A Place to Exhale

I make my way from my home in Natomas to 700 H Street in Sacramento. Traffic is light, but parking is difficult. I meander through the downtown area until I find a metered parking spot on this brisk fall day in October. I walk as fast as I can to make it to my 10:00 A.M. appointment with Supervisor Serna. As I make my way toward the Sacramento County Administration Center, I am taken aback by its jailhouse demeanor: it is concrete on top of concrete. The institutional milieu of this edifice is heavy, even intimidating. I straighten my blazer, open the large tinted-glass door, and begin looking for Room 2450.

When I reach Supervisor Serna’s office, I am relieved by its ambiance and welcoming staff. Although his political work is embedded within this large administration building, Phil’s own work area appears in stark contrast. I write in my notebook: Like an oasis. A place to exhale.

Phil’s office decor is colorful and musically themed; he has guitars near his desk. I am not surprised to learn that he plays the bass and the drums with several local bands. I also know from following him on social media for many years that he enjoys fly fishing and prides himself on cooking elegant and exquisite meals for his wife Roxanna. Underneath this public persona is a thoughtful servant-leader and ambitious agent of change.

In 2011, Phil was considered a “freshman supervisor” because he had only been serving for a few months. Although he was very new to the position, he had no interest in maintaining the status quo. His goal, quite admirably, was to make an impact. Phil’s ideals and political acumen were tested when he received a shocking report detailing extreme inequities in Sacramento, the city that raised him.

The study that came to Phil’s attention was an analysis of childhood health and well-being in Sacramento from 1990 to 2010. Demonstrating painful patterns and startling statistics, and aptly called the “Child Death Report,” it highlighted the fact that African American children were dying at twice the rate of any other children (102 deaths per 100,000 children). Phil had a visceral reaction to this information: “my anger” came from the “fact that Sacramento County” has this “incredible disparity in the number of deaths between African American children and children of other races.” This was not about “any given year”: there was a pattern of inequality, Phil says. “It has been chronic!” He felt compelled to do something: “I really made the case that this is our number one issue in Sacramento County.”

The longitudinal evidence in the report served as a catalyst for honest and courageous conversations. Why do we accept racial disparities as the status quo? Why is preventable death for Black children intergenerational? Even though Supervisor Serna was committed to action, he did not have the answers.

Supervisor Serna also recognized his own limitations: “Child welfare is not my background. I’m an urban planner.” He thus decided to get experts into the room and established the Blue Ribbon Commission on Disproportionate African American Child Deaths “comprised of health and child welfare professionals, law enforcement, clergy, mothers, grandmothers, and fathers” to create a “collective focus” and “understand the problem a bit more” as depicted in the “death reports.” “Not only understanding the nature of the problem, the challenge, its history,” he explains, “but also moving forward. The group continued to ask, ‘What do we do about it?’ ”

The Blue Ribbon Commission built momentum to address the welfare of Black children and youth in Sacramento, yet even this group of experts felt that they lacked the understanding needed to create a full semblance of a strategy. So, they “took it on the road.” I ask for clarification. He responds, “We went to various neighborhoods, those neighborhoods [where] the death report tells us the disparity is the greatest” and began to share the data. In listening sessions held in these communities, emotions were stirred, and deeper wounds were revealed. He continues, “I think, anecdotally, everyone kind of understood where the tough neighborhoods are in Sacramento County” and “most deaths associated with violence occur.” But something significantly shifted when we had “hard data.” In the twenty-first century, racial demographics still greatly shape a child’s probability of survival.

Black families in Sacramento County were angry, “which is totally understandable … they had never known about this, they had never heard about it!” There was an assumption, among all of us, that “children in Sacramento County basically have access to the same types of health care and parents have access to the same type of education.” Supervisor Serna underscores that the “anger people expressed was very palpable.” It was also “cathartic for a lot of folks.” He shakes his head and looks down at his desk. He admits, “it was cathartic for me.” He utters these words quietly and then asks a rhetorical question: “How do we address the most intimate problems that we have?” The word intimate lands between us. The intimacy of race relations in this country, the remnants of all that is still wrong, here.

Although political activism and government service were integral to Supervisor Serna’s upbringing, for many communities of color—and for Black folks in Sacramento, in particular—politics is not synonymous with productive, collective people power. Too many times, politicians have endorsed, enforced, and rationalized institutional racism. Although it was hard for Supervisor Serna to hear families openly discuss their disdain for city politics, these were truths he needed to hear and to acknowledge. Perhaps a lot of leaders might have stopped there, content with having received feedback from constituents. Supervisor Serna, however, was not satisfied with simply knowing about the problem. He felt responsible for doing something. Momentum continued to build, and he was determined to make a difference.

