Agenda

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PUBLIC PROTECTION COMMITTEE

Meeting Date:	05/23/2022
Subject: Racial Justice Oversight Body Data Needs
Submitted For:	PUBLIC PROTECTION COMMITTEE
Department:	County Administrator
Referral No.:	n/a
Referral Name:	Racial Justice Oversight Body
Presenter:	Paul Reyes, Senior Deputy County Administrator	Contact:	Paul Reyes, 925-655-2049

Information

Referral History:

In April 2016, the Board of Supervisors (BOS) accepted recommendations from the Public Protection Committee to form a 17-member Racial Justice Task Force and then appointed members to this Task Force in September 2016. After Resource Developments Associates was awarded a contract by the County in February 2017 to provide facilitation and data analysis services, the Racial Justice Task Force was convened from April 2017 through June 2018. During this time the Task Force reviewed data on local criminal and juvenile justice systems and processes, discussed best practices and emerging practices to address racial disparities in those systems and processes, and ultimately developed a set of recommendations that would help the County reduce the identified disparities.

In July 2018, the Board of Supervisors adopted the "Racial Justice Task Force - Final Report and Recommendations" (with the exclusion of recommendations #18 and #19). The first recommendation called for the establishment of a Racial Justice Oversight Body (RJOB) that would “meet on a quarterly basis” to “oversee the implementation of the recommendations” and provide the County with a report of its activities “on an annual basis.” Based on this recommendation, in November 2018 the Public Protection Committee (PPC) nominated individuals for appointment to the RJOB, and on December 4, 2018, the Board made the appointments.

In February 2022, the PPC received the latest update on the progress and activities of RJOB. During the update, there was discussion on the challenges RJOB is facing with data collection and analysis. The PPC directed staff to evaluate if additional supports could be provided to RJOB.

Referral Update:

The County Administrator’s Office met with the Probation Office and the Office of Reentry and Justice (ORJ) and determined that there are two areas that should be addressed: data requests/collection and data analysis.

RJOB has faced challenges in receiving the data that has been requested. The RJOB Data Subcommittee has made request from local agencies, but has only secured data from Probation, the Sheriff’s Office and the Contra Costa County Office of Education. In terms of process, it may be beneficial to revise the data request process to have the request come from the PPC or Board of Supervisors. Additional evaluation is needed to identify potential staffing impacts, as negotiation of data sharing agreement with local agencies may be necessary.

Data analysis has also been a challenge as RJOB has limited staff support. ORJ currently provides staff support for the meetings of the RJOB and its subcommittees, but ORJ does not have the capacity to provide dedicated data analysis services to RJOB. Staff is currently considering exploring a partnership with a local university to provide data analysis services. Additional evaluation is needed to determine if this approach would be feasible.

Staff will continue to work on addressing the identified challenges and will report back to the PPC at the September 2022 meeting.

Recommendation(s)/Next Step(s):

RECEIVE an update on the Racial Justice Oversight Body's data collection and analysis needs and PROVIDE direction to staff.

Attachments
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