Op-Ed by Clifford Jackson
This is my first piece for the Soundview Rising in 5 years. I thought I was retired if you will from my 23 years of contributions to this publication and others here in Westchester and Rockland County’s. Then I had a conversation with two people who work for the village of Larchmont about the village board of Larchmont and the Juneteenth holiday and I feel compel to come out of my ” retirement”. These workers said that a village of Larchmont trustee member was not looking to celebrate or acknowledge the Juneteenth Holiday. The workers of color were seeking to not only pay homage appropriately to the holiday but were looking for the day off with pay like millions of others around the country would be experiencing. The workers relayed to me that the Town of Mamaroneck , which the village of Larchmont is under , was honoring the holiday. The trustee said to one of the workers to exchange the day off for another holiday and the trustee said there will be a trustee meeting on June 19th.
In speaking to these individuals they confirmed what they had relayed to me that this trustee had no concern for this federalized holiday, and that like what I have seen living in Larchmont for 33 years that racism is alive and thriving in Larchmont. I told the two workers, one who was familiar with my contributions to this publication over the years, that I would contact the Village board of trustees to inquire why the town of Mamaroneck was honoring this holiday and the village of Larchmont was not.
I contacted the village Clerk, I believe the gentleman’s name was Brian and I inquired as far as why the village of Larchmont was not honoring the holiday, and confirmed with him that the trustee’s were having their meeting on June 19th. So he he gave me an e-mail address to send my concerns to at the village of Larchmont and that he would forward the e-mail to the board of trustee’s. In my e-mail I mentioned the main reason for it as well as what the holiday was, and that the holiday symbolized that much of the wealth and way of life of white America was based upon, as Abraham Lincoln said in his second inaugural address a month and a half before his assassination, ” the wealth of this country is based upon the 246 years of unrequitted sweat and toil and free slave labor of the African slave”.
As of the writing of this letter , which is june 19th, I have not received a response , and this letter was sent and its receipt confirmed by the village clerk a week ago ,and that he submitted it to the board of trustees. I had asked, not that I should have had to ask, for a response to my e-mail. The revelations over the last few years and the George Floyd protest about America’s brutally racist criminal history, or the so-called ‘ WOKE ” Movement, should have made a response to my e-mail a little more important than just ignoring it. They have confirmed Larchmont’s racist history that I have seen with the Larchmont PBA , certainly some of the officers, and the ” Karen’ syndrome that I have personally confronted many times during my 33 years here. As well as the ‘ole boy ” network that exists in the hiring practices of the village of Larchmont, that one of the people that I spoke to referred to, and in thousands of other ‘ lily white” hamlets and villages around the country.
Clifford Jackson, Larchmont
