The Clackamas County Board of Commissioners will consider defunding its six-figure budget for diversity, equity and inclusion after Commissioner Mark Shull – who drew scrutiny in 2021 for comparing vaccine passports to Jim Crow laws and COVID-19 restrictions to the Holocaust – moved to strike funding for the programs in the upcoming fiscal year.
The effort follows a May 24 budget meeting when Shull called the county’s proposed diversity, equity and inclusion funding – which would pay for three full time employees and programming – an “unnecessary expense” that “only foments friction.”
The board of commissioners and budget committee members voted 9-1 to table and return to a discussion about the nearly $830,000 in proposed funding in July, with Shull the lone no vote. This fiscal year begins July 1, but commissioners can alter the budget after that date, according to County Administrator Gary Schmidt.
“I do not support any allocated funds to support equity, inclusion and diversity,” Shull said. “I want everybody in this board to know that.”
Commissioner Ben West told Shull he supported the reconsideration, saying in a tearful speech that diversity, equity and inclusion efforts create a “victim mentality” and tend to be “something that does not bring our county and local communities together but I think divides it.”
Shull has previously fielded calls for his resignation for comments and social media posts he’s shared that many in Clackamas County — including fellow commissioners — found racist.
In January 2021, Shull’s comments about Islam, Muslim people, transgender people and the Black Lives Matter movement, prompted a board-imposed censure and widespread calls for him to resign.
County Chair Tootie Smith and three other commissioners voted in June 2021 to restrict Shull’s ability to serve as a liaison to various boards and committees after he compared COVID-19 vaccine passports to Jim Crow laws that legalized racial segregation.
In September 2021, he drew scrutiny again when he compared COVID-19 restrictions to the Holocaust.
Shull blamed the calls for his resignation on “cancel culture.”
Commissioners Paul Savas and Martha Schrader defended the budget for diversity initiatives, with Savas warning that slashing funding for diversity initiatives could put the county at risk of losing federal funding.
Schrader said her son, who is Korean American, would often come home crying after being called racist slurs, and that her friends who are Chinese have been spit on.
“People need to understand it still happens today,” Schrader said. “As Oregonians and Americans we need to understand that those kinds of behaviors are harmful to one another, and to me, the diversity, equity and inclusion piece is the constant reminder that we have to be sensitive to this and we have to honor that.”
Chair Smith moved to table discussing the budget instead of immediately voting to cut funding, saying she was “not opposed” to Shull’s idea.
“The pendulum has swung so far to one side that there’s many people like me who feel disenfranchised,” Smith said. “I think an overhaul of the program is in order.”
Former County Commissioner Sonya Fischer, whom West ousted in 2022, said the ongoing discussion is the result of the new power balance on the board.
While the positions are non-partisan, the 2022 election tilted the commission to 4-1 Republican control.
Schrader is the board’s only remaining Democratic member.
Discontinuing the county’s equity office would be “a mistake,” Fischer said Wednesday.
“An extreme agenda is taking over,” she said. “Commissioners would be wise to lean into the expertise and history of the equity office in Clackamas County to understand the important work of the equity office that addresses the unique needs of our diverse workforce and community.”
-- Catalina Gaitán, cgaitan@oregonian.com, @catalingaitan_
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