The HRC votes overwhelmingly to recommend further actions to protect marginalized groups
By SUNNY LIU — city@theaggie.org
On April 26, the Human Relations Commission (HRC) met to discuss recent hate incidents and a three-month-long research report on discrimination against Muslims, Arabs, Palestinians and their Allies (MAPA).
The commission first discussed a troubling rise in hate incidents in the Davis Joint Unified School District. Vice Chair Leonie Pickett informed the group of one recent hate incident in a local Davis high school.
“There was an incident with a swastika drawn somewhere in Da Vinci High School,” Pickett said. “I know, there, it’s being investigated as hate speech as the school always would, and I don’t think we’ve quite figured out the details of it yet, but it’s a hate incident.”
One resident who identified herself as a teacher at North Davis Elementary School described the situation in the school district further.
“We’ve had several incidents this year,” the public commenter said. “I think the most recent was the swastika and the n-word in an elementary school bathroom, but it’s pretty regular. […] Some of the students have kind of just stopped reporting to us. I found out recently, because there’s just a lot of racism, antisemitism and sexism. […] And that’s my main concern, just that our young people are kind of swimming in this right now and I don’t think most adults are aware.”
Following the discussion on rising hate incidents in Davis schools, the majority of the time in the meeting was devoted to discussing the MAPA Report and the commission’s list of recommendations. The previous meeting held on April 2 presented the report’s findings. The meeting on April 26 was intended to address only the commission’s recommendations to the Davis City Council.
Commission Member Ellie Kaplan provided some background on the research.
“These recommendations are coming out of three months of research [and] many, many conversations with Muslims, Arabs, Palestinians and allies within Davis,” Kaplan said. “We primarily took a qualitative approach for this. We really wanted this to be an opportunity for people to share their experiences, their thoughts [and] their feelings in a safe way. One of the things that came up is that there [are] enormous risks in speaking out for many members of this community.”
A Davis resident provided a comment to the commission and expressed their support for the initiative.
“I wanted to urge that the MAPA Report and recommendations be sent on promptly to the city council,” one public commenter said. “I wholeheartedly agree with the recommendations. Institutional acknowledgement of the hurt and distrust in the community is the beginning step towards healing and building a healthier community. […] I think that honestly recognizing that speech in favor of Palestinian justice is not antisemitic is important.”
Another supporter of the project thanked the commission for their work in highlighting the struggles faced by the MAPA community.
“I want to start by thanking the subcommittee for performing such a complete survey of the MAPA community and presenting your findings in such a clear and effective manner,” the commenter said. “This survey was so necessary because our community often doesn’t talk about hate speech or incidents, or it’s so common that it doesn’t even register anymore as something new.”
The commenter continued by describing specific incidents and their relevance.
“I have youth in the community who just casually mention stories of other kids calling them terrorists and saying racist, Islamophobic comments, and I’m hearing them in shock while they say, ‘Oh, it’s fine, I just play it off,’” the commenter said. “We don’t want our kids thinking it’s normal for others to call them these things, and as was mentioned earlier, these comments are a reflection of what their classmates hear at home. And that comes back to this survey and the recommendations. It’s an actual opportunity to make change in the community.”
Despite the broad support for the recommendations from those attending the meeting, other Davis residents voiced their apprehension with the MAPA study itself. One commenter who was reading off a mobile device claimed to speak for David Siegle, a professor emeritus of medicine at UC Davis.
“Islamophobia and anti-Arab sentiment are serious issues in the [United States] and worldwide,” the commenter said. “That said, the Davis Human Relations Commission’s meeting on April 2, last month, did little to advance knowledge of or combat these problems. Rather, they presented a 45-minute biased report. […] The report obstructed a deeper understanding of these concerns by making numerous false charges, promoting conflict and weaponizing Islamophobia and anti-Arab sentiment.”
The commenter continued by describing their perspective of the meeting.
“At the April 2 meeting, HRC members read long quotes from interviews, [interviewees] who supposedly represented a crop-section of the MAPA groups in Davis,” the commenter said. “It was quickly apparent that the quoted individuals were not randomly selected but were purposefully picked to spread carefully chosen political themes and falsehoods.”
Another public commenter further questioned the scientific rigor of the methods used to create the report.
“It is interesting to note that much of the report doesn’t actually include evidence or examples,” the commenter said. “Without clear examples and evidence, I worry that this report also serves to slander and libel community members. The Congregation Bet Haverim Counter Antisemitism Committee put on a presentation that is mentioned in the report. Three different people called it Islamophobic and anti-Arab, yet, somehow, none of these people provided specific examples.”
The commenter furthered describing their perspective.
“So, how do we know it isn’t just slander? How do we know that it isn’t just weaponization to silence Jews talking about antisemitism?” the commenter said. “It makes me wonder, are you, the Human Relations Committee, putting Jews in danger? I don’t have any issues with any of your recommendations, but bad data in makes bad policy out.”
One public commenter spoke out in favor of the report by pointing out that the report’s findings and efforts to combat antisemitism are not mutually exclusive.
“Hate is not a limited pie, it’s extremely expansive,” the public commenter said. “The good thing is, justice is also expansive. Justice for one group does not take away from justice for another group. And I think that’s what is being impressed here today, is to give justice, to give voice, to give legitimacy to the experience of the Arab, Muslim and Palestinian community. That does not take away [from] the need to give justice to other groups in this community who also feel hate.”
In discussing the merits of sending the report to the city council in addition to the recommendations of the HRC, Commission Member Deema Tamini addressed some of the comments.
“You might not like what the report says,” Tamini said. “You might not agree with what people feel, but this is what people feel. […] We did qualitative work where we actually talked to people. We gathered information. A lot, because this community is very scared to speak up. So there’s that, but there’s also just low numbers in this community, so we did not do quantitative [analysis]. We have shown that through this qualitative analysis, this is the sentiment of a group of people, whether that’s two people or a thousand people, that’s the sentiment. I think that the context is needed, but what we are not asking the city council to do is bless this report.”
Commission Member Edgar Wong-Chen also spoke out about the need to take action despite concerns with the MAPA Report.
“What I also realized was that there [were] a lot of people surveyed, and in my honest opinion, I don’t need a critical mass of people,” Wong-Chen said. “I just need a few good examples. We’ve had people who have come to HRC meetings, a single individual who […] brought up an issue, and we’ve taken it on, and we’ve formed subcommittees from a single person representing a single topic that they felt marginalized [on].”
Ultimately, the motion to move forward with the list of recommendations to the city council passed with a large majority. The sole dissenting vote was Commission Member Amir Kol, who then requested to include his dissenting opinion with the packet to be sent to the city council. His subsequent motion was not seconded. After the meeting, Kol explained his reasoning for voting against the motion to move forward with the recommendations.
“The report is not transparent, the methods are completely not transparent and biased and the recommendations are based on a report [where] the methods are flawed,” Amir said. “This report is not gonna heal anything in this community, just as we see again and again, it just deepens that divide, because it’s not about healing one community. It’s by definition, healing one community at the expense of another. Pointing fingers at another community. […] The Jewish community has lost its trust in [Davis] City Council, and the commission as a body that can represent us and care for us and have our needs and interests in mind.”
The Davis HRC meets on the fourth Thursday of each month at 6:30 p.m. The meetings can be attended in person at the Community Chambers at City Hall or viewed online at the city of Davis YouTube page. The MAPA Report and recommendations can be found online at the city of Davis website.
Written By: Sunny Liu — city@theaggie.org
