The Local and Regional Government Alliance on Race and Equity (GARE) is a joint project of Race Forward and the Othering and Belonging Institute (formerly the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society) at the University of California, Berkeley. GARE serves as a membership organization which municipal governments and agencies can join for an annual fee. GARE facilitates cooperation among members and promotes resources and training dealing with their conception of racial equality and left-of-center social policy. The group publishes research briefs, hosts webinars, and provides online tools for assessing and restructuring local and state government policy to address purported systemic racism and implicit bias. Its members, sometimes referred to as “cohorts,” include the statewide California Libraries Cultivating Race, Equity, and Inclusion initiative. Its website also features a guide for dealing with public relations, and the “Lets Talk About Race” communication tool designed to facilitate conversation around these issues.¹

Structure

Government Alliance on Race and Equity consists of over 350 member organizations, having expanded from its original 2014 coalition of 12. Members are expected to implement a Racial Equity Action Plan, use GARE’s Racial Equity Toolkit, and/or introduce legislation that will push equity agendas.  Member groups are largely made of governmental agencies that already deal with race and equity issues, for example the Philadelphia Mayor’s Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion or the California Department of Housing and Community Development. Member organizations can be “core” groups encompassing an entire city or municipality, “state/regional agency” groups that represent multiple jurisdictions, or “associate” members that represent a single department or agency. GARE charges its members a fee based on their tier of membership and the number of individuals in a given organization, ranging from $1000 to $20,000.²

Founding and History

The Government Alliance on Race and Equity (GARE) is a joint project of Race Forward and the Othering and Belonging Institute (formerly the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society) at the University of California Berkeley. GARE was founded by in 2014 by the then Haas Institute for a Fair & Inclusive Society, and in 2015 became a joint venture with the Center for Social Inclusion, which itself merged with Race Forward in 2017. ^{3 4}

GARE has worked with over 50 municipalities and counties to promote their conception of racial equality and works on a membership-based model. Member municipalities and government agencies pay annual dues based on the number of their employees, with the dues ranging from $1,000 to $22,500. Members join different regional hubs and cooperatively set priorities for the program. ^{5 6}

Parent Organizations

Race Forward

Race Forward is a 501(c)(3) organization that promotes racial equality and left-wing social policy. It produces various “intersectional” research initiatives, conducts activism mobilization, and publishes the news and commentary site Colorlines. Typical research reports include titles such as “Research and Recommendations for Racially Equitable Communications in Workforce Development,” “Confronting Racial Bias at Work,” and “Better Together: Bridging LGBT & Racial Justice.” ^{7 8}

Othering and Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley

The Othering and Belonging Institute (formerly the Haas Institute for a Fair and Inclusive Society) is a research hub dedicated to finding both long-term and more immediate solutions to advance their conception of a more just and equitable society. Research initiatives include a variety of left-wing racial policy and equity-focused programs. ^{9 10}

Programs and Resources

Government Alliance on Race and Equity’s main event is its annual members meeting, which includes various training workshops and regional breakouts. ¹¹

GARE publishes various resource guides and issue papers. One example is “Contracting for Equity: Best Local Government Practices that Advance Racial Equity in Government Contracting and Procurement,” which provides advice and strategy for increasing the amount of contracts that women and minority business enterprises receive through things like mandatory sub-contracting, loan programs, and bid discounts. Another is “Public Sector Jobs: Opportunities for Advancing Racial Equity,” which is supposed to aid local governments ensure the public workforce reflects the racial makeup of the community. ^{12 13 14} The brief places the blame for this lack of diversity on “conscious racial stereotypes and discrimination.” It also claims that the lack of minorities in these jobs is due to a penal system that “targets” Blacks and Latinos, and asserts there exists a disparity in wages between Latina women and white men, with the former group earning only 54% of the latter. ¹⁵

GARE also published a research paper focusing on purported areas of implicit bias and racism in libraries. “Advancing Racial Equity in Public Libraries” alleges that enforcement of library fines represents institutional racism if it impacts low-income minority groups. The study also laments the fact that at the time of its publishing, 88 percent of all librarians were white, and states that this disparity is the best place to begin “uprooting racism.” The document also quotes Melissa Kalpin Prescott’s study “Topographies of Whiteness,” urging white librarians to band together with minority librarians to “develop an anti-racist analysis and apply it to librarianship, confront white privilege in its multiple manifestations, and work in alliance with librarians of color to dismantle institutional racism.”¹⁶

Leadership

Julie Nelson is one of the co-directors of Government Alliance on Race and Equity. She has previously worked as the Director of the Seattle Office for Civil Rights and has also worked in various other roles within the Seattle municipal government. She is also a senior vice president at Race Forward and a senior fellow with the Othering and Belonging Institute. ¹⁷

Dwayne Marsh is the other co-director of GARE. He was previously a senior advisor at t the Office of Economic Resilience, which is part of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. ¹⁸

Gordon F. Goodwin is the senior director for GARE at Race Forward. He is the co-founder and former principal consultant of Development Solutions Group.¹⁹

1. Communication Tools. GARE. Accessed January 9, 2023.  https://www.racialequityalliance.org/tools-resources/communication-tools/
2. “Membership.” GARE. Accessed January 9, 2023. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/members/join/
3. “GARE: Who We Are.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/about/who-we-are/.
4. “Become a Member.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/members/join/.
5. “Advancing Racial Equity in Public Libraries: Case Studies from the Field.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/resources/advancing-racial-equity-in-public-libraries-case-studies-from-the-field/.
6. “Become a Member.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/members/join/.
7. “About Race Forward.” RaceForward.org. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://www.raceforward.org/about.
8. “Research Reports.” RaceForward.org. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://www.raceforward.org/research/reports.
9. “Vision.” Belonging.Berkeley.edu. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://belonging.berkeley.edu/vision.
10. “Areas of Work.” Belonging.Berkeley.edu. Accessed February 11, 2020. https://belonging.berkeley.edu/vision.
11. “2020 GARE Annual Membership Meeting.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 12, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/events-trainings/2020-gare-annual-membership-meeting/.
12. “Tools and Resources.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 12, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/tools-resources/.
13. “Contracting for Equity: Best Local Government Practices That Advance Racial Equity in Government Contracting and Procurement.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 12, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/resources/contracting-equity-best-local-government-practices-advance-racial-equity-government-contracting-procurement/.
14. “Public Sector Jobs: Opportunities for Advancing Racial Equity.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 12, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/resources/public-sector-jobs-opportunity-for-advancing-racial-equity/.
15. Nelson, Julie; Tyrell Syreeta. “Public Sector Jobs.” GARE. June 1, 2015. Accessed January 9, 2023.  https://racialequityalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/Public-Sector-Jobs-Final1.pdf
16. Sonnie, Amy. “Advancing Racial Equities in Public Libraries.” GARE. April 5, 2018. Accessed January 9, 2023. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/GARE_LibrariesReport_v8_DigitalScroll_WithHyperlinks.pdf
17. “Julie Nelson.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 12, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/team/julie-nelson/.
18. “Dwayne S. Marsh.” RacialEquityAlliance.org. Accessed February 12, 2020. https://www.racialequityalliance.org/team/dwayne-s-marsh/.
19. “Gordon F. Goodwin”. Linkedin. Accessed January 9, 2023. https://www.linkedin.com/in/gordon-goodwin-784536a/