Mark your calendars! African American Community Initiative (AACI) is hosting their 2026 Black History Month celebration! This year’s event will be an educational experience: a tour of the Domini Hoskins Black History Museum & Learning Center in Redwood City.
Registration is required for this event. See more info below.
Date: Sat, 2/21/26 Time: 12:00PM- 3:00PM PST Location: Domini Hoskins Black History Museum & Learning Center (890 Jefferson Ave, Redwood City) Contact: Dee Pennix at AACIInitiative@gmail.com
Media Notice:
This event will have photography and videography. Your entrance into the event area constitutes your full consent to being filmed and photographed by the County of San Mateo. The County of San Mateo reserves the right to use any photography or film taken in the event area without providing compensation to you. Such use by County may include, but is not limited to, postings to social media or websites, and/or use in promotional or informational materials in any medium.
You agree to release and discharge the County of San Mateo, its agents, representatives, assigns, and licensees from all claims, demands, and liabilities arising out of or in connection with the use of your likeness.
Alternatively, if you wish to participate/attend the event, but do not wish to have your photograph used in accordance with the above notice, please contact an Event Organizer.
The mission of the African American Community Initiative is to become a known resource for African American Community members facing challenges with finding and utilizing mental health services, while addressing inequalities faced by African Americans in our county. Our vision is to build a community driven support system for reducing mental health and substance use treatment disparities, and the stigma of mental illness.
On Saturday, February 15th, the African American Community Initiative (AACI) celebrated their 7th annual Black History Month celebration at Eastside College Preparatory Academy in East Palo Alto. This event paid homage to the African American/Black ancestors, specifically highlighting African Americans devout contributions to our American history through labor (the national theme was “African Americans & Labor: Paying homage to our ancestors”). The event featured guest presentations from our newest San Mateo County Board Member, Lisa Gauthier, who represents District 4 (East Palo Alto), Behavioral Health, and Recovery Services (BHRS) Director, Dr. Jei Africa, and BHRS Office of Diversity and Equity Director, Dr. Maria Lorente-Foresti. Attendees were provided history about African American/Black representation in predominately white work fields, as seen in the video by Misty Copeland, who shared her lived experiences as a Black Principal Ballet Dancer. In addition, attendees learned about the Port Chicago explosion in Suisan Bay and the 6888 Central Postal Directory Battalion, an all-Black female unit of the United States Army during World War II. Finally, the event celebrated the work of Maurice Goodman, the President of the San Mateo County National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) – the oldest and largest civil rights organization in the United States!
AACI closed out the event with an introduction to the Domini Hoskins Black History Museum and Learning Center in Redwood City, as well as providing some trivia and raffles to the community; all questions related to African American/Black individuals who contributed to American history and those who contributed to San Mateo County workforce. By celebrating Black History, AACI aims to reduce behavioral health treatment disparities, support an inclusive and welcoming environment for our clients and workforce and reduce the stigma around behavioral health challenges with the intention of creating more equitable behavioral health outcomes for our African American and Black community. The African American Community Initiative would like to thank all their guests and presenters for coming together and rejoicing in African American/Black History through music, community resources, speakers, and guest presenters. The African American Community Initiative hopes to see you all for their next event in June for Juneteenth!
To learn more about the African American Community Initiative, or to become a member, click here!
Mark your calendars! African American Community Initiative (AACI) is hosting their 2025 Black History Month Wellness Event celebration! This is a free community event promoting arts and wellness for African Americans. Expect live music, resource fair, speakers, and health & wellness checks.
Date: Sat, 2/15/25 Time: 1:00PM- 4:00PM PST Location: Eastside College Preparatory School (1041 Myrtle Street, East Palo Alto) Contact: Dee Pennix at AACIInitiative@gmail.com
About AACI:
The mission of the African American Community Initiative is to become a known resource for African American Community members facing challenges with finding and utilizing mental health services, while addressing inequalities faced by African Americans in our county. Our vision is to build a community driven support system for reducing mental health and substance use treatment disparities, and the stigma of mental illness.
Congratulations to our three BHRS Equity in Leadership Award winners, Delicia Pennix, Eri Tsujii and Gloria Gutierrez!
