Lak’ech Learning

Power Agency, and used the image as the Zoom background in his online meetings with state and federal officials.

“When we finally were able to go back to Washington, DC last year, I repeatedly heard, ‘Healdsburg? Yeah, you have that cool floating solar project!,’” said Hagele.

Though Rennie and the City of Healdsburg have come to a financial arrangement to license his shots, the 56-year-old pilot is remarkably casual about it. “I guess there may have been a contract in there,” he said. He has photographed controlled burns, colored night lights on the Healdsburg Bridge and the roundabout by night, among other projects.

“I take lots of pictures on my own,” said Rennie. “And people find them on social media, then I end up getting paid jobs through that. For me, it’s free advertising.”

The process is to conclude in mid-summer with a DEI Plan for Healdsburg, co-constructed by key stakeholders, city staff and Acosta. The three-to-five-year plan would give the city “baseline data” upon which to provide guidance for staff retention and recruitment; encouraging BIPOC youth participation; development of a more inclusive workplace; integrating diversity-equity-inclusion practices in city government, programs and law enforcement; and housing policy, and the like.

“This series of events is part of the [contract] with Acosta Learning Partnership that will ultimately result in a City Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Plan,” said Andrew Sturmfels, the city’s assistant city manager, who is leading the city’s DEI initiative. “These events will include guest speakers and an opportunity for participants to actively engage and support the co-construction of DEI plan goals.”

The City of Santa Rosa recently completed their own DEI Plan. In explaining the scope of Healdsburg’s DEI process, Sturmfels said, “While I do anticipate the plan will have some aspiration statements, the ‘actions’ in the plan will be more specific than the policy statements in a general plan, and will include things like new policies, practices or programs and/or changes to existing policies, practices or programs.”

The first encuentro shares information about Indigenous voices in the area, and subsequent meetings deal with the African-American experience in Healdsburg, housing and planning, the migrant community and the Asian-American Pacific Islander (AAPI) community in Healdsburg.

The next four Equity Encuentros will also be held at the Healdsburg Community Center. Their dates are Feb. 23, March 9, March 30 and April 27. Each will run for two hours, beginning at 6:30pm in the Multipurpose Room at the Healdsburg Community Center, 1557 Healdsburg Ave. Language interpretation, childcare and light refreshments will be provided. Further information on the programs is at healdsburg.gov/1071/ Diversity-Equity-andInclusion-Plan