Office of Health and Racial Equity
The Office of Health and Racial Equity at the Springfield Department of Health and Human Services strives to address all form of inequities stemming from disability status, age, gender identification, sexual orientation, race, religious denomination, economic status, color, and nationality status.
Equality and equity are terms that are often assumed to mean the same. While equality refers to the providing everyone with the same resources despite their age, sex, ethnicity, and race, equity acknowledges that each person has different experiences and should be allocated resources based on their individual needs.
We know that not everyone has the ability to prosper or reach their full potential, leading to negative health outcomes on historically marginalized and oppressed populations such as Black, brown, and low-income people. Many of these reasons can be due to the Social Determinants of Health, social and economic factors such as education, housing and income that people are born into; these vary for everyone and have been heavily influenced by race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status.
We stand firm on our belief that an equitable Springfield, is a healthier Springfield.
The office was created by Commissioner Caulton-Harris and Mayor Sarno with the hiring of Chrismery Gonzalez, MPH. Racism was declared a Public Health issue, this national declaration was vital to prioritize in a majority minority city like Springfield. We want to address not only issues of racism but of other discriminatory practices that our residents can face. In order to do this successfully we want to:
· Learn about problems residents are facing
· Strategize solutions together (community and the office)
· Inform new policies
We will be operating under four pillars; Transparency, Communication, Commitment to learn, and Relationship building. It is important for us to receive your feedback and have created a survey you can take to share with us what is important to you. If you have any questions, reach out to Chrismery Gonzalez, cgonzalez@springfieldcityhall.com to discuss opportunities to work together in the near future.
