Sonoma Connect | Sonoma Unidos
Working together to create a comprehensive equity-focused and trauma-informed network.
Pictured here is our backbone team. Left to right: Sofia Tecpoyotl, Mariana Raschke, Dana Swilley, Saskia Garcia.
Who We Are
Sonoma Connect | Sonoma Unidos (SC|SU) is a coalition of community leaders and multi-sector partners, working together to prevent and heal adverse childhood experiences and trauma caused by social determinants of health (SDOH).
What We Do
We lead the development of a local Community Information Exchange Model Network and advance a multi-pronged approach to increasing mental and physical health equity through supporting both direct services and systems changes. We convene community members, resource providers, and service providers to form systems-change-focused Action Teams to address fragmentation of resources and structural racism.
Why We Do It
Sonoma County’s population of just under 500,000 reflects significant disparities in wealth and physical and mental health outcomes. A Portrait of Sonoma County: 2021 Update (the Portrait) revealed glaring racial inequities in life expectancy, education, and earnings most significantly for the Black community, Latinx community and other communities often excluded from critical decisions that impact their health and long-term well-being. Despite Sonoma County’s many resources, these are hard to find, hard to access, and not adequately connected or coordinated. Systems tend to function in silos, to not be person-centered, and to not center community members most negatively impacted by structural inequities. Those closest to the problems are closest to the solutions yet too often they are also furthest from resources and power.
Spotlight: Structural Racism Explained
This video illustrates how structural racism encompasses systemic, institutional, and interpersonal racism and how they all work together to create racial disparities across entire systems. We want to highlight this video because it is relevant to Sonoma Connect | Sonoma Unidos’ values, which aims to dismantle systems, policies, and processes that generate barriers or oppression and work to generate access to opportunity, wellbeing and self-efficacy for everyone. Our Community Accountability action team provides a space for community partners to discuss material such as the one covered in this video and we welcome anybody interested to join. Please contact Mariana Raschke (mraschke@sonomaconnect.org) to receive the calendar invites for this team.
Structural Racism Explained by the Othering & Belonging Institute at UC Berkeley
Join our call to action
Be human centered, transformative rather than transactional, anti-racist, upstream and trauma informed
Dismantle systems, policies, and processes that generate barriers or oppression and work to generate access to opportunity, wellbeing and self-efficacy for everyone
Be sustainable and culturally responsive to support people across the age spectrum experiencing adversity
Reduce disparities in social determinants of health and eliminate ACES as measurable indicators
Increase efficiency and alignment in fiscal structures with shared resources and braided funding
Collect disaggregated qualitative and quantitative data, guided by anti-racist and indigenous practices, use this to look at intersectionality and reduce disparities and inequity in access to and outcome of services.
Our Partners
Community Action Partnership Sonoma
United Way of the Wine Country 211
Aliados Health
First 5 Sonoma County
Northern California Center for Wellbeing
Botanical Bus
Hanna Institute
Sonoma County Office of Education
Humanidad Therapy & Education Services
La Luz Center
Raizes Collective
Buckelew Programs
Corazon Healdsburg
Latino Service Providers
Child Parent Institute
Sonoma County Department of Health Services
County of Sonoma Human Services
Providence
Food For Thought
La Familia Sana
Community Support Network
United Way of the Wine Country
