Sonoma County creates equity office to ensure equal access

The Sonoma County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved the creation of an office to identify policies and practices that create structural inequality, and named COVID-19’s disproportionate impact on Latino and Indigenous communities as its first focus.

Staff at the Office of Equity, adopted in a unanimous vote, will work with other county departments and can recommend changes to root out disparities and evaluate programs and services to ensure equal access among the area’s residents, county documents showed.

The creation of the county’s equity office comes amid a broader national push for the removal of systemic inequalities faced by people of color and other marginalized groups, a conversation reignited by the recent deaths of Black men and women during encounters with police.

Fires and floods that have hit the county in recent years have compounded the disparities faced by people of color, Sonoma County Supervisor James Gore said.

The coronavirus pandemic exposed the impact of systemic inequalities once more, Gore said, adding that he was flooded with calls from Latino leaders once county data showed Latinos were disproportionately affected by the virus. The ethnic group represents nearly three-quarters of cases despite accounting for about 27% of Sonoma County’s population.

“I’m trying to double down and evoke the voices of those that breathe inequity every day,” Gore said of the equity office. “This is just one of the things that our community needs to do.”

Initial plans presented to supervisors Tuesday estimated the annual cost of the office would be almost $800,000.

To get the program off the ground, supervisors anticipate appointing an interim Equity Officer — whose first goal will be to zero in on the high number of Latinos and Indigenous people who have contracted the coronavirus locally — during its board meeting next week, a county news release said. Plans for the recruitment of a permanent Office of Equity director could come before the board as early as Aug. 4, a county news release said.

Zahyra Garcia, a commissioner on the Sonoma County Commission on Human Rights who virtually attended the meeting, said she applauded supervisors for bringing a discussion about equity in the county to the forefront.

But in an interview after the meeting, she questioned why county leaders had not considered redirecting money for the new office to groups already doing similar work, such as her group or the Commission on the Status of Women, which already have ties to the community but have received little funding.

“Instead of outsourcing, why not fund within?” Garcia said.

Gore acknowledged there was frustration among some community groups over the creation of the equity office but encouraged them to stay involved in the county’s efforts to build equality locally.

“We’re taking action and putting money during a huge deficit into this,” Gore said. “This is the start.”

You can reach Staff Writer Nashelly Chavez at 707-521-5203 or nashelly.chavez@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @nashellytweets.