Guest Opinion | Justin Jones: Acknowledge the Past

The first member of my family, Seaborn Carr, arrived in Pasadena from Georgia in 1893 when there were less than 9,000 Pasadena residents.

Pasadena is a wonderful place to live, and I am proud to represent our City’s most diverse Council District. However, my family bore witness to the fact that over the last 130 years, the City of Pasadena and some of its still existing civic groups actively participated, supported, and endorsed efforts to racially segregate and discriminate against people of color in Pasadena.

It’s past time for Pasadena, as represented by its City Council, to acknowledge this history in a way that advances the truth of what has occurred and advances the cause of reconciliation.

I have requested the City Manager place an agenda item before the City Council to discuss our city’s historical acts of racial segregation and discrimination.  My goal is to join my colleagues in formulating current recommendations that address these historical wrongs, including, but not limited to, the removal of selected portraits and honorifics in City Hall of the advocates for racial segregation and publicly acknowledging and apologizing to the descendants of BIPOC for the exclusion from the city-owned swimming pool. The actions that supplemented these wrongs were both dehumanizing and humiliating. 

Many of these past illegal actions caused long-lasting financial and economic harm to people of color. Pasadena politicians, lawyers, and civic groups corruptly acted together to violate the constitutional rights of thousands of families by preventing them from buying homes in Pasadena through the use of racial covenants on deeds.  Many of the homes they did manage to own were destroyed to build the freeway. My family was forced to sell their home to make way for the freeway. It’s one of the reasons I fervently pushed for descendants of the folks who were forced out of their homes for the construction of the 710 and 210 to be included on the Reconnecting Communities 710 Advisory Group.

In 1902, my family started Pasadena’s first black-owned newspaper (“The Enterprise”).  We actively resisted racial segregation and discrimination and supported strategies like civil disobedience, nonviolent resistance, protests, and using the power of the courts to legally challenge the City of Pasadena’s policy of racial segregation.  More than 80 years ago, my great-grandmother donated to the lawsuit fighting against the City of Pasadena’s efforts to maintain and defend racial segregation and was in the courtroom during the trial as the then City Attorney attempted to justify the City’s policy of racial segregation.

It is our duty as the governing body of this city to acknowledge and work diligently to repair past harms.

I am hopeful that as my colleagues and I explore the truth of our community’s shared history, we can also demonstrate that there were many  individuals and families of all colors, often ignored and overlooked by the media at the time, that pursued the battle for equal rights here in Pasadena.

These local heroes need to be celebrated and honored.

Justin Jones is the District 3 City Councilmember.