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Selected Resources
Updated April, 2026
Printable Materials
CURC Draft Legislation (Summary)
CURC Draft Legislation (Complete)
IL ADCRC: Taking Account: A History of Racial Harm and Injustice Against Black Illinoisans
Other Organizations
Universities Studying Slavery Consortium
National African American Reparations Commission
Illinois Legislation
IL HB1227. A bill filed by Rep. Sonya M. Harper, Jan. 9, 2025. From the synopsis: "Creates the Enslavement Era Disclosure and Redress Act. Requires each contractor that participates in a competitive bid with the State to review its records for evidence of the contractor's or a related party's participation in slaveholding or the slave trade and to make certain disclosures with respect to that participation."
IL HB5486. A bill filed by Rep. Carol Ammons, Feb. 6, 2026. From the synopsis: "Creates the Office of Genealogical Affairs Study Committee Act. Provides that the Office of Genealogical Affairs Study Committee shall have the following duties: (1) to examine the feasibility, scope, and structure of a permanent Office of Genealogical Affairs within the State government; (2) to examine how an Office of Genealogical Affairs could operationalize reparative genealogical services; (3) to examine how an Office of Genealogical Affairs could support forensic and historical accountability efforts; and (4) to examine how an Office of Genealogical Affairs could support administrative genealogical determinations."
Local Research Sources
Andrews, Elizabeth A. “Douglass Community Center: Its History and Development and the Place of Its Program in the Community.” MA Thesis. University of Illinois, 1948. https://eblackcu.net/portal/archive/files/andrews_1945_eaf83cfab1.pdf
Dolinar, Brian. "Champaign Housing Authority Considers Demolishing Third Black Neighborhood.” The Public i. 8 Sept. 2012.
______. "Champaign Housing Authority Considers Demolishing a Third Black Neighborhood." The Public i, 24 Aug. 2012.
_____. "Soon to be displaced residents protest outside of housing authority." The Public i, 23 Aug. 2011.
______."Consent Decree 101: The Mis-education of Champaign's Black Students." The Public i. 25 Feb. 2007.
Champaign County Restrictive Covenant Project https://champaigncountyclerkil.gov/recorder-deeds/restrictive-covenant-project
The Doris Hoskins archives at the Museum of the Grand Prairie are valuable and a finding aid is here: https://eblackcu.net/portal/items/show/3
Oral history interviews can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/@MuseumoftheGrandPrairie/videos
More on the Hoskins Collection: https://www.museumofthegrandprairie.org/Explore/Collections
Some digitized resources from the Hoskins archive are available on eBlack CU: https://eblackcu.net/portal/items/browse?collection=1
Illinois Organizations
African Descent-Citizens Reparations Commission, State of Illinois
The African Kinship Reunion, "Bringing Together Families Separated by Historic Mass Human Trafficking from Africa."
as
First Repair, "Informing Local Reparations, Nationally." Resources page, including the US Reparations Movement Interactive Map.
United States
African American Redress Network. Provides advocacy tools, research, and capacity building to descendant communities in their efforts to secure racial justice and reparation initiatives.
H.R.40. A bill introduced by Rep. Shelia Jackson Lee, Jan. 4, 2021. From the summary: "This bill establishes the Commission to Study and Develop Reparation Proposals for African Americans. The commission shall examine slavery and discrimination in the colonies and the United States from 1619 to the present and recommend appropriate remedies."
Media
(some local)
"ADCRC Urbana Public Hearing." YouTube (4 videos), A public hearing on reparations hosted at the University of Illinois by The African Descent-Citizens Reparations Commission, with presentations by Carol Ammons, Naomi Simmons-Thorne, Terrance Thomas, Sundiata Cha-Jua, and Clinton Boyd, Jr., Oct. 4, 2025.
"California's Case for Reparations: An ABC7 Originals documentary." YouTube (46 mins.), ABC7 News Bay Area, 2025.
"Governor Newsom signs several bills to create a Slavery Reparations Agency in CA." YouTube (2 mins.), 23ABC (Bakersfield, CA), 2025.
Conover, Adam. “Adam Ruins Everything: The Disturbing History of the Suburbs.” YouTube (6 mins.), College Humor, TruTV, 2017?
“The Cost of Inheritance.” (55-min. video), America Reframed, PBS, 2024.
Darity, William "Sandy." "A blueprint for reparations in the US." YouTube (36 minutes), Ted Talks, 4 Aug. 2020.
"Explained: The Racial Wealth Gap." YouTube (16 mins.), Netflix, 2020.
Hanson, Peter. "Champaign Co. Board to discuss supporting reparations coalition." WCIA News. Includes 3-minute video, with interview of CURC President Jeffrey Trask. 22 Oct. 2025.
_____. "Reparations committee hosts public hearing event in Urbana." WCIA News. Includes 3-minute video, with coverage of a public hearing on reparations hosted by The African Descent-Citizens Reparations Commission at the University of Illinois. 4 Oct. 2025.
