Structural Inequities Like The Pay Gap Are Built Into The City's Contract System, Say Nonprofit Leaders

San Francisco CA

12 November, 2021

5:17 PM

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By Anlan Cheney, Mission Local November 11, 2021 The pandemic has driven discussions on equity in a variety of directions, but for essential workers on the frontlines of health care, few inequities were as stark as one that impacted their own pockets – nonprofit workers earned decidedly less than their counterparts with a city job. For months, contact tracers for nonprofits were paid less than their city-employed counterparts, said Dr. Monique LeSarre, executive director of the Rafiki Coalition which hired and trained workers to do community contact tracing in Bayview Hunters Point. It's an inequity she had grown accustomed to: even qualified professionals like therapists and case workers who work for a nonprofit, she said, often make less than half of those holding the same position as a city employee. While LeSarre's contact tracers eventually got an hourly rate on-par with city workers, much needs to be done in the rates the city uses to contract with nonprofits, which have long taken on much of the city's social service work. To read the full article, click here. Mission Local covers San Francisco from the vantage point of the Mission, a neighborhood with all of the promise and problems of a major city. You can support Mission Local here.