We believe equity is more than civil rights. It’s more than equal access to decent housing. It’s more than equal opportunity to attain a living wage. It’s more than equality. We believe equity is a state of being in which people in communities small and large do not encounter barriers to opportunity and attaining the life they want to lead, particularly because of the color of their skin.
Place Matters
Realizing that vision requires a solid understanding of the social and systemic frameworks that have created unjust opportunities in America, resulting in present day inequities. In order to restructure social and systemic frameworks that will ensure equity for all, community members and leaders require tools to identify methods for dismantling the systems that have led to barriers. It requires a baseline and connection point for understanding where we’ve been, where we are, and where we want to go.
The Metro Atlanta Racial Equity Atlas (MAREA) is an immersive, story-centric tool that contextualizes personal narratives with engagement, interactive community data, and historical background with an explicit focus on advancing racial equity. This platform will help users explore and understand the multifaceted landscape of today’s race- and ethnicity-based inequities, as well as pathways toward a future of equity. While we acknowledge that systematic discrimination has impacted many groups in America, the overwhelming amount of evidence shows that communities of color face the greatest obstacles today and continue to experience the lasting effects of discriminatory systems.
Neighborhood Nexus
ARCHI
Steering Committee
- Madi Shields, Atlanta BeltLine, Inc
- Max Blau, Canopy Atlanta
- Ed Chang, redefinED Atlanta
- Na’Taki Osborne Jelks, West Atlanta Watershed Alliance
- Odetta MacLeish-White, Center for Community Progress
- Kim Addie, United Way of Greater Atlanta
- Katrina DeBerry, Community Foundation for Greater Atlanta
- Freddie Broome, Georgia Municipal Association
- Ade Oguntaye, Annie E. Casey Foundation
- Erika Smith, Microsoft
- Ginneh Baugh, Purpose Built Communities
- Michael Baptiste, MAC