Hatfield, Christine, producer. "Evanston began issuing reparations years ago. So, what’s next for Illinois and America?" (audio, 50 mins.), The 21st Show, Featuring Robin Rue Simmons, Jeff Trask, Alvin Tillery, December 11, 2023.
Higher Ground, WEFT Radio: discussions on international and national reparations, (audio), featuring Siphiwe Baleka (at 1:03:23-1:31) and Kamm Howard (1:36-end), December 23, 2023.
"The History of Reparations." (14-min. video), Origin of Everything. PBS, 2020.
Hoffman, Chad. Executive Director Habitat for Humanity. "Social Work CEU presentation: Racial Equity and Housing in Champaign County." School of Social Work, U of Illinois webinar (53-min. video), media space Illinois, 2022.
Letson, Al, et al. "Forty Acres and a Lie." (audio, 3-part podcast), Reveal News, June 15, 2024.
"NY Reparations committee collecting input on reparations." YouTube (2 mins.), WGRZ-TV, 2025.
Ochuba, Anulika. “State Rep. Carol Ammons wants descendants of slaves in Illinois to have access to free DNA testing.” (1-min. radio segment, 500-word article), Illinois Public Media, February 28, 2024.
Office of the Chancellor, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. "A Home of Their Own." (15-min. video), media space Illinois, 2017.
Orenstein, Bruce and Chris L. Jenkins. “Shame of Chicago, Shame of the Nation.” 4-part documentary on racially segregated housing and its impact on the wealth gap. [free to watch], 2014.]
Sewell-Smith, Nicka. "A Monumental Discovery: The Trask 250 and their 10,000-Strong Legacy." Lecture at Amherst College about DNA research. YouTube (1 hr. 29 mins.), 2025.
"Slavery by Another Name." Explores the new forms of slavery after the Civil War. (1 hr. 24 mins. video), PBS, 2012.
Trask, Jeff. "How Reparations is Biblical, Beneficial and Best for Everyone." Presentation at 2025 Christian Community Development Association. 2025 (1 hour, 15 mins. long)
______. Presentation on reparations commission proposal to the Urbana Human Relations Commission. YouTube (29 mins; 1:36 to 30:30), December 17, 2024.
______. Interviews on various media sites in 2025:
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WDWS May 29 with Brian Barnhart on Penny for your Thoughts (audio)
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WILL May 30 recorded interview with Penny Bradford, Illinois Public Media (audio)
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WEFT June 29 with Verdell Jones (audio)
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New Memphis Dialogue June 13 interview “Addressing Reparations” with New Memphis Dialogue (video)
"https://www.pbs.org/video/the-truth-about-black-banks-and-the-racial-wealth-gap-via3fm/
"The Truth about Black Banks and the Racial Wealth Gap." (14-mins. video), In the Margins, PBS, 2024.
Who We Are Project. "Who We Are: A Chronicle of Racism in America." (118-min. video), 2022.
Publications
(some local)
Alexander, Michelle. The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Color Blindness. The New Press, 2010.
Anderson, Carol. White Rage: The Unspoken Truth of Our Racial Divide. Bloomsbury, 2016.
Barram, Michael, Drew G.I. Hart, Gimbiya Kettering and Michael J. Rhodes, eds. Reparations and the Theological Disciplines: Prophetic Voices for Remembrance, Reckoning, and Repair (Rowman & Littlefield, 2023).
Brown, Dorothy A. Getting to Reparations: How Building a Different America Requires a Reckoning with Our Past. Crown, 2026.
Burns, Michael S. 2013. The Rhetorics of Community Space: Critical Events in Champaign-Urbana's Black Freedom Movement Ph.D. dissertation, University of Illinois.
https://core.ac.uk/reader/17354700
“California Votes oppose cash reparations for slavery, poll finds.” All Things Considered/NPR (Sept. 11, 2023). https://www.npr.org/2023/09/11/1198805444/most-california-voters-oppose-cash-reparations-for-slavery-poll-finds
Cha-Jua, Sundiata. "Reparations: The Time has Come." News-Gazette. March 28, 2026.
Cha-Jua, Sundiata, M.F. Berry, and V.P. Franklin, eds. Reparations and Reparatory Justice: Past, Present, and Future. University of Illinois Press, 2024 ; Cha-Jua talking about the book:”Why is the reparations movement gaining momentum in the US?” (April 18, 2024) https://news.illinois.edu/view/6367/579962727
Charles, J. Brian, Mike Maciag, Daniel Vock. “Segregated in the Heartland: An Investigative Series.” Governing (January 14, 2019) https://www.governing.com/archive/gov-segregation-series.html
Chavez, Nicole. “Georgetown University and Jesuits Donate $27 Million…” CNN (September 14, 2023)
Chibelushi, Wedaeli and Thomas Naadi. "UN votes to recognise enslavement of Africans as 'gravest crime against humanity.'" BBC News, March 2026.
