The Oklahoma City Council voted last Tuesday to redact discriminatory language from 13 plats, covering areas of Crown Heights, Edgemere Park and Lincoln Terrace.
The resolution marks the newest step in the city’s Plat Amendment Project, an effort organized by the Oklahoma City Human Rights Commission last year to wipe outdated, racially discriminatory clauses from the city’s land records.
“I think that although the language in the plats hasn’t been legally enforceable, the impacts of that sort of racist behavior, other racist behaviors, are still felt today by the city,” Emma Winiski, the compliance officer for the Human Rights Commission, said in an interview. “And so if we want to move forward, it doesn’t mean erasing that history or ignoring that it happened. I think the Human Rights Commission and the City would say, like, we believe that it’s important to acknowledge that history and then make a statement that that’s really not how we want to behave.”…