The BHRS Leadership in Equity Award was created to honor the workforce members who have shown passion, dedication, and action to bolster policy and practices that support equitable outcomes.
Through our MCOD work and before, we have witnessed individuals transform our system and elevate the voice of our workforce and communities.
The purpose of the award is to:
Recognize staff who are living into our multicultural organizational development (MCOD) vision
Show our commitment to Diversity, Equity, Inclusion & Belonging (DEIB) efforts
Model & share the message to all our workforce that equity & our BHRS MCOD goals can be achieved by all of us working together.
In 2021 ODE was proud to initiate the first Scott Gruendl Equity in Leadership Award. Our Workforce, Education and Training (WET) Director led this work after noticing one executive team member who consistently showed up willing to courageously engage in personal reflection and actively create system change.
In 2022 the program was expanded to honor and recognize Managers/Supervisors and Direct Care/Administrative team members who have shown exceptional work in leading our BHRS Equity work. This year, with your feedback, the category relating to positions (e.g.: Administrative staff/Direct Care, Supervisor/Manager, or Executive) is no longer part of the criteria.
About the Award Recipients:
Delicia “Dee” Pennix has exemplified the spirit of diversity, equity and inclusion while working for BHRS as a Patient Service Assistant for Service Connect and Pathways. Delicia has been the African American Community Initiative (AACI) co-chair for the last two years and in this position, she has demonstrated a commitment to serving all of San Mateo County as well as hosting annual events for Black History Month and Juneteenth. Dee has participated in the BHRS equity recruitment workgroup to advocate for workplace diversity and inclusion, GARE and the Recovery Happens committee. Since her start in San Mateo County, she has been committed to the County’s vision of diversity and equity and strived to be a leader who keeps this vision in the center of her various roles in our County.
Gloria Gutierrez is a co-chair of the Native and Indigenous Peoples Initiative (NIPI) and is one of the founding members of NIPI as well as other Health Equity Initiatives (HEI). She selflessly serves the community while advocating for the rights of Indigenous and Native American communities as well as other marginalized individuals. Gloria maintains the Phoenix Garden on her own time, which is a project that the initiative and other supporters have brought to fruition. We are also honored to have her provide the blessing and land acknowledgment at many of our county community events.
Lastly, Gloria is one of our Cultural Humility trainers, teaching our workforce about this important foundational training. Gloria approaches her services through a person and family-centered lens and is a health advocate who encompasses BHRS’ values.
Eri Tsujii is a great example of how a traditionally non-direct service/non-client facing staff can implement an equity lens in the work that they do as a colleague. Eri applies collaboration and an equity lens in the work that she does to improve our system of care. As a member of the Quality Assurance team, she works to ensure that data from our clients and community is represented and weaved into our work. By gathering the voices and perspectives of many she works to ensure information is being shared for efficiency and that the data and the voices of our stakeholders are incorporated into the work she leads with developing and evaluating Performance Improvement Projects (PIP).
We are grateful to our three awardees for their impactful work in ensuring that Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Belonging (DEIB) are at the forefront of all we do. We also thank the many people in our workforce who are working alongside our current recipients to create change. Next year we look forward to your nominations of individuals who bring the DEIB lens into their work.
To learn more about BHRS’ Office of Diversity & Equity, visit SMCHealth.org/ODE.
The in-person location is at Ravenswood Family Health Network in the Juanita Duncan Conference Room (1842 Bay Road, E Palo Alto).
Lunch and refreshments will be served!
Please see the above flyer for more information and how to reserve your seat if you plan to attend in-person (seating is limited).
You will need to log in separately for each meeting if you plan to participate via Zoom. For Zoom Info, email Lee Harrison at leharrison@smcgov.org.
Both meetings will have brief presentations:
Office of Diversity and Equity (ODE)
African American Community Initiative (AAC) – Adult Protective Services Presentation (Cassie Villar) and AACI Introduction and Overview
Spirituality Initiative (SI) – Bishop, Dr. Cleveland Prince, Senior Pastor of True Light Missionary Baptist Church in East Palo Alto. A discussion about “Spirituality in the African American Experience, Overcoming Struggles, Faith and Fatherhood.”
Please plan to join us, and please share this information widely in your networks!
