Greetings PRWG colleagues, partners, and friends!
It has been a busy 2021 so far — we can hardly believe it’s already June! Lots has happened since we submitted the 10-Year Plan to Dismantle Poverty in January. Below are some exciting updates about how the plan is being put into action, and important information on our next meeting, in which we hope to set priorities for next year.
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Steering Committee & 10-Year Plan Getting National Attention
10-Year Plan Gets Liftoff in 2021 Legislative Session and Beyond
This past year we saw truly heroic efforts among so many of our colleagues in the PRWG community to address the social, health, and economic consequences of COVID-19. Agency leaders and their teams worked tirelessly under extraordinary conditions to provide virtual services and invest in our children, families, workers, and communities; non-profits and philanthropy stepped up their game to meet the substantial increase in need; businesses rallied together to keep as many people working as possible; and advocates pushed for bold policies and programs to meet the moment. Dozens of PRWG members and partners — including many of our Steering Committee members — testified in legislative hearings, wrote op-eds, and participated in endless Zoom meetings in support of the 10-Year Plan.
The 2021 legislative session gave lift off to the 10-Year Plan, laying a foundation for the work and moving the state closer to a just and equitable future. Legislative highlights related to PRWG strategies and recommendations include:
Ongoing Efforts
Partnership to elevate community-led solutions in state policy, programs, and funding decisions. During the early months of the pandemic, an interagency Technical Advisory Group (TAG) formed with a goal to define, measure, and build accountability toward a just and equitable future. The proposal is supporting the creation of the Just Washington Collaborative, a group of public-private partners with a shared interest in a just and equitable recovery from COVID-19 and long-term, inclusive economic well-being.
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation funding Just WA Collaborative. Funding from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is supporting the capacity of communities historically excluded from social and economic well-being to co-create a vision for a just and equitable future and a design a process that elevates community-led solutions in state policy, program, and funding decisions. The TAG proposal and the work of the Just WA Collaborative will be highlighted at the upcoming Results WA Public Performance Review (see details below).
Results Washington Public Performance Review (PPR). PRWG co-lead agencies will be presenting the TAG proposal with our partners at the June 23 PPR meeting with Governor Inslee.
Human-Centered Poverty Reduction workgroups. The Steering Committee asked us to focus on Strategy 6 in the plan and in the last nine months, a multidisciplinary group of agencies have met on each of the six recommendations within Strategy 6. The goal of the workgroup is to create a human-centered upward mobility system that coordinates the work of our agencies, empowers people experiencing poverty, treats them as customers, centers on the impacts of racism and implicit bias, and measurably and equitably reduces poverty. The committee leads presented their efforts-to-date and their work plans to the last PRWG meeting in order to get feedback on the work. Feedback was shared and incorporated into work plans with the emphasis on the foundation of creating hope and resilience (Strategy 6f).
Economic Security for All grants. The Employment Security Department, a PRWG co-lead, will continue to administer the EcSA grant program. EcSA develops and tests innovative approaches to serve low-income Washingtonians in their pursuit of equity, dignity, and sustained self-sufficiency. EcSA focuses on streamlining access to existing resources and developing new strategies to fill in the gaps. Read more about the future of EcSA here.
Next PRWG Meeting
July 15, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. (virtual).
Topics and activities will include:
- An introduction to Dr. Karen Johnson, Executive Director of the Office of Equity
- Review of 2021 legislative successes
- Steering Committee updates
- Setting priorities for the next year and planning ahead
Get Involved
Learn how your organization can support the 10-Year Plan by inviting PRWG staff to one of your events or meetings and use the Action Toolkit to take action!
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