Community Advocacy

We work alongside coalitions and partners to advance strategies to improve mental health care for refugee and immigrant communities. Some examples of our work include:

• CERI contributed to the creation of recommendations for Improving Mental Health Care for California’s Immigrants and Refugees organized by California Pan-Ethnic Health Network (CPEHN) and went on to share them with state legislators. 

• Since 2016, CERI has collaborated with the East Bay Refugee and Immigrant Forum (EBRIF), a coalition of over 30 agencies, organizations, advocates and community leaders serving people permanently displaced from their home countries by persecution, violence, or war who now seek refuge in the San Francisco East Bay. 

• As one of six active members of the RICE (Refugee Immigrant COVID-19 Engagement) Collaborative, CERI along with Korean Community Center of the East Bay, Bay Area Resources for Newcomers, Diversity in Health Training Institute, Filipino Advocates for Justice, Mental Health Association for Chinese Communities, and Refugee and Immigrant Transitions work in coordination to improve health outcomes among refugee and immigrant communities. Initiated to increase engagement with the census and then to address COVID-19, the group comes together to identify strategies to reduce inequities; identify models and best practices for prevention and early intervention; and strengthen partnerships between Local Health Department and refugee and immigrant populations.