‘Community Profile’ will return in 2012

The Sonora Area Foundation will release a Tuolumne County Community Indicators Profile later this year, after a three-year hiatus, the charitable organization’s Executive Director Ed Wyllie said Monday.

The organization in 2005 and 2008 released a similar Tuolumne County Indicator Profile that outlined demographic information for the county including birth and death rates, population, literacy rates, childcare availability, abuse rates, health-care access, causes of death, suicide rates, air and water quality.

Sections of the 2008 profile were broken up between health and safety, education and learning, natural resources and recreation, economy and infrastructure, and arts and heritage.    

This year’s profile will glean much of its information from the 2010 U.S. Census, Wyllie said.    

SAF’s board originally hoped to compile the indicators profile every three years, but was unable to secure adequate funding in 2011, he explained.
By partnering with Chico State University’s Center for Economic Development, it’s now “affordable,” Wyllie said.    

The 2008 profile was compiled by more than 100 community volunteers.    

The profile highlights issues concerning the community, and examines what is being done to address those challenges, and allows charitable foundations like the SAF to know where funding would best be apportioned, Wyllie explained.    

“There are a variety of uses,” of the profile throughout the community, within various organizations, he said.    

“It helps for community foundations in particular to do a project like this so we have an accurate picture of what’s going on in Tuolumne County and it helps determine priorities for funding,” Wyllie said.    

Not all aspects of the survey have been worked out yet, though some data must be gathered from primary sources, Wyllie explained.    

For example, data from the Amador-Tuolumne Community Action Agency, a social services agency, will be used, he said.     

The profile “will be out later this year,” Wyllie said.    

According to the 2008 profile, the goal of the project was to “inform, inspire, and even provoke. We hope to do these things by presenting sound, unbiased information on the issues our community has identified as important to our quality of life.”    

To see the 2008 county profile, visit www.tuolumnecountyprofile.org.