As UHS evaluates how to grow its neighborhood building efforts, we recognize the need to center equity across our entire agency. This is especially pertinent in a service like housing and community development, which has historically been a locus of segregation and poor health and economic outcomes.
Last year, we created a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion committee that meets monthly. It includes a board member, two UHS staff, and a member of our community council, and there are current efforts to recruit residents and representatives from partners outside of our board or special committees. The committee is tasked with internal and external evaluations and recommendations to promote a more equitable approach. This includes the diversity of our staff and leadership. Our social service team includes individuals who have experienced homelessness and struggled with addiction, which allows for deeper connections and service coordination for residents. Our property management and leasing team has multilingual capacities to meet residents and applicants where they are. We continue to diversify our Board of Directors as new seats become vacant. Our Board currently includes a member of the LGBTQ community, a minority entrepreneur, women in leadership, and we are in the process of filling vacancies for resident representatives. The committee is helping to create policies to further improve our agency's diversity to reflect the communities we serve, and to promote opportunities for our staff to grow into leaders of UHS.
Looking externally, the committee is evaluating the policies that affect the residents that live (or apply to live) in our communities. The conversations within the committee are helping to identify gaps in service availability (i.e. language/cultural barriers, disabilities, etc.) and recommending the development of partnerships with trusted community institutions and practices that identify and address these gaps.
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