A Look at the STL 2030 Jobs Plan through a Racial Equity Lens

When an initiative has the potential to yield large-scale systems change — or uphold the status quo, or worsen it — we make time to analyze it and share our thoughts.

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Forward Through Ferguson

13 min readMar 3, 2021

The following story is the blog version of a public comment submitted by Forward Through Ferguson on March 3, 2021 in response to Greater STL Inc.’s STL 2030 Jobs Plan.

This public comment (view as a PDF) was prepared by Lead Data & Research Catalyst, Karishma Furtado, PhD, MPH and FTF Executive Director & Lead Catalyst, David Dwight IV.

Photo by Christina @ wocintechchat.com on Unsplash

Forward Through Ferguson is not a large organization. We’re a small, but mighty team of 5 fulltime and 5 part-time individuals (and growing!). So we can’t pull together a response to every decision, investment, and initiative that has been affected by and that affects the region’s racial inequities (which is all of them). But when an initiative has the potential to yield large-scale systems change — or, alternatively, uphold the status quo, or worsen it — we make time to engage with it and share our thoughts. The STL 2030 Jobs Plan met that threshold for a few reasons.

4. Opportunities to Strengthen the STL 2030 Jobs Plan and its Impact

5. Conclusion

Why is FTF Submitting Public Comment?

As the STL 2030 Jobs Plan lays out, the past several decades have seen a consistent pattern of economic underperformance and stagnation. A comprehensive and inclusive strategy to reverse this trend, which the STL 2030 Jobs Plan seeks to provide, has long been missing in St. Louis and is critically important. The reasons why are painfully obvious — our region is struggling. Black St. Louisans have disproportionately endured the realities and consequences of these patterns. We will not turn those patterns around with piecemeal plans. It will take intentional vision, strategy, and execution.

This plan is the first major undertaking of Greater STL Inc., the merger of five economic development entities and one of the region’s latest and largest examples of consolidation. Greater STL Inc., and the five civic and business organizations that rolled into it, have massive resources as well as economic and political power.

If we want to see enduring improvement in the economic well-being of everyone in our region, if we want to chip away at the profound fragmentation and siloing that hamstrings our region, and if we need Greater STL Inc. to succeed for those futures to be realized, then we as an organization have a role to play in being a pressure-ful partner. If done right, the STL 2030 Jobs Plan and Greater STL Inc. have the potential to serve as a model of how regional planning can intentionally center and advance Racial Equity and systems change. If it’s done wrong, we are at risk of investing massive resources in ways that perpetuate or worsen our inequities and siphon momentum, trust, and the heartset from other change initiatives.

The Positives of the Plan

In this last regard, the STL 2030 Jobs Plan has much going for it. It unreservedly names systemic racism — past, present, and future — as 1) a fact that 2) has dire implications for the economic well-being (or lack thereof) of the region. We cannot think of another business/civic produced report that has named this so explicitly. The STL 2030 Jobs Plan brings a more comprehensive framing of St. Louis’ assets and deficits. The call for “patient” philanthropy and capital is heartening to see amidst a landscape that too often tends toward short-term and programmatic funding. The STL 2030 Jobs Plan also names specific action steps, which increases the likelihood that it will be picked up and implemented. It attempts to overcome the fragmentation of our economic development and civic landscape. These are all necessary components of success. Necessary, but not sufficient.

Ultimately, the STL 2030 Jobs Plan treats equitable economic development as a set of outcomes achieved primarily through the implementation of a set of tactics and not as a paradigm shift towards anti-racist, equitable economic development that entails challenging and changing current mental models, which in turn requires substantial capacity-building, radical collaboration, radical listening to directly impacted communities, and ongoing effort. These are shortcomings of the Plan as it currently stands that, if acknowledged and addressed, can become opportunities for true regional transformation.

