2020 Post-Election Briefing: A National Reckoning on Race

This webinar is the fourth program in the EOF post-election virtual funder learning series.

Click here to view the recording.

The twin pandemics of COVID-19 and systemic racism have spurred a new moment of reckoning and national uprising for racial justice. Three funder colleagues shared how they are responding to the call for action to build real power for Black communities and demand bold systems and institutional change in civic engagement, criminal justice, employment and social supports. Hear from Will Cordery on the M4BL Donor Organizing Committee and recent effort to raise $50 million for M4BL. Samantha Tweedy on Robin Hood’s new “Power Fund,” and work to address the interplay of racial justice and economic justice through their work and Aisha Alexander-Young on her work with a new funder collective, Resourcing Radical Justice as well as the Meyer Foundation’s new $20 million Fund for Black-Led Change and journey to center racial equity in their grantmaking. Speakers:

• Breechaye Milburn, Wellspring Philanthropic Fund (Moderator)
• Will Cordery, Leverage Philanthropic Partners and Movement for Black Lives
• Samantha Tweedy, Robin Hood
• Aisha Alexander-Young, Meyer Foundation

Breechaye Milburn, Wellspring Philanthropic Fund

Will Cordery, Leverage Philanthropic Partners and Movement for Black Lives

Samantha Tweedy, Robin Hood

Aisha Alexander-Young, Meyer Foundation

                Pre-Session Reading: Philanthropy has said it would focus on ensuring Black lives matter before, then let up as attention moved elsewhere. We must not falter as a field again. Read More Here:  https://nonprofitquarterly.org/dear-philanthropy-these-are-the-fires-of-anti-black-racism.

• The Inland Empire Funders Alliance launched the Black Equity Fund, with a $5 million fundraising goal and innovative model of philanthropy. The Black Equity Fund is the first known regional pooled fund on Black equity that brings together statewide, regional and local funders as well as private donors and corporate philanthropy, working in partnership with leaders of the Inland Empire Black Equity Initiative to advance their priority issues.
• Borealis supports ten donor collaboratives that create opportunities for donors to learn from the field and direct resources to innovative leaders, organizations, and movements pursuing transformational change, including the Black Led Movement Fund, which invests in the ecosystem of the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL) by resourcing the powerful local organizations that anchor this movement infrastructure. 
• The Black Liberation Pooled Fund was launched in June 2020 as a critical opportunity for donors and foundations to step up in defense of Black lives. Through the Black Liberation Pooled Fund, Solidaire is moving money to the powerful ecosystem of Black-led social change organizations around the country, and will make multi-year grant commitments, with the first $10 million moving within 2020-2022. 
• The Denver Foundation, Colorado Health Foundation, Mile High United Way, and a men’s giving circle called Denver African American Philanthropists created the Black Resilience in Colorado Fund, which has a goal of making $1 million in grants during its first year.
• Backed by an eclectic mix of funders, many of whom are newcomers to Black-led movement-building, the Democracy Frontlines Fund is an exercise in reimagining philanthropic norms. Over three years, it’ll provide $36 million in general support to a slate of 10 Black-led movement organizations, themselves selected and curated by a “brain trust” of eight women with deep experience at the intersection between predominantly white-led philanthropic spaces and movements spearheaded by people of color.
• Philanthropic Collective to Combat Anti-Blackness & Realize Racial Justice will raise $25 million and invites additional funds to invest in a visionary and historic Black-Led Movement Fund.
• Resourcing Radical Justice is a new funder collective that centers Black liberation as the path to a thriving Greater Washington region.

Individual Foundation Initiatives

• Citi Foundation launched Citi’s Action for Racial Equity — a new company-wide commitment to deliver on four key business goals.
• The Community Foundation of Herkimer and Oneida Counties announces a $10 million community equity initiative, the largest single investment in the organization’s history, as an initial 10-year commitment to address racial equity and social justice issues. 
• Ford Foundation announces $180 million in new funding for U.S. racial justice efforts, backed from the proceeds of the unprecedented sale of $1 billion in social bonds.
• The Irvine Foundation will spend $20 million over the next 18 months to support efforts to end anti-Black racism and advance racial equity in California.
• JPMorgan Chase commits $30 billion to advance racial equity over the next five years to provide economic opportunity to underserved communities, especially the Black and Latinx communities.
• Lumina Foundation is committing $15 million over the next three years to Lumina’s Fund for Racial Justice and Equity to help eradicate systemic racism.
• Meyer Foundation launches Fund for Black-Led Change, a $20 million commitment of core support to Black-led organizations in the Greater Washington region that are building power, advancing permanently organized communities, and transforming systems toward liberty, justice, and the pursuit of happiness for all.
• Meyer Memorial Trust is launching “Justice Oregon,” a 5-year, $25-million initiative to advance racial justice in the trust’s home state.
• Open Society Foundations announces a $220 million racial justice initiative to build power in Black communities, promote bold new anti-racist policies in U.S. cities, and help first-time activists stay engaged.
• Robin Hood announces new Power Fund, a new initiative to fund and elevate nonprofit leaders of color who share Robin Hood’s mission of increasing mobility from poverty, while addressing the interplay of racial justice and economic justice through their work
• Rockefeller Brothers Fund will increase its grant-making budget by $48 million over five years, including $10 million for a new program focusing on racial justice.
• W.K. Kellogg Foundation will award $90 million in a global call to advance racial equity by 2030.
• Woods Fund Chicago will support relationship building through its Movement Building for Racial Justice Fund, which will seed one movement building collaborative with a two-year, $500,000 grant to build a Black progressive agenda in Chicago.

Center Grantmaking in Racial Equity Examples

• The California Endowment has issued a new ten-year strategic plan and framework focused on transforming health and communities with people power that will target funding to communities of color and grassroots leaders. 
• Consumer Health Foundation has made a commitment to achieving health equity through racial equity and economic justice and is shifting their focus from charity to powerbuilding.
• The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation announces new steps to address system racism including $18 million in funds this year dedicated to combating systemic racism, a new 10-year $150 million racial justice initiative, and intentional efforts to add a racial justice lens to their ongoing programs and operations.

Additional Tools & Resources

• Call for Action for Philanthropy on Anti-Black Racism: A joint statement on COVID and Police Shootings from the Association for Black Foundation Executives and more than 60 Black philanthropic CEOs
• Guiding a Giving Response to Anti-Black Injustice, ABFE and The Bridgespan Group, August 2020: This memo offers funders potential paths to invest in organizations and movements within the Black-led racial justice ecosystem. It provides principles for giving and highlights priority investment areas and example organizations within those areas.
• Foundations Nationwide Commit Nearly Half a Billion Dollars to Racial Justice, By Alex Daniels, Chronicle of Philanthropy, July 16, 2020.
• Crisis Funding is Not Enough: Invest in Black Communities for the Long Term, Borealis Philanthropy, June 2020: This article offers program strategy and grantmaking practice examples as well as three things funders can do right now. 
• Grantmaking with a Racial Justice Lens: A Practical Guide, By Rinku Sen and Lori Villarosa, Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity, December 2019: This guide provides grantmakers with reflections, frameworks and tools built from the direct experience of activists and funders for advancing racial justice in any philanthropic setting.
• Funders for Justice Divest/Invest: From Criminalization to Thriving Communities: This website is a toolkit for grantmakers, donors, and funder affinity groups, to help funders in confronting criminalization and supporting efforts to move public dollars out of policing, prisons, and immigrant detention centers, and directly into the public safety net and infrastructure that actually keep our communities safe.

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