Dismantling individual, Ssructural and systemic discrimination, and racism at all levels of the community

BY PAUL JUNOR

Since the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis in 2019, many policymakers, social activists and change agents have sought ways to bring about racial and social justice.

On Monday, September 19^th, a press release announced that a relevant and overdue toolkit was prepared to address and tackle these longstanding and complex social issues.

The toolkit was prepared by the Anti-Black Racism & Systemic Discrimination Collective of Peel (ABR-SD), which grew out of the work of the Region of Peel’s Community Response, which was formed in 2019 at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.  Subsequently, about 25 agencies came together as well as other individuals in June 2020 in order to focus on addressing systemic racism, specifically anti-Black racism and systemic discrimination. There has been focused intensity of their work since 2020 when: Jamal Francique, D’Andre Campbell and Ejaz Choudry were killed by the police as well as the shooting death of Chantelle Krupka.

ABR-SD involves over 30 community organizations and individuals in the design of the toolkit. It is the cross-sectional collaboration of: community agencies, institutions, and individuals who are committed to dismantling systemic discrimination and eliminating all forms of racism from within respective organizations and the broader Peel community.

The mandate of ABR-SD is to provide a safe and open forum for discussion and advocacy that will lead to dismantling individual, structural and systemic discrimination, and racism at all levels of our community. There are five key areas that ABR-SD will target: healthcare, police, education, hate crimes and community practice, which focus on internal systems. The overall goals of ABR-SD include the following:

• dismantle discrimination
• advocate for underrepresented communities through pushing for change at the organizational and systemic level
• holding institutions responsible to their equity commitments

Angela Carter, co-chair of the ABR-SD states in the press release, “In developing this toolkit we are aware everyone is at a different stage in their equity work process. We believe that we can be stronger together if we join forces and commit to helping one another along this path. We encourage individuals and organizations to work through the toolkit in whichever order makes sense, and have conversations that will be instructive, productive and difficult at times, all within the context of learning and

growing together toward systemic change.”