Good morning, everyone.
My name is Yvete Porter Moore, and I am a native Californian residing in the city of San Diego.
It is a true honor to be present today. I want to personally thank Chair Kamilah Moore for invitng me to give testimony on this final day of the Reparations Task Force Meeting. I also want to recognize my councilmember, Council President Pro Tem Monica Montgomery-Steppe, from San Diego, who represents the 4th district. I would also like to recognize Dr. Shirley Weber for introducing the Bill. Thank you to all the Reparations Task Force Members for all the hard work you have done to get us to this point before the final draft is submited.
I am a genealogist and public historian and have been tracing my genealogy and other people’s genealogy since 2012. This statement seems so simple; however, my ancestral journey did not begin in 2012.
I want to start with a story about myself. I was born on April 8, 1968, in Hollywood, California. When I was born, my birthmother would not look at me as she was relinquishing me for adoption. On August 18, 1968, my parents Bety and Walter J. Porter adopted me and took me home. Both of my late parents were Black. On my amended birth certificate, they were listed as Negro. I was raised in a stable environment, with loving parents who were both educators and taught me to appreciate my Black heritage.
When I was 8 years old, I was asked by a friend whose mother taught at the same school as my mom, “Are you adopted?” I had no idea what adopted meant and did not know if I were adopted. So, I asked my mother, and she said yes. I accepted the answer and eventually asked what adopted meant. My mother shared with me that when I was born my birthmother was young, Mexican and could not care for a child. She also stated my father was Black. My mom shared that they looked at all the other children needing homes and they chose me. That answer sufficed until I got much older.
When I was 18, I requested non-identifying information from the Adoption Agency. The information writen was prety much the same as what my mother shared with me. The additional information the social worker wrote “You were named Victoria by your mom.”
I hired a researcher to help me locate my birthparents. Not going into too much detail, I found my birthparents’ families.
I met my maternal grandparents in 1989. My grandfather Felipe, who looked Native American invited me into their home to speak with my grandmother Esther. Esther shared photos and stories about my mother and their family. Esther looked at me and apologized for the choices she made for my birthmother as she was 15 at the time and I was her second child. However, she told me they were not proud of their racial attitude, but they made her give me up because I was Black. I later met my birthmother. We have had a strained relationship over the years. She later told me what my grandmother Esther said, “We swept her under the rug, and you should have kept her there.”
I met my birthfather’s family whose roots were in Noxubee, Mississippi. My birthfather, Johnny Roy Mitchell died in 1974 at the age of 21 from a heroin overdose. He was one of 10-children born to Reverend Jesse E Mitchell and Frances Paulete. In 1968, an unmarried father did not have legal rights to
the child of the mother who had given birth. My father’s family said they knew about me, wanted to keep me, but had no legal rights to take me home.
I have traced my biological ancestry and my parents who raised me ancestry.
I have discovered a wealth of information pertaining to my ancestry research.
- Frances Paulete, my paternal grandmother’s Great Grandfather Thomas B. Paulete enslaved our family in Noxubee County, Mississippi. The plantation is preserved and is now named Circle M Plantation. A description: “A magnificent Southern plantation providing fine hunting & fishing, bed & breakfast romantic getaways, and hosing of weddings in our lovely antebellum home.
- My mother Bety Porter’s, 3 X grandmother Prewilla Cully was a free woman of color in the 1820’s in North Carolina. She was given 350 acres of land in Havelock, North Carolina for which my 2 X great grandfather William H Cully Jr inherited along with his siblings. Later it was passed down to the next generation. However, the U.S. Government took their property through eminent domain which included many Black Families who had lived on the land of which is now Cherry Point Marine Base. My ancestors were not properly compensated.
- Ten years ago, I met the great nephew of my father Walter Porter. His name was Robert Fulford, who died a few years ago. I met him in Dermot, Arkansas which is very close in proximity to the county of Lake Providence, Louisiana where my father was born. Robert was a storyteller, author of various small books that told of his childhood while living on Yellow Bayou Plantation. He shared stories of my dad’s half-brother Jack Porter and the living and working conditions of being a sharecropper. Jack and his family were treated so badly as tenement farmers. They would always owe the man, and the share that they received was not enough to care for his family that he would have to yet again borrow from the owner of the farmland. In order to get away from this way of life, Jack had to slip away into the night and move elsewhere. Eventually Jack migrated to Los Angeles, California to my grandmother Helen Bunn’s home.
I present these stories to you because I have been fortunate to have been reunited with my birth family and to learn more about my ancestry.
Many Adoptees and Individuals raised in Foster Homes may have a difficult time finding their lineage. However, with today’s technology and DNA testing, researching has become easier for those who have been cut off from their families.
Since qualifications for reparations is going to be determined through lineage-based research there needs to be legislative law changes to open sealed birth and adoption records. We, as adoptees, do not have access to our original birth certificates. We as adoptees have been cut off from our legal rights of claiming our heritage and ancestry. So then what? Can we claim our lineage through our adopted family of African American descent? What if one’s parents are not of African American descent, but the adoptee is? Why should Adoptees be harmed by this too? I am pleading that the Genealogy Branch of the New State Agency will take this issue into consideration. I read a testimony where it was said that descendants taking DNA tests could be costly. I think we should consider having the tests covered through reparations.