Introduced Version
House Concurrent Resolution 25 History
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HOUSE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION NO. 25
(By Delegates Webste
r, Manuel, and Schoen
)
[Introduced February 9, 2004; referred to the
Committee on Rules.]
Requesting the three branches of state government to cooperate and
encourage leaders of the state, county and municipal
governments to identify and affirmatively address the racial
disparities in the areas of civil rights, health, education,
housing, social issues, employment, economic development and
criminal and juvenile justice systems in West Virginia in the
interest of equality.
Whereas, House Concurrent Resolution 76, passed by the West
Virginia Legislature in 2002, recognizes and outlines a number of
employment, social, health, educational, criminal justice and
economic problems confronting African Americans and their
communities in this state; and
Whereas, Select Committee B on Minority Issues was created by
the Joint Committee on Government and Finance as part of the 2003
legislative interims to consider HCR 76 and to study and make
recommendations and offer solutions to address problems identified
in HCR 76; and
Whereas, According to the 2000 Census, African Americans
comprise approximately 3.2% of the state's population and more than 5% of the population in seven counties; and
Whereas, The West Virginia Legislature should be committed to
connecting communities, exploring strategies for racial and social
equality and taking proactive steps to remedy the effects of past
discrimination on African American children, adults and families;
and
Whereas, Prevention of discrimination in civil rights, the
justice system, education, health care, economic development,
employment, business development, housing, community and family
services is preferable to attempting to remedy the consequences of
discrimination; and
Whereas, There is a wide disparity between African American and
Caucasian public school students in West Virginia with regard to
standardized testing scores, indicating a significant achievement
gap which widens with tragic consequences for a number of African
American students as they progress in school; and
Whereas, On the 2003 ACT college entrance examination, which is
used by the Promise scholarship program to determine eligibility
for college scholarships, African American students' success rate
was significantly lower than that of Caucasian students; and
Whereas, African American children have been over represented
in special education programs in schools in Kanawha County, the
only area of the state for which statistics were provided to the
Committee, and under represented in advanced education programs and programs for performing or gifted students, but the Kanawha County
Board of Education has established programs better to identify and
include all qualified students, without regard to race, in special
programs to enhance performance and to address the academic
achievement gap between African American and Caucasian children at
early stages of the public education process; and
Whereas, The percentage of African American teachers and
educational professionals in many of the state's public schools is
disproportionately lower than the African American student
population, to some degree depriving minority students of important
African American role models and advocates in educational settings;
and
Whereas, Training assistance and education programs with
affirmative outreach to African Americans combine to help prevent
racial discrimination; and
Whereas, African Americans in West Virginia experience a
disproportionately higher incidence of health risk and mortality
from cancer, diabetes, hypertension, heart disease and HIV;
African American women tend to be diagnosed with breast cancer at
later stages than Caucasian women; and the teen birth rate and the
infant mortality rate among African Americans is twice that of
Caucasians; and
Whereas, The percentage of African American children in the
care and/or custody of the Bureau of Children and Families in 2003 was more than twice the percentage of African Americans in the
general West Virginia population; and
Whereas, Business ownership among African Americans in
Charleston, West Virginia, the only area of the state for which
statistics were provided to the Committee, is proportionately less
than minority business ownership nationwide; and
Whereas, The unemployment rate of African Americans recently
has been about twice the unemployment rate for Caucasians and
significantly higher in some counties with a greater concentration
of African American population; and
Whereas, Statistics provided by the State Equal Employment
Opportunity Office indicate that the percentage of minority
employees among the full-time state government employees under the
control of the Department of Administration is approximately the
same as the percentage of African Americans in the state's
population as a whole; and
Whereas, The West Virginia Advisory Committee to the United
States Commission on Civil Rights has found continuing reports of
racial discrimination in hiring, tension between law enforcement
officers and African American citizens, and hate crimes and
violence against minorities, including reported incidents of
harassment of racial and ethnic minorities in schools; and
Whereas, The West Virginia Human Rights Commission reports that
two-thirds of the hate crimes reported between 1992 and 2000 were racially motivated; and
Whereas, The West Virginia Legislative Auditor's Performance
Evaluation and Research Division (PERD) reports there is a scarcity
of minority and female state troopers, especially in upper ranks,
with only 16 (2.6%) of 606 troopers being female and only 3 (1.3%)
of 606 troopers being African American; that the percentages of
female and African American officers in county sheriff's
departments are even lower; and that the state's 10 largest cities
employ, on average, only 4.6% female officers and 3.9% African
American officers, even though most of those cities have
significantly greater populations of African Americans; and
Whereas, The West Virginia State Police have voluntarily sought
to determine and monitor their own efforts relating to racial
profiling sensitivity during routine traffic stops; and
Whereas, According to data voluntarily collected and provided
by the West Virginia State Police, between October 2002 and March
2003, motor vehicles operated by minority drivers were stopped by
state troopers at a rate roughly comparable to the percentage of
minorities in the general state population. After being stopped,
63% of minority drivers were ticketed or arrested, compared to 51%
of Caucasian drivers, and warnings were issued to 37% of all
minority drivers, compared to 49% of Caucasian drivers; and
Whereas, West Virginia enjoys both a low juvenile crime rate
and one of the nation's lowest juvenile detention rates, yet the percentage of minority youth in the West Virginia juvenile justice
system exceeds the national rates of minority youths in the
juvenile justice system; and
Whereas, In West Virginia, African Americans make up only 3.2%
of the general population, but account for one third (1/3) of the
adult prison population, one fifth (1/5) of the juveniles placed in
detention and admitted to correctional facilities, and over one
half (½) of the juveniles transferred to adult jurisdiction for
major felonies; and
Whereas, There is a great and immediate need for comprehensive
data collection and analysis on a multi-year basis and for
continuing examination and review of solutions with regard to
racial disparities in the areas of civil rights, health, education,
housing, social issues, employment, economic development and
criminal and juvenile justice systems; therefore, be it
Resolved by the Legislature of West Virginia:
That the three branches of state government should cooperate
and encourage leaders of the state to identify and affirmatively
address the racial disparities in the areas of civil rights,
health, education, housing, social issues, employment, economic
development and criminal and juvenile justice systems; and, be it
Further Resolved, That county boards of education should be
encouraged to recruit aggressively minority teachers and other
professionals to work in the public school system; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Department of Education and county
boards of education be given greater flexibility to employ teachers
who are trained or experienced in working with African American
children and parents; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature should provide funding
for professional development to improve teachers' effectiveness
with African American students and parents; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature should provide more
funding for academic enrichment programs in locations where there
are concentrations of poor and minority students, including more
early pre-school programs and after-school programs; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Department of Health and Human
Resources should increase access to education in welfare-to-work
programs and evaluate placement and referral policies; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Governor continue the mission of
the Governor's Minority Students' Strategies Council to collect and
analyze information from other states and organizations regarding
effective policies and strategies for closing the academic
achievement gap between Caucasian and minority students and to
prepare an annual report for the Governor, the State Board of
Education, the Higher Education Policy Commission, the Legislative
Oversight Commission on Educational Accountability and the public,
outlining issues, recommendations, and strategies to close the
academic achievement gap; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Department of Education be required
to review its Policy No. 2421, 126 CSR 18, (1996), governing peer
harassment and violence against minority students, to study the
extent to which the Policy has been implemented in public schools
throughout the state and to take necessary steps to insure complete
implementation of the Policy in all public schools as soon as
reasonably possible; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Department of Education and county
boards of education themselves, with the input of the local
communities, should provide hate crime prevention and response
programs in schools and anti-bias training and education for
students and teachers, including mechanisms to insure harassment is
reported before problems escalate and that there are appropriate
responses to incidents of harassment when they do occur; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature should direct resources
to support community-level partnership and innovation to address
racial and ethnic disparities in health care; and, be it
Further Resolved, That all governmental agencies, institutions
and corporate bodies at state and local levels should be encouraged
to regularly collect, analyze and report to the Department of
Administration data relating to racial disparities among children,
adults and families in West Virginia; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Department of Administration should
review and, if necessary, establish or reform state procurement policies and practices to assure that they meet federal and state
requirements and that they effectively encourage meaningful
participation of African Americans and other minorities in the