I try to dig into the details and find out what were his next steps. I ask, “How did you go from facilitating the commission to really creating a line item in the budget and moving the bureaucracy, so to speak, to align with the will of the people?” Phil says emphatically, “I really kind of view myself as not doing the heavy lifting, quite frankly.… I’ll be very honest. It was all the folks around the table—literally, figuratively, with the Blue Ribbon Commission—that really gave a lot of thought to, um … [Phil reaches for a metaphor and connects it to a meal] … bite off a chunk of meat that we can chew and swallow.” That is how the problems of childhood deaths got distilled into “four leading causes of death” and BCLC began to get a foothold with funding. “I’m a big believer that our budgets—your tax dollars—should be reflective of our value sets.” At each milestone, Phil understood his position: “For me, politically, it was keeping this issue at the forefront of our discussions, and when I say our discussions, I mean the Board of Supervisors.” In addition to his advocacy, Phil remained active as chair of the Blue Ribbon Commission, “quite frankly, kind of [laying] down a challenge to folks to tell me what’s a more pressing problem.”

There really was no precedent for any of these actions. Yet, these collective efforts were very successful. Early on, individuals were forced to make the road by walking it. Eventually, “gradually, more and more” people joined the walking, the doing of this important work, and Supervisor Serna describes a shift from “talk” to “application.” Just this step took eighteen months, he admits. “It didn’t happen immediately.” Shaking his head, he repeats, “That was an eighteen-month process.”

To recap, the strategies used to build this city-wide initiative were simple but very effective. Supervisor Serna established a commission that included a wide range of stakeholders. This commission examined the “death report” and shared information via listening sessions with the community. Members of the commission then reached consensus around key focus areas and recommendations. Supervisor Serna recalls, “The ultimate goal, quite frankly, was to reduce African American child deaths 10 to 20% … pretty intense accountability that we set for ourselves.” At this point, there was created a permanent committee, the Steering Committee on the Reduction of African American Child Deaths, to “dig a little deeper” into the budget and “make specific recommendations for the Board of Supervisors.” Supervisor Serna gets serious: “We’re talking tens of millions of dollars, and we didn’t want this to be an instance where people felt like we’re just throwing money at a problem.” Finally, a vote among the city supervisors was held, and the funding was approved.

These actions occurred primarily at the policy level, helping catalyze a larger journey toward racial justice in Sacramento. Once the funding was approved, the real work began. Supervisor Serna has long understood that impact must be tangible on the ground, inside people’s homes and neighborhoods. Yet, even with good intentions and some institutional support, a gap between city government, social services, and Black families persisted. To gain access and build trust, partner agencies such as the Sierra Health Foundation and Community Incubator Leads became critical conduits for engagement, advocacy, and empowerment.

Bullets Hit Black Children Differently

The work grew exponentially, so I wonder about pushback. Race-based policies that support Black life are still controversial. Supervisor Serna was not distracted by the debates and is still convinced that a specialized approach benefits all of Sacramento. His analysis reminds me of targeted universalism, a framework developed through john a. powell’s (2009) extensive legal scholarship on structural racism. Essentially, targeted universalism alters the approach of universal strategies—policies that make no distinctions among recipients—to achieve goals such as improved health: it instead argues that policies should target the least served to expose, address, and uplift them. Strategic inputs then create improvements that cascade outward, affecting the policies and practices of the larger ecosystem.

Similar to powell’s theory of change about targeted universalism, Serna contends that the BCLC does not just benefit African Americans. For instance, even though it focuses on educating Black families about safe sleeping habits for infants, he tells me, “We are pursuing interventions that will help all children.” He continues, “I think everyone’s going to have some important takeaways.… The interventions that we develop around child abuse and neglect, homicides, third-party homicides will probably, most likely, benefit the broader community.” He then cites the example of youth gun violence. Most gun violence in Sacramento is nestled inside particular areas of the city, but Black people are not the only folks who live and spend time there. “Just because you’re white or non-African American, you’re not immune to violence.”

I nod my head in agreement and go right into my next question: “What do you think are the root causes of the disparities that we’re seeing?” His answer is thoughtful: “I think there’s a lot of things. I mean, some of it is institutional racism.” I ask Supervisor Serna to be more specific. His analysis is grounded in a clear understanding of interlocking forms of oppression. He delineates that there are “inequities socioeconomically, inequities when it comes to educational opportunities, inequities in the history of investments in different parts of our community, different stressors when it comes to racism.” He takes a moment and leans back in his chair. It seems he is pondering his answer.

