Drafter
Clerk 06/17/2020
Title
A RESOLUTION declaring racism a public health crisis.
Body
WHEREAS, racism has deep and harmful impacts that unfairly disadvantages Black, Indigenous and People of Color ("BIPOC") and unfairly advantages people who identify as white, and
WHEREAS, racism harms every person in our society and is the root cause of poverty and economic inequality, and
WHEREAS, "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere," as King County's namesake, the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., said, and
WHEREAS, whether intended or not, racism becomes ingrained in institutional policies and practices, creating differential access to opportunities and resources, and causes disparate outcomes in all aspects of life affecting health, and
WHEREAS, by maintaining the status quo and existing systems of power and privilege based on our country's long history of and continued persistence of white supremacy, institutional policies and practices do not need to be explicitly racist in order to have racist impacts on residents, and
WHEREAS, culture across institutions and systems is critical, and the legacy of racist policies and practices continues to exist even once the policies and practices have been changed, and
WHEREAS, reversing the legacy of institutional racism calls for an understanding of the intersectional nature of power and oppression that amplify adverse effects on people who experience more than one form of marginalization, such as race, gender and disability, and a commitment to anti-racist policies and practices, and
WHEREAS, decades of data collected by Public Health - Seattle & King County have demonstrated how BIPOC communities are affected by both acute impacts, such as gun violence, and chronic impacts such as higher rates of cardiovascular disease and diabetes, maternal and infant mortality, underweight babies and shorter, less-healthy lives overall, and
WHEREAS, King County residents of color have deep wells of resilience...
Click here for full text