Land Recognition
We would like to acknowledge that Santa Clara County is located on the unceded ethno-historic tribal territory of the Thámien Ohlone (THA-mee-in oh-LOW-nee) speaking tribal groups, which included the lands of the Paleños - whose tribal region was named after their powerful chief Capitan Pala.
This land was and continues to be of great importance and significance for the Muwekma Ohlone (mah-WEK-mah Oh-LOW-nee) Tribal People. This region extends to surrounding areas that held several Túupentaks (too-pen-tahks), traditional semi-subterranean spiritual roundhouses. Túupentaks were places of celebrations, healing, rituals, dances, intertribal feasts, and religious ceremonies. Also, the nearby ancestral heritage “shellmound sites” served as the Tribe’s territorial monuments and traditional cemetery sites for high lineage families, craft specialists, and fallen warriors.
It is important that we not only recognize the history of the land of the Thámien Ohlone on which we stand and gather to participate, learn, and honor but also recognize that the First People of this region – the Muwekma Ohlone People, are alive and thriving members of the San José and broader Bay Area communities today.
This land acknowledgment is a shortened version of the acknowledgment from the Indian Health Center of Santa Clara Valley.
County Alignment
The Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap provides a unifying vision and strategic direction for County-wide and departmental racial equity efforts to operationalize the explicit commitments to equity in our County Mission, Values, Operational Priorities, and Board Policy Priorities.
County Mission
The County’s mission is to plan for the needs of a dynamic community, provide quality services, and promote a healthy, safe, and prosperous community for all.
County Values
Advance Equity: We strive to create a more just and prosperous community by focusing on equity, inclusion, and belonging in County services, initiatives, policies, and decisions.
County Operational Priorities
Advance Equity: Proactively seek to eliminate inequities and embed equity, inclusion, and belonging into daily operations, policies, and budget decisions.
Board of Supervisors Policy Priorities
The Board of Supervisors affirms and upholds the values of equity, community partnership, open communication, and transparency in pursuit of the Board’s policy priorities.
Background
Beginning in December 2023, the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Belonging (ODEB) facilitated the co-design of the County’s first Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap. The process included County-wide engagement of departments and agencies, as well as engagement and partnership with the Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits’ Racial Equity Action Leadership (REAL) Coalition. By June 2024, the end deliverables of the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap development process included:
- An equity definition;
- Guiding principles for achieving transformative racial equity in government;
- A County-wide racial equity vision;
- Racial equity priority areas; and
- Racial equity goals, strategies, and measures for internal County programs and services.
The Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap action planning phase began in October 2024. Implementation of the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap will require departments to identify their role within the internal goals and strategies and to work with ODEB to build an action plan to track, monitor, and communicate progress.
Engagement and Data Inputs
In preparation for the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap process, ODEB engaged in quantitative and qualitative data collection to:
- Understand the current landscape of racial equity efforts across the County,
- Gather baseline data that can be used to measure progress over time, and
- Establish key racial equity principles and definitions to support a shared understanding across the organization.
Employee Equity Survey
In fall 2022, ODEB surveyed all County employees to measure their knowledge, skills, and abilities to advance racial equity in government, as well as gather employee feedback on departmental and County racial equity efforts. This baseline data is important for understanding where we are, identifying the work we need to do, and measuring and communicating our progress over time.
The final report outlines the County-wide quantitative survey data, key findings, and recommendations, one of which is the “development of a County-wide Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap to identify goals and objectives to advance racial equity.”
Environmental Scan
Sixteen (16) departmental and County-wide equity plans were reviewed and analyzed for themes around the focus/goals of each plan and the measures/deliverables used to evaluate each plan.
The purpose of the environmental scan was to have a better understanding of all the current equity and racial equity efforts happening across the County to ensure that the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap would be designed in a way that aligned to preexisting efforts.
Plans reviewed in the environmental scan included action plans developed by departments and departmental strategic plans that outlined priorities and strategies to address racial inequities.
Key Informant Interviews
Thirty (30) interviews were conducted with internal and external leaders, decision-makers, and County staff who are tasked with implementing equity strategy (“Key Informants”).
