Q&A
Council Member Cabán's personal example illustrating disparities in gang database inclusion
0:51:51
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89 sec
Council Member Tiffany Cabán presents a hypothetical example based on her own background to illustrate the disparities in gang database inclusion. She compares her experiences growing up in different neighborhoods and schools with varying demographics.
- Cabán describes attending public schools in a predominantly minority and immigrant area, then a Catholic high school in a predominantly white, higher socioeconomic status area.
- She notes that social connections and behaviors were similar in both environments, but the likelihood of being included in a gang database was much higher for those from her childhood neighborhood.
- The example highlights the potential racial and socioeconomic biases in gang database inclusion, despite similar social behaviors across different communities.
Tiffany Cabán
0:51:51
Great.
0:51:52
Now, I I wanna give you, just like an example, a hypothetical, and and then maybe you can just give me a reaction to, a reaction to it.
0:52:01
So I'm gonna use myself as an example.
0:52:03
I grew up in South Richmond Hill.
0:52:05
I went to public elementary school and and middle school.
0:52:09
Where I live, the the school was predominantly like vast majority people of color and and immigrants.
0:52:18
And then I went to may I continue, chair?
0:52:21
I'll I'll wrap up quickly.
0:52:22
Then I went to a Catholic high school in Northeast Queens, vast majority, white, higher socioeconomic status, and my experience was that the factors, that influence social connection, they mirrored in each of those places.
0:52:41
The same ways we were connected to to to people at my high school, kids in in the schools I went to when I was younger connected in that way, but and they used social connections the same way.
0:52:51
I would imagine today you can throw in a little older, so throw in social media.
0:52:56
When you look at it now, I was a public defender for 7 years, use social media very, very similarly, but for whatever reason, the kids that I grew up with and the neighborhood I grew up with were much, much more likely to be on a gang database whereas I don't know anybody from my high school community that ended up the same, but the the social connectives and behaviors kind of mirrored each other.
0:53:18
Like, can can you talk, like, what's your reaction to that?