The Coalition to Dismantle the Doctrine of Discovery https://dofdmenno.org/
Coates, Ta-Nehisi, "The Case for Reparations," The Atlantic (June 2014) https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/06/the-case-for-reparations/361631/
Cobb, Deirdre Lynn. “Jim Crow Room & Board: The Experiences of African American
Students at UIUC 1945 to 1955.” MA thesis, 1997. https://eblackcu.net/portal/archive/files/jim-crow-room-and-board-1997_f040df85f7.pdf
Coming to the Table reparations guide can be accessed and downloaded here:
https://comingtothetable.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/CTTT-Reparations-Guide-July-2021.pdf ; Background on the Coming to the Table working group and additional resources can be found here: https://comingtothetable.org/reparations-working-group/
Darity, William and A. Kirsten Mullen. From Here to Equality. University of North Carolina Press, 2022.
https://uncpress.org/book/9781469671208/from-here-to-equality-second-edition/
Darity, William, A. Kirsten Mullen and Lucas Hubbard, editors. The Black Reparations Project: A Handbook for Racial Justice. University of California Press, 2023.
Davis, Allen J. "An Historical Timeline of Reparations Payments Made From 1783 through 2023 by the United States Government, States, Cities, Religious Institutions, Universities, Corporations, and Communities." https://guides.library.umass.edu/reparations
Fennell, Christopher. "Examining Structural Racism in the Jim Crow Era of Illinois." The Materiality of Freedom: Archaeologies of Post-Emancipation Life. Jodi Barnes, Editor. University of South Carolina Press, 2011, 173-189.
Franke, Carrie. "Injustice Sheltered: Race Relations at the University of Illinois and Champaign-Urbana, 1945-1962." Ph.D. dissertation, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, 1990.
Goza, Joel E. Rebirth of a Nation: Reparations and Remaking America. Eerdmans Publishing, 2024.
Howard, Kamm. Laying the Foundation for Local Reparations: A Guide for Providing National Symmetry for Local Reparation Efforts. Self-published, 2020.
Hunter, Marcus Anthony. Radical Reparations: Healing the Soul of a Nation. Amistad, 2024.
Kwon, Duke L. & Gregory Thompson. Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and Repair Brazos Press, 2021.
Lenstra, Noah, et al., Webliography of African-American Champaign-Urbana. CI Lab Note (July 2010).
Library of Congress. “Born in Slavery: Slave Narratives from the Federal Writers’ Project, 1936-38.”
Love, Bettina. Punished for Dreaming: How School Reforms Harms Black Children and How We Heal. St. Martin’s Press, 2023. Especially ch. 12, “A Call for Educational Reparations”
Meacham, Jon. And There Was Light: Abraham Lincoln and the American Struggle. Random House, 2022.
Mureithi, Carlos and Eromo Egbejule. "'History longs to heal': how Africa hopes to advance campaign for reparative justice." The Guardian, March 8, 2026.
“New York Launches Commission to Consider Racial Reparations” (December 19, 2023) https://news.yahoo.com/york-launches-commission-consider-racial-180719182.html
Patton, Carl Vernon. Urban Renewal and Negro Involvement (A Case Study of Negro
Politics in Champaign, Illinois). Thesis. U of Illinois, Spring 1968. https://eblackcu.net/portal/archive/files/patton_1968_6ccf928c04.pdf
Plaut, Martin. "Widening the reparations debate." The Round Table: The Commonwealth Journal of International Affairs and Policy Studies, May 2025.
Providence (RI) Municipal Reparations Commission. Report. (August 2022). https://www.providenceri.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/ReparationsRecommendationsReport_FINAL.pdf
"Racial Equity and Housing in Champaign County." Informational flier created by the CU Reparations Coalition, Fall 2024.
Reparations Narrative Lab. There Are New Suns: Building a Transformative Narrative for the Black Reparations Movement (2023).
https://www.reparationsnarrativelab.org/report
Reparations United. Slavery Disclosure and Redress Ordinance Toolkit. (2024?). https://reparationsunited.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Reparation-Toolkit.pdf
Shah, Disant. "The Long Shadow of Slavery: Who Owes an Apology and Who Owes Reparations?" Africa Unfiltered, Substack, March 26, 2026.
Smith, Clint. How the Word is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America. Little Brown, 2021.
Spielman, Fran. "Chicago takes another baby step toward reparations." Chicago Sun Times. March 24, 2026.
Stack, Carol. All Our Kin: Strategies for Survival in a Black Community. 1975. Basic Books reprint, 1983.
Táíwò, Olúfẹ́mi O. Reconsidering Reparations. Oxford University Press, 2022.
Trask, Jeff. "The Case for Reparations: Champaign County." The Public i, April 2024.
Turner, Robert. Creating a Culture of Repair. John Knox Press, 2024.
Washington, Jessica. "The Root's Guide to Reparations in the United States" (Updated July 8, 2023) https://www.theroot.com/a-guide-to-reparations-payouts-and-promises-in-america-1850520354
Urbana, City of. A RESOLUTION COMMITTING TO ENDING STRUCTURAL RACISM AND ACHIEVE RACIAL EQUITY (2021)
Wilkerson, Isabel. Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents. Random House, 2020.
_______. The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration. Vintage, 2010.
LINKS TO LOCAL ARCHIVES + PROJECTS
Coming soon!