Over 100 leaders participated in the Institute for Local Government’s Immigrant Engagement and Integration Multi-Sector Bay Area Convening in September 2017 where city managers, public information officers, analysts and others shared their successes and lessons learned. A key theme was the role of partnership with community based organizations in supporting this work. The purpose of the convening was to:

• Engage with experts on immigrant integration trends and opportunities
• Access new regional economic data
• Learn about innovations and best practices from local government immigrant integration incubators in the region
• Build and enhance connections between local governments and nonprofits supporting immigrant integration

The event kicked off with welcoming remarks from Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf. Featured speakers included Kate Brick, Director of State and Local Initiatives, New American Economy, who shared new regional data and Mauricio Palma, Director of Initiatives and Special Projects, Silicon Valley Community Foundation who moderated a panel discussion. The panel included:

• Felecia Bartow, Vice President, Grantmakers Concerned with Immigrants and Refugees
• Sally Kinoshita, Deputy Director, Immigrant Legal Resource Center
• ILG’s own Sarah Rubin

Next, the event featured “lessons from the field” with participants from ILG’s Immigrant Integration and Race and Equity “incubators” which featured:

Engaging Beyond the Usuals:

• Arquimides Caldera, Deputy Director of Human Services, City of Fremont
• Doris Palmer, Communications Director, City of Foster City

Implicit Bias and Immigrant Integration:

• Gabriela Baños-Galván, Program Coordinator, You Me We = Oakley

 Leadership Development:

• Nancy Amalia Ducós, Multilingual Community Outreach Coordinator, City of Mountain View
• Marco Antonio Cedillo, Spanish Leadership Academy Graduate, City of Mountain View

Language Access and Culturally Responsive Local Governments:

• Jasmine Hartenstein, Immigrant Services Coordinator, San Mateo County
• Zulma Maciel, Assistant to the City Manager, City of San José.

Attendees also had the opportunity to participate in breakout sessions with content experts to dive deeper on specific topics such as: providing language access and culturally responsive local governments.

The Convening was supported through grants from: the Y&H Soda Foundation, Heising-Simons Foundation, The Grove Foundation, the Silicon Valley Community Foundation and the East Bay Community Foundation.​