Episode 7: Terminating Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

On this episode, Richie Greenberg walks us through the recent history of the San Francisco Office of Racial Equity creation in 2019, its mandates and requirements for all city departments and agencies, the implications of the DEI policy today, and what he would do, to end this state-sponsored discrimination and bigotry, as San Francisco mayor.

Transcript

EPISODE 7 . WWRGDAM

What Would Richie Greenberg Do As Mayor? The Podcast

 Diversity, Equity and Inclusion

DEI

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The policy which is pervasive and guiding of the many aspects of San Francisco city hall’s hirings, promotions, workplace environment and department’s mission statements is called Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, better known as DEI.

To get better perspective, we need to look at two things from our city’s recent past: The 2019 law passed by the board of supervisors, and then the resulting changes in the city’s departments and agencies as a result of that 2019 law.

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In July of 2019, the Board of Supervisors announced the passage of Ordinance 188-19 , which created the “Office of Racial Equity”.  According to the authors of this ordinance, then city supervisors Sandra Lee Fewer and Vallie Brown, this new office and the resulting plan which came out of this office, was necessary according to them, and I quote “in response to growing racial disparities in the City as a means to address the history of structural and institutional racism in San Francisco's delivery of services to the public and its internal practices and systems.” End quote.

You can read up on the office of racial equity, their mandates and obtain more information on that office’s website, at www.RacialEquitySF.org . It’s quite eye-opening, if you haven’t heard of this plan or the office, perhaps you are new to San Francisco or were just paying attention elsewhere at that time.

This city office, the Office of Racial Equity, was established to operate under the San Francisco Human Rights Commission, which is problematic in itself. The Human Rights Commission is also the agency which oversees and funds the city’s Reparations Committee. Yes, this whole intertwining of questionable, dubious and race-based policies as the whole basis for a city department is highly controversial and must be addressed, which I would do immediately, As Mayor.

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Lets look briefly at what Racial Equity in San Francisco means:

• Establish a citywide racial equity framework and racial equity indicators. (in other words, a template, a marketing guide, a plan, to distribute to all city departments)
• Direct all departments to develop and implement mandated racial equity action plans and provide annual progress reports for each.
• Provide training, technical assistance, and capacity building to departments on racial equity strategies.
• Analyze racial equity impacts of pending ordinances. (in other words, review proposed city laws to see if they meet the racial equity standards)
• Create tools for departments to assess racial equity in budget requests and decisions. (I other words, is the money a department needs to operate based on racial equity.)
• Recommend policy priorities for racial equity to the Mayor and Board of Supervisors.

In other words, the racial equity plan installs examination and scrutiny of every aspect of government operations through the lens of color and race and gender. It is therefore leading to government-led intolerance, government-led exclusion, government-sanctioned bias, discrimination. DEI and Racial Equity removes merit and replaces it with arbitrary, subjective favoritism and privilege. That is was this entire program and policy is so problematic.

What makes any society great, any company successful, any sports team champion-caliber, is merit, Merit Wins. Excellence Matters.

The office of racial equity and its resulting requirements for implementing race-based review and exclusion is the opposite of excellence, the opposite of merit.

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Back in 2019, Mayor London Breed was glowing in her press conference at the prospects DEI is coming to real fruition, which meant, of course, the city was then able to implement racism, officially, sanctioned by the city government, in hiring, in job promotions, in considerations of awarding contracts, and in appointments of members to city commissions, for just a few examples.

The immediate results of passage of this ordinance was: saw the websites of every San Francisco city department, very prominently, crate and include a section dedicated to their bowing down to racial equity standards. How they comply with the city’s Racial Equity mandates. For one example, the San Francisco Building Permits Department,  ( direct to DBI for example)

• The 2019  law required all city departments:
  • It Designates staff racial equity leaders as liaisons to ORE (if annual budget is over $10 million, department must submit a staffing plan to ORE and designate at least one racial equity leader per division). (In other words, it requires the hiring of personnel as equity officer, to be an observer and report back to the Office of Racial Equity).
  • It Provides staff racial equity leaders with dedicated time for racial equity work and protect them from retaliation. (what does this even mean? Does it mean that one worker is doing something outside their duties, and cant be disciplined for not performing their assigned job description?)
• It requires the San Francisco Department of Human Resources to work with ORE to release annual race/ethnicity and gender data about the City’s workforce. 
• It requires the San Francisco controller’s Office and the City Administrator to work with ORE to develop processes and systems to gather race/ethnicity and gender about the City’s contracts.

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So, what does this all mean? First off, it’s the creation of a vast new bureaucracy, with the hiring of dozens of new gatekeepers and data gatherers to monitor the gender and race of every employee of city government. These positions come at a cost, for wages and benefits. 

Second, it creates a staff within city hall, again, salaries wages and benefits.

Third, bureaucracy means paperwork, creating of plans, implementing plans, shuffling around employees, adding to or reducing certain races and genders prioritized over others within city hall departments and agencies.  This is very problematic. To be considering one individual over another because they have the preferred skin color, the better gender orientation, or to balance out the makeup and characteristics of a department, an agency or commission because there are not enough ____ insert your preferred pronouns, national origin, gender identity, race, that’s not only wrong, its illegal and unconstitutional. These factors should never be a part of the hiring process, the contracting of services process, the legislation process, the employee promotions process, the raises and salaries process.

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Just recently, a case was brought before the US Supreme Court, where a woman sued her employer over them forcing her transfer to a different department , reassigned because of her being a woman, replaced specifically by a man to balance a department’s gender makeup. The supreme court ruled in favor of that woman, and against her employer in St Louis, the city’s government. That city institutes DEI programs. This ruling has national implications. 

This court ruling should serve as a reminder that San Francisco city hall made a huge legal error in 2019 by approving this DEI race/gender based plan to implement, and as a result, they are arbitrarily viewing an employee’s skin color and gender over merit and over excellence.

Therefore, as mayor, my action plan in the first days serving as mayor, after being sworn in, would be to undo the unlawful unconstitutional practices under the city’s Office of Racial Equity;

I would create an executive order, a directive, to cancel the 2019 legislation.

I would suspend funding this office of racial equity.

I would demand all city departments, agencies, the board of supervisors to terminate any work and cancel the mandate for all departments to follow the equity plan. I would cancel all actions. I would stop the data collection and stop reporting. I would terminate the racial equity review of budget requests and decisions. I would terminate providing and accepting recommendations to the mayor and the board of supervisors.

I would terminate all racial equity officers. I would cancel all equity staff positions in all city departments. 

DEI and Racial Equity is racism. It is bigotry. It is intolerance, it is hypocrisy, and it is divisive. It removes merit and disregards excellence. Therefore, the city of San Francisco, under a Greenberg administration, would terminate the DEI program, close the office of Racial Equity as a priority. That's what I would do, as mayor.