“Affecting change in our world starts right at home,” said Dustin Worth, the outreach manager for The Diversity Center of Santa Cruz and an attendee at the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors meeting. “We know we can affect the lives of those that we see every day by investing [energy] right here.”
The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors met with the general public during a board meeting on Feb. 25 to discuss a plan to further support the undocumented immigrant and LGBTQIA+ communities in the county. This proposed resolution came in response to the multiple executive orders Donald Trump has signed in recent weeks which have spread fear amongst many marginalized groups.
The Director of Health Services (HSA) Mónica Morales and County Administration Office staff member Nicole Coburn presented a proposal to the Board of Supervisors to “allocate $100,000 for undocumented immigrant legal services and $100,000 for LGBTQ+ community support services.”
The board unanimously approved this resolution. 
Among the speakers during public comment was a member from Santa Cruz Barrios Unidos, a local community organization based in civil service and racial equality advocacy. Photo by Malia Peris.
“I don’t think it’s surprising that the undocumented immigrant community and LGBT community are really worried. In 2023 alone, there were over 500 anti-LGBT bills introduced in the U.S. and state legislatures. Think about that,” said Morales during the presentation. “There’s also been an increase in anti-immigration bills targeting more than 11 million undocumented immigrants in our country. This is not a small group that we’re talking about.”
The HSA funds would be put towards community-based organizations supporting undocumented legal systems and LGBTQIA+ support systems across Santa Cruz County.
As of the publication date of this article, the HSA is still deciding what organizations they will be allocating the funding to. However, they are looking to officially choose and announce these details later this month.
Before the meeting started, several public speakers showed their support for the plan, urging the county to pass the resolution. Reyna Ruiz, a volunteer for Your Allied Rapid Response (YARR), a hotline that serves as a way to report ICE activity or get information and services, expressed the need for solidarity between marginalized groups.
“Those two communities are the folks at the margins,” Ruiz said. “They are the ones, on one hand, that are what we call essential workers. And on the other hand, folks that people tend to render invisible.”
During President Trump’s first week in office, he issued a series of executive orders targeting diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programs, which seek to promote underrepresented groups, including undocumented immigrants and LGBTQIA+ individuals, and make them feel welcome in schools, workplaces and various organizations.
The policies seek to terminate federal contracting and spending based on gender, race, sex, gender identity, sexual preference or religion. A letter from the Department of Education states that DEI programs are “smuggling racial stereotypes and explicit race-consciousness into everyday training, programming, and discipline.”
Morales explained that because the money is being taken out of the county’s reserves, DEI policies like this one-time funding resolution will not be affected by federal administration.
“The DEI [policies] are so broad right now. We have no direction on how exactly it’s gonna roll out,” stated Morales during the interview with City on a Hill Press. “It is really difficult right now to know [what to do next]. We’re waiting for more directives to come our way so we can really understand what they mean.”
Public commentary was monitored and timed, which gave speakers two minutes to address their concerns. Photo by Malia Peris.
Aside from a few public speakers who voiced support for the action, some said that $100,000 is not enough and proposed an extra $50,000 each to be allocated to both communities.
Stephanie Barron Lu, another volunteer for YARR and one of the public speakers who proposed the increase, explained why the $100,000 is not enough.
“I just hate seeing so much work being done around small [amounts] of $50,000 or $100,000. I mean, those are really just small potatoes. If we are able to get that kind of investment for immigrant and undocumented families, it’s symbolic more than anything,” Lu said. “The need is so much greater than what $50,000 or $100,000 can actually [do].”
Morales acknowledged the criticisms from attendees and possible next steps the county can take to support these groups.
“This is obviously not enough, but at least it’s something for us to work with,” said Morales in the interview. “Then we’ll work with different community based organizations to try to bring more money in to support these communities. We’re confident that what we’re providing can really chip away at some of those much needed services.”
In the following months, the county plans to disperse these funds, affirming its support for the undocumented immigrant and LGBTQIA+ communities. At the board meeting, Dustin Worth reiterated why solidarity between these communities is important.
“The LGBTQ+ [community], you know, I think we’re everywhere. We are amongst the immigrant community, we are amongst the BIPOC community,” Worth said. “When you think about it, how we show up for each other is what matters. When we have voices that are trying to divide us and keep us separate, the more that we can come together and celebrate each other in our diversity, the more we all win.”
