Sharing Our Notes: Two Conferences Address Equity
As we work more on making our organization more diverse, equitable, and inclusive, staff members are taking the opportunities to learn and understand more of these issues. Last week, we had the chance to attend the conference, Street Lights: Illuminating Implementation and Equity in Complete Streets as well as the State of the Region: Planning for the New Geography of Race and Class.Below is our recap of the conferences, provided by Marissa Aviña, SVBC Events Manager, and myself.National Complete Streets Coalition’s Street Lights ConferenceHosted by Smart Growth America's National Complete Streets Coalition“Everyone, regardless of age, ability, income, race, or ethnicity, ought to have safe, comfortable, and convenient access to community destinations and public places–whether walking, driving, bicycling, or taking public transportation…A Complete Streets approach integrates people and place in the planning, design, construction, operation, and maintenance of our transportation networks. This helps to ensure streets are safe for people of all ages and abilities, balance the needs of different modes, and support local land uses, economies, cultures, and natural environments.” – National Complete Streets CoalitionPlenary: Equity, Implementation, and Complete Streets in California Robert Sanchez, from Los Angeles' Department Of Transportation spoke about how the agency seeks equity when planning streets through an "equity index". They use data on injuries and fatalities along with an equity index. The equity index looks at, among other things: access to resources, previous attention and funding, income, land use and community character, and health variables such as childhood obesity, and rate of respiratory disease. The agency puts all these things on a map and can easily determine that the streets with the biggest issues are located in the areas that are darkest on that map. To plan for outreach and equity, LADOT follows these steps:
- Understand what the community needs vs what we think it needs
- Use data to prioritize needs
- Identify ALL community partners and resources
- Develop relationships with community - use partnerships to refine conversation
- Empower the community to take action
- Educate and encourage
- Create streamlined accessible mechanism to facilitate action
- Work hand in hard to achieve goals
- Stay engaged
We also heard from Tamika Butler, Executive Director of the Los Angeles County Bicycle Coalition (LACBC). She emphasized that we must look at people’s issues fully; we can’t just think about active transportation, we need to acknowledge what’s going on for the people who are using the streets. Complete Streets aren’t the end goal: Complete Neighborhoods and Complete Communities are. As one example of this, LACBC does monthly events in different communities called Active Streets LA. They do a walk and bike ride in a specific community, organized with local community partners, offer food and other fun activities. On these days they bring in city and county staff, which is the best way to show them what,the real issues are for the people who live there. They start to hear the barriers the residents have, see where there are no bike lanes, bus shelters, or access to transit and groceries. By understanding what the community needs most, you can work collaboratively toward positive change.During the breakout session, Stories from the Streets, Aiditi Kambuj of the Seattle Department of Transportation and Dean Porter-Nelson of Enterprise Community Partners presented on their Complete Streets projects, and the successes and unforeseen ramifications of those projects. They shared that even the most well-intentioned projects can potentially lead to unanticipated displacement or gentrification. One way to avoid this is to directly involve the community members in the planning and decision-making process to ensure that their wants and needs are implemented. This means going to pre-existing neighborhood meetings, not expecting people to come to yours; it means being equitable in every aspect of your work; and it means being flexible in your approach.Another breakout session, Social Equity in Complete Streets, featuring Charles Brown of Rutgers University, Naomi Doerner of Seneca, Max Podemski of Pacoima Beautiful, and Stephanie Ramirez, of AARP California, discussed the importance of co-defining equity. Each given project is different, so their approach should be different, too. The richest resource of each neighborhood are its people. Doener spoke of how to operationalize social equity values in your work. She emphasized:
- Invest in your values – Resource the change you say you want
- Interrogate assumptions and processes – You must change the system that produced the original result
- Understand that markers of success will change
- Co-power diverse leadership and community voices
Stage of the Region: Planning for the New Geography of Race and ClassHosted by Urban HabitatThis conference was organized by Urban Habitat partially to present their policy brief, Race, Inequality, and the Resegregation of the Bay Area. This report explores “the increase in affluence and displacement of low-income communities of color in urban centers and the rise of poverty in suburban areas.” The conference focused on this report, its impacts, and how to build power among affected groups. One notable finding was that almost all the areas with highest growth in poverty have above average percentage of people commuting over 25 miles to work. How does that impact peoples’ abilities to choose biking to get to work? How does that impact their community and their ability to engage in local decisions? It also noted that there is a relationship between different parts of our region and displacement – housing and transportation policies in one city or county are affecting access and connectivity in faraway cities and counties. This conference was a great way to connect to other local organizations working on diverse issues and link local campaigns to build a regional movement.Maria Noel Fernandez from Silicon Valley Rising mentioned how for every one tech job, four non-tech jobs are created. For many people, that means piecing together part-time minimum wage jobs- and a lot of times, people go between these jobs by bike because they can’t afford other ways of getting around.These conferences help our staff to think about how to better incorporate equity into our work. As we focus on our campaigns for the coming year, including a Complete Streets policy for VTA, we will consider the lessons learned, as well as some of the resources that were shared:
