By Lisa Carolin
(Publisher’s note: The city’s Human Rights Commission is an advisory group and any policy or ordinance changes would be voted upon by the Chelsea City Council.)
How to proceed with Freedom City designation is the challenge facing the Chelsea Human Rights Commission. For more information from the ACLU about what this is, please click here.
At the commission’s April 19 meeting, members decided to hold a work session on the topic during their next meeting on Wednesday, May 3, at 5:30 p.m. in the City Council Chambers.
“This is our first issue and it’s a heavy one,” said HRC member Dan Kaminsky.
Members of Chelsea City Council are invited to attend the work session, along with members of law enforcement, immigration attorneys, and all interested residents.
In other business, the HRC agreed to table the subject of Indigenous People’s Day indefinitely.
Also, the HRC discussed creating a complaint form, and decided to model it after the form that the city of Ann Arbor uses.
Chelsea City Manager John Hanifan explained to the HRC, “People don’t have to use this form. It’s a way to encapsulate issues.”
The HRC nominated officers for a term of one year that will go until February 2018, a year after the commission’s first meeting. Lynn Fox is the chair, Dan Kaminsky is the vice chair, and Susan Morrel-Samuels is the secretary.
Hanifan said that information on the HRC will be available on the city web page and will include meeting minutes and agendas.
Editor, I have read the ACLU’s treatise on the so called “Freedom Cities” initiative, and again, the ACLU is trying to use fear and Islamophobia to hoodwink the people of Chelsea. The travel ban says nothing about a person’s religion. It does focus on six countries that have no functioning government. You cannot conduct a proper vetting of someone if there is no government available to do a background check with. I ask you, if this were truly a “Muslim ban”, why are there 41 majority-Muslim countries that have no such travel ban? These countries comprise over 85% of the world’s Muslim population.
Again, learn the facts and don’t give in to the fear promulgated by the ACLU. Thank you, Tom
Chelsea Founding Fathers are rolling in their graves.