CLEVELAND, Ohio- Community activists, academicians and officials of the OHIO ACLU will host an open-to-the public town hall meeting on police brutality, racism, equity for women and police reform on Saturday, January 24 from 1 pm to 4 pm at the Cleveland Public Library Martin Luther King Jr. Branch, 1962 Stokes Boulevard. A large crowd is expected and speakers include family members of police brutality victims, a women's panel, Ohio ACLU representatives, youth affiliates, and community activists.
Light refreshments will be served and the media are invited beginning at 2 pm.
The event comes on the heels of findings by the U.S. Department of Justice of systemic problems in the largely White Cleveland Police Department, and the Cleveland police shooting death last year of 12-year-old Tamir Rice, who was gunned down at a public park for sporting a toy pellet gun.
Other high profile police killings include Tanisha Anderson,Daniel Ficker, and rapper Kenneth Smith.
The contact for the event, which is sponsored by the Greater Cleveland Civil and Human Rights Coalition, is Don Bryant at (216) 772-6788
Organizers said that the group is "responding to racism, police violence and systemic injustice."
"Everyone is invited," said Julia Shearson, executive director of the Cleveland Chapter of CAIR-Ohio.
Other speakers include a women's panel of Dr. Rhonda Williams, associate professor of history at Case Western University, Norma Jean Freeman of the Social Justice Committee , Shakyra Diaz, who is an Ohio ACLU policy manager, Kathy Wray Coleman of the Imperial Women Coalition and Cleveland Urban News.Com, Genevieve Mitchell of the Carl Stokes Brigade, Jessica Lewis of Hollaback Cleveland, and Lizzard of #CleDemands, who represents an activists youth group.
The Greater Cleveland Civil and Human Rights Coalition was formed in Cleveland through the help of the Bill of Rights Defense Committee (www.bordc.org) in 2011, and under the leadership of George Friday, a national community organizer.
The purpose of the coalition is to help unite diverse communities to build power for social justice and human equality, organizers said.
The coalition has been focused on racial profiling, the criminalizing of communities of color, and other systemic injustices.