Also join AACI and Voices of Recovery for their Juneteenth celebration on Friday, 6/16/23. More info here.
The African American Community Initiative (AACI) and Voices of Recovery San Mateo County (VORSMC) are proud to co-host our second Juneteenth Celebration on Friday, June 16, 2023.
The theme of this year’s Celebration is: Discovering-Recovering Our Roots: The Continued Journey of Black Struggle
As our country’s newest National Holiday, Juneteenth acknowledges and celebrates the final end of institutional slavery in the United States.
This year’s event promises to be inspirational, fun and educational, with a program that includes presentations from San Mateo County Supervisor Noelia Corzo, a Proclamation presented by City of East Palo Alto Mayor Lisa Gauthier, African drumming and storytelling, a panel discussion, cultural performances, health checks (blood pressure and glucose), a photo booth, music and dinner.
In honor of Black History Month, the Health Equity Division at Alameda County Behavioral Health invites you to join the conversation “Black Don’t Crack? Dispelling the Myth, Uplifting Excellence, Mental Health and Wellness in the African American Community” via Zoom on February 24, at 10 a.m.
Join us for a lively panel discussion featuring Keynote Speaker: Dr. Wade Nobles, Psychologist/Educator/Author and panelists:
Dr. Karyn Tribble, Director ACBH
Kimi Watkins-Tartt, Director ACDPH
Dr. Angela Coombs, Psychiatrist, ACBH
Dr. Khalid White, Educator/ Entrepreneur
Ken Jones, PEER Mentor, San Mateo County
Shuja Johnson, Executive Director, Black Men Speak
Zoom link and more info about the event can be found here.
Please join San Mateo County’s African American Community Initiative (AACI) for their 2023 Black History Month Celebration. The event is on Saturday, February 11th, 2023 from 10am to 2pm. In-person location is at Cooley Landing Center (2100 Bay Rd, East Palo Alto, CA 94303).
This event will be hybrid with an in-person limited capacity of 75 people. Registration is first come first serve, and you don’t want to miss out!
Scheduled presentations and activities include Black Mental Health, COVID-19 and Health Care in the Black Community, raffle prizes, live musical performances and poetry.
If you are interested to volunteer for set up, clean up, ushering, door monitoring, etc, please email dpennix@smcgov.org.
The mission of the African American Community Initiative is to become a known resource for African American Community members facing challenges with finding and utilizing mental health services, while addressing inequalities faced by African Americans in our county. Our vision is to build a community driven support system for reducing mental health and substance use treatment disparities, and the stigma of mental illness. Learn more about AACI here.
The African American Community Initiative (AACI) proudly hosted their annual Black History Month Program on Saturday, February 26, 2022. The audience was greeted with a musical interlude by The Glide Ensemble singing “Say Their Names” chanting “Black lives matter- we matter.” This poignant song was followed by Dana Johnson (they/them), Pride Initiative Co-Chair, honoring our ancestors by reciting the Sankofa African Ancestral acknowledgement. Lee Harrison (he/him), AACI Co-Chair, gave an introduction to the national theme for Black History Month: Black Health and Wellness.
Doctoral student from Palo Alto University and AACI intern, Chika Ofodu (she/they) gave a well received presentation on Healing Centered Engagement (HEC), a framework for engaging with youth of color that embraces a holistic and strength- based approach to trauma that involves culture, spirituality, civic action, and collective healing.
Dr. Kim Rhoads (she/her) told us that the highest rate of COVID infection and deaths are still occurring in Black and Latino communities. Social determinants drive these disparities that are common among all other diseases. Although the total numbers of people with COVID has declined, Dr Rhoads emphasised that Black and Brown communites need to continue to follow precautionary guidelines to reduce our high infection rates:
Masking matters: It is most important to block the aerosol spread from the mouth and nose.
Protect yourself by getting vaccinated despite community conspiracy theories to the contrary.
Omicron is a variant of COVID, there will likely be new variants.
We must act accordingly to protect ourselves from this airborne disease.
The African American Community Initiative (AACI) Health Equity Initiative of San Mateo County BHRS’ Office of Diversity and Equity is hosting its Black History Month celebration on February 26, 2022 from 10am to 12pm as an online Zoom event.
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