Leading the news: More than 90 federal agencies released their Equity Action Plans on Thursday, ordered by President Biden in the first days of his term.
All cabinet services have revealed what senior Biden officials have called “an ambitious equality and racial justice agenda” on work, housing, the environment, healthcare, broadband and law enforcement.
The big picture: With police reform and suffrage legislation halted in Congress, the Biden administration is taking action to do what it can to deliver on a promise to tackle systemic racism.
The details released by the White House also included plans to make National Parks more accessible to people with disabilities and reduce discrimination against LGBTQI + people. Senior Biden officials said the services would simplify grants, programs and government documents to facilitate access to services for people of color and race.
Details: The Department of Homeland Security has said it will use training to improve controls at airports of people of color and promote grant programs to fight white defenders and other domestic terrorists.
The Ministry of Housing and Urban Development has promised to consider how to reduce bias in housing appraisals through the inter-service Real Estate Appraisal and Valuation Task Force. The Department of Commerce has promised to spend about $ 50 billion on broadband infrastructure in rural and tribal communities. The Ministry of Veterans Affairs has stated that it will work to improve the social and economic determinants of health for LGBTQI + veterans. NASA says it will publish Earth science data in more accessible formats to show environmental challenges in underprivileged communities
What they say: “Federal agencies have just completed a historic one-year journey to fully evaluate for the first time ever,” said White House Home Affairs Advisor Susan Rice, who leads the government’s White House flow.
“Sometimes these obstacles are the result of exclusionary policies that the federal government has been promoting for decades.”
Looking back: In the 1930s, President Franklin D. Roosevelt offered to help white Americans buy housing to boost the economy in the midst of the Recession. The aid program strengthened housing segregation through the red line.
Today’s school boundaries in many cities are still linked to the history of housing segregation from the 1930s, reinforcing segregation and inequality despite years of progress.
Remember: While the Biden government described the plans as “transformational” and predicted that they could have consequences for generations, a new government could overturn them immediately.
