The last two known survivors of the Tulsa Race Massacre will not receive direct payments from a $105 million reparations package recently announced by the Oklahoma city's mayor.
Tulsa's first black mayor, Monroe Nichols, announced the $105 million "Road to Repair" project on Sunday, aiming to tackle lasting socioeconomic disparities caused by rioting white mobs in 1921 in the Greenwood neighborhood as well as the wider North Tulsa community.
The project aims to collect $105 million in assets, including private contributions, property transfers and potential public funding, in order to create the Greenwood Trust, a private charitable trust. The goal is to collect the sum by the 105th anniversary of the massacre, which will occur next spring, reported the New York Times.
However, the last two known survivors of the massacre, who are 110 and 111 years old, are not set to receive direct cash payments from the project. City spokesperson Michelle Brooks told the outlet that direct payments for the two survivors are not off the table, as they could be considered and granted by the trust's Board of Trustees.
The two survivors, Lessie Benningfield Randle and Viola Fletcher, brought their grievances to the Oklahoma Supreme Court in 2024, stating that the lingering socioeconomic problems left behind by the massacre constituted a public nuisance. However, the court dismissed the case, Oklahoma Voice reported at the time.
"One hundred and four years is far too long for us to not address the harm of the massacre," Nichols told NYT, adding that they wanted to focus on "what has been taken on a people, and how do we restore that as best we can in 2025, proving we're much different than we were in 1921."
Nichols announced the formation of the trust fund at the city's first Tulsa Race Massacre Observance Day, stating that the plan to restore the prosperous neighborhood of Greenwood was incredibly belated.
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