Shift power to Black-led change: A commentary by Chera Reid and Lulete Mola

The uprising for racial justice that was ignited by the murder of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police still reverberates today. Notably, people with power and wealth seemingly took note, with institutions, companies, and organizations vowing to change and allocate more resources to advancing racial equity and justice. Many foundations made a two-part commitment: to direct more resources to racial equity and justice initiatives and to center Black voices in their efforts.

But Black Philanthropy Month and the 2022 theme of the “Fierce Equity of Now! From Dream to Action” is a higher calling of philanthropy and a sober reminder that philanthropy still has a long way to go. The sector as a whole has not yet made significant progress on these goals. To attain the stated aims of racial equity and justice, philanthropy must follow through on the second part of its commitment and shift power to Black-led change.

This path forward includes social, economic, and political change led by diverse groups of Black people centering the power, interests, and well-being of Black communities that often benefits all communities....

Read the full commentary by Chera Reid and Lulete Mola, co-executive director of the Center for Evaluation Innovation and co-founder and first president of the MN Black Collective Foundation, respectively.

(Photo credit: James Eades via unsplash)

The Black community finds ways to restore dignity: A Q&A with Garnesha Ezediaro, Bloomberg Philanthropies

Garnesha Ezediaro leads Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Greenwood Initiative, an effort to accelerate the pace of wealth accumulation for Black individuals and families and address systemic underinvestment in Black communities.

Ezediaro has worked across the public, private, and philanthropic sectors to design, direct, and scale mission-focused programs, brands, and content that inspire change. She previously served as a senior program officer for the Government Innovation program at Bloomberg Philanthropies and also led global leadership development programs at Verizon Media, delivering training and targeted development programs for over 12,000 employees. Prior to that, she was the communications director for New Orleans mayor Mitch Landrieu and director of marketing at Brick City Development Corporation in Newark, New Jersey, under the leadership of former mayor Cory Booker.

Philanthropy News Digest asked Ezediaro about the long-lasting effects racism and violence have had on the Black community’s ability to achieve generational wealth and its impact on Black philanthropy, how Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Greenwood Initiative seeks to address racial wealth inequities, the initiative’s mission of reducing wealth disparities in Black communities, its investments and plans for future funding, Ezediaro’s role in the decision-making process, her background working in government innovation and communications and marketing for the mayors of two large urban cities, and her experiences discussing economic mobility for the Black workforce and closing wealth gaps.

Philanthropy News Digest: The 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre that occurred in the neighborhood of Greenwood, once known as “Black Wall Street,” took hundreds of lives and stymied the growth of wealth proliferation in the Black community. What impact do you think it also had on Black philanthropy?

Garnesha Ezediaro: Throughout U.S. history, deep-seated racism and violence have shown up and disrupted thriving Black communities. A horrific event like the Tulsa Race Massacre not only immediately robs a neighborhood of life but simultaneously seizes invaluable community assets. In order to recover from such tragedy and to respond to the persisting inequity in housing, health care, education, and employment, Black communities donate their time, talent, and treasures. From places of worship to community groups to local giving circles, we have seen the Black community consistently find ways to restore dignity within their communities and to give to a range of causes and organizations. According to a report from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Black households give 25 percent more of their income annually than white households, and nearly two-thirds of African American households donate to organizations and causes, and their contributions total $11 billion each year....

Read the full Q&A with Garnesha Ezediaro, Greenwood Initiative lead at Bloomberg Philanthropies.

Wage inequity is 'a dream deferred': A commentary by Kyra Kyles

One of my favorite poems of all time is Langston Hughes’ “Harlem,” better known by the compelling question it posits: “What happens to a dream deferred?”

Far too many in the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and people of color) community can answer that question from personal experience due to a pipeline of privilege that favors white workers. People of color, particularly those from Black and Latine communities, are locked out of desired careers by a toxic mix of systemic racism and bias; comparative lack of generational wealth; and sparse access to corporate sponsors. This is certainly true in for-profit companies, especially in fields including finance, television and film, technology, music, and journalism. Sadly, it is also a pervasive issue for nonprofit organizations, even though social good and positive impact is at the very center of our missions.

I have no doubt that my colleagues in the nonprofit community want to improve, rather than echo hollow vows to increase diversity and retain BIPOC team members, but no anti-bias training, career fair, or positive intention can trump equitable payment for employees who hail from communities of color. This is critical at every level, from interns up, and it must be a competitive wage....

Read the full commentary by Kyra Kyles, CEO of YR Media.

