We are thrilled to announce that our County Board of Supervisors will be issuing a Proclamation to declare May 2021 as Adverse Childhood Experiences and Resilience Month on May 4, 2021. We chose the month of May because several organizations recognize May as National Mental Health Month or Mental Health Awareness Month and Child Abuse Prevention Awareness Month.
We thought some of you may want to do something similar so we are sharing a word.docx and a PDF (to preserve formatting) version to use your template.
Inclusions in the Proclamation
To give you a sense of what we included in our draft, please find following three sections:
WHEREAS: there are multiple pathways to resilience because there are a number of protective factors that work, including: close relationships with a caregiver or other caring adults; a parent’s resilience; community and social systems that support health and development for parents, families, neighborhoods, and communities; integrated physical and behavioral healthcare; early screening and interventions; a two-generation approach to support children and their parents/caregivers; and safe and supportive (trauma-informed) education, health, child welfare, juvenile justice, foster care systems; and
WHEREAS: Resilient Sacramento is a coalition of leaders from diverse sectors, including: state and local government; non-profit organizations; infant/child development and behavioral health agencies; parent and youth advocates; juvenile/adult and civil justice; foster care; education; mental health; business; family services; health care; and substance misuse and suicide prevention working to raise awareness about unaddressed exposure to ACEs; organize partnerships across diverse sectors to address systematic barriers to the prevention and treatment of toxic stress; and support and expand efforts to foster safe and supportive (trauma-informed) practices and resilience in families, neighborhoods, and communities and across health care, education, child welfare, and juvenile justice systems; and
WHEREAS: Resilient Sacramento, First 5 Sacramento, and a diverse group of partners,inclusive of all six sectors identified in the CA Roadmap for Resilience (health care, education, early learning, social services, public health, and justice), have committed to partner and collaborate with the Sacramento County Office of Education (SCOE), through the $3 million Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) Aware Network of Care Implementation Grant. The commitment is to build an effective response to, and support of, the Office of the California Surgeon General’s statewide effort to cut ACEs and toxic stress in half, in one generation, through the county-wide Network of Care and connections to community-based health, education, and social supports. These supports are designed to meet the needs of children, adults, and families, and builds upon existing initiatives, including Help Me Grow Sacramento, funded by First 5 Sacramento and led by SCOE.
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the Board of Supervisors, County of Sacramento County, State of California, does hereby PROCLAIM THE MONTH OF MAY AS ADVERSE CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCES AND RESILIENCE AWARENESS MONTH, and wishes to thank Resilient Sacramento for bringing awareness to this important issue and support their efforts.
As For Process
We created a draft that was then submitted to our Steering Committee for fine-tuning. From there, a member of our steering committee who had connections to our Supervisors approached them with our proposal. They liked it and sent it to the full Board for approval, which was grated. The whole process took about a month to complete. Given the short turn-around to declare May, you can always declare another month or a specific day.
To celebrate that month, we plan to have several presentations with panel discussions on relevant issues. Look for updates to events on Resilient Sacramento PACEs Connection.
And if you happen to be in Sacramento on May 4, please feel free to attend the County Board of Supervisors' meeting to observe this exciting proclamation presentation.
Feel free to contact me at captainskala@live.me or 916-225-3408 if you'd like more information.
Wendie Skala
Resilient Sacramento Steering Committee Chairperson
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