Press Release
Join: Virtual Press Event in Support of the Health Equity & Racial Justice Fund
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Focus Areas
Healthy Communities -
Expertise
Public Policy Advocacy
What: Virtual press event with HERJ Fund co-sponsors and partners, along with local leaders and community groups, to speak on the need for Governor Newsom to Finally Stand Up for Racial Justice and Health Equity in the 2022-23 budget.
When: Tomorrow, Wednesday June 8th, 2022, 10 a.m. – 10:30 a.m. PT
Where: Zoom; register here
For Spanish Media: There will be Spanish speaking representatives to answer any press questions.
Who: Ron Coleman, Managing Director of Policy at the California Pan Ethnic Health Network; Nadia Kean-Ayub, Executive Director of Rainbow Spaces; Tavae Samuelu, Executive Director of Empowering Pacific Islander Communities (EPIC); Assemblymember Dr. Joaquin Arambula, District 31 – Invited
Register here
MEDIA ADVISORY: Broad Coalition to Urge Governor Newsom to Finally Stand Up for Racial Justice and Address Root Causes of Systemic Health Inequities
Zoom – On Wednesday, June 8th, community leaders, public health advocates, and racial justice groups will convene for a virtual press event to urge Governor Newsom to stand with his own Legislature and over 200 organizations across California, representing every region and every policy area, including education, environmental justice, health care, labor, and business, by supporting an historic initiative that would finally address systemic racism, which is at the root of California’s preventable health and racial justice inequities. “Our state boasts a staggering $97 billion budget surplus. If not now, when? Given the devastating impact of racism on the health and well-being of Californians of color it’s a travesty of the highest order that racial justice isn’t even mentioned in the Governor’s budget proposal,” said Ron Coleman from the California Pan-Ethnic Health Network.
The Health Equity and Racial Justice Fund (HERJ Fund), a transformative new approach to solving California’s intractable health equity and racial justice problems, cleared a significant hurdle last week with the State Legislature including $75 million ongoing for the Fund in their joint budget. The HERJ Fund would provide support to community based organizations to address the underlying social, environmental, and economic factors that limit peoples’ opportunities to be healthy, such as poverty, violence and trauma, environmental hazards, access to affordable housing and healthy food.
Wednesday’s virtual community gathering and press event represents the culmination of a series of rallies held by supporters in cities across the state to call upon Governor Newsom to finally trust that those closest to injustice know the solutions and to stop only paying lip service to equity. Over the past two years, advocates describe a roller coaster with every budget proposal from the State Legislature including this transformative proposal to fight racial injustice and every budget proposed by the Governor stripping it back out.
Learn more: California Health Equity & Racial Justice Fund
The Health Equity and Racial Justice Fund would disrupt top-down governmental funding through supporting communities to identify and address the health and justice issues most important to them—instead of being told what to do and how to do it, which is what often happens when funding is offered. The HERJ fund is supported by communities and the state legislature, but Governor Newsom hasn’t included it in his budget.
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