Black Futures Lab
Black Futures Lab (BFL) is an innovation and experimentation lab focused on engaging Black communities civically. This year, BFL’s capacity-building work strengthened Black-led grassroots organizations and supported Black organizing infrastructure – laying the foundation for us to shift the balance of power and change the rules that have been rigged against us for so long.
-
Launched Black Census Project 2022, the largest survey of Black people in America, and partnered with Black-led organizations and Black media partners, created an HBCU challenge, and hosted events towards the goal of 200,000 respondents.
-
Was on the ground with #BlackToTheBallot, its non-partisan voter education program, talking to tens of thousands of Black voters about the responsibilities of Governors and Secretaries of State, the impact of redistricting, and how mis/disinformation works to keep Black people from voting.
-
Re-granted $2.5 million under the Black Organizing Innovations Project, in partnership with Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, to 11 Black-led organizations to activate Black voters between election cycles and test its theory that building Black political power requires year-round electoral organizing.
-
Celebrated the graduation of the second cohort of Black to the Future Public Policy Institute and awarded grants to help graduating Fellows advance their policy campaigns. BFL also opened the application cycle for the third cohort.
Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project (BLMP)
BLMP envisions a world where no one is forced to give up their homeland, where all Black LGBTQIA+ people are free and liberated. BLMP builds and centers the power of Black LGBTQIA+ migrants to ensure the liberation of all Black people through community-building, political education, creating access to direct services, and organizing across borders.
-
Launched the 2nd cohort of the Malaika Network, an extensive training program for BLMP members on deportation defense and post-release support. BLMP’s Deportation Defense arm supported the release of and provided post-detention support for 12 LGBTQIA+ Jamaican migrants and continue to support detention cases and campaigns, namely #FreePaulWhite – a Black bisexual migrant detained since August 2020.
-
Co-organized and co-sponsored the 2nd annual Defend Black Women March in Washington DC in July 2022, strategizing and advancing the movement towards global solidarity for Black Women and Femmes, Trans, Non-Binary, and LGBTQIA+ people.
-
Hosted Becoming Home: Transcendence Through Transitions, a virtual celebration of 5 years of power-building for Black LGBTQIA+ migrants filled with speakers, performance, presentations, a film screening, and DJ sets.
-
Joined Familia: Trans Queer Liberation Movement and the Transgender Law Center as an anchor organization for the Border Butterflies Project that works at the US/MX border to help LGBTQIA+ migrants navigate their journey to the United States.
Black Voters Matter Capacity Building Institute
Black Voters Matter (BVM) Capacity Building Institute’s work is to increase power in marginalized, predominantly Black communities. BVM agrees with the words of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. when he said, “Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”
-
Mobilized Black voters through over 20 bus tours (including the “We Won’t Black Down” tour), texting/photobanking campaigns, radio and print ads, and over 107,000 canvassing attempts in 11 core states throughout the region leading up to the 2022 midterms. In November, BVM got back on the road with partners in Georgia and Louisiana to encourage communities to head to the polls once again for the December runoff elections.
-
Distributed over $9 million directly into the hands of local partners to provide on the ground resources to support GOTV, voter protection, and education efforts to minimize the impact of voter suppression across the country.
-
Joined national advocacy organizations in marking the 57th anniversary of the 1965 Selma-to-Montgomery march in March 2022. BVM hosted several miles of the march and concluded with a rally at the Alabama State Capitol to ensure voting rights remain front and center.
Black Youth Project 100 (BYP100)
BYP100 is a national, member-based organization of Black activists aged 18-35 creating justice and freedom for all Black people. BYP100 has chapters in Chicago, Dallas, Durham, Jackson, Milwaukee, New Orleans, and a National Chapter, all base building and organizing around alternatives toward Black liberation.
-
Coordinated a Week of Action in May 2022 to commemorate the 2020 uprisings and reiterate the demand is to defund the police.
-
Hosted a Resource Mobilizing Convening in July 2022 with our ecosystem of members, organizers, and partners to collaborate and strategize around transforming our relationship to wealth and resources through the Just Transition framework.
-
Released the She Safe, We Safe Report, based on the SSWS Story Collection Project, the SSWS Report offers statistics, stories, alternatives, and Black Queer Feminist visions to address patriarchal violence.
-
Led Root to Rise: Regional Trainings in Baltimore, Milwaukee, and Durham to introduce the She Safe We Safe Report, increase members’ practice and capacity to base build in their cities, and deepen relationships between chapters.
Blackbird
Blackbird is a co-creator of strategies and narratives with influential justice organizations around the country, reaching audiences around the world. We work with movement leaders and build durable and sustainable infrastructure for multi-year wins that mitigate harms and advance structural change under a “low ego, high impact” mantra.
-
Continued working with partners on building durable movement security infrastructure with an exceptional team with expertise in cyber, digital, legal protections and physical security. The security infrastructure has grown to have the capacity to respond rapidly in moments of crisis, provide recommendations to organizations on how to incorporate best practices, and provide a series of training for leaders across the ecosystem.
-
With its partners throughout 2022, Blackbird deepened alignment and strengthened coordination across movements and sectors, providing resources, capacity and expertise through the Global Black Victory Lab in order to support the building of cross movement infrastructure within the United States while investing and supporting Black feminist movement building experiments in Europe, Southern Africa, Latin America & Caribbean.
