Activists plan weekly protests in Kalamazoo to call for police accountability

Kalamazoo activists gathered outside the county courthouse downtown on Saturday with one goal in mind: To demand accountability for the way the Kalamazoo Department of Public Safety (KDPS) has handled rallies and protests over the summer.

On the one hand, KDPS enacted a curfew and pepper sprayed Black Lives Matter protesters in June. On the other hand, KDPS stood by as out-of-town racists rallied in Kalamazoo in August before arresting ten counterprotesters, including a reporter and a legal observer.

Tamara “TC” Custard is one of the coordinators of Saturday’s protest. She says the demonstrations will go on every Wednesday and Saturday throughout September.

“I want to be very clear. We are not anti-police,” she said during the demonstration. “We are anti-police racism, we are anti-police injustice and we are anti-police inequality.”

“We’re demanding more in terms of accountability, actionable change than they intend to implement in order to stop the systemic racism and the oppression,” said Noelle Massey, another organizer.

You can read more at WWMT.