Welcome to the Bay Area Equity Atlas!

Our team at the San Francisco Foundation, PolicyLink, and the USC Program for Environmental and Regional Equity (PERE) is thrilled to share the Bay Area Equity Atlas with you!

The Bay Area Equity Atlas is a comprehensive data resource to track the state of equity across the region and inform solutions for inclusive prosperity.

We built the Atlas for everyone working to create a more equitable, just, and resilient Bay Area. Racialized inequality — along with a housing and displacement crisis — is placing our region’s future at risk. The only path to inclusive prosperity is to advance equity solutions at scale.

Data that is disaggregated by race, nativity, geography, and more is critical to charting a more equitable future. Data can elevate the debate about equity and catalyze the bolder solutions needed to make equity our regional reality. Data can also help strengthen the voice and power of the communities most impacted by inequities. As Ellen Wu, executive director of Urban Habitat and a member of our Equity Campaign Leaders Advisory Committee explains: “Data is critical to democratizing power and running effective advocacy campaigns.”

At the click of a button, you can access 21 powerful equity indicators across the San Francisco Foundation’s People, Place, and Power equity framework. Data is available for 272 geographies, including the region as a whole, its nine counties, 40 sub-county areas, and 220 places including cities and Census Designated Places.

The Bay Area Equity Atlas is a tool for social change. It equips community leaders and policymakers with facts and analyses to:

  • Assess how well Bay Area communities are doing on key measures of social and economic inclusion, neighborhood opportunity, and political voice and power
  • Spark and inform new conversations about why—and how much—equity matters to the cultural and economic vitality of the Bay Area as a whole and each of its communities
  • Inform policies, plans, strategies, business models, and investments for inclusive prosperity

Our aim is to democratize data and make it easy for you to understand, discuss, and use. Explore the Bay Area Equity Atlas to find:

  • Contextual information for each indicator explaining why it matters for building an equitable region, key trends in the region, major drivers of inequities, and policy solutions
  • Charts, graphs, and maps to share with your colleagues and add to your presentations, fact sheets, reports, and funding proposals
  • Stories about residents’ experiences of equity challenges as well as solutions
  • Analyses of equity trends and issues across the region
  • Examples of how local leaders are using Bay Area Equity Atlas data to advance equity solutions
  • And much more!

The atlas is a living resource. We invite you to share your feedback and tell us what you’d like to see on the site. Please sign up to Get Atlas Updates (bottom right corner) to learn about new features and analyses, and how people are using our data. And follow us on social media at #BayAreaEquityAtlas.

We hope you enjoy exploring! Here are two additional resources to help you get started:

- The Bay Area Equity Atlas team (Sarah, Jamila, Michelle, Rosa, Jessica, Justin, and Arpita)

UPCOMING WEBINAR: Introducing the Bay Area Equity Atlas

Data matters for building an equitable Bay Area. From informing the public debate to driving policy solutions, data broken down by race and geography is a key ingredient in advancing equity. Yet, even in the tech capital of the world, such data remains far too difficult to access and use.

Enter the Bay Area Equity Atlas – a new data tool launching on June 5, 2019. Produced by a partnership between the San Francisco Foundation, PolicyLink, and the USC Program for Environmental and Regional Equity (PERE), the Bay Area Equity Atlas equips community leaders with 21 powerful equity metrics and policy solutions for inclusive prosperity.

Join us for the launch webinar, Thursday, June 6, (12-1  pm PT/ 3-4 pm ET), to take a tour of the Atlas and be the first to learn about our analysis of the diversity of elected officials in the region, based on a unique dataset assembled by the Atlas team.

Speakers include:

REGISTER TODAY

Economic Inclusion in Southern Cities Biannual Convening Recap

Equity is the superior growth model. Research confirms that supporting residents and workers of color in reaching their full potential is more than just a moral imperative. Indeed, it is an economic imperative as well. Economists tell us that inequality hinders growth and greater inclusion accelerates it. As the diversity of this country continues to grow, and we move closer towards becoming a majority people of color nation in 2044, embracing these principles will only become increasingly important. It was to this end, and as part of their unwavering commitment to promoting racial equity, that the Annie E. Casey Foundation first launched the Advancing Economic Inclusion in Southern Cities (EISC) learning community back in 2015.  

EISC consists of municipal officials and staff, local philanthropists, and business and community partners from seven major cities in the South:  Asheville, Atlanta, Charlotte, Memphis, Nashville, New Orleans, and Richmond. On April 2-4, 2019, EISC representatives gathered at the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond branch in Charlotte to discuss challenges and solutions for advancing increased participation of business enterprises owned and operated by women and people of color. In addition to Casey, the Federal Reserve banks of Atlanta, St. Louis, and Richmond have been partners in this project and hosted virtually all of the cohort meetings thus far. 