process of competing for and awarding of state contracts for goods
and services; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the State should continue to support
and expand small business incubator programs like the one in place
at Bluefield State College to encourage new and minority small
business development; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the State should undertake initiatives
to encourage African American business ownership similar to those
efforts used to encourage greater rates of business ownership among
women; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the State should assist community and
economic development corporations to provide effective technical
and business advisory services to minority-owned and -operated
enterprises; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Governor and the Legislature should
encourage industry, banks and other private businesses to hire
African Americans and to encourage businesses to be more aggressive
in establishing diversity-conscious practices as employers and for
their operations; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the State should encourage traditional
and nontraditional lending institutions to be more creative and favorable to lending in minority communities and to minority
persons, especially for business enterprises; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature should encourage small
business start-up and expansion and provide funding to assist
African American and other minority vendors to meet bid bonding
requirements; and, be it
Further Resolved, That workforce investment boards should be
accountable for educating poor and minority persons for jobs better
than low-paying service jobs; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the West Virginia State Police and
local law enforcement officers should be trained and required to
collect data regarding stops of motor vehicle operators which
affect all persons' precious right of privacy in their motor
vehicles, which data should include information on the stops and
arrests of African Americans; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the West Virginia State Police and
local law enforcement agencies be required to provide diversity
training for officers, including training to recognize and report
hate crimes; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the West Virginia State Police be
required to develop, in writing, goals for increasing the number of
women and African American for all grades of officers and staff and
to report annually as to its efforts and success in meeting those
goals, and be encouraged to employ African American and other minority persons as recruiting officers; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature, the Governor and the
Supreme Court should increase support for criminal justice research
and for the development, maintenance and continued assessment of
data related to the effectiveness of the court system in the areas
of criminal sentencing, juvenile adjudication, and community-based
corrections; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature should protect and
maintain the confidentiality of juvenile records pending a study on
the adverse impact of the release of such records on the employment
and higher education opportunities of minority youth; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the West Virginia Supreme Court of
Appeals should continue to study issues related to minority youth,
including the highly disproportionate number of minority youth
transferred from juvenile to adult jurisdiction in the criminal
justice system, through its Task Force to Study Perceived Racial
Disparity in the Juvenile Justice System and to study and develop
similar research projects with data collection in regard to adult
offenders; and, be it
Further Resolved, That state agencies should study racial
disparities in a number of areas to reduce gaps in educational
achievement and in the over representation of African Americans in
adult prisons and juvenile facilities and encourage all
participants in the educational and justice systems, including teachers, principals, and other educational personnel, probation
officers, juvenile referees, judges, justices, prosecutors,
attorneys, law enforcement officers, detention and correctional
officers, caseworkers, social service providers, agency staff, and
members of the community, to join in the study and development of
policies and programs to address racial disparities; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature, the Governor and the
Supreme Court should take immediate steps to develop, implement and
fund a collaborative and comprehensive community-based plan to
study and correct over representation of minority children and
adults in the state's criminal and juvenile justice systems, with
particular attention to prevention of juvenile crime through
mentoring, diversion, recidivism-reduction strategies, in-school
and after-school programs, entrepreneurial education, job training
and placement alternatives, community-based sentencing for non-
violent offenders, and transition and reentry programs for
offenders upon completion of their sentences; and, be it
Further Resolved, That state agencies and the Legislature
should be encouraged to propose specific legislative proposals
where appropriate to facilitate these recommendations; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Legislature should continue to
study racial disparity issues in 2004; and, be it
Further Resolved, That the Clerk of the Senate is hereby
directed to forward a copy of this resolution to the Governor of West Virginia, the Justices of the West Virginia Supreme Court of
Appeals, the President of the West Virginia Senate and the Speaker
of the West Virginia House of Delegates.