Teaneck Forum Offers Ideas for Combating Bias

Fostering a community in which neighbors of all backgrounds speak to one another and learn about one another is at the heart of fighting hate and discrimination, said several area leaders Monday evening at a forum about bias.

The Teaneck Democratic Municipal Committee (TDMC) hosted the forum, which was held at the . TDMC member and event moderator Sarah Jack said the idea for a panel discussion came about after a committee meeting in January. The group was discussing and wanted to involve more Teaneck residents in the conversation.

“Teaneck is an incredible place, and one of our biggest assets and certainly one of our points of pride is the diversity of our town,” Jack said. “It’s really a special place, and we’d like to keep it special.”

The speakers for the night talked about what their particular organization does to encourage dialogue among different groups of people and what the protocol for their particular organization would be in the of a bias incident.

The eight panel guests were:

• State Senate Majority Leader Loretta Weinberg, D-Teaneck
• Officer Gabriel Santiago of the Community Policing Bureau
• Teaneck Police Detective Sgt. Harry Harrison
• Patricia White, co-chair of the Advisory Board on Community Relations
• Joel Baskin, educator and counselor for the Teaneck Public Middle Schools
• Rabbi Lawrence Zierler of the
• Anthony Cureton, president of the NAACP in Bergen County
• Waheed Khalid, chair of the Bergen County Chapter of the American Muslim Union

Santiago said the Community Policing Bureau tries to discourage bias incidents by creating projects and presentations for residents, organizations and schools that are geared for their specific concerns.

He said the bureau also educates members of the community on the importance of reporting bias crimes.

“We do have a lot of times when bias crimes do occur, but people fail to report them,” Santiago said. “That’s a problem because there’s a likelihood that it’s going to occur again. If everyone keeps turning their back to it and not reporting it or getting involved, then we can’t assist in that matter. So we do ask that residents get involved.”

Detective Sgt. Harry Harrison explained that residents need to get involved by looking out for their safety first, and then calling the police immediately. It also means not tampering with the evidence.

“If you’re ever any type of victim, do not disturb the scene – whatever it is that’s on the floor or how you found it,” he said. “Simply walk away and call us.”

All the panelists were in agreement that fighting bias crimes begins with educating young people on how to use the right words to get across any of their differences.

Baskin said Teaneck excels in creating a climate in which “kids evolve as citizens of the world together … sitting next to other people who look and sound and have customs different than their own.”

Baskin said some of the most common occurrences he looks into involve insensitive comments that young people say to one another, such as bluntly asking why a student wears a particular article of clothing.

“In looking into [such an incidence], we found that it was a clumsily asked question of real curiosity,” Baskin said.

But Zierler said it’s important not to “sugar coat” things because he hears kids asking others, “What part of Teaneck are you from: white Teaneck or black Teaneck?”

“The fact that they ask that question is because they’re feeling it, they’re feeling the tensions, and they’re struggling with it,” Zierler said. “It means that they need clarification, they need confidence, and they want some kind of resolution in their community.”

Zierler, who’s a parent of a student, said he enjoys having his daughter’s diverse friends over for dinner, especially because it allows him the opportunity to share information about his community.

He added that the influx of Orthodox Jewish students to public schools presents both an opportunity and a challenge and that getting all different groups of people together for social events will help build relationships.

Weinberg said one of the problems of the community is not nurturing the town’s diversity when major incidences of bias, discrimination or tensions between groups occur.

“I was lucky enough to be elected to the Teaneck Town Council in 1992 a month after the [Phillip] Pannell shooting,” she said. “I think if I learned nothing else at that time is that we went around talking about the wonderful, integrated, diverse community that we had. We thought it was just working perfectly until this grand, terrible incident pointed out it wasn’t working so well.”

Weinberg said many changes were made after that incident, such as creating the Richard Rodda Community Center and building a new police department.

“We realized for the 30 years before 1992 when we thought we were this great integrated community, we really hadn’t done anything to nurture it along,” she said. “We don’t worry about it until the big incident takes place. What we need to do – and it’s hard work – is to continuously nurture the diversity that we have here. It takes a commitment from the residents, the council, the advisory board, the school boards and the religious communities.”