Current Shortcomings of the STL 2030 Jobs Plan

There is no one list of activities that, if accomplished, will yield economic equity and inclusive growth. The routes to such a future are as numerous and complex as the countless ways racial inequity has been institutionalized into our systems, businesses, structures, and culture. That’s because systemic racism is dynamic and shifting. The dismantling of systemic racism cannot be static. It must evolve and adapt. That requires more than executing a list of tasks. It requires an ongoing commitment to acting and showing up differently based on a deep awareness of racial inequities and understanding of the drivers of those inequities and informed by the leadership of those closest to the inequities. Such capacities will only emerge from an operationalized commitment to anti-racist economic development and the new ways of thinking and acting that it necessitates. Only with the prerequisites of awareness and understanding is transformation possible. This theory of change is outlined in our Path to Racial Equity.

*Click here to download a PDF of the Path to Racial Equity Worksheet*

When we analyze the STL 2030 Jobs Plan through the lens of the Path to Racial Equity, a few things become apparent.

We see a strong awareness of racial disparities in economic well-being in the Plan.
There’s also a definite desire to see the region transform economically and a recognition that doing so will only be possible if we address our racial inequities.
But the intermediate understanding of the historical and present-day causes and lived experience of those inequities is lacking.

This has negative implications for the report’s ability to fully diagnose what needs to be done, who needs to do it, and how.

Weaknesses in Analysis of What Needs to Be Done

The interventions proposed in the STL 2030 Jobs Plan largely fall within the conventional “boundaries” of economic development — even though the drivers of the inequities that the Plan hopes to address lie well outside those boundaries. These restrictive boundaries lead to silos and people/entities staying within them. Those silos become reasons to not engage, to pass the buck, or to be passively supportive.

This is antithetical to systems change, which in this case fundamentally asks us to notice, name, and address how institutional racism in other sectors — from exclusionary housing policies, to limited transportation infrastructure, to a predatory criminal justice system, to uneven access to a quality education — all deeply shape and constrain the success of workforce and economic development initiatives in bettering the lives of Black and Brown St. Louisans. The STL 2030 Jobs Plan currently takes a check-the-box approach to eliminating racial inequities as opposed to an approach that builds the capacity of individuals and their organizations/institutions to own anti-racism as an essential component of their and our region’s success. The solutions and actions proposed, including implementing the STL Pledge, creating a STL Inclusive Capital Initiative, creating 50,000 jobs with specific hiring goals for Black residents in north City, and fueling Black- and Brown-owned small business and startup activity, will fall short if they aren’t shored up by stakeholders with a solid Racial Equity analysis.

Superficial interventions ultimately stem from a lack of interrogation of what systemic racism in the economic development space has looked like historically and recently and what it will look like moving forward if left unchecked. Naming history and acknowledging it is essential for authentic and effective collaboration moving forward. The STL 2030 Jobs Plan cannot, of course, provide an exhaustive explanation of this history, in part because it is still being written — nor can we seek to fix every racist system. This is why it is all the more important that the Plan call for interventions that build the capacity of the region to examine that history, recognize the linkages between interconnected systems, and specifically align resources to make anti-racist systems change a continuous commitment.

Weaknesses in Analysis of Who Needs to Do It

A natural consequence of an overly narrow definition of economic development is an overly narrow cast of characters responsible for crafting and executing the vision and plan for reinvigorating our region. Based on who led the STL 2030 Jobs Plan’s development (i.e., the St. Louis Team and Working Groups), the STL 2030 Jobs Plan was largely informed by the “usual suspects.” (While Forward Through Ferguson was listed in the acknowledgements, we were not actually part of the STL 2030 Jobs Plan development process.) Among the dozens, if not hundreds, of stakeholders engaged, we see many noteworthy absences including activists, community members, and the region’s K-12 education infrastructure, to name a few.

