Fulton County’s Reparations Task Force has dropped a doorstop of a document: a 615-page Harm Report that mines tax digests, court files and archival records to tally how slavery, Jim Crow and later county policies have shaped life and wealth for Black residents. The authors plan to walk the public through the findings next Thursday at the Auburn Avenue Research Library, where the report will get its first full public airing.
What the Harm Report Documents
The task force produced the study with $250,000 in county funding, according to Fulton County. Using quantitative formulas developed by Task Force Chair Dr. Karcheik Sims-Alvarado, the team converted archival and fiscal records into economic estimates of harm. The report identifies historic "seed money" tied to the legal valuation and taxation of enslaved people as high as $4.7 billion and, when extraction and compounded losses are modeled, estimates that the cost of stolen labor and unredressed extraction can reach nearly $903 billion. Researchers also point to disparities such as Black property assessments that rose faster than white assessments and more than $8 million in library services denied to Black residents, per reporting and the task force’s published findings.
As Dr. Sims-Alvarado told WABE, “We knew that if we were going to be talking about dollars and cents, this research had to be based on quantitative data.” In other words, the dollar figures are meant to be spreadsheets first, politics second.
How County Leaders Responded
The Task Force presented an earlier snapshot of its findings to the Fulton County Board of Commissioners in late 2025, and commissioners voted to extend the panel’s work while staff and task force members prepare a separate, feasibility-focused “Repair Report,” according to WSB-TV. The task force also notified county leaders that it paused its regular public meetings in September 2024 so researchers could finish the Harm Report before resuming broader community engagement, per an update letter filed with the commission.
Public Debut And Next Steps
The Harm Report is set to make its public debut next Thursday at the Auburn Avenue Research Library, where task force members say they will walk residents through the findings and take public comment, according to WABE. After that community input, the task force plans to draft the Repair Report, which is expected to lay out feasibility and cost estimates for specific policy options. The panel then intends to return to the Board of Commissioners with staffing and budget requests to support any recommendations, per the task force’s update to county officials.
Why The Report Matters
The Harm Report attempts to move a long-running debate into more concrete territory by attaching dollar figures and archival receipts to familiar disparities. None of its numbers automatically trigger a payout or a policy change. Any reparative steps will still have to run the gauntlet of public hearings, commission votes and budget negotiations. Expect a long, loud season of town halls and board meetings this spring as descendants, community groups and elected officials dissect the findings at the Auburn Avenue session and the follow-up engagements that are already on deck.
