Deputy Speaker Williams questions OMB on racial equity accountability mechanisms
Williams asks about accountability for agencies failing to incorporate equity considerations. Solomon describes a two-way street where OMB's framework and agencies' submission process must align, with the racial equity plan charging all agencies to think this way from the inception of new needs.
Yeah, and on that note, it's my understanding that OMB works really closely with the Mayor's Office of Climate and Environmental Justice to integrate the climate considerations into the annual budget process.
Again, already existing, you have this formal structure.
So wanting to understand if that coordination process, a similar coordination process, would exist with the Mayor's Office of Equity and Racial Justice.
Yes, I mean, I think it's in the same way that the climate budgeting is inextricably linked to the administration's environmental justice work.
I think it's sort of similar, right?
We want to make sure that our budget is representative of the decisions and the choices and the investments that we make.
To tackle a systemic issue, right?
And so we're making sure that we're looking at in the same way that we would look in environmental justice or investment in fossil fuel.
reduction or decarbonization or the various tools that exist there, what are the tools that we can employ here vis-a-vis investment for where we know there's been a paucity of resources that have been devoted to
either services or amenities or public institutions.
And that is what our focus will be.
Okay, so the plan establishes a goal of having agencies utilize equity budgeting tools and strategies during budget submissions.
Will there be any accountability mechanisms for agencies that fail to meaningfully incorporate equity considerations into their requests?
Yeah, it's something that we are attentive to, attuned to, and making sure that it's a two-way street, right?
I mean, that's the goal here is that OMB clearly is going to do its part in the framework, but we want to make sure, and again, the racial equity plan, it really charges all the agencies with thinking in this way as well,
which is to say if a new need is going to be submitted at its inception.
How does it comport with the racial equity plan?
How does it advance those goals?
It will make the process much more aligned and compatible if we know the front end is also matching up with the back end.
So we're committed.
I know agencies are committed as well.
And we will have a good product when we're working together in a two-way street.