Durham’s Human Relations Commission has been a waste of time and money, and has been a political patronage dumping ground for decades. It should have been disbanded long ago. But there are too many opportunities for victims’ groups to make political hay using it as a vehicle. So, it survives.
A low point for the panel came 15 or 20 years go when its director tried to get a black woman thrown out of a Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People because she wasn’t black enough. The high points aren’t much better.
The latest in the HRC saga is the firing of its director, Yvonne Peña. Durham County Manager Tom Bonfield released his letter to her and it cites “persistent complaints” about unprofessional conduct that included “mistreatment and intimidation of subordinates,” according to The Herald-Sun of Durham.
I don’t know whether Peña deserved to be fired, or whether she just upset the wrong people. In Durham you can’t count out the latter. She’s accused of yelling at subordinates, but, in my experience with employees of the Human Relations Commission, many of them deserved to be yelled at.
Did some with powerful political connections call in their chips and get her canned? Did Hispanic-black tensions, always just below the surface in Durham, have something to do with it?
I have know way of knowing. I just know that we’d all be better off if this dysfunctional panel were disbanded. What better way to work toward a balanced budget?
