Last month, the city of Wilmington joined New Hanover County in creating a position to look at equity efforts within their government operations and services to the community.

Joe Conway started Jan. 18 as the city’s first chief equity and inclusion officer, coming from NHRMC where he had served as the hospital’s director of health equity and human experience.

In August 2020, Linda Thompson became the county’s chief diversity and equity officer.

Both joined Thursday's BizTalk to share updates on their programs and goals in the area of diversity, equity and inclusion for the local governments.

Conway said the city began conversations in 2020 to look at its diversity, equity and inclusion practices within the local government's structure and leadership, leading to the adoption of the Rise Together initiative. "The city has really taken a great step and a very methodical approach into how to address this specific topic and this real culture that we're trying to bring forward," he said.

Thompson said one of the latest additions to the county's program is providing free diversity and equity training for small businesses and nonprofits with 35 or fewer employers. "One of the things that we discovered when we began to talk with businesses in our community is that there just wasn't accessibility to this kind of training on a free scale," Thompson said.

View the full BizTalk conversation below. Also listen to this and future weekly WilmingtonBiz Talk discussions on the Business Journal's podcast, available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Stitcher.

 
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