Members of the Thomasville Multicultural Committee were shocked when they were informed during their May meeting that the committee was going to be dissolved.
“I’ve been trying to wrap my head around it,” said JacQuez Johnson, chairman of the former Thomasville Multicultural Committee.
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He said during the meeting Thomasville City Council board members Wendy Sellars and Hunter Thrift made a brief statement of appreciation for the work of the committee before the city attorney, Misti Whitman, announced the committee was no longer going to be sanctioned by the city.
“Her synopsis was basically that it was the overwhelming feeling the of Thomasville City Council to disband the committee,” said Johnson. “Their reason behind it was because they felt like the committee could operate better as a nonprofit.”
On May 16, the Thomasville City Council unanimously voted to approve a resolution to dissolve the multi-cultural committee.
According to the resolution, the purpose of the multicultural committee was to “establish an annual multicultural event and other related activities that embrace diverse groups and promote understanding”. And that over the past years the multicultural committee has “deviated from the primary mission” and has “expressed interest in focusing on a more narrowly tailored group of cultures.”
The nine-member multicultural committee was created by the City of Thomasville in 2012.
Thomasville City Councilman Hunter Thrift said the reason the board decided to dissolve the multicultural committee was mostly because in the past several years they have rejected any oversight by the city council.
“When I was first elected, I served as a liaison,” said Thrift. “We tried to direct them, but it seemed like every time we suggested how we wanted a multicultural committee to be handled, there was a lot of pushback.”
He said there has also been a lot of turnover of committee members, which sometimes led to insufficient members to hold a quorum at meetings. It also meant that city council members had to continually find new people willing to be appointed to the board.
Johnson said recently the multicultural committee had been reaching out to community leaders and business owners to gather more information to identify diversity, equity and inclusion issues in the city.
“It was just kind of to gather some information to, you know, how (diversity, equity and inclusion) works. You have to know what problems people are having before you can address them,” said Johnson.
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Thrift said there seemed to be a difference of opinion about the function of the multicultural committee. He said the point was to celebrate and promote the diverse races, ethnicities, and cultures in Thomasville, not to focus solely on diversity.
“They have had some racial equity talks which (we didn’t have an issue with) but I don’t see that as a type of community-wide, multicultural event. It is not a (diversity, equity and inclusion) committee; it is a multicultural committee. There is a difference and there has to be a balance,” said Thrift.
He also said the committee has not held any community-sponsored multicultural events in the past 6 or 7 years.
Johnson said his idea for joining the multicultural committee was for the city to deal with diversity and equality issues and to be a voice for people that are underrepresented.
“It was my understanding that we were going to be able to help foster creative conversations to help people understand different cultures and different ways of life so that we can help to gain more inclusion,” said Johnson.
He said he has had conversation with members of the former committee about how the group can continue to work with the community but there hasn’t been any decision made.
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He said he is very disappointed in the decision by the Thomasville City Council to dissolve a committee that had been part of the community for so many years.
“It really kind of sends a very bold statement,” said Johnson.
Thrift said the decision to dissolve the multicultural committee was not easy and that it would be viewed negatively, but the point is the government-sanctioned group didn’t want the city council to be involved.
“It’s not that we don’t want to celebrate multiculturalism in Thomasville, we do,” said Thrift. “We just felt like they didn’t want to be tied with us; they questioned everything we wanted them to do. So, if they don’t want council oversight, let’s disband them as a branch of our organization and let them do what they want.”
General news reporter Sharon Myers can be reached at sharon.myers@the-dispatch.com. Follow her on Twitter @LexDispatchSM.
