Gainesville is one step closer in achieving its goal of becoming a more inclusive and welcoming city to immigrant neighbors.
Community leaders in partnership with the Gainesville Immigrant Neighbor Inclusion Initiative (GINI) revealed Wednesday at a press conference at the Matheson History Museum how they have expanded the safety and inclusion of local immigrants.
The GINI project began in 2021 following a collective effort by local leaders, advocacy organizations, academic institutions, health care providers, business partners and immigrant neighbors to improve access to city services, education and health care. Its mission is to create policies that ensure sustainable equity and inclusion of foreign-born residents.
“The idea behind GINI is to break down isolation, to build community, safety and just be a more welcoming and healthier community for us all to live in,” said Robin Lewy, lead community liaison for GINI and director of the Rural Woman’s Health Project (RWHP).
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The GINI blueprint, unveiled six months ago, maps out ways for local government and supporting entities to reduce barriers for equitable access while ensuring that foreign residents feel connected and contributing members of the community.
“Today is a special day because we find ourselves in the middle of Welcoming Week, which is a week-long celebration around the globe where communities hold events, release proclamations and create opportunities for communities to come together and transform their spaces where people can truly belong,” said Jordyne Krumroy, a GINI blueprint contributor and senior regional manager of Welcoming America.
The Gainesville City Commission passed a resolution in 2016, joining Welcoming America, which is a national organization that helps communities become more inclusive of immigrants and refugees.
“The city has been focusing most of our efforts … on our language inclusion,” said Gainesville Mayor Lauren Poe. “We want every person who interacts with city regardless of how long they’ve been here or how proficient they are in English to be able to take advantage of all the city services and opportunities that we have.”
Aside from recently offering translation services, the city also created a new position, immigrant affairs manager which will be “responsible for designing and implementing policy and programs that support the inclusion of immigrants and refugees” within Gainesville. The position, however, is currently vacant.
“This is a journey, not a destination,” Poe said. “It’s not as if in a year, we will be done and sort of say we’re a fully inclusive community. We will always be striving to do better.”
GINI is mostly driven by the Rural Woman’s Health Project (RWHP), which is a nonprofit organization that creates community programs that target barriers to health and social justice.
Beyond the mayor, Wednesday’s press conference featured updates from the Gainesville Police Department, Alachua County commission and Alachua County Public Schools.
GPD Chief Inspector Jaime Kurnick serves as the community liaison between GINI, GPD and the city’s general government.
Kurnick said her main push since joining GINI has been to help people in Gainesville feel more welcome even if they may have limited English proficiency.
During the conference, she announced the creation of what she calls “language inclusion champions.”
“There will be a member of each department within the general government side that will actually have the ability to get you on a translated call with somebody if you need to, will get you a document or signage translated also,” she said. “We’re going to be providing training to those employees so that they have the understanding and capability to understand what it means for our community members who speak different languages when they walk into the office.”
In 2019, about 14,800 immigrants resided in Gainesville with nearly 1,800 having limited English language proficiency, according to data from the American Community Survey.
Data from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy also shows that the city’s immigrant population contributed $22.2 million in state and local taxes in 2019.
Alachua County Public Schools spokeswoman Jackie Johnson said that the district has a student population that speaks a total of 85 different languages.
She said the district has inclusive developments that are underway and different strategies to help make navigating the school system for non-English parents easier, including the recent hire of a full-time translator-interpreter, a brand-new position.
Javon L. Harris is a local government and social justice reporter for The Gainesville Sun. He can be reached by phone at (352) 338-3103, by email at jlharris@gannett.com or on Twitter @JavonLHarris_JD.
