Rev. Dr. Charles Franklin Boyer discusses “The Statewide Black Agenda,” in a free online Continuing Conversations event hosted by Not In Our Town Princeton on Monday, December 1, at 7 p.m. Register for the free Zoom link through the Not in Our Town Princeton website events calendar at niotprinceton.org/calendar.
Rev. Boyer will also be among several Black leaders, including Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman and Newark Mayor Ras J. Baraka to participate in a Statewide Meeting for the Black Agenda on Saturday, December 13, at 12:30 p.m. at Shiloh Baptist Church in Plainfield. They will discuss numerous policy issues they advocate for in Gov. Elect Mikie Sherrill’s first 100 days, including appointing Black leaders to her transition team and to key leadership positions; a biannual meeting with Black leadership, and numerous issues from funding for affordable housing to Black maternal health legislation.
Rev. Boyer is the pastor of Greater Mt. Zion A.M.E. Church in Trenton, and co-founder with his wife, Rosalee, of Salvation and Social Justice, a non-partisan Black faith-rooted public policy organization. Rev. Boyer is also a senior consultant to the Social Action Commission of the African Methodist Episcopal Church.
Dr. Boyer is a leading faith voice in New Jersey for racial justice issues, as well as in the campaign to abolish the drug war and end the criminalization of Black people. He has been among advocates for statewide policy changes such as a racial impact analysis, closure of youth prisons, voting rights restoration for the formerly incarcerated, appointing independent prosecutors, restricting solitary confinement, community reinvestment of millions of dollars each year through cannabis taxes. He was among those successfully advocating to secure $8.4 million for restorative justice hubs and $12 million for community-led first response as an alternative to police. He was also a leader of the campaign to free more than 9,000 people from New Jersey’s prisons during the pandemic, which was the largest singular decarceration event in the state’s history to date.
NIOT Princeton is a multi-racial, multi-faith group of individuals who stand together for racial justice and inclusive communities. Our focus is to promote the equitable treatment of all, and to uncover and confront white supremacy — the system that facilitates the preference, privilege and power of white people at the expense of non-white people and pits racial and ethnic groups against each other by upholding a hierarchy based on proximity to whiteness. Continuing Conversations are held the first Monday of most months at 7 p.m.
