Approved Minutes of March 2, 2024 Board Retreat

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MINUTES-Draft ORANGE COUNTY BOARD OF HEALTH RETREAT March 2, 2024 • Dr. Royce expressed concern about the lack of Span ish-speaking/Hispanic/Latino/a/e representatives on the board given the makeup of the communities and school populations. Select Priorities and Divide into Priority Committees Before voting to confirm the priority areas, Ms. Phillips-Weiner asked members to show their willingness to commit to serve on one potential committee each by show of hands. • Connections to Community Support: Mr. Bagby, Mr. Whitaker, Dr. Stuebe, and Dr. Jonnal. • Access to Care: Dr. Royce, Dr. Rodgers, and Dr. Pickett. • Behavioral Health: Dr. Nickelson, Dr. Crandell, Dr. Baldwin, and Commissioner Fowler. A motion was made by Dr. Lee Pickett to establish three committees:Access to Care, Behavioral Health, and Connections to Community Support, with membership outlined above, was seconded by Commissioner Amy Fowler, and passed without dissent. The board took a short break before resuming discussion. Because of the board's concerns about holding themselves accountable for maintaining a focus on health equity and justice, the board spent about thirty minutes brainstorming ways to incorporate a health equity/justice lens into various areas of their work. Ideas for strategies included a bulletin board in the health department where committee members who did not address health equity/justice are displayed, including health equity on committee agendas, including guiding questions about equity/justice at the top of documents, disaggregating statistics, using the One Orange Racial Equity Toolkit to check equity/justice on specific initiatives, including a time to consider health equity/justice in all committee meeting agendas, opening committee updates at BOH meetings with equity/justice reports, notifying speakers that the board wishes to hear specifically about health equity and health disparities, including equity impact on the agenda abstracts, considering how the committee priorities affect the health issues (e.g., morbidity, mortality, health disparities) that are impacting community members, quantifying impact and the magnitude of the problem and gauging which initiatives will create more health and address disparities within the community, putting a reminder to consider health equity/justice in personal calendars, conducting periodic surveys (quarterly) among the board to assess board efforts on equity/justice and then holding an educational session/discussion to review and discuss the results, and being sure to consider both health equity (providing supports to make sure everyone has access to what they need) and justice (removing barriers). Dr. Rodgers clarified that the term "marginalized" may not be appropriate to use to describe racial groups, as it implies being on the outside looking in and that many folks of racial and ethnic minorities may not identify with that term and might feel that it's othering. The board briefly discussed other terms that might be more appropriate but weren't ideal (historically S:\Managers Working Files\B0H\Agendas&Abstracts\2024 Agenda and Abstracts/130H Retreat Page 12