When: Lancaster City Council meeting, Sept. 27.
What happened: Sharon Allen-Spann, the city’s leadership development and diversity manager, and Angie Papavasilion, bureau chief for human resources, gave their annual report on the city’s diversity, equity and inclusion initiative.
Why it matters: Working on building an inclusive culture is one of the premises of the city’s strategic plans. “The goal we’re trying to achieve is to create a workforce that’s more reflective of the community we serve,” Allen-Spann said.
City resident demographic: According to the latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau, presented at the meeting, there are 57,503 residents in Lancaster city: 52% of them identify as female, 48% as male; 38.9% identify as Hispanic, 38.8% as white, 16.9% as Black, 4.5% as Asian and 0.3% fall in the category of other.
Workforce data: In 2021, the city had 577 employees, 73% of which self-identified as male, 27% as female. Of these, 69.3% self-identified as white, 20.5% as Hispanic, 8.1% as Black, 1% as Asian and 1% as other. In 2021, the city hired 82 people, the majority, 59%, self-identified as white.
Initiatives: Allen-Spann also talked about the importance of having a strong leadership team to maintain a strong employee base, and creating internal career paths. “One of the things that we know about the great resignation is that individuals need to feel like they have a future in an organization, so we want to make certain that we start to create career paths so people see a path to the next opportunity in the organization,” she said. The city is also looking to implement “stay-interviews”, which will be conversations with employees to find out what’s working for them, and what’s not working.
Comments: Council member Lochard Calixte asked what could be done to create a better culture of inclusion and diversity in order to make the police force hire people more representative of the city. “Most of the police officers in this city are white males, and most of the people who live in this city are not white,” he said. Mayor Danene Sorace pointed out there’s an intersection between their recruitment and hiring efforts and the civil service processes they are required to follow by law. “That somewhat challenges our efforts around diversity of our teams,” she said.
250 College Ave.: Council, in a unanimous vote, agreed with the recommendation from the Historical Commission to approve the proposed demolition and construction at 250 College Ave., with six conditions added by the city. Chris Delfs, director of community planning and economic development, during the last council meeting, asked for two more weeks to look at the project in light of community feedback, mainly regarding design details. The six conditions revolve around design.
Capital projects: A first reading was held on an ordinance authorizing the borrowing of $64 million for capital projects consisting of: improvements and upgrades to the city’s water treatment and distribution facilities, improvements and upgrades to the city’s parks, improvements to streets and traffic signals within the city, and improvements to stormwater facilities.
What’s next: Lancaster City Council will meet for their committee meeting at 6:30 p.m. Oct. 3 in council chambers.
