Conferencing on Tulsa Time

Conferencing on Tulsa Time

A shout out of thanks to the folks at the University of Tulsa Clinical Program for the gracious hosting of the Midwest Clinical Conference this weekend. Dean Lyn Entzeroth not only welcomed us warmly on Thursday evening, but has been an engaging participant throughout. Associate Dean Betsy McCormick and her colleagues (Mimi Marton, Anna Carpenter, Barbette Viet, Lynn Miller, Kate Vetterick, Nathalie S. Guerrero, & Cynthia Yaschine de Kohler) have put together a great program.

I urge colleagues to stay tuned to the conference website, as materials from the raft of great presentations are posted. There’s still a day to go, but so far we’ve inspired and informed, especially about Tulsa’s past and present social justice struggles. Some highlights from those presentations:

Our lunch keynote speaker yesterday was Marq Lewis, director and founder of We the People Oklahoma. Lewis told the story of organizing the petition effort to empanel a civil grand jury to remove Tulsa Sheriff Stanley Glanz from office in the aftermath of the fatal shooting of Eric Harris. Particularly inspiring were the practical proposals made by Lewis to advance policing reforms, including blood testing of officers following shootings and efforts to reduce use of force incidents.

Following lunch, Devon Douglas (a recent TU alum) and David Blatt of the Oklahoma Policy Institute; Deborah Shallcross, a former judge now at GableGotwals; Dan Smolen, a civil rights attorney in private practice; and Adrienne Watt, of Legal Aid Services of Oklahoma, shared about the ongoing efforts to secure access to justice in Oklahoma.

Hannibal B. Johnson, attorney and author of Black Wall Street: From Riot to Renaissance in Tulsa’s Historic Greenwood District, was the keynote speaker at dinner. Johnson shared with us the sad and powerful history of the 1921 Race Riot in which white mobs destroyed the thriving black business district of Greenwood. He recently wrote that:

“We are fast approaching the five-score anniversary of the riot. Let us exhale, and then let us breathe freely, oxygenating our efforts on three fronts: (1) healing our history; (2) making an appreciative inquiry into our past; and (3) recommitting to diversity and inclusion. If we do this, we will have honored the memory of one of our darkest days by illuminating it with a bright new light.”

In the Q&A, Johnson also shared about the history and current struggles of the black towns of Oklahoma, formed in the post-Reconstruction era by migrants from the South.