Findings from the Key Informant interviews were used to inform priority strategies within the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap and will also inform the design of departmental implementation plans.
Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Risks Assessment
County leaders, decision-makers, and equity strategy implementers came together to assess the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and risks (SWOR) associated with implementing a County-wide Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap.
Findings from the SWOR assessment were used to inform priority strategies within the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap and will also be used in the design of departmental action plans.
Roadmap Milestones
Over 60 County executives, department leaders, and equity practitioners participated in an exercise to review, provide feedback, and endorse local versions of five guiding principles for achieving transformative racial equity in government. These principles will guide consistent decision-making, strategy, and actions to advance racial equity across County departments and in cross-system operations, in alignment with the County’s values and operational priorities.
Additionally, participants endorsed a definition of the term ‘equity’ to build a shared understanding among County employees of the nuanced term. For ‘racial equity,’ the County continues to utilize a definition from Race Forward.
Guiding Principles for Achieving Transformative Racial Equity in Government
1. Understand government’s role in past and present inequities: Understand and acknowledge the government’s role in impacting communities at a wide scale to this day—whether positive, negative, or neutral.
Example: Taking an inventory of the historic and present benefits and harms of major laws, policies, and programs.
2. Consistently address root causes: Target the fundamental root causes of gaps and inequities and ensure that we are reaching the people who have traditionally been excluded, recognizing that these investments will benefit all.
Example: Assessing the impact of an entire portfolio of departmental programs and operations on holistically addressing root causes of inequity versus selectively addressing symptoms.
3. Work in partnership with communities impacted by inequities: Engage and elevate community voice in the design, discussion, and decision-making process for policies, practices, and programs that impact them.
Example: Leveraging the expertise and experiences of all, particularly leaders and other individuals who represent the various communities served by the County.
4. Adopt a continuous learning and adaptive approach: Acknowledge that the scale and complexity of reaching racial equity will require ongoing commitment, action, and adjustments to drive meaningful change and strengthen our communities over time.
Example: Evaluating and significantly adjusting policies, programs, and systems where data highlights that racially equitable outcomes or sufficiently positive outcomes are not being produced.
5. Be transparent and accountable: Build trust and accountability in the long-term commitment for racial equity through data-driven decision-making and outcome tracking.
Example: Creating and publishing annual reports on progress toward departmental aspirations and goals, including positive and negative changes in outcomes across populations.
Adopted Definitions of Equity and Racial Equity
Equity is both a process and outcome that results in just and fair inclusion into a society in which everyone can participate, prosper, and reach their full potential.
As a process, equity requires a way of doing business that:
- Prioritizes access and opportunities for groups who have the greatest need;
- Methodically evaluates benefits and burdens produced by seemingly neutral systems and practices; and
- Engages those most impacted by the problems we seek to address as experts of their own experiences, strategists in co-creating solutions, and evaluators of success.
As an outcome, equity is a measure of justice that is achieved when outcomes in the conditions of well-being are improved for marginalized groups, improving outcomes for all.
Racial equity is the process of eliminating racial disparities and improving outcomes for everyone. It is the intentional and continual practice of changing policies, practices, systems, and structures by supporting measurable change in the lives of people of color for the benefit of all people. Source: Adapted from Race Forward
Equity-Centered Results-Based Accountability
Introduction
To facilitate the co-design of the County’s first Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap, ODEB contracted with Equity & Results, LLC. This process utilized a Results-Based Framework to transform organizational culture and actions and deliver racially equitable results.
The County is steadfast in its commitment to advancing equity in government. This process supports those efforts by providing a disciplined approach to strategy development and progress measurement to ensure that our hard work produces real change and improves outcomes for all.
Methodology
The process begins with impact—with a universal vision for all people—and works backward from that vision to understand why different marginalized communities are further away from realizing that vision. It also emphasizes understanding the root causes of why racial inequities exist and then designing strategies and solutions that will address those roots. This is important because while safety-net services and programs offered by the County are crucial to meet the needs of families today, those services often address the symptoms of racial inequities, rather than prevent racial inequities from impacting future generations. The County is committed to addressing both the symptoms and roots of racial inequities, and this process gets us closer to being able to understand and address the root causes of racial inequities.
