Black Lives Matter. Period.

Dear Recovery Community,

I join you in mourning, rage, and action. 

#justiceforgeorgefloyd #justiceforbreonnataylor #justicefortonymcdade #justiceforahmaudarbery

The number of people to name that deserve justice is quite high. 

I join you in mourning, rage, and action. 

Black Lives Matter, since its inception after the murder of Trayvon Martin, has been working and inspiring others to work. Countless POC-led organizations, movements, and people have been invested in dismantling white supremacy for hundreds of years, before that and since.

The work is a marathon, not a sprint. The work is always needed. The work will not end when the protests do. The work was here before me, it's not about me, and it will be here long after me.

This moment is not my moment to shine as a white ally. While I want to be transparent with you all about where I stand, as the Founder & Executive Director of RtW, I find it most important to continue to center Black Lives in this moment. This letter is where I landed.

I stand with those who call for:

The END of racially motivated, state-sanctioned violence against Black people.

The END of the militarization of police and policing.

The REDISTRIBUTION of our tax dollars away from policing and towards the funding of social services that uplift and assist people of color rather than jail and kill them. 

The END of the school-to-prison pipeline.

The END of voter suppression and disenfranchisement.

We as an organization support the Movement for Black Lives.

We grieve the deaths of too many Black and Brown people in this country, and I continue to be committed to my part in the fight against racism.

If you are interested in what RtW has done, is doing, and will do in the fight against racism in this country and at our organization, I will send another statement out about that in the coming weeks. 

From my perspective, it felt most important to first center the lives of those who are unjustly hunted and killed in this country, to center the movement and the work.

In solidarity and in the work,

Kat.