“It’s odd, quite frankly, for a non-African American to say it, but I’ve come to learn a great deal about it from professionals and people, the PhDs that study this. I’ve had some really enlightening conversations with folks who know the subject matter a lot better than I do.” These conversations have led him to a stark conclusion: “It is much more challenging for African Americans to raise healthy children.” As he shares his insights, a wave of names come over me: Tamir Rice (12 years old), Trayvon Martin (17 years old), Michael Brown (18 years old), Stephon A. Clark (22 years old), Ahmaud Arbery (25 years old). There are many contemporary instances of police murdering Black men and women, and when these bullets hit children and young adults, they hit differently. African American families do raise healthy Black children, but this is often despite a deeply entrenched system of white supremacy designed and nurtured through policies, practices, and policing that are wedded to anti-Blackness.

With the vision of these unarmed victims stirring in my mind, I push back a bit on Supervisor Serna. “As someone who does represent government,” I assert, “what are some ways that the system is trying to address and eliminate institutionalized racism?” Phil helps connect the dots between collective activism and institutional responsibility. “You have to remember,” he says, that “the death report” and the formation of the Reduction of African American Child Deaths committee “all happened, interestingly enough, during the infancy of Black Lives Matter.” He describes a type of “serendipity” where “there was a broader realization across the country that racism has by no means evaporated from the American milieu.” He expounds on this point: “The incidents of violence against African Americans … thrust this conversation to the forefront: What do we do as local government? What do we do as state government? Now, unfortunately, with the Trump administration, it has become all too prominent an issue. It’s inescapable for everyone. And to some degree, that’s kind of a good thing because it forces us to talk about it.” Phil brings the conversation full circle. “Institutional racism,” he attests, “really presents itself in the form of these massive disparities.”

Even though inroads have been made and the death toll has significantly decreased, this work is by no means complete. “The nature of what we’re trying to tackle” is complicated and not conducive to a quick “mission accomplished” framework, Phil says. Demanding and creating healthy environments where Black children thrive is a process, much more than a destination. Because this is a lifelong quest, we have “to remind everyone, including the media, that we have a long way to go.” “Not for a minute,” he contends, “do I think that Sacramento County is somehow an outlier and that the disparities based on race are solely a Sacramento County phenomenon.”

Serna’s advice for other counties and cities is straightforward. Disaggregate data based on race, and do not be afraid of the findings or try to rationalize the disproportionalities. “If it weren’t for that data,” patterns of inequality would not have been unveiled in such a blatant and concerted way. “That information,” he believes, “really sparked some hearty conversations” and “tough questions early on.” Serna is in the early stages of drafting legislation that would require all fifty-eight counties in California to collect similar information to gain greater insight into “the environment of child welfare” and lifelong well-being. As James Baldwin (2014, 25) taught, “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”

According to Phil, “institutional racism is happening everywhere,” and that’s why each person needs to “engage in the process of your own governance.” Democracy functions through advocacy, but people do not have the same access, opportunities, or time to deal with the government. “I know they don’t necessarily want to write emails,” he quips, “or perhaps even some are afraid of public speaking,” and yet that’s “absolutely what it takes.” He insists, “Politicians come and go. We are only temporary occupants of our offices.” Phil wants his constituents to understand that priorities shift, especially when new mayors and supervisors are sitting around the table. Regardless of who is elected, it is “incumbent upon the community to keep this at the forefront.” Change, he affirms, “sustains itself from the bottom up.” Then he chuckles and looks right at me: “And, quite frankly, keeps it in the discussions every June” throughout the budget negotiation process. “What I don’t want to see happen” is that we are forced to get “our budgets balanced on the backs of the good work that happened.” Budget cuts to BCLC “would be a travesty.”

“I Am Fighting for My Community”

A lot has happened since the initial “death report.” As we reflect on the past eight years, I ask Supervisor Serna what he is most proud of. He instantly tells me that “I’m just proud” of all the ways Community Incubator Leads came to “own it … and by that, I mean this ought not to be a top-down approach, this ought not to be big government telling the communities where the disparities are the most pronounced how to do everything. This needs to be a set of solutions, a set of interventions that is a little more organic than that … derived from a great deal of input from the communities themselves.” Solutions and expertise exist among those who “have been feeling the disparity” and “living with the disparity.”

The more I listen to Phil Serna’s convictions and understand his work behind the scenes, the more my appreciation grows for his role as a servant leader in this movement. Yes, he is a politician, but he does not let politics define the possibilities. He strengthens his convictions with clear data, with real and innovative results. Instead of overseeing colonial modes of operation in which the many serve the few, Phil Serna is a Latino leader who exists to serve the people. “I see myself, fundamentally, as someone that’s responsible for doing everything I can to try and give voice to those that don’t usually have it or have never possessed it or find it difficult to express themselves politically when it’s necessary.” In terms of the BCLC, Serna is “very grateful that the community has really taken the reins and really identified it as a very, very high priority for themselves.” Building on this energy, Serna wants everyone in Sacramento to “become activists in their own right.” He is adamant: “People just need to keep in mind that they really hold the power.”

