Equity Statement
Independence Gardens' equity goal is to create programs that provide a sense of belonging that is universally experienced. Connecting children and communities to food through actionable, impactful nutrition education programs benefits everyone by ensuring accessibility to fresh food, and taking a critical eye to systems of unequal food access; systems where healthy food access includes understanding the physical environment, the economic environment, and the sociocultural environment. This is especially critical where the devastating impact of unequal food access is more prevalent in low-income communities and where race often undermines fairness across demographics, conditions, and experiences. By prioritizing attention to racial and socio-economic equity, it will benefit all communities.
Racial Equity Statement
Independence Gardens is committed to racial equity both internally through our work environment, and externally through our programming.
- We are committed to ensuring that every policy enacted reflects democratic principles of equity and justice.
- We understand that enacting policy in a just and equitable manner considers critical issues of implicit bias and discrimination that requires concerted and purposeful action.
- We believe that bringing together Executive Board Members, staff and other partners with differing backgrounds and life experiences will enhance our ability to increase opportunities for all arts service organizations to succeed.
Policies, programs, and activities will be administered to identify and avoid discrimination and barriers to access, and to avoid disproportionately high and adverse effects on communities of color. Accountability to our grantees is of central importance to us. We understand the significance of evaluating the impact of our policymaking on grantees over time and utilizing this evaluation in the development of new policy initiatives. - We are committed to the just and equitable disbursement of resources.
- We will obtain the following information when relevant and appropriate in order to utilize data to evaluate the impact of our equity goals: population served and/or affected by race, color, national origin, and income level, which will include diverse communities across the state such as: communities of color, racially and ethnically diverse individuals, tribal communities, immigrant and refugee communities, and communities that have principal languages other than English.
Building a race equity culture requires intention and effort. Independence Gardens' Racial Equity Statement should inspire greater collaboration in policy making, strengthen public will and input, and develop policymaking that has a strong commitment to advancing equity. Led by our Racial Equity Statement, we will fully integrate race equity into every aspect of our operations and programs and work toward the dismantling of structural racism wherever we encounter it and improving Independence Gardens outcomes for all.