Equity and the Budget
The City Council is responsible for managing the city’s finances to meet the community’s current and future needs. As the national economy stabilizes after the Covid-19 pandemic and the recent rise in inflation and interest rates, Mountain View is at an economic turning point.
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Our low-income and minority communities have struggled recently. 31% of our population is considered low-income. In 2010, the Latinx population comprised more than 21% of Mountain View residents. Now it’s just over 17%. Displacement has left many households looking for a new place to live, and some have been forced to leave the city.
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Many of the economic disparities in our city today were brought about by historical discrimination and unequal opportunity. I believe that we should implement equity-based budgeting to ensure that the city grows sustainably. Equity-based budgeting analyzes investments through the lens of policy impacts on low-income and minority communities.
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The 2020 National League of Cities Municipal Action Guide for Advancing Racial Equity identifies the following questions we can ask during the budgeting process:
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Who will be better/worse off through this policy?
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Who is deciding the goals, parameters or features of this policy?
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What historical structures or social norms drive the policy?
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Which systems will implement the policy?
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Who has access, both physically and socially to that system?
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What do data analyses say about where inequities have manifested due to previous policy changes?
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To make sure nobody gets left behind, I propose allocating 40% of all capital improvement spending to projects that will benefit low-income and minority communities. My proposal is modeled after the Biden-Harris Administration’s Justice40 Initiative, which commits 40% of federal spending in certain climate change investments to go to underserved and underrepresented communities.
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Learn more about my budget ideas here.