About

The Nine Mile Creek Watershed District includes a variety of residents of different races, ethnicities, and economic circumstances. The District’s DEIA initiative will help managers and staff understand the needs and intersection of watershed district work with its more underrepresented communities. The District believes it plays a role in equity work and has opportunities in its realm of influence to create a more equitable and just community.

What is DEIA?

DEIA stands for Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility. It represents a set of principles and practices aimed at promoting a more inclusive and equitable environment within organizations and communities.

  • Diversity: Refers to the presence of a wide range of human differences, including but not limited to race, ethnicity, gender, sexual orientation, age, physical abilities, religious beliefs, and socioeconomic status.
  • Equity: Involves ensuring fairness and justice in the distribution of resources, opportunities, and benefits. It recognizes that individuals may have different needs and works to address those differences to achieve equal outcomes.
  • Inclusion: Focuses on creating a culture and environment where all individuals feel valued, respected, and included. It goes beyond just representation and aims to foster a sense of belonging.
  • Accessibility: Involves making sure that all individuals, regardless of their abilities or disabilities, have equal access to information, services, and opportunities.

DEIA Becomes a District Priority

In October 2022, the Nine Mile Creek Watershed District Board of Managers held a board retreat to identify District priorities. At the retreat, the board of managers identified DEIA improvements within District processes and overall work as a priority. In April 2023, the board of managers adopted a DEIA policy statement:

The Nine Mile Creek Watershed District strives to understand and to prioritize diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility. Within the context of strategic watershed management, the district will work toward addressing current and historical inequities in every facet of its operation.

Using the Hennepin County Climate Vulnerability Assessment, the District mapped out its population to identify “vulnerable communities”. The District’s vulnerable communities are those that bear the largest combined social and environmental burdens.

Variables included in the score:

  • Asthma hospitalization rates
  • COPD hospitalization rates

    Map of the District boundaries with locations in different shades by vulnerability. The City of Hopkins, the City of Richfield, East Bloomington, East Edina, and South East Eden Prarie locations in the District are most most vulnerable.
    Population vulnerability scores within the Nine Mile Creek Watershed District. Darker regions have a higher vulnerability score. Green outlined areas denote the District’s priority equity zones.
  • Households with no vehicle
  • Limited English proficiency
  • Median household income
  • No high school degree
  • People of color
  • Population 5 and under
  • Population below 185% poverty threshold
  • Population density
  • Population over 65
  • Population with any disability
  • Renter housing units
  • Unemployment rates
  • Flood susceptibility
  • Urban heat island
  • Air quality
  • Tree canopy

Vulnerability Map in Action

At the December 18th, 2024 Board meeting, the Nine Mile Creek Watershed District Board of Managers adopted a new policy for the District’s cost share grant program. 50% of the cost share grant program’s total budget is now reserved for projects in the District’s priority equity zones outlined in green in the map above. During the development of the District’s next 10 year water management plan, similar lenses are anticipated across other District program areas.

District Completes DEIA Plan

In August 2023, the Nine Mile Creek Watershed District hired Zan Associates to develop a DEIA Plan to help guide the integration of a DEIA lens into District policy and programs. By fall of 2024, Zan completed an internal review of the District, completed a community DEIA survey focused the high vulnerability zones of the District, and developed a DEIA plan for to help the District more equitably serve its community. Click on the links below to learn more about this work. Reach out to Lizzy Boor: eboor@ninemilecreek.org to see a more detailed, internal DEIA checklist/action plan which the District will implement over a series of years.