Public input on reparations for slavery and the damage left in its aftermath is being compiled by the group Citizens Uprooting Racism in Bermuda for an anticipated release in the summer of 2026.

Teacher, poet and activist Melodye Micere Van Putten led a talk by Curb yesterday on the issue, telling a packed gathering at the Bermuda National Library: “Everyone should be engaged in this fight — this is a human fight.

“This is everybody’s fight because it affects the world that we live in.”

Ms Van Putten said that while the Black Lives Matter movement had shot to prominence in 2020 after the murder of George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black American man by a police officer in Minneapolis, Minnesota, the topic of reparations had returned to “business as usual” in the years since.

“We can no longer afford the excuses and the inactivity of the past,” she added.

“The word inside of ‘reparation’ is ‘repair’. We need to repair a people who have been historically broken.”

Stacey-Lee Williams, the executive director of Curb, told the forum that reparations appeared to be “our most popular” topic in the organisation’s monthly lunch and learn meetings.

She said: “Curb has been holding focus groups on reparations for close to two years now and the goal is the preparation of our position paper.”

Curb member Cordell Riley told The Royal Gazette that the organisation was regularly fielding questions about its stance on reparations.

He added: “We didn’t want to form a position without going to the general public.

“We’ve held two focus groups so far and today’s session was just another part of the outreach.”

Another focus group is planned for the autumn, with potential for an additional group meeting early next year, Mr Riley said, with potential for a survey of residents.

He added that Curb’s hope was to have the position paper ready to issue in June 2026.