Amherst Black Reparations Committee Elects Shabazz and Cage as Co-Chairs

Report on the meeting of the Amherst Black Reparations Committee, Nov. 12, 2026

This meeting was held over Zoom and was recorded.

Present
Committee members: Monica Cage, Sarah Crary, Andrew Grant-Thomas, Kelly Norris, Raphael Rogers, and Amilcar Shabazz. Staff: Paul Bockelman (town manager) and Philip Avila (assistant director of diversity, equity, and inclusion). Also present: Michele Miller (former co-chair, African Heritage Reparation Assembly)

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Members of the newly formed Amherst Black Reparations Committee (ABRC) held their first meeting to discuss the committee’s charge and elect leadership. After members introduced themselves, Amilcar Shabazz and Michele Miller, former co-chairs of the African Heritage Reparation Assembly (AHRA), gave a brief history of Amherst’s efforts to establish reparations for its Black community.

Rather than electing a chair and vice chair, the committee voted unanimously to name Shabazz and Monica Cage co-chairs.

A History of Reparations

Shabazz said one of the earliest instances of reparations to formerly enslaved people of African descent occurred in Massachusetts. Isaac Royall Jr. of Medford, a loyalist, fled to England at the start of the Revolutionary War, and the state confiscated his estate. Royall left a bequest to Harvard that helped establish its first law professorship, the forerunner of Harvard Law School. Belinda Sutton, a woman Royall had enslaved, petitioned the Massachusetts legislature in 1783 for compensation for her decades of enslavement. She was in her 70s when she was awarded a small annual pension from the estate, and she had to petition repeatedly to keep it paid.

Shabazz said that in recent years, reparations have received little attention nationally. In March 2026, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution declaring “the trafficking of enslaved Africans and racialized chattel enslavement of Africans as the greatest crime against humanity.” Only the United States, Israel, and Argentina voted against it, while most European countries and Australia abstained.

After the murder of George Floyd and the killings of other African Americans in 2020, Amherst residents petitioned the Town Council to create reparations for the town’s Black residents. The council’s discussions led to the establishment of a reparations stabilization fund and the AHRA.

Miller spoke about her role as a white member of the AHRA. She said she saw herself as a channel for listening to the harmed community. It was an unusual but important role, she said, one that required her not to discount anyone’s opinion, even when it made her sad or angry. She encouraged the new committee’s members to do the same as they build on the AHRA’s foundation and decide how to use the reparations money.

The AHRA submitted its final report in September 2023. The report recommended focusing reparations on youth empowerment, affordable housing, and business grants and entrepreneurial training. It also recommended creating the ABRC to carry out reparations in Amherst.

The Reparations Fund

Town Manager Paul Bockelman said the reparations stabilization fund now holds about $750,000, toward a goal of $2 million. The town has funded it each year with an amount equal to its estimated revenue from the local cannabis sales tax. That revenue has declined each year and is projected to be only about $48,000 this year. Bockelman said the ABRC may decide to request additional money for the fund.

Bockelman added that the town must take several legal steps before it can disburse money. Part of the committee’s work will be to establish a framework for how the money is used.

Andrew Grant-Thomas asked whether the ABRC’s job was to act on reparations locally or also to develop a model for other communities. Shabazz said Amherst could model reparations for other predominantly white communities in the North, especially nearby towns interested in reparations, such as Northampton. The ultimate goal, he said, is to advance a national conversation.

Several members said they hope to involve community volunteers in the committee’s work, especially students at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Amherst College.

Members of the ABRC

Bockelman appointed the committee’s members in a Sept. 29, 2026, memo, and the Town Council approved the appointments Oct. 5. One of the committee’s seven seats remains vacant.

The committee’s charge calls for seven voting members, some of whom should have experience in one or more of these areas:

• Affordable housing
• Climate action
• Economic development or entrepreneurship
• Recreation
• Youth empowerment
• Human rights
• Prior membership on the African Heritage Reparation Assembly

The members and their terms are:

• Three-year terms expiring June 30, 2029: Andrew Grant-Thomas of Merrick Circle and Amilcar Shabazz of Chapel Road.
• Two-year terms expiring June 30, 2028: Monica Cage of Longmeadow Drive and Raphael Rogers of Greenwich Road.
• One-year terms expiring June 30, 2027: Sarah Crary of Farview Way and Kelly Norris of Pine Grove.

Andrew Grant-Thomas is co-founder and co-director of EmbraceRace, a national nonprofit that provides resources, community spaces, and tools to help parents, educators, and caregivers talk openly with children about race and systemic racism. His main personal and professional commitment is to racial and social justice. He said he does not love politics, but that addressing structural racism, harm, repair, and redress is central to his work. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Yale University and a master’s degree and doctorate from the University of Chicago.

Amilcar Shabazz co-chaired the AHRA. He has served on the Amherst School Committee, the Regional School Committee, the School Equity Task Force, and the Town-Gown Steering Committee. He said anti-Black racism has been a powerfully negative force in his life, and as the father of three, he wants to make racism less of a factor in the lives of his children and other young people. He also wants to help the town repair harms caused by historical and ongoing inequities and injustices. He hopes to develop remedies in consultation with harmed community members and create a model that inspires other towns to act. Shabazz was a founding member of the National Coalition of Blacks for Reparations in America and has served on the National Council for Black Studies.

Monica Cage’s professional and community work has centered on advancing economic opportunity and empowering Black communities. She owns a business in Amherst and has experience in civic engagement and nonprofit leadership. She attended Crocker Farm Elementary School, Amherst Regional Middle and High schools, Hampshire College, and Greenfield Community College. She said it is important to bridge the generational divides that often arise in Amherst.

Raphael Rogers is a professor at Clark University, where he is affiliated with the Adam Institute for Urban Education and Community. He believes reparations can play a meaningful role in narrowing experiential, equity, and racial wealth gaps in the United States, and he wants to work locally to expand the experiences and opportunities available to Black people. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Clark University, a master’s degree from Northeastern University, and a doctorate in education from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. He also serves on the Jones Library’s Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI) Committee.

Sarah Crary is a longtime Amherst resident and a member of Hope Community Church, where she has been a small-group leader. She said reparations work is crucially important for everyone in the community, and that her experience raising a son in a biracial family brings an important perspective to the committee.

Kelly Norris is a high school English teacher whose teaching focuses on social justice. She is the author of the memoir “Too White: A Journey into the Racial Divide,” which traces her development of white identity through growing up in an isolated suburb, living in West Africa, and joining a community of anti-racist educators. She said she brings writing and communication skills to the committee, along with a willingness to listen and support the process.

Reparations Conference in Evanston in December

Shabazz said he and Cage will attend First Repair’s sixth annual National Symposium for State and Local Reparations in Evanston, Illinois, Dec. 2-4. He encouraged other members to attend and asked for town money to help cover Cage’s expenses. Bockelman said the town had no money budgeted for that, but he would check whether the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Department had funds left in its budget.

Shabazz said Charles Lewis and the Evanston-based Lewis-Sebring Family Foundation founded First Repair. Lewis graduated from Amherst College.