Bridging divides has arguably been at the heart of Baton Rouge policy and outreach for much of the past year.
Mayor-President Sharon Weston Broome stressed the necessity of repairing relationships along racial boundaries between citizens in her keynote address at the annual John Breaux Symposium, hosted by the Reilly Center for Media and Public Affairs and the Manship School of Mass Communication.
The two-day symposium focuses on the intersection between public policy and race relations and highlights faculty research and student-driven projects.
The mayor-president discussed the disparity in how North and South Baton Rouge are often perceived, with North Baton Rouge, which is predominantly people of color, stereotypically seen as unworthy of development, underprivileged and under resourced, she said.
“As a longtime resident and public servant of Baton Rouge, I still saw and still see greatness here,” Broome said in her address.
Unifying residents is a key goal for Broome’s administration, and has been launched through community organizations like Together Baton Rouge, a coalition of organizations to address community issues, and her team’s dialogue on race initiative. People tend to judge one another and stay isolated, she said, but through shared experiences like visiting friends or having dinner in other areas of the city, people can connect with one another.
“I really believe that is one of the keys in closing the gap between citizens, having those shared experiences,” Broome said in an interview after her presentation. “Too many individuals form their opinions about other people not based on experiences, but often based on images that come through television, for example.”
Regardless of race, there are common denominators people share, such as wanting to live in a safe community and earn a decent living, Broome said. By rallying around those denominators, residents can broaden their views and extend relationship-building beyond the workplace, she said.
In her speech, Broome discussed restoring a positive relationship between citizens and the police by increasing access to police officers and encouraging officers to be more present in the community. The implementation of body cameras for police is an initiative Broome is pursuing — departments with body cameras receive 93 percent less complaints from the public, according to a 2016 study from Cambridge University.
Currently, there is not a timeline set for the U.S. Department of Justice release of the verdict on the Alton Sterling investigation. Broome said she does expect to see peaceful protests in the city, with the weaponization of police only serving as an “extreme last resort.”
After her election in December, Broome’s Millennial Agenda Community Input Transition Team released its “Millennial Agenda” in March, which outlined recommendations on how to engage young adults in contributing to the future of the city better connect them to the political process.
Broome said many of the recommendations are short-term, or “low-hanging fruit,” and can be easily implemented, such as an alternative education program for at-risk youth and a city-parish employment opportunity website. Broome plans on embracing and working on many of the recommendations.
“My thought is that we get millennials in the process of helping redesign the future of Baton Rouge post-flood and not only will they be part of that process but they become committed stakeholders, because they want to see the manifestation, the fruit of their labor,” Broome said.