program to praise and criticism," Jan. 2023, abcnews.go.com. Accessed July 2026.
  17. Ballotpedia, "Detroit, Michigan, Proposal R, City Reparations Committee Advisory Question (November 2021)," ballotpedia.org. Accessed July 2026.
  18. BridgeDetroit, "2 more resign from Detroit reparations task force," bridgedetroit.com. Accessed July 2026.
  19. Detroit Reparations Task Force, "Report of Recommendations 2025" (558 pages), documentcloud.org. Accessed July 2026.
  20. BridgeDetroit, "Detroit task force delivers long-awaited reparations recommendations," Nov. 2025, bridgedetroit.com. Accessed July 2026.
  21. BridgeDetroit, "Detroit reparations report is in. Now what?," Dec. 2025, bridgedetroit.com. Accessed July 2026.
  22. St. Louis Public Radio, "St. Louis Reparations Commission recommends grants and policy reforms in final report," Oct. 15, 2024, stlpr.org. Accessed July 2026.
  23. City of St. Louis Reparations Commission, final report (124 pages), documentcloud.org. Accessed July 2026.
  24. St. Louis Public Radio, "St. Louis mayor says direct cash payouts for reparations would be unconstitutional," March 3, 2025, stlpr.org. Accessed July 2026.
  25. Ballotpedia, "Mayoral election in St. Louis, Missouri (2025)," ballotpedia.org. Accessed July 2026.
  26. The Boston Globe, "Boston's reports on possible reparations are set to be released this fall. Here's what we know now," June 17, 2026, bostonglobe.com. Accessed July 2026.
  27. KSTP 5 Eyewitness News, "St. Paul City Council establishes permanent reparations commission," Jan. 2023, kstp.com. Accessed July 2026.
  28. St. Paul Pioneer Press, "Process over $250,000 reparations study splits St. Paul's Black leaders," Nov. 11, 2025, twincities.com. Accessed July 2026.
  29. KCUR, "Kansas City's reparations commission has been working for 2 years, but there's a lot left to do," June 18, 2025, kcur.org. Accessed July 2026.
  30. Flatland KC, "KC Reparations Leaders Uncertain Work Will Lead to Action," flatlandkc.org. Accessed July 2026.
  31. MassLive, "Amherst Town Council paves way for $2 million reparations bank," June 28, 2022, masslive.com (archived). Accessed July 2026.
  32. GBH News, "Who should be eligible for reparations? That's the big question in Amherst," May 30, 2023, wgbh.org. Accessed July 2026.
  33. CBS News New York, "NYC Council passes bill to study reparations for slavery," 2024, cbsnews.com. Accessed July 2026.
  34. Capital B News, "Will Zohran Mamdani Make New York the First City to Confront Its Debt to Slavery?," capitalbnews.org. Accessed July 2026.
  35. Fox News, "Mamdani allocates $500K for reparations talks as NYC faces $5.4B deficit," May 2, 2026, foxnews.com. Accessed July 2026.
  36. ABC7 News (KGO), "San Francisco lawmakers vote to create reparations fund for Black residents without initial funding," Dec. 17, 2025, abc7news.com. Accessed July 2026.
  37. Associated Press, "San Francisco apologizes to Black residents for decades of racist policies," Feb. 2024, apnews.com. Accessed July 2026.
  38. The San Francisco Standard, "Ex-leader of Dream Keeper Initiative under criminal investigation, sources say," Aug. 25, 2025, sfstandard.com. Accessed July 2026.
  39. The Sacramento Observer (California Black Media), "'A Promise Kept': California Establishes First-in-the-Nation Reparations Agency," Oct. 12, 2025, theobserver.media. Accessed July 2026.
  40. Gothamist (Arun Venugopal), "NY officials, citing shifting politics, put off reparations study another 2 years," May 2026, gothamist.com. Accessed July 2026.
  41. NorthJersey.com (The Record), "Report lists reparations for NJ African Americans, including payments to slave descendants," June 27, 2025, northjersey.com (archived). Accessed July 2026.
  42. Maryland Matters (William J. Ford), "Legislature overrides Moore's veto, approves creation of reparations commission," Dec. 16, 2025, marylandmatters.org (archived). Accessed July 2026.
  43. Maryland Matters, "Moore to veto reparations bill, one of a list of measures he will reject," May 16, 2025, marylandmatters.org (archived). Accessed July 2026.
  44. The Colorado Sun, "Law requires historians to study toll of racism on Black Coloradans," June 19, 2024, coloradosun.com. Accessed July 2026.
  45. Vermont Truth and Reconciliation Commission (est. by Act 128), official site, vtrc.vermont.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  46. Massachusetts Legislature, "Bill S.1181: An Act establishing a commission to study reparations in Massachusetts" (194th General Court, bill history), malegislature.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  47. GovTrack, "H.R. 40 — 119th Congress: Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans Act" (prognosis: 1% chance of being enacted), govtrack.us. Accessed July 2026.
  48. City of Greenbelt, Md., "2021 Reparations Referendum" (passed Nov. 2, 2021, 1,522-910), greenbeltmd.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  49. Atlanta City Council, Ordinance 25-O-1204 (adopted May 5, 2025), amending the Community Reparations Commission ordinance and removing its sunset date, atlantacityga.iqm2.com. Accessed July 2026.
  50. The Boston Globe, "Where are Boston's reparations reports?" (June 17, 2026), bostonglobe.com; vote date per Boston Reparations Task Force minutes (Jan. 28, 2025), boston.gov (PDF). Accessed July 2026.
  51. The Boston Globe, "Providence reparations program will move forward under Smiley" (Nov. 2, 2023: "$273,430 — less than 3 percent — of the $10 million has been spent"), bostonglobe.com. Accessed July 2026.
  52. Maryland Senate Bill 476 (2026), first reader (proposing Sept. 1, 2028 preliminary and Dec. 1, 2028 final report deadlines), mgaleg.maryland.gov (PDF). Accessed July 2026.
  53. NYC Commission on Racial Equity, "Progress Update" on Local Laws 75/76 of 2024 (2026: "no other cities to our knowledge have designed these efforts to occur simultaneously"), PDF; the two laws at council.nyc.gov. Accessed July 2026.
  54. ABC News, "Asheville approves reparations for Black residents" (July 2020: "first municipal government in the south"), abcnews.go.com. Accessed July 2026.
  55. Human Rights Watch, "US: Groups Ask Biden to Create Commission to Study Reparations" (June 16, 2022), hrw.org. Accessed July 2026.
  56. Human Rights Watch, "'Why We Can't Wait' Coalition Statement on US Failure to Establish H.R. 40 / S. 40 Commission" (Aug. 23, 2022: "The failure of the administration of US President Joe Biden to establish a commission … by executive order"), hrw.org. Accessed July 2026.

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