(Photo credit: Getty Images/DMEPhotography)

Innovate and invest in communities: A commentary by Angela F. Williams

Americans are hurting. More than one million people across our nation have died from COVID-19, a staggering and profound loss. Even as we continue to grieve, the other crises we face—rising costs of living, surging gun violence, and increasing division—can feel like a second pandemic.

The last several years have exposed deep fault lines in our society. As our problems become increasingly complex, so do their solutions. There is no silver bullet that will solve systemic problems like income inequality, hyper-polarization, or poverty. But as CEO of United Way Worldwide, the largest community-based nonprofit in the world, I believe that progress is possible. It starts by reimagining philanthropy to focus on the place where all of our global ills and solutions ultimately begin: community.

Communities are the cornerstone of society. But too often, philanthropies view local investment as a nicety that can be overlooked, instead of a necessary first step in solving global problems. Now more than ever, we cannot afford to abandon the power of local community. We need to innovate and invest in it like never before....

Read the full commentary by Angela F. Williams, CEO of United Way Worldwide.

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Closing the wealth gap: A Q&A with Denise Scott, President, Local Initiatives Support Corporation

Denise Scott has served as president of Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) since December 2021. She joined LISC in 2001 as the executive director of the organization’s New York office and served as LISC’s executive vice president for programs from 2014 through 2021. Prior to joining LISC, Scott served as a White House appointee to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and as the managing director and coordinator responsible for launching the Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone Development Corporation.

Philanthropy News Digest asked Scott about settling into her new position as president of LISC, one of the nation’s largest community development financial institutions, how the organization uses its investments to work with local community and government leaders at a time of historic crisis in the housing market and major economic uncertainty, the organization’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and Justice agenda and how it shapes the work, and how and when LISC evaluates its job as “finished” in a community.

Philanthropy News Digest: Since joining LISC in 2001, you’ve seen the organization evolve over multiple presidents’ tenures. How has the organization’s approach to housing policy advocacy changed over that time?

Denise Scott: Our approach has changed in response to market shifts. We started many years back with a focus mainly on multi-family tax credit projects, and then we evolved to a broader housing strategy that included preserving single-family housing, both occupied and vacant, with a real push to focus on home ownership—not across the entire LISC footprint, but in certain strategic markets. I’ll call out New York because that’s where I started in LISC. Over time, we came to focus on both multi-family and some single-family homes, and then we started turning our attention to issues around community resiliency.

That, of course, has tied into disasters like hurricanes. LISC’s focus on rebuilding after disasters has grown to include attention around climate and resiliency to be more proactive.

Read the full Q&A with Denise Scott, president of the Local Initiatives Support Corporation.

Learning from trust-based philanthropy and participatory grantmaking: A commentary by Kim Moore Bailey and Laura Rodriguez

In 2021, Justice Outside’s Rising Leaders Fellowship program brought together 20 early-career nonprofit professionals, most of them Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC), to get hands-on experience with philanthropy. Fellows had the opportunity to design a $40,000 grantmaking program and decide to whom they would award grants and how they would distribute those funds across the selected grantees. They were invited to examine all the “rules” they knew about philanthropy.

Funded by the Environmental Education Funders Collaborative (EEFC), a network for Bay Area funders, the Rising Leaders Fellowship offered an opportunity for young people—who are often on the receiving end of grants—to reimagine and have agency in grantmaking. Supported by Justice Outside, they discussed wealth disparities generated by capitalism and white supremacy culture; and how trust-based philanthropy and participatory grantmaking can be antidotes to inequities in philanthropy.

What’s more important than what they learned, however, is what they can teach us....

Read the full commentary by Kim Moore Bailey and Laura Rodriguez, president and CEO and chief program officer, respectively, of Justice Outside.

(Photo credit: Getty Images)

Sustaining progressive change through community-based participatory research: A commentary by Sarah Bobrow-Williams

How many of us have spent countless days producing exacting research reports informing the most salient social issues today—only to find a box of undistributed reports in the office storage closet a year later? Even the most impactful research aimed at influencing public policy makers and other targeted audiences has a short shelf-life. By contrast, participatory action research (PAR), also known as community-based participatory research, can make a far greater, longer-term impact—especially when the intended audience for the research includes communities that are the most marginalized and affected by the issues being studied.

Many marginalized communities have long and often sensitive histories of being “researched”—being the object of the research, while the job of identifying, defining, and assessing the issues is left to outside “experts.” Regrettably, excluding instead of centering the expertise of community members who are directly impacted by the issues not only leaves them feeling used but is a missed opportunity to catalyze and sustain progressive community change on many levels.

