On-Call Equitable Community Engagement Services

The County of San Mateo is seeking qualified community-based organizations, nonprofit organizations, firms, academic partners, and individuals to assist with equitably engaging communities in the County of San Mateo. The goal of this Request for Statement of Qualifications (RFSQ) is to make it easier for San Mateo County jurisdictions to find community partners to help conduct community outreach to historically underrepresented groups, to allow more meaningful participation in government decisions. The selected community-based organizations, nonprofit organizations, academic partners, firms, or individuals may be asked to provide services such as building community trust and relationships, serving as a trusted liaison, conducting background research, creating public outreach materials, identifying and implementing equity-focused community engagement strategies, and leading community engagement activities. • Build community trust and relationships between the cities/County and community, including leveraging existing relationships. • Serve as a trusted liaison between the community and the County/cities, sharing information and feedback both ways • Conduct background/technical research to determine which communities are most impacted or will experience greater impacts. • Create online, social media, radio, video and print public outreach and educational materials accessible to audiences with different language speakers, ages, cultures, abilities and familiarity with the issue requiring engagement. • Identify and implement equity-focused and creative community engagement strategies using formats that are relevant to the communities where traditional public meeting formats may not be effective, which could include arts, music and other cultural activities. • Tailor community engagement strategies to reach specific hard-to-reach populations, which may include renters, unhoused individuals and families, seniors/older adults, people with disabilities, immigrant and refugee communities, undocumented residents, non-English/limited-English speakers, low-income households, small businesses, and communities that have historically been excluded from civic processes. • Lead community engagement activities and associated follow-up activities, which may include facilitating and summarizing public meetings, workshops, surveys, polling, and mapping exercises. • Design and lead engagement activities specifically for youth and teens, and partner with schools, school districts, youth-serving organizations, and university youth engagement programs to meet young people where they are. • Coordinate the work of other team members and community ambassadors, including youth ambassadors and culturally/linguistically specific ambassadors. • Assist City or County staff in summarizing findings, attending, and/or facilitating at public forums, commissions, committees, and/or City Council meetings. • Plan and facilitate in-person and virtual events, which may require food, room rentals, childcare, distributing compensation to the community, translation and interpretation services, and accessibility support. • Provide tracking, documentation and analysis of engagement activities and outcomes, including analysis of the engagement’s success at reaching priority populations and adapting strategies in response. • Build capacity in their communities to understand how government works and engage successfully with their local jurisdiction(s). • Support jurisdiction staff in “closing the loop” with the community to explain how their feedback was responded to and/or integrated into decisions.