AdvanceOC

I am attracted to The Elevate Prize because I saw it as an opportunity to leverage this truly innovative idea with a cohort of other visionaries.  The Elevate Prize would be used to complete the creation of the Orange County Equity Map as a social determinant of health (SDOH) data-sharing hub. Data analytics is a critical infrastructure to assist policy-makers and community stakeholders to decide where to invest funding. The full potential of this idea is not limited to Orange County.  In fact, Orange County would only be a proof of concept.  This idea has the potential to change the world.  

I created the OC Equity Map as a way to aggregate and visualize data on the important social and environmental indicators that belie every society.  Communities that prosper have strong social structures that promote equitable access to basic foundations of health and wellness.  Communities that struggle are plagued with systemic racial, social and health disparities. Orange County is a hybrid of both, with communities that thrive and communities that consistently falter.  It is the perfect breeding ground to test out interventions on social determinants of health.

I am an immigrant refugee from Vietnam who left a war-torn country in search of a better life.  When I arrived in the United States, our family was settled in the housing projects of East New Orleans in a mostly black community.  The tenth child of 13 children, I was lost in a new country without an identity or sense of belonging.  I quickly adapted and became proud of my new nickname: the Cajun Asian.  My teachers took an interest in me and enrolled me in accelerated courses and extra-curricular activities.  I blossomed under the love and exceptional care of some amazing adults in my extended circle.  I would then attend UC Berkeley on a scholarship and graduated in 3 years.  From there, I had an incredible trajectory of success in the private sector but yearned to do something that was personally meaningful.  I returned to my old community in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina and rebuilt 100 homes in my old neighborhood.  Battling darkness and a pervasive sense of hopelessness, my team and I proudly turned on the first porch light in many streets in East New Orleans.  And since then, I vowed to create opportunity where none exist.

Huge disparities exist between the richest and poorest neighborhoods in Orange County. This divide has been persistent and is the known lived experience for the poor in our community.  However, it was never distinctly displayed in a way that was meaningful for both policymakers and the average resident.  That changed when we created the first ever Social Progress Index for Orange County and the Orange County Equity Map, which mapped and measured 50 of the most significant social and environmental factors for all 580 census tracts/neighborhoods in the County. The Equity Map was a resounding indictment, displaying a stark contrast between North and South County. 

These disparities, though not a surprise to anyone, have been elusive to close.  It takes grit, hard work, fierce determination and a commitment to change.  But before any of this gets off the ground, a case needs to be made.  By building the first ever Equity Map based on the Social Progress Index, AdvanceOC is able to make a compelling and irrefutable case for change.  Using data, we can do away with pet projects and political gimmicks.  We can now have a meaningful conversation for systemic change and involve all residents equally in the process.   

Data is becoming a critical tool, necessary to address today's biggest problems. The Equity Map is an easy to understand tool that allows stakeholders to utilize the data to help close racial, economic and social disparities. 

Community activists are now empowered with data to demand change.  With this tool in hand, they can organize their communities and engage more actively in the political process, making their voices heard.

Policymakers and local elected officials can use the Equity Map to create participatory budgeting process by encouraging active engagement with constituents to address areas of greatest need. This data is especially valuable as it provides a means to map, measure and track community investments over time.

Educators, philanthropists and health care workers can use The Equity Map as a baseline for community health and wellness, highlighting areas of need that require greater attention, examination and community investment. Student achievement and patient health outcomes are strongly influenced by the conditions in which families live and work. These social determinants are structural in nature and present a foundation for community stakeholders to engage with government officials on shared goals. Never before has a tool been developed with such a multifaceted potential for social progress. 

We believe that a person's zip code should not determine their human potential.  Our organization hopes to reimagine how communities are designed, with an intention to build social constructs that allow every person to be able to realize their potential. 

With meaningful and transparent data, communities can reinvest wealth to help residents escape poverty and achieve a higher life expectancy.

The first step was to create a data sharing hub and prove its effectiveness. Then we set out to build use cases.  We explored multiple partnerships including working with the Orange County Health Care Agency to conquer a global pandemic.  Our platform proved to be very consequential and it is currently being used by the Vaccine Task Force to micro-target communities for equitable COVID-19 vaccination.

The next step is to invest in data architects, designers, and engineers to incorporate Artificial Intelligence and use it to predict outcomes. Imagine we have a 40 year old with a certain amount of health predispositions and lives in a neighborhood with certain environmental factors.  Could we predict the health outcome of this 40 year old and help put him/her on a path that would prevent them from developing a serious chronic condition?