The following are milestones of the process, in order of development. First is the vision, co-designed by participants of the Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap development process.
Vision
All people in Santa Clara County are powerful co-creators of their vision of the future, have agency over how and where they choose to live, are healthy, and are safe in their communities.
Indicators
Next in the process was the identification of five indicators that demonstrate a few areas of persistent racial inequities in Santa Clara County. By disaggregating these indicators by race and ethnicity, the data served as a starting point for analyzing why racial inequities persist across outcomes in our county, with the understanding that the identified indicators are just a sample of Board- and County-identified priorities. The identified indicators consist of:
- Rates of asthma-related emergency department visits among children, by race/ethnicity.
- Percentage of adults with less than a high school diploma (aged 25 years and older), by race/ethnicity.
- Share of housing units paying over 30% of household income in owner costs or gross rent, by race/ethnicity.
- Rates of infant mortality, by race/ethnicity.
- Rates of youth detention, by race/ethnicity.es and experiences.
Root Cause Analysis
By asking ‘why?’ over and over again, participants explored roots beyond the usual areas of County service delivery—such as access to health care, housing availability, and access to education—and documented how our communities were shaped and continue to be deeply impacted by the historical legacy of explicitly exclusionary and racist policies and practices.
And though participants explored each indicator individually, as separate systems, it soon became apparent how each system was informed by similar sets of exclusionary policies and practices. The roots all lead to the same groundwater, and to truly shift these systems for racial equity, it would require moving beyond services and toward transformational solutions.
Root Causes
Once the root causes of racial inequities in the five indicator areas were explored in-depth, our organization looked inward to identify recurring themes for operational improvement and to understand the County’s role in addressing the roots of racial inequities. The following are organization-wide root causes that the roadmap strategies seek to address:
Leadership skills, capacity, and buy-in for advancing racial equity are inconsistent, while fear of accountability to racial equity and risk aversion are high.
County processes do not center the experiences of people (internal and external) who have to engage with them, which places the burden of navigating systems on individuals, rather than on the County taking ownership of systems improvement to address structural racism.
Lack of County infrastructure (people, resources, and processes) and accountability measures to build, implement, and communicate sustainable departmental racial equity strategies.
Community engagement practices are varied and inconsistent across the County, ranging from ‘informing’ community to ‘shifting decision-making power’ to impacted communities.
Employee equity and wellness practices are rooted in individualism, while not being responsive to the experiences of all communities represented in the workforce; practices are also designed to address symptoms rather than allocating resources to upstream needs (e.g., undervaluing lived experience in hiring).
Racial Equity Priority Areas
The following priority areas and root causes encompass recurring themes around challenges and pain points for advancing racial equity within our County policies, programs, and services. The associated strategies seek to address the related root causes within each priority area.
Priority Area: Transparent County Systems
Goal: Increase transparency of processes and decision-making (budgeting, procurement, programs, etc.) toward the advancement of racial equity in government.
Priority Strategies:
- Develop departmental activities to alleviate the burden of navigating County systems on all residents by being fully responsive to the experiences of communities of color (internal/external).
- Prioritize the voices of communities most impacted in decision-making to be as important as legal, political, and budgetary considerations in the development and improvement of policies, processes, and strategies across County systems.
- Conduct racial equity impact assessments to reduce racial inequities and increase transparency of decision-making processes.
- Invest in leadership development to build capacity to implement racial equity strategies, with an emphasis on communication and accountability.
Related Root Causes:
- Leadership skills, capacity, and buy-in for advancing racial equity are inconsistent, while fear of accountability to racial equity and risk aversion are high.
- County processes do not center the experiences of people (internal and external) who have to engage with them, which places the burden of navigating systems on individuals, rather than on the County taking ownership of systems improvement to address structural racism.
- Lack of County infrastructure (people, resources, and processes) and accountability measures to build, implement, and communicate sustainable departmental racial equity strategies.
Priority Area: Continuous Improvement through Data and Evaluation
Goal: Improve data (qualitative/quantitative) collection, analysis, and use for evaluation and decision-making processes to align with the County’s Racial Equity Principles.