The Movement for Black Lives (M4BL)
M4BL is a space for Black organizations across the country to debate and discuss the current political conditions, develop shared assessments of what political interventions were necessary to achieve key policy, cultural and political wins, and convene organizational leadership to debate and co-create a shared movement-wide strategy.
-
Introduced the Black Climate Mandate (through the Black Hive), which is a list of demands that call for dismantling the status quo and investing NGO and government resources in transformative climate-change strategies that centers Black lives and protects all communities in the U.S.
-
Participated in COP27 with 23 delegates from 8 countries and organized for the U.S. to sign on to the acknowledgement in climate change losses and damages, and expand and deepen our climate change work in a diasporic solidarity strategy.
-
Through the Electoral Justice Project, invested in 19 grassroots power-building organizations to build political infrastructure and provided individual support for campaign design, implementation, and wins.
National Black Food & Justice Alliance (NBFJA)
NBFJA is a coalition of Black-led organizations aimed at developing Black leadership, supporting Black communities, organizing for Black self-determination, and building institutions for Black food sovereignty & liberation. It engages in broad-based coalition organizing for Black food and land, increasing visibility of Black-led narratives and work, advancing Black-led visions for just and sustainable communities, and building capacity for self-determination.
-
Opened the Lola Hampton-Frank Pinder Center for Agroecology, in partnership with Florida A&M University, to grow and expand practices, develop innovative solutions, and provide cross-institutional support for land grant institutions and future generations of land stewards to carry forward food system and climate resilience.
-
Trained 100 Black farmers through a Land Stewardship Training program to build the capacity of Black people to sustain collective land space, increase community resilience, and ensure food security in the Black community. The training took place over the course of 12 months over 5 multi-day trainings in multiple locations across the country.
-
Through the member-led MARC (Mutual Aid Resource Council), funded over $700,000 in awards to 87 applicants for collective care through crisis and uncertainty.
Southern Power Fund
The Southern Power Fund supports frontline communities in the South and builds off of relationships among movement leaders and philanthropic allies that have been cultivated for decades. Composed of nine organizations with deep roots in the U.S. South – AgitArte, Alternate Roots,, Highlander Research and Education Center, The Ordinary People Society (TOPS), People’s Advocacy Institute (Mississippi), Project South, The Smile Trust, Southerners on New Ground (SONG), and Taproot Earth – the formation is strengthening community resilience through mutual aid, hot zone campaigns, ecosystem and infrastructure development, and the capacity of community controlled funds.
-
Fundraised over $18 million and moved over $16 million to over 375 frontline organizations, groups, and formation in 15 states across the U.S. South and Puerto Rico through low barrier grantmaking.
-
Announced future goal of redistributing $100 million over the next five years to a wide range of frontline organizations and formations under three strategic streams of funding: intervening on unsustainable cycles of emergency funding, fortifying existing movement formations, and growing land investments projects that create autonomous funding streams for movements.
State Voices
State Voices is the nationwide network of 25 permanent, nonpartisan, state-based coalitions, called State Tables, working year-round with over 1,200 local and state partners to create a more accessible, inclusive, representative democracy. Their network’s power is rooted in centering the experience, voices, and votes of Black, Indigenous, Latinx, Asian American and Pacific Islander, and all people of color (BIPOC), to achieve well-resourced and thriving communities.
-
Through their network, they made over 140 million contacts to voters, including over 3 million contacts to voters for the Georgia runoff elections. Nine (9) State Tables organized and won efforts focused on key ballot measures around reproductive justice, economic justice, and more.
-
Administered 19 tools to their State Tables, Emerging States, and Tools for All partners and shared at least 8 toolkits and guides (including their annual Tools and Tech Guide) to support on-the-ground organizers and activists in their mobilization efforts. They also hired over 20 digital organizers, including people who were formerly incarcerated, to support national and state digital efforts.
-
Regranted $8.7 million and coordinated an additional $1.3 million directly to State Tables and in-state grassroots partners, supporting critical programs like voting rights education and engagement, Election Protection, redistricting and census, issue advocacy, and more.
Communities Transforming Policing Fund (CTPF)
CTPF supports local grassroots organizing groups led by and for communities most impacted by deadly and discriminatory policing practices. We support groups to build power, increase police accountability and transparency, end criminalization, and shift power and resources away from punitive, reactive, and carceral responses to preventative, transformative community-based safety strategies.
-
Awarded over $5.1 million in new grant commitments and payments to 64 grantee partners in 2022 – $3.9 million in 3-year grant commitments to 26 small and emerging organizations through participatory grantmaking and $1.35 million in rapid response and learning opportunity grants. CTPF made an additional $1.85 million to 17 multi-year core grantee partners from 2020 and 2021.
-
Facilitated capacity building support, fielding over 70 requests from grantees for individualized coaching focused on communications, campaign strategy, budget advocacy, coalition building, digital security, and fundraising support.
-
Celebrated 5 years of the fund, supporting frontlines organizers such as Cambridge HEART, Chicago Torture Justice Center, and Tallahassee Community Action Coalition in developing community-led public safety programs, reparations for survivors of police violence, and police budget divestment campaigns.
-
Organized donor learning, in partnership with Funders for Justice, Piper Fund, CS Fund, and the Center for Protest Law & Litigation, around safety and security through: "In Defense of the Movement, Policing, Criminalization and Surveillance of Protesters of State Violence”, which highlighted the long-term legal, safety, and economic challenges organizers face when working to end police violence.