The convening began with a rousing video of acclaimed poet Danez Smith speaking passionately about the impact that racial inequities have had and continue to have on young people of color in cities across the country. This poem served as powerful motivation for the three-day convening and helped to ground participants in the urgent need for change present in the communities they seek to serve. The poem also underscored the importance of moving beyond representative diversity towards tangible investment in underserved communities, full inclusion of residents and workers in decision-making processes, and the removal of systemic barriers that continue to hold back low-income people of color. 

Over the course of the three-day meeting, participants were joined by committed advocates, activists, academics, and municipal leaders to help them develop viable strategies for advancing equity and inclusion. For example, on the second day Memphis Mayor Jim Strickland and Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles each spoke about inclusion efforts underway in their respective cities. For example, the city of Charlotte commissioned a disparity study to document the underrepresentation of people-of-color-owned business enterprises among those receiving contracts for city procurement opportunities.  Similarly, Memphis is also using the city’s purchasing power to help grow and expand small, and people-of-color owned businesses.

Other noteworthy strategies for advancing racial equity and economic inclusion include:

  1. Local and targeted hiring – require or incentivize businesses that receive public resources, such as government contracts or tax breaks, to hire workers living in a particular geographic area or from specific populations within the community.
     
  2. Anchor institution procurement – leverage the tremendous purchasing power of universities, hospitals, community colleges, and large private sector employers to help not only grow new businesses through contracting, but also fill open employment opportunities at these institutions. The Chicago Anchors for a Strong Economy (CASE) is a noteworthy example of this strategy in action. 
     
  3. Tailor workforce strategies – career training and education opportunities should be targeted for industries slated for growth, or those that have historically had barriers to entry for low-income people of color similar to the EARN Maryland program.
     
  4. Asset-building strategies – take an intergenerational approach to ensure that economic inclusion strategies will address the racial wealth gap through efforts such as individual development accounts for low-income families, or city-wide efforts such as the Richmond Office of Community Wealth Building or Atlanta Wealth Building Initiative.

To learn more about economic inclusion in general and the challenges and opportunities facing Black-owned business enterprises in particular, please check out the latest report from the Association for Enterprise Opportunity (AEO), The Tapestry of Black Business Ownership in America: Untapped Opportunities for Success.

Equity, Artificial Intelligence, and Transportation

May 17, 2019

From autonomous vehicles and bio-transit tickets, to airport face scanning and smart highways and cities, artificial intelligence (AI) is making its way into the transportation sector, one innovation at a time. As exciting as these technologies are, the big challenge will be to ensure that rapid innovation does not perpetuate existing inequality. Instead, artificial intelligence should be applied to providing benefits to the communities that too often have carried the negative burden of our traditional transportation infrastructure and systems without enjoying the benefits they provide.

With the growth in popularity of ubiquitous apps and services like Uber, Lyft, Amazon, Postmates, and DoorDash, companies are looking for ways to grow their client base and outdo their competition. In today’s era of convenience and efficiency, this means being faster and more automated. As companies focus on expansion and increasing their profit, we must ensure that their growth does not cause new harm to our most vulnerable communities. This means considering how artificial intelligence and automation affect the transportation systems low-income people and people of color depend on. Will new technology increase the mobility and connection of disinvested people and places or will it undermine the buses, trains, carpools, and shuttle services people depend on? Will it improve access to high quality jobs that pay fair living wages and treat workers with dignity and respect or will it leave new generations of people behind? Will it support a more inclusive society or deploy new surveillance tools and predictive policing that perpetuate algorithmic bias and propagate the wrongful criminalization of people of color? 

Despite these challenges, there are clear opportunities for artificial intelligence technology to help solve the transportation issues that have negatively impacted low-income communities and communities of color for generations:

As we think about the potential impact of AI on transportation and transit systems, it’s helpful to look to the principles set forth by the Transportation Equity Caucus, a coalition chaired by PolicyLink and composed of more than 125 national, state, and local organizations working to embed racial equity into federal transportation policy. The principles and their AI implications are:

1. Create affordable transportation options for all people. We must ensure that the cost of using autonomous vehicles (AVs) and AI technologies for daily travel is accessible for people of all income levels, particularly if they are to be an extension of the public transit system.

2. Ensure fair access to quality jobs, workforce development, and contracting opportunities in the transportation industry. As AVs other AI technologies are deployed in our cities, we must ensure that the jobs and contracts associated with their growth are high quality and are accessible to workers and firms who have historically been shut out, namely people of color and people with disabilities.

3. Promote, healthy, safe, and inclusive communities. Just like there are food deserts, there are transportation innovation deserts. Too many communities of color already lack access to quality transit services, safe pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure, and well-maintained roads. These same communities are the last ones to have access to on demand rides, bikes, and scooters. As AVs and AI technologies are deployed it is important to think about the spatial distributions of affordable transportation options and the impact they will have on the transportation services that communities of color already depend on.

