Located in southeast Florida on the Atlantic Ocean, St. Lucie County is part of the fabled Treasure Coast and boasts a rich cultural history that includes famed author Zora Neal Hurston and the Highwaymen artists—a group of African Americans, mostly from the county seat of Fort Pierce, who sold their stylized Florida landscape paintings on the roadside to tourists beginning in the 1950s and 60s. Today, those paintings can fetch $10,000. St. Lucie County is also known for citrus, cattle ranching, deep-sea fishing, and the Indian River Lagoon, and for being the spring training home of the New York Mets.
County Seat
Fort Pierce
Most Populous City
Port St. Lucie
Population
321,128
Government Type
County
Legislative Body
Board of Commissioners
Size of Legislative Body
5
Like many places across the country, Florida’s St. Lucie County is beginning to focus more deeply on improving diversity, equity, and inclusion among county staff. As a participant in the Upward Mobility Cohort, the county anticipates being able to align its internal discussions with a broader external conversation around advancing equity and upward mobility.
As the county looks to do this, it intends to build upon on the strength of local organizations that are working to support residents—including those living in St. Lucie’s historically Black neighborhood of Lincoln Park in Fort Pierce—and of many Black business leaders and elected officials who are engaged in improving the community. Among the county’s challenges in its effort to increase equity and boost upward mobility is to better understand where community services that support these goals are lacking or duplicative. St. Lucie County leaders also hope the Mobility Action Plan they develop can inspire more collaboration among local agencies, nonprofits, and community organizations and can shape less divisive community conversations about race.
St. Lucie County’s collaborations so far with the Upward Mobility Cohort have yielded early valuable lessons. One of them is a recognition that coordinating its data collection with existing annual data gathering conducted by key community stakeholders could be perceived by community members as a biased practice. With that in mind, the county plans to gather additional data through a survey of its stakeholders as well as through additional community engagement.
Partner Highlight
St. Lucie County is collaborating with several organizations to develop its Mobility Action Plan. Among them are the following:
- Allegany Franciscan Ministries
- Economic Development Council of St. Lucie County
- Indian River State College
- Lincoln Park Main Street
- Lucie Sheriff’s Office
- United Against Poverty, St. Lucie County
