\u201cThe opposite of poverty is not wealth,\u201d said Justin Terrell, ex\u00adecutive director of the Minne\u00adsota Justice Research Center, citing Bryan Stevenson. \u201cThe opposite of poverty is justice.\u201d Terrell added that \u201cthe opposite of trauma is not healing\u201d but \u201cagency,\u201d because trauma can strip people of the ability to act while agency restores it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Six years after George Floyd\u2019s murder, speak\u00aders at George Floyd Square ar\u00adgued that justice cannot depend on police reform promises, philanthropy after destruction, or official action after harm is already done. They said the deeper test is whether Black communities gain the agency, resources and authority to pre\u00advent crisis before it returns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The discussion took place during day four of Amplified Voices, Global Impact, broadcast live from George Floyd Square on KFAI 90.3FM\u2019s The Conversation With Al McFarlane. KFAI de\u00adscribes the show as a public affairs program featuring con\u00adversations with McFarlane and community leaders about issues affecting the Black community and the broader public. (KFAI | Minneapolis & Saint Paul)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Broadcasting from Worldwide Outreach for Christ Ministries at 3808 Chicago Av\u00adenue South, McFarlane said the weeklong series was leading up to the commemoration of Floyd\u2019s death at \u201cground zero, 38th and Chicago.\u201d He called Floyd\u2019s murder \u201ccataclysmic\u201d and global, saying protests after his death were seen in Asia, Eu\u00adrope, Africa and South Ameri\u00adca.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The conversation unfolded as Minneapolis prepares to close 38th Street and Chicago Avenue to all traffic on June 8, 2026, for the 38th & Chicago Re-envisioned project, with closure expected to con\u00adtinue through late 2027. It also came amid a complicated po\u00adlice reform landscape: a federal judge dismissed the proposed federal consent decree over the Minneapolis Police Depart\u00adment in May 2025, while the city remains under a separate court-enforceable agreement with the Minnesota Department of Human Rights.\u00ad<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Terrell said Floyd\u2019s murder immediately moved him into crisis response. At the time, he was executive director of the Council for Minnesotans of African Heritage, advising the governor and Legislature on issues affecting African-Amer\u00adican and African immigrant communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe just got activat\u00aded,\u201d Terrell said. \u201cMe and my team, we made a list of 100 community members we knew we needed to check in with and started calling folks and check\u00ading in with the neighborhood.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those community calls, he said, shaped recom\u00admendations to state leaders: an independent investigation, At\u00adtorney General Keith Ellison\u2019s involvement, and serious dis\u00adcussion of a consent decree.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThey were all com\u00ading from the community,\u201d Ter\u00adrell said. \u201cIt\u2019s not a stretch of the imagination by any means to say that it changed the trajectory of my career. It changed my life.\u201d Terrell said some accountability tools are stronger now than they were in 2020. One example, he said, is Minnesota\u2019s police li\u00adcensing system. The Minnesota POST Board adopted new rules effective May 30, 2023, includ\u00ading new standards of conduct for peace officers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cOne of the things we changed was the licensing pro\u00adcess for officers in the state,\u201d Terrell said. \u201cThe licensing body that controls every offi\u00adcer\u2019s conduct in the state was pretty much inactive for 40 years.\u201d Since new conduct stan\u00addards were adopted, he said, the board has been \u201cvery active in holding officers accountable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Terrell warned against treating reform as victo\u00adry. \u201cWe have a long way to go to repair trust,\u201d he said, \u201cand to figure out a way to make sure that something like George Floyd never happens again, where you have elders and chil\u00addren begging officers to be re\u00adsponsive and they ignored them and let a man die in front of the world to watch.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He also pointed to Minneapolis\u2019 new Firearm As\u00adsault Shoot Team, known as FAST, as a public-safety tool aimed at nonfatal shootings. The city says FAST began oper\u00adations on March 23, 2026, with personnel from MPD, the Bu\u00adreau of Criminal Apprehension, Hennepin County Sheriff\u2019s Of\u00adfice, Ramsey County Sheriff\u2019s Office and Metro Transit Police. (Minneapolis)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cA lot of times vio\u00adlence in our community gets facilitated by the failure of the criminal legal system to inter\u00advene effectively,\u201d Terrell said. Treating nonfatal shootings more like homicides, he argued, could help prevent retaliatory violence and reduce the feeling that residents must \u201ctake the law into their hands.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Todd Western III, a sixth-generation farmer, co-founder of Iowa Farmers of Color and senior donor advisor at Greater Twin Cities United Way, said Floyd\u2019s killing forced philanthropy and business to respond differently. He was on a tractor in Iowa planting corn and soybeans when he first heard the news.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cUnfortunately, when I heard the news, I said, \u2018Well, there\u2019s another one,\u2019 not know\u00ading this was not going to be just another ordinary another one,\u201d Western said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Western said corpo\u00adrate spaces often acknowledge racial trauma briefly before re\u00adturning to business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIt was, \u2018That\u2019s bad. I\u2019m sorry it happened, but where\u2019s the report? Where\u2019s your numbers?\u2019\u201d Western said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At United Way, he said, he was able to help raise about $3 million for a rebuild fund for Lake Street. More broadly, the Minneapolis Foun\u00addation says the Restore-Re\u00adbuild-Reimagine Fund provid\u00aded more than $14 million for small-business repairs, security upgrades and community art af\u00adter the unrest. (Minneapolis)<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI wasn\u2019t on the side\u00adline on this one,\u201d Western said. \u201cUnited Way provided that plat\u00adform where I could actually do something. I was able to work with our donors to raise money to help rebuild the community.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The panel then turned from institutional reform to community-controlled justice. Carmen Lewis, referred to on air as Reverend Carmen Lew\u00adis, said she had been leading the Central Area Neighborhood Development Organization and working in Bryant during the uprising. She said faith and jus\u00adtice cannot be separated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI really believe that part of our faith and part of our movement has to be centered in justice,\u201d Lewis said. \u201cIt\u2019s not ei\u00adther-or. It is a both-and.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lewis said the Min\u00adnesota Restorative Training Program, developed in partner\u00adship with Sabathani, aims to train 80 justice-impacted Black and brown residents as healing practitioners and circle keepers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThere will not be a turning to outsiders, if you will, for culturally relevant services,\u201d she said. The goal, she added, is to help communities \u201cexpress and process the trauma that we are experiencing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Manu Lewis said re\u00adstorative practice is about re\u00adbuilding relationships before harm escalates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cHow do we invest in each other and build those relationships so we can talk about some things and address some things before they hap\u00adpen, while they\u2019re happening, and with solutions so that they actually never happen again?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For Terrell, that is public safety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf there is violence in our community, there is not an intervention from the criminal legal system that we can rely on,\u201d he said. \u201cThe intervention has to come from us. We can choose other interventions than violence.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At George Floyd Square, the panel\u2019s challenge was direct: justice after Floyd cannot be measured only by what institutions promise. It must be measured by whether communities have the power to act before the next crisis arrives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cThe opposite of poverty is not wealth,\u201d said Justin Terrell, ex\u00adecutive director of the Minne\u00adsota Justice Research Center, citing Bryan Stevenson. \u201cThe opposite of poverty is justice.\u201d Terrell added that \u201cthe opposite of trauma is not healing\u201d but \u201cagency,\u201d because trauma can strip people of the ability to act while agency restores it. Six years […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4075,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[155,2636,38],"class_list":["post-4074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-george-floyd","tag-minnesota-justice-research-center","tag-minneapolis","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Insight-News-Website-Images-17-1.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4074"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4074\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4076,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4074\/revisions\/4076"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/apexsamplework.com\/insightnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}