Nikkita Oliver

I still remember the first time I answered a call from a jail. I barely heard the name, but I recognized the voice. It sounded like my father. Confused, I couldn’t figure out how to accept the call and mistakenly selected the option to disconnect. I was so upset. I immediately called my mom and asked, “Would Daddy be calling from jail?” She hesitated to respond before she reluctantly said, “Yes.” My dad, a factory worker, struggled to pay child support.

In December, Satterberg and Pierce County Prosecutor Mary Robnett asked the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider rulings by our state’s own high court requiring that judges recognize what we all know to be true — children deserve mercy. Fourteen other states have come out in support of Satterberg and Robnett’s play. If they succeed, they’ll doom thousands of imprisoned Black, brown and Indigenous men and women in Washington state and across the country.

As news spread of the chief’s decision, a slew of articles, Facebook posts and tweets condemned the majority women of color city council for “humiliating a Black woman” and “forcing” her to resign. Some decried the move as a form of “anti-Blackness.” Others compared Best’s resignation to “a death.” What actually happened was this: The council lowered Best’s salary to meet the maximum cap of the chief’s pay zone — $275,000, or a roughly 6% cut.