I challenge Phil to move from the general to the specific. I ask him to think about a fifteen-year-old African American student whose cousin was recently murdered. What would you say to that young man? What would you do? “I’m a Latino politician. I don’t know what it feels like to be an African American fifteen-year-old,” but I still have “an obligation.” He emphasizes that he wants this student to “know that he’s not alone. He’s got a community behind him; he’s got people that care about him. Even if we’re not family. Even if we’re not friends. Even if we’re not the same race. Even if we come from different neighborhoods.” Phil wants to convey the importance of a “focused opportunity” and “stress that he’s at a fork in the road.” Although Supervisor Serna empathizes with the need to grieve (“mourn his cousin’s death in his own way”), he wants to immediately “nurture the alternatives.” Many people have similar experiences and find ways to “advance their chances of not being the next victim.” So, he surmises, while this young man “has a choice, we have an obligation. That’s where the magic can happen where you can really change someone’s mind about their limited time on this earth.” Supervisor Serna speaks in terms of transformation and purpose, cornerstones of his own life.

The work of racial justice is psychological, physical, and spiritual. In many ways, it is embodied long before it is politicized. Supervisor Serna agrees, sharing that the life and legacies of Black children far exceed “some county supervisor who had an epiphany in 2011.” Building on his words, I ask what legacy is Phil Serna trying to leave for the Black children of Sacramento. His response is profound: “That they’re living longer.… It’s a pretty simple way to look at it, but that’s what, fundamentally, this is all about.” He expounds on his point: “It’s not a foreign concept. It’s one that has been steeped in the civil right movement. And I challenge anyone to tell me there’s something more important than our kids.… We’re talking about life and death.”

Our interview draws to a close, and we look into the future. He tilts his head to the left and seems to be peering far into the distance as he says, “I would like to look back in my old age” and see a “new generation of political leadership.” With a glisten in his eye, he shares his sincerest hope: “It would be wonderful” though “probably impossible.” I lean forward and prod, asking “What would be impossible?” “What if,” Phil opens up, “one of the African American young adults” whose life has been impacted and influenced by the Black Child Legacy Campaign becomes a change agent? Somehow, we could trace back to the effort and say, well … that baby.” Although we cannot know whether the babies whose lives were saved through this work will become our next leaders, it certainly seems that we are moving in the right direction.

In our final moments together, I shift the conversation. I probe Supervisor Serna poetically, giving him the beginning of five sentences and asking him to finish them. Without a moment’s hesitation, he offers his responses quickly, simply, and purposefully:

Black childhood … is difficult.

Freedom sounds like … a ballot dropping.

Black power feels … like equality.

I am fighting … for my community.

I am fighting against … the harm of my community.

Serna’s piercing words reach into the heart of his commitment to servant leadership. He continues to connect freedom to the political process and power to equality. Many of the community organizers introduced in subsequent chapters take a slightly different approach.

Vantage points shape perspective. In this moment, I am picturing Ms. Jackie, for instance, for whom Blackness is “nothing but greatness.” Her conceptualization and reflection on being African American echoes a similar sentiment articulated by Imani Perry (2019, 21–23) in Breathe: A Letter to My Sons: “I do not believe the acts of oppressors are my people’s shame. For me, that my people became, created, and imagined from a position of unfreedom is a source of deep pride, not shame.… There was love and legacy everywhere.” While Ms. Jackie and author Imani Perry both assert an asset-based analysis of their identity as glorious and victorious, Supervisor Serna’s perception is different. Perhaps his sympathy is a natural inclination because he is not African American. As an onlooker and witness, he believes, “Black childhood is difficult.” The distinctions between these outlooks are important and may point to deeper ideological schisms and manifestations.

Consider the initial naming of this effort when it was in the hands of the Blue Ribbon Commission: Reduction of African American Child Deaths. Even though this name was a call to arms to reduce deaths, it was formed, informed, and imbued with loss. Policy makers were reinforcing a deficit lens, even as they were seeking answers to this crisis. Fortunately, they soon realized that centering the Black community would lead to new solutions.

These Black leaders also led us to a new name. I cannot help but grin inside my soul when I consider that RAACD is now a community-driven movement called the Black Child Legacy Campaign. Language matters, and names often reflect our values, perceptions, and ambitions. While racism is problematic, shameful, inhumane, gruesome, and challenging, Blackness is not. Blackness is legacy, and this sentiment is simultaneously a compass, definition, and destination.

REFERENCES

• Baldwin, James. 2014. James Baldwin: The Last Interview and Other Conversations. Brooklyn: Melville House.
• Perry, Imani. 2019. Breathe: A Letter to My Sons. Boston: Beacon Press.
• powell, john a. 2009. “Post-Racialism or Targeted Universalism?” Denver University Law Review 86: 785–806.