Those of us who have worked alongside communities have witnessed the consternation and dispiritedness felt by individuals when they are placed under the microscope without being given the opportunity to define challenges as they experience them. This omission also precludes the synergy and devotion that is often generated by problem solving from multiple perspectives. Conversely, community-based participatory research offers a collective, dialogic process for expression, reflection, perspective taking, and information sharing, and, ultimately, creative solution-based action among stakeholders. This process helps form a nexus of dynamic connections and relationships that can lead to sustained change over the long term....

Read the full commentary by Sarah Bobrow-Williams, a community-based participatory research consultant for the Southern Rural Black Women’s Initiative (SRBWI).

(Photo credit: Getty Images)

Ensuring equitable access to mental health care in communities of color: A commentary by Daniel H. Gillison, Jr.

All people deserve equitable access to quality and comprehensive mental health care. But unfortunately, some of the populations most in need of such care have historically been, and continue to be, the most underserved.

According to the Health and Human Services Office of Minority Health, Black adults in the U.S. are more likely than white adults to report persistent symptoms of emotional distress such as sadness, hopelessness, and feeling like everything is an effort. And according to one survey from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Latinx adults reported significantly higher rates of depression during the pandemic compared with other populations. Yet in 2020, only one in three Black adults with mental health conditions received treatment. And only 10 percent of Latinx people with a psychological disorder contacted a mental health specialist.

We at the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) have been reflecting on these disparities during July in honor of Bebe Moore Campbell National Minority Mental Health Awareness Month, named after a pioneering mother who strove to end stigma associated with mental illness, particularly in communities of color. But we must also commit beyond raising awareness—to taking action....

Read the full commentary by Daniel H. Gillison, Jr., CEO of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI).

(Photo credit: Getty Images/FatCamera)

Learning environments that prioritize trust building: A commentary by Cierra Kaler-Jones and Jaime T. Koppel

In the last 20 years, the U.S. Department of Justice’s Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) office moved more than $1 billion in grants for school policing, hardening, and militarization. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, passed quickly in the wake of the tragedy in Uvalde, Texas, is another effort that advances the illusion of “school safety” by increasing funding for police in schools, threat assessments, and school hardening—despite significant evidence that surveillance technologies and police presence undermine students’ trust. According to the U.S. Department of Education, millions of students attend schools where there are police officers but no counselors, nurses, psychologists, or social workers. Further, Black and brown students, LGBTQ+ students, and students with disabilities face the brunt of the harms of policing. Since investments in school policing have ballooned in recent years, many students and staff have never been in a school without police and policing infrastructure. This reinforces the myth that safety comes from police. Why keep investing in a strategy that’s never worked?

Philanthropy is too often complicit in these efforts. As a sector, we overwhelmingly invest in tidy policy wins that seem attainable within a grant cycle or two. We privilege groups with larger budgets, typically because we believe they have the greatest likelihood of “winning”....

Read the full commentary by Jaime T. Koppel and Cierra Kaler-Jones, co-director and director of storytelling at Communities for Just Schools Fund.

(Photo credit: Getty Images)

Advancing racial and social justice is a core responsibility for Christians: A commentary by Emily Jones

As the executive for racial justice for United Women in Faith, I think regularly about how to inspire our hundreds of thousands of members to make the world a more just and equitable place. United Women in Faith is committed to putting faith, hope, and love into action to improve the lives of women, children, and youth. There is no shortage of work for our members to do. There is no shortage of issues competing for our time and attention. But we have decided to focus on pushing back against the criminalization of communities of color—especially children of color. Every year, we work hard to inspire our members to do their part to disrupt the “school-to-prison pipeline.” We do this by aligning with and supporting the campaigns of groups such as Dignity in Schools and others who have been doing this work far longer than us. We also support our members to engage in advocacy work at the local, state, and federal levels.

We believe that advancing racial and social justice is a core responsibility for Christians. It is not enough to be engaged in our churches if we are not also working to dismantle systems of oppression in our communities. United Women in Faith’s board of directors recently voted to grant $500,000 in funding to mission-aligned groups led by Indigenous and Black women: $250,000 to Brittany K. Barnett’s Girls Embracing Mothers and $250,000 to Tia Oros Peters’ Seventh Generation Fund for Indigenous Peoples. Girls Embracing Mothers helps girls with incarcerated mothers to fulfill their unique calling and break the cycle of incarceration. The Seventh Generation Fund is the oldest organization of its kind and is dedicated to Indigenous peoples’ self-determination and Native nations’ sovereignty....

