Blue Ribbon Commission Recommendations

Thank you to Sacramento County Board Supervisor Phil Serna for convening a Blue Ribbon Commission to report on the disproportionate number of deaths of African American children in Sacramento County. The Commission’s goal was to formulate recommendations for the Board of Supervisor’s consideration to end this chronic tragedy.

After eighteen months of study - collecting and compiling data, interviewing community members, and conducting focus groups - the report was released and presented to the Board of Supervisors. Sheila Boxley, President and CEO of the CAP Center, presented the information on behalf of the Blue Ribbon Commission.

African American children die at a rate two times higher than children of other races in Sacramento County. For two decades, known data has been reported that African American children in Sacramento County die at disproportionately high rates when compared to children of other races. In effect, a full generation of children has grown up, or has not been able to, during that period. In 2011, County Supervisor Phil Serna created the Blue Ribbon Commission on Disproportionate African American Child Deaths (Blue Ribbon Commission), and the group accepted the charge to change that history by working for the last eighteen months to develop the recommendations contained in this report. The recommendations are a call to action, a challenge to us all, to stop looking the other way; to commit to all children with our collective resources, financial and otherwise; to do the right thing.

Representatives from the Sheriff and District Attorney’s office, a church deacon, parents, a medical doctor, the CEO of a major foundation, nonprofit leaders and many more passionate community members urged the Board of Supervisors to take action and make a commitment to prevent the senseless deaths of African American children.

The Commission developed a set of recommendations that will reduce African American child deaths by 10% to 20% over the next five years through targeting the most disproportionate causes of death for these children: third-party homicides, infant sleep-related deaths, child abuse and neglect homicides, and perinatal conditions.

Thank you to Sierra Health Foundation, First 5 Sacramento and Sacramento County for underwriting the project. Click here to read more from the Sacramento Bee.

Photo: Supervisors Phil Serna and Susan Peters