Are your Sacramento leaders upholding social justice values? This report card survey wants to find out

Last year, Sacramento’s elected leaders made sweeping commitments to social justice issues in the face of a national racial reckoning following the murder of George Floyd. The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors declared racism a public health crisis. City Council is considering a mandate that would require racial equity analysis on policy decisions.

But how well are elected officials actually upholding social justice values? A new community-driven survey, which will culminate in a letter grade for each councilmember and supervisor, seeks to answer that question.

Created by local advocacy group Social Justice Politicorps, the group hopes to release the social justice report card each year to help residents better understand their representatives, and to make more informed decisions at the voting booth, said program manager Andi Bianchi.

“Our main goal is to increase accountability and transparency in local government,” he said. “We’re trying to make sure people we elect who say they care about social justice are actually doing something about it.”

The group defines social justice on the survey as “a redistribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges to those who have not historically benefited from such investments so that we can all do well.”

Social Justice Politicorps aims to collect about 1,000 survey responses to crowdsource residents’ assessment of how well officials over the previous year addressed issues such as criminal justice reform, housing affordability and accessibility, health equity and economic investment without displacement, among others.

Then, a Social Justice Politicorps subcommittee made up of local community advocates and experts will review the survey results — in tandem with each elected official’s voting record, past comments and more — before releasing a final grade.

“Our goal is to hit communities most often left out of the conversation by local government or policies,” Bianchi said. The survey doesn’t necessarily have to be perfectly demographically representative of the county, but should reflect a wide spectrum of perspectives from communities of color, LGBTQ+ residents, immigrants and low-income neighborhoods.

The survey will soon be available in eight languages besides English, including Spanish, Chinese, Farsi, Russian and Hmong, and will close by mid-October, Bianchi said.

Final grades will likely be out around November, with Social Justice Politicorps planning to ultimately hire canvassers to distribute information about each elected official’s grades in underresourced neighborhoods to raise awareness.

“We’re not making the report card to influence elections, but to help residents make educated decisions,” Bianchi said.

To take the survey, visit Social Justice Politicorps’ website.