Read the full commentary by Emily Jones, executive for racial justice for United Women in Faith.

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Review: 'Nonprofit Neighborhoods: An Urban History of Inequality and the American State'

In 2014, when Massachusetts launched its “pay for success” social impact bond program—in which private investors would front the funding for nonprofit efforts to address a social issue—it was hailed as an innovative, data-driven public-private partnership that would deliver demonstrated results and cost savings. Yet, as Claire Dunning illustrates in Nonprofit Neighborhoods: An Urban History of Inequality and the American State, it was just the latest chapter in a long history of public-private initiatives that so far have not fulfilled their promise.

An assistant professor of public policy and history at the University of Maryland, College Park, Dunning defines “nonprofit neighborhoods” as “places where neighborhood-based nonprofit organizations controlled access to the levers of political, economic, and social power and mediated the local manifestations of the state and market.” While that definition might suggest the nonprofits have power, Nonprofit Neighborhoods illuminates how, through government and public-private grantmaking, nonprofits in Boston’s low-income and minority neighborhoods came to provide the services that government should have provided and, even more disturbingly, how that funding mechanism was used to appease, manage, and control grassroots movements for policy reform and inclusion....

Read the full book review by Kyoko Uchida, features editor at Philanthropy News Digest.

Supporting BIPOC-led climate work creatively: A commentary by Kim Moore Bailey, Danielle Levoit, and Michele Perch

Foundations across the United States have increased funding for racial equity and social justice over the last few years, but more needs to be done to support the organizations at the forefront of this work. A 2021 report by the Philanthropic Initiative for Racial Equity (PRE) found that, in 2018, the latest year for which complete grants data is available, just 6 percent of total philanthropic dollars supported racial equity work and only 1 percent supported racial justice initiatives. Similarly, in research by Echoing Green and the Bridgespan Group, an analysis of approximately 1,000 early-stage organizations found Black-led entities reporting 24 percent less in revenues and 76 percent less in unrestricted net assets than their white-led counterparts. There is a growing awareness of disparities like these; in fact, the PRE report noted a five-fold increase in the number of funders investing in racial equity and racial justice in the U.S. over the past 10 years. But even with increased support, the level of investment remains low as a percentage of overall philanthropic dollars and has not translated into commensurate resources for Black, Indigenous, and people of color-led (BIPOC) organizations. So how, as a philanthropic community, do we address this critical gap?

To truly advance equity in philanthropy, foundations must continue to increase financial investment, and the sector must also do more through new partnerships, approaches and grantmaking innovations to create opportunities that can deepen philanthropic impact. This will support BIPOC-led organizations in driving meaningful work anchored in social change.

The Doris Duke Charitable Foundation (DDCF) and the William Penn Foundation (WPF) recently embarked on an innovative partnership with Justice Outside to advance racial justice and equity in environmental conservation and, more broadly, to rethink how our foundations can better support BIPOC-led initiatives....

Read the full commentary by Kim Moore Bailey, Danielle Levoit, and Michele Perch. Bailey is president and CEO of Justice Outside, Levoit is a program officer for the environment at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, and Perch is a program officer for watershed protection at the William Penn Foundation.

(Photo credit: Thomas Kloc/Getty Images)

Racial justice at the forefront of impact investing: A commentary by Ian Fuller

Following the racial reckoning of 2020, billions in corporate and individual donations to Black-serving and Black-led organizations changed the landscape of investment advising. If investment advisory firms are to keep up with this trend, they must adopt a community-centered, racial justice approach to business.

In response to calls for racial justice in the wake of the murders of countless Black Americans following brutal interactions with law enforcement, $50 billion in corporate and individual donations poured into Black-led or Black-serving nonprofits, civil rights groups, and historically Black colleges and universities. This disbursement of billions is creating one of the largest windfall events for beneficiaries directly impacting and serving Black communities in our country’s history. Many of these institutions have never received donations of this size, or scale, at one time.

Since 2020, Westfuller, a Black-majority, woman- and LGBTQ-owned investment advisory firm I co-founded, has seen eight times as many nonprofit clients experience windfall events from wealthy donors. We saw this with billionaire philanthropist MacKenzie Scott publicly donating more than $12 billion as of March 2022. In working with these organizations to manage their expanded financial portfolios, we’ve learned that for investment advisory firms to have an impact in this new landscape, it is essential to adopt a community-centered approach—concentrating on community economic development, revitalization, growth, and sustainability—with racial justice at the forefront of impact investing. It’s not a choice, it’s a necessity....

