The Finance and General Government Group

The Finance and General Government Group (FGG) provides essential support functions serving as enablers for the rest of the organization and the region. These support functions include traditional services such as human resources, budget, legal, and technology. The group is also responsible for administering the property tax system, communications, planning and execution of extensive capital program and fleet management, oversight of the county’s portfolio of contracts, managing the county’s investment pool and outstanding debt obligations, financial reporting and auditing, coordination of unemployment and worker’s compensation benefits, conducting elections, investigating misconduct of sworn officers, and administering your board’s community grant programs. 

D&I highlights from the group included:

Implementation and development of the County’s first Budget Equity Assessment Tool. The Office of Equity and Racial Justice in collaboration with the Office of Financial Planning developed and implemented the tool for this Fiscal Year 2022-23 budget cycle. Every County department completed the tool with the purpose of better understanding how their resource allocation impacts Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC), LGBTQIA+, people with disabilities, people of low‐income, the young, the older, the immigrants, refugees and communities that have historically faced inequality and inequity, to ensure our programs and services serve their needs.

The Office of Equity and Racial Justice and Department of Human Resources partnered with the Othering and Belong Institute at UC Berkeley and the Urban Policy Development consultants to provide Targeted Universalism and Structural Racism training to County Staff to various departments at the enterprise-level and to provide technical assistance as they develop equity related goals and performance measures for their operational plans.

The Department of Purchasing and Contracting continued to show its commitment to increasing diversity of supplier base and awards to small, disadvantaged and minority owned business by publicizing contracting opportunities with local associations, collaborating with multiple county departments to increase community engagement and contract awards in underserved communities and, by holding outreach events to engage small and diverse business and services providers in the region. DPC hosted workshops for interested suppliers in partnership with the Small Business Development Center (SBDC) and participated in vendor/supplier outreach sessions in cooperation with local business associations with the focus on minority and small business. The department also developed a Supplier Diversity and Community Engagement public webpage containing resources for small and diverse suppliers, subcontracting opportunities and information, and supplier diversity reports and data.

The Registrar of Voters worked on mitigating challenges to the voter registration process, engaging the community in the electoral process, and increasing voter awareness of the convenient methods for voting and on increasing voter accessibility to the polls. They continued to work with volunteers and community-based organizations to identify needs and increase voter registration, including the partnership with organizations that work with persons with Limited English Proficiency (LEP) to recruit bilingual poll workers.

The County Technology Office and County Communications Office collaborated to center a renewed focus on the County’s digital presence.  By establishing a Digital Services Program, their efforts are driving changes in accessibility, information sharing, expanded language access, engagement opportunities and the internal and external customer experience.