PACA undertake to build community led power through participatory programs of action and political education drives that avow and advance: our “Human Right to Informed Consent and Self-Determination” (Pursuant to UDHR’s Article 15, ICCPR’s Article 1, and ICESCR’s Article 1), collective community control over local economies, community control over the police, and a movement led by the most impacted of our communities.

PACA is explicitly anti-capitalist. We stand against all forms of race, class, gender and sexual orientation based oppression. We stand for full community access to resources to realize a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of individuals and families, including: food, clothing, housing, medical care, and necessary social services. We also believe all people have the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond one’s control." 

What is the problem?

Currently, we are in the middle of a pandemic (in relation to the coronavirus aka COVID-19) according to the WHO. 

The danger of a pandemic is two fold, first being the immediate medical impact and health risk to our community. Our community already resides in areas which are deprived of efficient health facilities and services.  The risk which this poses may only be second to the social impacts to our community, when Social Distancing begins to occur, suggested and/or enforced by the State. Currently, the state is recommending to institutions, businesses, organizations, etc. that they should develop plans to be shut down from if/when Social Distancing measures are put in place.

This will impact: 

Health: Healthcare systems, which are lacking in our areas, will become harder to access. Individuals won’t be able to fill prescriptions or get over the counter medicine.

Food: access to food and water will decrease as grocery stores close

Housing/Shelter: hourly workers won’t make any money to be able to pay their rent, under capitalism, this will lead to evictions or attempts to do so. =

Childcare: Childcare facilities and schools will be closed. 

Travel: Public Transit will be limited to curb spread. This will impact the ability to address any of the needs listed

Other everyday necessities.

Government officials and major corporations have been found to be the perpetrators and the root cause of community decay by implementing elaborate schemes to set the conditions we find ourselves in today. 

How are we to solve the problem?

PACA plans to address the problem through our existing Survival Program by implementing a Mutual Aid Plan that achieves community control through self-reliance. This plan will attempt to meet some of the needs of the people during this time. 

The PACA Community Control Over Crisis Response is building African working-class solidarity, collaborative partnership with fellow Black-Led Organizations and self-reliance within the community itself, by redirecting and compiling the totality of the resources held by the working class to strategically support the working class, underclass and lumpen sectors of the community, who will become invisible due to the lack of need for their labor in the process of capitalist production.

While interacting with constituents, the program will seek to expose the unfair treatment of residents by the government, and disrupt government operations by causing the government to lose contracts by creating a program that eliminates the need for government services. The most impacted should eventually assume control of the program and be able to sustain it. This is dropping a pebble in a pond of the grand scheme of things, but hopefully creating a ripple effect that somehow in the future can contribute to a shift in power.  In order to achieve Community Control Over Police (CCOP), as well as other institutions, it is imperative to reach out and involve the most marginalized groups within the larger Black African community in DC.

Why are we doing this? 

The overall aim of the PACA Community Control Over Crisis Response Program is to build solidarity (amongst the African working class), self-reliance, develop a sense of community in DC and increase the quality of life of African working class, with the aim of shifting power to the most-impacted within the African working class. 

 

DESCRIPTION 
PACA Social Distancing Preparedness Program will seek to provide some basic necessities to the most impacted within the community while elevating the consciousness of its constituents. We will provide basic necessities in the form of 100 care packages to African/Black individuals surviving in the DC area once per week, depending on partnership agreement and capacity. Care packages will be handed out in popular forementioned Outreach locations via Outreach Plan in Southeast, DC. Funding for care packages will be donated by PACA members, PACA’s base, partner organizations and local organizations that understand the needs of residents for Social Distancing Preparedness and nourishment. 

Care packages will include a toilet paper, canned foods, noodles packs, wipes, deodorant, soap, pocket tissue,  lotion and shampoo along a flyer explaining who PACA is, what is CCOP initiative and a good hygiene resource document. One care package will be given per person to maximize the reach to people. A reporting sheet will be used to record pertinent information like location where packages were handed out, # of care packages handed out, demographics (ex. age range, gender, etc) of each person, and observations (such as dis/interest in package items, etc.) that will help in improving strategy. (Reporting Sheet should include estimates or actual boxes for demographic information.)

We will also incorporate political education for the target audience and help them understand how we can combat the effects of capitalism through community organizing.