We fear this lack of representation to-date forecasts a familiar trajectory. Community leaders that have long fought for equity can quickly recall many past planning initiatives that began with the usual partners — often those with social, political, and economic power — and resulted in a similarly restrictive universe of owners and keepers of the work moving forward. In other words, when the process — the how — of initiatives doesn’t break out of the exclusive, limited-engagement patterns, their ability to achieve an equitable impact is also harmed.

There is, in short, no decisive commitment to bringing together the radically collaborative stakeholder network that we believe is necessary for systems change. The statement “We fully acknowledge the seriousness of these challenges and understand they will only be resolved through holistic, ongoing efforts” rings hollow given the approach used to create the STL 2030 Jobs Plan and the solutions and actions it names.

The Plan also identifies racial activism forged during the #Ferguson unrest and cultivated in the years following as one of the region’s greatest assets. It goes on to name organizations like Beyond Housing, Civic Progress, and Opportunity Trust as leaders of the “exceptional rise in civic engagement and collective action.” It does not mention most of the grassroots organizers that have worked tirelessly to build community-centered movements. Organizations like Action St. Louis, Coalition Against Police Crimes and Repression, Metropolitan Congregations United, and the Organization for Black Struggle. It also fails to identify the legacy groups like Hands Up United and Millennial Activists United that were at the core of the Ferguson uprising but that no longer exist, in no small part because of the trauma they experienced doing that work. The Plan also does not acknowledge much less align with several existing regional initiatives, like Forward Through Ferguson’s existing #STL2039 campaign.

This isn’t just about demanding credit. It is not by accident that many of the organizations the STL 2030 Jobs Plan names are aligned with conventional clout and money. It is symptomatic of a system of leadership and planning that elevates certain voices and that creates a version of history that valorizes those voices and ignores others in ways that profoundly skew the diagnosis and treatment of our inequities and lives into the cycle of oppression.

Weaknesses in Analysis of How It Needs to Happen

The current STL 2030 Jobs Plan assumes that everyone will agree with its assessment and will therefore fall in line behind its proposed solutions. And, that agreement = understanding = ability to execute on the vision of equitable economic development. These are not safe assumptions to make. Building racial equity capacity and dedicating substantial resources accordingly should be named as a key, ongoing solution/action.

Applying a Racial Equity lens to economic development will not happen on its own. It is not a set of skills that should be solely self-taught or that a person can take on as a side-of-desk activity. Nor is it a past tense action that, once completed, can be checked off and assumed. It needs dedicated time, resources, and attention. We need the implementers of this plan to have the capacity and power analysis to determine what is needed and do it as opposed to simply executing a set of tasks, which is why it’s important to name capacity building for Greater STL Inc and all the business, civic, and institutional leaders that conventionally drive economic development planning as an area of investment.

The STL 2030 Jobs Plan is also lacking an adequate accountability infrastructure for ensuring the commitments are honored, that progress is being made. The metrics and baseline that the Plan advises gathering seem to be unattached to any particular functional owner, much less the community ownership we would assert is appropriate and necessary. In fact, the community, especially directly impacted residents, feels absent from the “how” of the Plan in many ways.

Opportunities to Strengthen the STL 2030 Jobs Plan and its Impact

As FTF moves through the complex terrain of systems change, we try to center ourselves on our core principles. We offer them to Greater STL Inc. as a way of suggesting some opportunities for strengthening the STL 2030 Jobs Plan.

Apply and Model a Racial Equity Lens

Intentionally seeking to understand for any initiative, program, or policy whom it benefits, how or if it differentially impacts racial and ethnic groups, and what it is missing that will decrease racial disparities.

Dig further into the history of systemic racism in economic development in St. Louis. Acknowledge the complicity of St. Louis’ economic development infrastructure, including Greater STL Inc and its founding organizations, in that history.
Call for the intentional investment of resources to build the Racial Equity capacity of Greater STL Inc and all the business, civic, and institutional leaders that conventionally drive economic development planning needed to continue that examination and deepen understanding of the drivers of racial inequities in economic well-being.
Engage in a proactive and public discussion of what applying a Racial Equity lens to economic development looks like.
Move beyond the vague use of the term “inclusive economy,” which lacks meaning and measurable outcomes and instead get specific about what equitable economic development looks like and how it would be measured.
Support, align with, and be accountable to the St. Louis Regional Equity Indicators, a tool for measuring regional progress toward Racial Equity.

