efforts where their hearts are i'd like to introduce to my right the t c f ragout and she is chair of the civil rights commission for princeton and was  formerly vice chair of the princeton human services commission she has a lot to share with us sitting next to her is tommy parker he's vice chair since princeton civil commission and both of them want to see something good happen or many good things happen but what do you think about that which sounds wonderful and thank you for having us my pleasure so ok give us a little backstory on the civil rights commission if it did exist at a certain point in history and then it didn't and now it's back again so let's go back to the beginning so just to give you some background both tommy and i when we served on t langford to do some research and then to come back with our recommendations and so we formed a committee there was a committee of four worth barbara five commissioners so the others were aside from tommy and myself was elizabeth bit well bates larry spiral and john howard and homer so the five of us did some research we interviewed individuals in the community stakeholders who had served on original commission and also other elected officials into the background when the commission first this was established and what happened along the way  so in our research what we found was that the original it was the joint commission on civil rights was established first in one thousand nine hundred sixty eight and this was following the assassination of martin luther king junior then again and one nine hundred ninety two both the borough and the council reaffirmed their commitment to civil rights and  the civil rights commission and this was following the rockne king riots there was about to ask what's with the event or event that would have yes ok so and this is what we have may be coincidental that that tends to be reactionary to what's going on at the time and what's going on in the in the community or in the nation lot of community dialogue about various concerns so we did a lot to go to to let folks know that yes we're still here you have an advocate you know for your concerns in the area of civil rights  well maybe not intentionally so but it has evolved it evolved and it worked very well as far as what the under the human services department what the committee would do they would that for that reason that's why our committee when we study the different bodies whether it was in the pendant or in west london the another department  how it would best serve the community and that's why eventually our committee recommended a stand alone that we reestablish a stand alone commission and you think things changed to remember when was it two thousand and eight that we go on with our research we found that it was not a lot longer act that it was never formally this than there right there was during kind of restructuring again to see how things fit into the overall process i think there was always kind of encouragement absolutely you know thus the reason for the study and research there was always encourage me to the importance of the civil rights commission slash committee and now back to commission and basically kind of building on  thought was the absolute number one issue to get done and then a community of this size and the you know the kind of spirit in which they they brought to this process the leadership at the was under the arm it so when there was a standalone commission because the commission had to do annual annual report submit annual reports to council and i know at the last one that that we look that there were some eighty some complaints that were filed and address that that year now when we looked at the most current one under when it was under the apartment we all  believe when it was still active and i think it would be safe to say that it wasn't because suddenly there was a drop in incidents yes that would be a question what would explain the change in the statistic good good go one way or the other couldn't it right so just personally i feel that it was because it was more when i was stand alone it's more visual more press and people know exactly where to go if they have a concern i say there's more outreach and education and when i was under another department not that it was an active but it wasn't as visible  and so is so that individuals would know where to go where to turn to if they have an issue or a concern that type of complaints that we saw that have been address a lot local merchants and all saw complaints related to police and community relations ok and you give some examples of what the complaints were and tommy actually he served cross from from a civil issue into into a civil rights issue so we would have dialogue about opportunities in trying to direct him to various agencies you know that they could pleasantly surprised that we would come and this is sand a little bit because this is not the kind of image that he wanted for store so consequently not only did he deal with the immediate individual issue he went about instituting it with our help training program for his staff in you know about it not only you know customer engagement but also being being conscious of considered biases is  not what he would want and i and i you know like i said when we reached out to him in in this conflict resolution process he was absolutely more than willing to sit out which also  of the first dialogues in fact the first dialogue that we did from come from the commission in a study circle form it was about police community relations and the police were our our first partners that they created a number of dialogues because part of the charge being that the community members their police partners would start these dialogues this would expand to other groups and got folks talk and i think i think you know ironically you know it did impact not not only the lack of visibility but some of the changes came about impacted where we would get  again you know i mean we had gotten so good with this this process that some of the surrounding communities reached out to our director at the time in and we went out and showed said unconscious bias in all areas whether it's and how seeing whether it's public accommodations whether it's sad at the schools police community say for example in housing someone's late with their rent and immediately they are issued eviction notice where someone else they my may because they have discretion what we want in this for individuals who feel a lot of it might be just perception but if that person there the individual has a perception and they feel that they've been discriminated against that can be very demoralizing and that's what we want to be able to have conversations and dialogues about for people to understand that you may not be intentionally discriminating but this is this is how that person feels when you do this and let me give you one really good example from personal experience because it's happened more than once where i go into a shop and i asked to see know that's telling me oh this person thinks i can afford it and it could be the color of my skin now i may be overly sensitive but it's happened so often have you ever questioned them what that why do they think you couldn't for them you know individuals to really for us to be able to understand each other to you know when you say this this is how i feel including you know if somebody might just be making friendly conversation for example when i first moved to princeton i remember meeting one of my neighbors and and you know i shared information i'm originally from mexico and they said oh my son has a mate who is mexican and they may be just making friendly conversation but but for me you know i'm sorry say the economic system we're at work here and yeah they didn't say my best friend is from mexico or yeah or the other hand some of my best friends are their support are right at the end there i obviously have our support in the mission this kind of laid out not only by my orders but you know it's just like it was just a wonderful process disc you know been revitalized and are all new up point east by the mayor and council and we started out when we had a group of students really great group of students very very vocal that came before the commission to voice superintendent come to a special meeting that we held to to address their concerns and to talk about what the school district was doing as far as racial literacy and some other policies that were being put into place so we see this as a really good tool for us to be able to to give voice to individuals and groups who have concerns and also to be able to address them publicly so that others who may not be as comfortable stepping forward can also have the opportunity to hear what's being done to address their concerns have you heard from the schools have you heard from any of the students in terms of if any changes have made life better for them or if they can you know well find out what  wonderful very aware group of young people out there and you know one of the things that i know that i said to them is hey keep had this you know keep talking and you know my charge there would be that what we had to do to address this part of the going forward that we talk about yes or you know we said now where do we go going forward here on earth maybe you can share some of those thoughts yet so going forward we would like to continue with the dialogues with our community forums so we know not that we are not done what the schools addressing the concerns of the students but we also would like to address concerns of  saw police and community relations that we would like to help but it's something that we believe we can right we we can help with that and then public accommodations as dealing with the merchants folks who actually write reached out to us you know about gee you know i really don't feel comfortable that i've been you know it automatically associated with you know some stereotypical ideologies  society all the beautiful help in the world thank you so much thank you ma'am for having us