Priority Strategies:
- Establish systems and tools to anchor quantitative and qualitative data collection, analysis, and sharing to facilitate racial equity impact assessments.
- Establish standards for data collection and reporting data findings that prioritize community-based methods and diversity of languages, cultures, and abilities.
- Facilitate collaboration, transparency, and accountability by making County data accessible in alignment with legal and privacy considerations.
- Shift narratives around data to understand the historical legacy of harm to certain communities caused by data, its connection to current racial inequities, and how to mitigate any present harms.
- Conduct racial equity impact assessments to reduce racial inequities and facilitate continuous improvement in data and evaluation.
- Strengthen existing County feedback structures to gather continuous qualitative and quantitative data on whether communities’ needs are being met to inform racial equity strategy.
Related Root Causes:
- County processes do not center the experiences of people (internal and external) who have to engage with them, which places the burden of navigating systems on individuals, rather than on the County taking ownership of systems improvement to address structural racism.
- Lack of County infrastructure (people, resources, and processes) and accountability measures to build, implement, and communicate sustainable departmental racial equity strategies.
Priority Area: Community Engagement
Goal: Emphasize community engagement strategies that prioritize participation of communities of color to advance racial equity and improve outcomes for all.
Priority Strategies:
- Co-design, in partnership with community, and adopt a shared framework for countywide community engagement practices.
- Build County-wide and departmental community engagement infrastructure (people, resources, processes) that is co-created in partnership with BIPOC communities.
- Operationalize community engagement practices through racial equity impact assessments to center BIPOC/community voice and systems change.
Related Root Causes:
- Community engagement practices are varied and inconsistent across the County, ranging from ‘informing’ community to ‘shifting decision-making power’ to impacted communities.
- County processes do not center the experiences of people (internal and external) who have to engage with them, which places the burden of navigating systems on individuals, rather than on the County taking ownership of systems improvement to address structural racism.
- Lack of County infrastructure (people, resources, and processes) and accountability measures to build, implement, and communicate sustainable departmental racial equity strategies.
Priority Area: Workforce Equity and Wellness
Goal: Design workforce equity and wellness strategies to ensure that the strategies reflect the diversity of the communities that we serve across the breadth (functions) and depth (hierarchy) of the County.
Priority Strategies:
- Establish and clearly communicate consistent County-wide policies, processes, and practices to ensure racially equitable recruitment, hiring, promotion, evaluation, and retention of County employees.
- Facilitate systems improvement by establishing clear delineation of responsibilities and points of collaboration between the Employee Services Agency and County departments, including ongoing training and accountability systems for all employees involved in recruitment and hiring processes.
- Conduct racial equity impact assessments to identify and mitigate any racially inequitable outcomes in the life cycle of employment, from recruitment to separation.
- Invest in career development and support that will be effective for all employees, including BIPOC employees.
- Design employee wellness activities that center BIPOC voices and experiences.
Related Root Causes:
- Leadership skills, capacity, and buy-in for advancing racial equity are inconsistent, while fear of accountability to racial equity and risk aversion are high.
- Lack of County infrastructure (people, resources, and processes) and accountability measures to build, implement, and communicate sustainable departmental racial equity strategies.
- Employee equity and wellness practices are rooted in individualism, while not being responsive to the experiences of all communities represented in the workforce; practices are also designed to address symptoms rather than allocating resources to upstream needs (e.g., undervaluing lived experience in hiring).
Next Steps
Racial Equity Action Plans
The current phase of this planning process began in October 2024; and, by June 2025, every County department is expected to develop a racial equity action plan to implement the goals and strategies outlined in this document.
Each County department is at a different developmental stage in terms of their understanding and application of racial equity principles into day-to-day practice and operations. The support, guidance, and continuous learning opportunities provided by ODEB will meet departments where they are in their journey to apply racial equity principles and tools into County operations. Together, we can work toward our racial equity vision and improve outcomes for all.
Acknowledgements
ODEB would like to thank everyone who contributed their time, reflections, and insights to the development of the County’s first Racial Equity Strategic Roadmap. We are grateful to have embarked on this journey with County staff and representatives from the REAL Coalition. Thank you for your unwavering commitment to the families and communities of Santa Clara County in the pursuit of racial equity and justice.