4. Invest equitably and focus on results. As AI has moved into many parts of society, concerns have been raised about the lack of racial and ethnic diversity in the tech sector. Specifically, people have pointed to several incidents related to image recognition systems where unconscious racial bias showed up in tech projects. In the transportation space there is early evidence that bias is embedded in computer algorithms that should drive automated vehicle technology. Research has found that autonomous vehicles are less able to detect people with darker skin color, compared to people with lighter skin color. Facial recognition and predictive policing technology deployed through our transportation infrastructure can also perpetuate discrimination and increase police surveillance in communities that are already subject to disproportionate policing. To address this, we must be thoughtful in considering both the functionality of technology and its application and impact. We must ensure that people of color, people with disabilities, and other vulnerable populations are co-designers of the deployment of AI in our communities and cities.

The AI train is already running at full steam and there is no sign of a slow down. We can either watch it pass us by or get on and help program its direction. It is time for community leaders, advocates, and policymakers to chart a new course that will deliver real transportation equity to the millions of Americans who have been harmed and neglected by our past infrastructure investments, policies, and practices.

Safe and Affordable Water is a Critical National Imperative


With mounting and devastating water challenges in America, we can leverage Infrastructure Week to turn urgent attention to ensuring both the human right to clean water and to focusing on the climate mitigations to address the droughts, floods, and sea-level rise that threaten our water futures.

For an increasing number of communities in the United States, their water is unsafe and having negative impacts on health. Nearly 77 million U.S. residents are served by drinking water systems with one or more Safe Drinking Water Act violations. Race and income are central factors in both urban and rural water vulnerabilities, and many studies have found links between poor water quality and low-income communities of color. Over the last few years, lead has been documented in school water in 26 states. Today, the U.S. ranks 36th in the world in terms of access to water and sanitation.

The crisis of water affordability is mounting. The lowest 20 percent of income earners pay 20 percent of their monthly income for water. If rate hikes continue at their pace of the last decade, more than one-third of all U.S. households, 35.6 percent, will be unable to afford running water in the next five years. Estimates of the cost to replace aging infrastructure in the United States alone project over $1 trillion dollars needed in the next 25 years to replace systems built circa World War II, which could triple the cost of household water if current rate payers are required to shoulder the bills. An estimated 15 million people in the United States experienced a water shutoff in 2016 with the highest shutoff rates in lower-income cities with higher rates of poverty. The decline of federal investment has removed a valuable funding source to support maintenance and replacement of safe drinking and wastewater systems. Cities, states, and water customers are increasingly shouldering the bulk of costly maintenance and repair responsibilities to protect the health, quality, and accessibility of their water.

Climate-related flooding, sea level rise, and waste water exposures are steeply increasing—threatening both drinking water and wastewater systems. An increase in the number of extreme weather events can overwhelm water systems and impact those residing in vulnerable neighborhoods—including sewage backups, sewage overflows into water sources, and the flooding of homes, businesses, and neighborhoods with toxic runoff. The capacity for lower-income communities to recover is severely compromised. Almost five million people and 2.6 million homes are within zones vulnerable to sea level rise predicted to be inundated by the end of the century. Studies estimate that adaptations to water systems to deal with climate change will warrant investment in the United States of more than $36 billion by 2050.

The critical imperative to increase water infrastructure investment offers an opportunity to align major economic opportunities with the demographic shifts underway. With chronic labor shortages and an aging workforce in the water sector, new investment creates an opportunity to tackle the legacy of racial and gender discrimination in the water infrastructure and construction industries and the need for good employment for young workers. While opportunities remain underdeveloped, demonstrated success in local hire measures, local procurement policies, and supply-side training and support all offer pathways to both increase the equitable outcomes across communities and address the climate resilience of diverse environments.

Policy Priorities for Water Equity and Climate Resilience

As Congress and the President discuss a potential new infrastructure bill, and as architects of the Green New Deal flesh out policy proposals, they should ensure they address the water threats to communities of color, Indigenous communities, and low-income communities to deliver improved water equity and climate resilience.

  • Guarantee universal access to safe and affordable water. Ensure water infrastructure investments are equitable and prioritize vulnerable communities for safe and affordable drinking water, sanitation, and storm water management. Philadelphia has an exemplary ‘tiered-assistance’ program for affordability and universal access.
     
  • Ensure vulnerable communities—low-income communities and communities of color, and those proximate to climate threatened waters—engage in water planning, governance, and implementation of resilience measures. Cleveland’s Climate Action Plan embedded equity provisions into its plan and targeted vulnerable communities in its water provisions.  
     
  • Address historic economic disparities and dislocations by increasing educational, job, and business opportunities for low-income people and people of color in designing, building, operating, and maintaining communities’ next generation of green and sustainable water infrastructure. The San Francisco Public Utilities Commission has structured targeted local hiring and inclusive procurement;  and the Emerald Cities Collaborative runs training for businesses of color to successfully compete in water infrastructure build out contracts to address economic inclusion of communities left behind in the current economy. The EPA Brownfields Environmental Workforce Development and Job Training Grants and the Environmental Health Sciences Environmental Career Worker Training Program both provide effective opportunities for disadvantaged workers and opportunity youth to enter the water and green infrastructure careers.  
     
  • And finally, honor the cultural and spiritual access to water that communities depend upon in public lands policy and protections.

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