The Golden State Promise can be Realized for Every Californian.

California is at a TURNING POINT. As the state’s racial makeup and needs have completely transformed over the past 40 years, many of our public institutions and policies remain stuck in the past.

Get a 3d view of racial equity

This graph shows the 3-D view of life expectancy by county. Click a button above to Learn More.

Performance: How well people are doing. The higher the circle, the better the performance.

Disparity: How racial groups compare to one another. The further right the circle, the greater the differences by race.

Impact: The Total Population. The bigger the circle, the larger the population.

Explore Rankings

Our history shows us that cross-racial coalitions and organized power have led the charge to push back against regressive forces and demand much needed improvements in our public safety, economy, health, and governance. This is why we are coming together to leverage our collective assets and shared commitment to justice to assert that RACE COUNTS. Now is the moment, to once again, reinvent our public institutions and policies to ensure that all Californians can thrive over the next 40 years.

To push California forward, we need effective ways to measure and address long-standing racial disparities and to center organizers and activists to lead those conversations.

For the first time, the RACE COUNTS project will maintain a comprehensive tracking tool of racial disparities across the state in seven key issue areas:

• Democracy
• Economic Opportunity
• Crime & Justice
• Access to Health Care
• Healthy Built Environment
• Education
• Housing

Through cutting-edge, rigorous research and analysis, RACE COUNTS will rank all 58 counties by these issue areas and provide a roadmap of how we can unwind generations of racial oppression. Click here to see frequently asked questions.

Lead Organization

Catalyst California (formerly Advancement Project California) advocates for racial justice by building power and transforming public systems. We partner with communities of color, conduct innovative research, develop policies for actionable change, and shift money and power back into our communities.

Our Partners

PICO California is the largest multi-racial faith-based community-organizing network in the state connecting and leveraging the power of the people to impact broad systemic change. Motivated by various prophetic traditions, we ground our civic action and demands for change in moral and ethical principles. We use a relationship-based organizing model to develop leadership and build capacity for civic engagement in communities throughout California.

Established in 1994, PICO California organizes in 73 cities, 35 school districts, and in more than seventy-five percent of the state’s Senate and Assembly districts.  We are deeply connected with communities through congregations and religions institutions and we work in coalition across racial, economic, ethnic, and religious lines. PICO California is comprised of 19 non-profit organizations made up of 480 interfaith congregations, schools, and neighborhood institutions representing 450,000 families.  PICO California brings local federations together throughout California to affect meaningful budget and policy change at the state level.

The USC Dornsife Equity Research Institute (ERI) provides data and analysis to power social change. ERI believes that long-term change is made when historically marginalized communities are empowered, can put forth proposals, and hold decision-makers accountable. And, when communities come together across race, space, and place, movements for change build and have an impact on greater scales of governance.

ERI is a research unit housed within the Dana and David Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences at the University of Southern California. It is the entity resulting from the combination of two institutes: the Program for Environmental and Regional Equity (PERE) and the Center for the Study of Immigrant Integration (CSII), which were founded at USC in 2008.

California Calls is a statewide alliance of 31 organizations organized in 12 counties. Their long-term goal is developing a progressive alliance of grassroots social justice organizations and unions representing key issues and strategic geographic regions of California, with agreement on a public policy agenda, and the collective power to win systemic reform.

Through their bottom-up approach, CA Calls organizes voters most impacted by budget cuts and deteriorating public services in support of systemic, progressive solutions to our state’s fiscal crisis. Working together, and including those who are often left out of policy decisions, CA Calls believes we can reclaim the California Dream of equality, opportunity and prosperity for all Californians.

Other statewide partners include:

• Alliance of Californians for Community Engagement (ACCE)
• Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles (Advancing Justice)
• PolicyLink
• Mobilize the Immigrant Vote (MIV)
• Yo California!/Free Our Dreams
• Chrissie Castro, Consultant

Key Issue Area Partners include:

Crime & Safety
• Californians for Safety and Justice
• Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
• Urban Peace Institute
• Violence Prevention Coalition

Democracy
•  Hahrie Han, Associate Professor of Political Science at UCSB
•  Zoltan Hajnal, Professor of Political Science at UCSD
•  Karthick Ramakrishnan, Professor of Political Science at UCR

Economic Opportunity
•  California Budget and Policy Center

Education
•  UCLA Civil Rights Project
•  The Opportunity Institute
•  The Education Trust – West

Healthcare Access
•  California Pan-Ethnic Health Network (CPEHN)
•  Community Health Councils (CHC)
•  Investing in Place
•  PolicyLink, Health Equity and Place
•  Prevention Institute

Housing
•  Southern California Association of Nonprofit Housing
•  Trust South LA