Letter To The Editor: Equity Task Force Cannot Be 'In Name Only'

To the editor:

Black and brown people — women and too many marginalized groups — have been told they don’t belong in rooms where decisions are made for far too long.

Some of the points of view represented in this Patch article are not true and misrepresent what has transpired with our town’s Racial Equity and Justice Task Force.

The administration established the Task Force as an acknowledgment of — and a necessary response to — systemic racism in our town. However, the difficult work of looking in a transparent and honest way at implicit and explicit bias requires an ongoing and real commitment to the work; it can be (at times) uncomfortable and disruptive. This is the point.

Having a task force on racial equity and justice in name only is not enough.

This Task Force must be allowed to enter rooms where decisions are made, not to directly influence decisions, but to listen and learn how our town’s governance can be more inclusive, more equitable and more just. Our ask for transparency (deemed inappropriate, meddling and an attempt to interfere) was about the hiring process, not the specific people being hired. Period. To state otherwise is a distortion of the truth.

I want to state unequivocally and emphatically that I personally couldn’t be more proud of the choice of our new chief of police — a point of view expressed by some of my colleagues on the Task Force. For the short time I’ve known Bob Kalamaras, he has proven to be fair, open, decent and dedicated to the well-being and safety of our community. Further, I was impressed with all of the candidates’ breadth of training, talent, passion and commitment to Fairfield. I’m certain any one of the candidates would have handled the job with aplomb.

There's so much to be proud of and celebrate in our police department and its leadership, including their commitment to the work of racial equity and justice; both the outgoing and the incoming chiefs have been working tirelessly and constructively on the issue, knowing how critical it is to the overall well-being, health and safety of our entire community.

In light of this, it's all the more disappointing that the administration is not rising to the inherent challenges of combating racism and injustice and is obstructing some of the necessary inquiry required to fully examine existing policies and procedures that may perpetuate a racist status quo.

By not allowing the Task Force to ask necessary questions, by not allowing for transparency, the town will not be able to find actual solutions for improving and modernizing town government through a lens of racial equality and justice. Or maybe that's the point?

The Task Force’s request to learn from our current hiring process of a new chief of police has been met with legal and political obfuscation. We were told we were inserting ourselves where we don’t belong. Ironically — and sadly — this is exactly the message the Task Force was established to address.

It just may be that the good and necessary trouble required here is not as welcome as so many of our town had hoped.

Very sincerely,

Nancy Lefkowitz

Co-Chair, Racial Equity and Justice Task Force