Here’s the report and a quick summary of the recommendations.
1. DEVELOP INFRASTRUCTURE AND TOOLS TO INCREASE DANE COUNTY EMPLOYEES’ AND RESIDENTS’ UNDERSTANDING OF AND ABILITY TO A DVANCE RACIAL EQUITY BY:
Phase I
• Leadership – Strengthening the current Racial Equity and Social Justice Team by expanding and strengthening the RESJ Strategic Leadership Team. The RESJ Strategic Leadership Team should be responsible for convening interdepartmental racial equity teams to address select topics.
• Capacity Building Action Team – Launching a Capacity Building Action Team for broader interdepartmental collaboration on and implementation
of strategies.
• Action plans – Developing department specific racial equity action plans with timelines for implementation and designation of accountability for advancing racial equity within each department’s lines of business.
• Staff capacity and tools – Designating departmental staff for development and implementation of racial equity action plans, including use of a Racial Equity Tool.
• Training
• Providing training on the Racial Equity Tool to increase the capacity of management to effectively apply a racial equity analysis to new and existing policy and practice.
• Building internal capacity to provide racial equity training to all county employees by selecting identified members of the RESJ team to participate in racial equity train-the-trainer equity 101. Conducting racial equity training for county employees at all levels so that employees have a shared understanding and increased skill to advance racial equity.
• Assessing – Establishing a biennial countywide employee survey to track attitudes toward and commitment to racial equity.Phase II
• Expanded infrastructure – Expanding the work of the existing racial equity teams to focus on cross cutting policy issue areas as described in detail in the report.
• Customization of a Racial Equity Tool – Customizing the Racial Equity Tool, for specific policy and program areas as needed.
• Training – Creating additional racial equity training modules and activities to encourage continued learning and skill building among all Dane County employees.
• Community conversations – Hosting and facilitating a series of pubic racial equity workshops.
• Community RESJ survey – Establishing a community racial equity survey.
• Racial Equity fund – Establishing a racial equity fund.2.IMPLEMENT STRATEGIES TO ENSURE DANE COUNTY IS AN EFFECTIVE AND INCLUSIVE GOVERNMENT THAT ENGAGES COMMUNITY AND IS RESPONSIVE TO ITS NEEDS BY:
Phase I
• Inclusive Engagement Action Team – Designating the existing Community Connections Team with responsibility for development and support of a
countywide policy and strategic approach to community engagement, that provides employees with the tools needed to implement.
• Training – Providing Inclusive Outreach and Public Engagement Training to employees that routinely engage with the public.
• Advisory groups – Collecting baseline data of existing advisory groups, identifying gaps in participation and engagement and developing approaches to address gaps.
• Inclusive outreach pilot project – Identifying a cross-department pilot project to engage communities using the newly formed comprehensive approach.Phase II
• Assess current efforts – Conduct an assessment of current engagement activities and their effectiveness, led by the Inclusive Engagement Action Team.3.ENSURE DANE COUNTY’S COMMUNITIES OF COLOR SHARE IN THE COUNTY’S ECONOMIC PROSPERITY BY:
Phase I
• Workforce Equity and Contracting Equity Action Teams – Creating a RESJ Workforce Equity Action Team and Contracting Equity Action Team,
including members of the existing RESJ Data Action Team to include broader representation of relevant parties.
• Data collection – Improving the Employee Relations data collection system to better identify specific positions that have the greatest disparities.
• Targeted strategies for job classifications – Requiring each department to identify a specific classification not reflective of county demographics and develop and implement strategies to eliminate the gaps.
• Core competencies – Expanding use of racial equity as a core competency/expectation in select job descriptions.
• Management – Delineating clear racial equity expectations for managers regarding hiring, incentivizing use of best practices within hiring processes to minimize bias and incorporate equity throughout all phases of the process.
• Online application system – Addressing any perceived or existing barriers in the online application process for county positions.
• Employee handbook – Tasking the RESJ Workforce Equity Team to review the Employee Handbook to identify racial equity barriers to hiring, retention, and upward mobility and develop recommendations to present to executive team.
