A new report paints a dismaying picture of racial equity in the state. The report finds that people of color have been the targets of harassment and threats, whether they were running for office, serving in the Legislature, or just driving in the state. They are underrepresented in state government management roles, and overrepresented in both Covid infection and death rates.
The report — presented by the state’s racial equity executive director, Xusana Davis — pointed to “xenophobia” in the state that has been exacerbated by fear and anxiety over the coronavirus.
It has been directed at people who are perceived as out-of-staters, whether that is because of their skin color or the license plates on their car.
While traffic-stop data has showed that drivers who are Black, Asian or Indigenous are stopped at higher rates than whites, this year “people flagrantly reported and harassed people driving with out-of-state license plates for their mere presence in Vermont,” the report says.
While the report is meant to tackle systemic racism in state government, it looks beyond the Statehouse to provide context.
As in the rest of the country, rates of Covid infection and death disproportionately affect people of color in Vermont, too. While people of color make up 6% of the state’s population, they account for 18% of Covid-19 cases in the state.
“So much of that heightened vulnerability is the result of systemic bias,” Davis said at a recent hearing held by the Senate Government Operations Committee.
But tracking those disparities was a challenge. In the spring, barely a quarter of Covid data collection met the requirement to include race and ethnic data. While that rate ultimately rose to over 99%, staff time and resources had to go into tracking down the missing information.
“That is so blatantly wrong,” said Sen. Anthony Pollina, P/D-Washington, about the failure to collect data related to race.
Davis said that’s an example of how state efforts to combat racial inequity depend on actors who are beyond state government. “The state can make every effort to be racially equitable and to collect thorough and accurate data, but it cannot do it alone,” she said.
There were problems for people within state government, too. Interviews revealed that people of color who ran for office or who were elected to the Legislature had faced threats and harassment.
“The experiences we heard from some of them were really just harrowing, discouraging and troubling,” Davis said. “We have heard of people being threatened with violence, or harassed, and in their mind, it appeared as if there was no recourse.”
Evidence of racism comes from both anecdotes and data about the state workforce.
Based on numbers from 2019, the report found that minorities are underrepresented in management roles in state government. These jobs also pay the most, with an average salary of $93,139. Minorities hold only 1% of these jobs, a statistic that contributes to lower average earnings. Minority staff were paid $56,904 on average, white staff $62,679.
The report also finds that the state hired fewer than half the people of color who applied for state jobs. Applicants of color made up 12.3% of total applicants, but only 6% of hires. And those who were hired were paid less, on average, and staff retention for people of color was at a lower rate than white staff.
Still, the report found that Vermont has made progress, such as efforts to provide Covid health updates in multiple languages so the information is accessible to Vermonters who aren’t proficient in English.
“When I draft a language access plan in Burlington,” said Sen. Kesha Ram, “knowing that resources are finite, we had to prioritize this agency gets lifesaving interpretive services first.”
Davis said a goal for the coming year is a unified translation plan across agencies.
The report also noted that Vermont made strides in its Covid Equity Relief Fund, providing stimulus payments to undocumented immigrants in the state who were excluded from federal stimulus payments.
“They contribute not only to the social fabric of our state, but also to the economic fabric of the state,” Davis said. “They are effectively a backbone of the dairy industry, and the dairy industry is a backbone of the state.”
But while the state took a step forward toward equity with that program, federal attempts to exclude undocumented immigrants from the 2020 U.S. Census count was a step in a different direction.
“This is hugely problematic, especially for states like Vermont,” said Davis, referring to the state’s large population of undocumented immigrants. About 5,000 undocumented immigrants live in the state. Vermont was part of a coalition of states that challenged that exclusion.
The report also criticized the “differential privacy” policy that distorts and rearranges census data in an effort to preserve the privacy of respondents. In small states like Vermont, this policy has a “destructive effect” because populations are so small. When the data is distorted, the population breakdown is no longer reliable.
In a year when racial equity was a big topic across the state and country, Davis said her role expanded significantly, her tasks swelled from a reasonable handful to a lengthy laundry list, and she now sits on 14 committees. And there was an outpouring of requests for racial equity training.
Still, she hedged when Sen. Alison Clarkson asked what resources Davis’ office needs to meet her ever-growing mandate.
“To be frank, what I need most is not going to come directed to my office,” she said. “The bulk of our investment in racial equity should not come to the racial equity director’s office. It needs to go to areas like health and housing and justice and education.”
Still, she said, staff and money would help. “If you add one person, if you add two people, if you add 10 people, we will make it work. We’ve been making it work for the last year and a half.”
Read the story on VTDigger here: Report: People of color face harassment and threats in elections, health care, good jobs.