Enfield begins community conversations on race after slur was used towards Black student

More than 200 people participated in a community conversation on race, equity, and inclusion that was organized after an Enfield High School football player was called a racial slur while out raising money for the football team this month.

The event, organized by the Enfield Town Council and Board of Education, was facilitated by Kamora Herrington, the founder of Kamora’s Cultural Corner in Hartford, who laid the foundation for the conversation for the town, noting that while there would be respect for all voices, it would not be a safe space, especially for voices that are homophobic or racist.

While there were some lighter moments during the Diversity Bingo icebreaker, during which participants had to interact with people who are different than they are, the mood quickly shifted back to serious, when Herrington asked the community about what they believed happened on Aug. 13 during the fundraising and why they chose to attend the meeting.

Former Enfield resident Zach Zannoni said he heard about the racist act in the news and flew back to town.

“I’m an educator. And I’ve worked with seventh graders, eighth graders, sixth graders, and they came from a lot of different backgrounds. And I’ve worked most recently out in California and worked in a district, where about 60 to 70% of our students are on free and reduced lunch. They came from first generation households, and they knew racism. Those were my kids,” he said.

Zannoni said he learned that the Enfield racial incident occurred to the child of a mother he knows.

“It killed me inside to know that it wasn’t just about the news, it was in the community, it was someone we knew. And it killed me as an educator to know that a student would be treated with such disrespect and such angst from someone in the community, that I flew 2,000 miles to come home ...” he said.

“And to see things like that in the news broke my heart,” he said.

Enfield Superintendent of Schools Christopher Drezek had said this month that an Enfield High School football player was called a racial slur while out raising money for the team.

POWER Up Connecticut founder Keren Prescott, who is Black, said that she was fighting the urge not to speak, as she pointed out that there were only a handful of Black people who were in attendance.

“But I have to speak … this is why I show up to these places, because Black people don’t feel safe to come to these things to make sure that their voice is heard,” she said.

Prescott said that while she did not live in Enfield, her daughter had played high school sports and would often be the only Black girl on the field and had faced racism.

“Every single town and city in Connecticut, there is a hate crime that is committed every day,” Prescott said.

“That’s why I showed up because I’m not going to allow these things to continue to happen … I’m gonna show up ... whether you like it or not. I’m showing up … I don’t care if I am outnumbered, I’m showing up,” Prescott said.

Participants were dispersed into smaller groups in the cafeteria where they could talk about education, policing, and other topics related to race, diversity and equity, with other facilitators from the town.

While some commended the town for taking a step toward addressing that racial slur incident, some said they feel the community conversation is long overdue.

A Black couple with a child in the Enfield Public School system, who gave only their first names, Precious and Dez, said they did not see the community conversation as being more than a start.

“We need to do more. Even in school, my daughter goes to this school. She experiences microaggressions all the time. All the time. She doesn’t feel safe talking about it. She didn’t feel safe, coming forward with it. Meanwhile, we have people who feel perfectly safe saying and doing these things,” Precious said. “So, we’ll see what happens at the Board of Education meeting. We’ll see what happens going forward. We’ll see. Like [Herrington] said, this was reactive. So let’s see what happens.”