Apply a Policy and Systems Lens

Seeking to understand and intervene on root causes of inequities in addition to the more superficial symptoms of them. Pushing to redesign policies and systems as opposed to stopping with programs.

Resist the urge to draw hard boundaries around economic development. Engage with the complex ways in which economic development is inextricably connected to other systems, like public education, housing, wages and wealth, and healthcare for Black and Brown residents.
Establish a broadly informed, more systems-aware definition of economic development.
Determine how to operationalize a systems thinking lens of the root causes of inequities into the planning, execution, and monitoring of economic development investments. This means engaging unusual suspects and crossing “lanes.”
Examine the report’s solutions and actions through a systems lens. For example, these are some questions to ask about each of the STL 2030 Jobs Plan’s solutions, inspired by the Commission’s calls to action:

Are pipelines of workers of color ready for the Plan’s proposed inclusive workforce solutions? By creating jobs without ensuring the pipeline, are actions taken in the service of such solutions propagating toxic narratives and ‘we tried’ saviorism?”

How have tax incentives and exclusionary zoning been used and mis-used historically in the development sector? What can be learned from that history and what tools and capacities must we build to prevent future misuse, repair past abuse, and actively promote equity?

Is the existing K-12 infrastructure strong enough to meet the goal of becoming an equitable talent engine? Is partnership in the form of industry-led training adequate and accessible? If not, how can the economic development space be a partner for determining and resourcing needed systems changes?

Engage in Radical Collaboration

Bringing together at the same table parties who may have never spoken before, or have even been rivals. This means sharing resources and ideas and credit in a way that might feel uncomfortable. This means staying at the table even when the conversation gets hard — which it will. This means putting egos second and community outcomes first. This means understanding that we are stronger as one, and acting as such.

Ask who directly engages with and/or experiences the current lack of opportunity and compare that list with whose perspectives were centered in the production of the STL 2030 Jobs Plan. Our assessment concluded that the list of interviewees skewed sharply in favor of institutional power holders. Undoubtedly these figures and institutions will be essential to making change. But so are the on-the-ground advocates, activists, and practitioners who are scrambling to staunch the bleeding represented by our current economic realities, not to mention the people who are experiencing the figurative bleeding.
Invite those constituencies into the conversation to better understand how the Plan fits into their work and lives.

Take Time to Radically Listen

Trusting community members to be the best solvers of their problems; it means asking for individuals’ experiences and ideas and centering that in the development of solutions.

Work with partners to develop an approach for amplifying and centering community voice in the STL 2030 Jobs Plan, now, at the development phase, and on into implementation and iteration. Commit to sharing out the feedback received.
Create and invest in ongoing mechanisms that include community voice and leadership through the implementation of the Plan.

Conclusion

We have one more principle: committing to a culture of trying. It calls on us to attempt the foreign, bold, and impossible, even if we don’t know exactly how, even if it is unknown, even if it is uncomfortable. Heartfelt trying–not to be mistaken for heartless and perfunctory trying in order to check a box–is a vulnerable and powerful practice. It requires that we name what we don’t know and how we move forward accordingly. It means holding ourselves accountable and building structures that encourage others to do so as well. Can you imagine what an economic development hub that lives into these principles could accomplish? We can.

“In trying, new coalitions will be built, and a new sense of community will be developed. As the region tries together, people will learn new things from each other, and generate new ideas they never would have come up with if they’d said, ‘That’s too risky to try,’ or, ‘Better to leave well enough alone,’ or worst of all, ‘That’ll Never work here.’” — Ferguson Commission Report