Communities Count
Communities Count is a resource that supports King County communities in the use of data in promoting and achieving equity. Communities Count does this by:
Providing a platform for community data & stories
Highlighting data on disparities, inequities and strengths in our community
Complementing existing civic, social, economic, and health indicators
Providing data support and trainings to King County communities
In our data reports on population and community indicators, Communities Count emphasizes prevention and a long-term view of change while using data to understand how to advance equity work to sustain healthy communities and families.
Our team also provides data support and data trainings for community based organizations in King County on finding, interpreting and using population health data. To learn more, get in touch with us using the Contact Us form on this page.
Read about our latest work and accomplishments in our 2022 Annual Report.
To read about our work and accomplishments in 2021, please see our 2021 Annual Report.
VISION & MISSION
Creating a vibrant, diverse county where all people have the opportunity to thrive
Mission
Providing reliable, timely, and relevant data to improve the quality of life for residents of all King County communities
FUNDERS
Communities Count was born out of a collaborative effort among public and private organizations to create a report of population and community indicators for King County and continues to this day as a program to provide King County communities with relevant data to strengthen local equity work.
Scientific, technical and production support for Communities Count is provided by Public Health - Seattle & King County’s Assessment, Policy Development & Evaluation Unit.
Communities Count funders include:
Best Starts for Kids
King County Department of Community & Human Services
King County Veterans & Human Services Levy
Public Health - Seattle & King County
Communities Count is also a member of the National Neighborhood Indicators Partnership (NNIP), a learning network, coordinated by the Urban Institute, of independent organizations in 30 cities that share a mission to ensure all communities have access to data and the skills to use information to advance equity and well-being across neighborhoods.
HISTORY
In 1993, Communities Count started as part of the King County Children and Family Commission’s Healthy Communities Project, which was established in response to provisos from the King County Council. The purpose was to create a process among members of the public, Commission members, elected officials and County employees to develop a vision of a healthy community for King County’s children and families and identify concrete ways of evaluating our progress toward that vision.
In 1997 a partnership of organizations set out to identify a unified set of health and social indicators to help monitor King County progress toward more livable communities and set priorities for future actions. Through a community engaged process, the project sought community input on the conditions King County residents found most valuable to track and included things like basic needs, such as food and housing; a positive atmosphere for personal and family development; and safe and healthy neighborhoods. Using this core indicator set, the data collection partnership conducted a telephone survey of King County residents and a series of focus groups to collect information on these social and health indicators. Results were released as a series of reports from 2000-2008, which can be accessed in the Communities Count archive.
Currently Communities Count provides an online data platform for King County communities, featuring a curated set of health and social indicators sourced from population datasets. Communities Count also provides training and support in using data to assess, understand and act on inequities to improve community health and wellbeing.
Our Office
Address:
401 5th Ave
Seattle, WA 98104
Email: CommunitiesCount@kingcounty.gov
Phone: 206-263-8786
Contact Us
Are you looking for King County data you can use? Interested in a King County data training for your organization? Do you have questions about data on Communities Count? Are you looking for archived content?
Get in contact with the Communities Count team using the form below. You can also email us at CommunitiesCount@kingcounty.gov or call us at 206-263-8786 for assistance.