• Contracting equity — Tasking the RESJ Contracting Equity Team to develop a plan for collection and analysis of data to identify gaps in contracting and procurement and support departmental specific target and strategy setting to eliminate gaps, using national best practice.
• Planning for retirements – Conducting an analysis of county positions that have a large number of anticipated retirements in the coming five years and developing and implementing career pathways to ensure a diverse applicant pool is prepared to compete for those vacancies.
• Bilingual staff – Exploring opportunities to compensate bilingual staff with external responsibilities.
• Contracting and procurement data – Collecting and analyzing data to be able to identify gaps in contracting and procurement.
• Contracting and procurement policies – Eliminating barriers from contracting and procurement policies and procedures.Phase II
• Employment pipelines – Partnering with the school district, community colleges,
and business organizations to strengthen pipeline programs to ensure young
People of Color are prepared for emerging jobs that pay a living wage.
• Local hire – Building on existing Local Hire Program to ensure that county
contracts are benefiting the full diversity of the county employment pool.4. ENSURE ALL DANE COUNTY NEIGHBORHOODS AND PEOPLE ARE SAFE AND RACIAL DISPROPORTIONALITIES IN THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM ARE ELIMINATED BY:
Phase I
• Criminal Justice Council – Ensuring existing Criminal Justice Council and the Racial Disparities Subcommitee develop an action plan to prioritize and operationalize recommendations from the 2009 Dane County Task Force on Racial Disparities in the Criminal Justice System.
• Criminal justice data and tools – Tasking the Criminal Justice Council with assessing the full continuum of criminal justice data and assessing the possibility of development of a more integrated and aligned data collection system and developing recommendations for appropriate policy and practice strategies using the Racial Equity Tool and criminal justice data.
• Training – Expanding racial equity training for employees in the criminal justice system focused on implicit bias, institutionalized racism, problem-solving strategies, conflict mediation techniques, de-escalation tactics, and understanding mental health considerations.
• Criminal justice staff diversity – Ensuring criminal justice personnel reflect the demographics of the community.Phase II
• Prosecutorial discretion – Using the Racial Equity Tool to assess the role that race plays in prosecutorial decisions, and develop and implement recommendations to eliminate racial disparities5.ENSURE THAT ALL RESIDENTS HAVE HEALTHY LIFE OUTCOMES BY:
Phase I
• Health equity action team – Launching a Health Equity Action Team for broader interdepartmental collaboration on and implementation of strategies.
• Accessibility of healthy food – Developing strategies to improve access to healthy food in neighborhoods that are currently underserved.
• Tools – Using the Racial Equity Tool to analyze and improve existing policies and practices and increasing the use of integrated data systems to surface opportunities for strategic intervention.
• Training – Training front line health staff on policy updates to nutrition standards.
• Partnerships – Strengthening partnerships between organizations within the food system, focusing on ways to boost equity through opportunity and access.
• Community initiatives – Supporting community-led initiatives that address healthy life outcomes and build community capacity, including efforts led by those most impacted by food insecurity.Phase II
• Health equity action team – Expanding the Health Equity Action Team to focus on additional health indicators.The recommendations, described in greater detail in the full report, provide community indicators, performance measures, and specific actions that Dane County leadership and employees can take to ensure that the organization’s values move from intent to outcome.
The analysis and recommendations provide concrete next steps that, if adopted, would establish Dane County as a national leader in government’s role in addressing race and equity.
To ensure the the recommendations of the racial equity analysis are implemented, it is necessary for:
• The County Board to pass a resolution that adopts the recommendations of this analysis.
• The County Board, County Executive and Constitutional Officers to collaboratively convene an expanded Racial Equity Strategic Leadership Team.
• The County Board, County Executive, and departments to prioritize funding for implementation and expansion of infrastructure as outlined in the report.
• Departments and the Executive to develop the 2017 budget incorporating use of the Racial Equity Tool.