Read the full commentary by Ian Fuller, a co-founder and partner of Westfuller, a Black-majority, woman- and LGBTQ-owned investment advisory firm.

(Photo credit: Getty Images/Leo Patrizi)

Effective violence reduction strategies: A Q&A with Jocelyn Fontaine and Anita Ravishankar

On June 2, Arnold Ventures issued a research agenda and an RFP focused on violence reduction, including gun violence, citing an increase in violent crimes and incidents over the past two years across U.S. cities “regardless of their size, geographic location, or political leanings.”

Jocelyn Fontaine is Arnold Ventures’ vice president of criminal justice research; she previously served a senior researcher in the Justice Policy Center at the Urban Institute, where she directed projects focused on corrections and reentry issues, gun violence, violence reduction programs, and police-community trust-building efforts. Anita Ravishankar is director of criminal justice research; she was a founding member of The Lab @ DC and the research and innovation team within the DC Metropolitan Police Department.

Philanthropy News Digest asked Fontaine and Ravishankar about the rise in gun violence, the priorities of the new research agenda and RFP, how violence reduction intersects with racial justice, and the role of philanthropy in driving solutions.

Philanthropy News Digest: Presumably the development of this research agenda and RFP on solutions for reducing violence was under way well before the mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde. What do you see as the main causes of the surge in violent crimes and incidents nationwide—many of which have targeted specific populations for their race or ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation or gender identity, or other marginalized identities?

Anita Ravishankar: Gun violence has long been at unacceptably high levels in the United States. The nearly 30 percent nationwide increase in homicides in 2020, on the heels of massive social disruptions due to the pandemic, brought that reality into sharp relief. As we noted in our materials, the increase in violence was widespread, affecting communities regardless of their size, location, political leadership, or policy environment....

But we do not have precise explanations, which is unsatisfying and hinders policy makers’ ability to address violence. So through this research agenda we are prioritizing studies that can help us understand both the immediate causes of violence—e.g., how do we understand what the particular problem of violence is in a given jurisdiction and respond in the near term—as well as the underlying or root causes of violence that require longer-term and more holistic strategies or solutions to address. Our work focuses on the people and places most at risk of involvement in violence, as perpetrators of violence and victims of violence, which has not changed much over time, and understanding what works to support police solutions.

PND: The research agenda comprises three pillars: address immediate crises of violence, identify and address the underlying causes of violence, and promote effective police investigations to solve violent crime. Did the most recent mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde shift or sharpen your priorities for the research agenda in any way?

AR: Arnold Ventures has been making substantial investments to understand the efficacy of different gun policies and different violence reduction strategies for several years. The notable increase in community violence over the past few years made clear the need to increase our research efforts to match the urgency of the moment in needing answers on effective solutions, spurring our research agenda and RFP. The events in Buffalo and Uvalde are absolutely heart-wrenching, leading so many of us to want our elected leaders to “do something, anything” to prevent these tragedies from happening. Those leaders will need to understand what policies and practices are effective, however, and building the evidence is a critical contribution to ensuring that decision makers do have high-quality information to navigate these challenges. Identifying evidence-based policy solutions has been and continues to be a key driver of our research investments, across all of our areas of work.

PND: The announcement notes that “[t]he distribution of these violent incidents remains predominantly concentrated in communities that have been subject to chronic underinvestment”—which would suggest that violence reduction is a racial and social justice issue. How do you see the intersectionality of those issues?

Jocelyn Fontaine: Homicide remains the #1 cause of death for young Black men, and the second leading cause of death for young Hispanic men. These statistics are sobering and unacceptable. We must develop effective tools and responses—including policies, interventions, and resources–to address the problem of high levels of violence effectively to save lives and reduce victimization and harm. Yes, violence reduction is an issue of racial equity. Several studies have found that the majority of crimes often occur in a small number of specific streets or blocks and those trends are largely stable over time. Further, Black and Brown people are significantly more likely than white people to be victims of serious violence and homicide. As violent crime is concentrated in economically disadvantaged Black and Brown neighborhoods, which have been historically underserved and marginalized and where residents have a relationship with the police and the justice system that has been defined through a history of marginalization, oppression, surveillance, coercion, and control, effective violence reduction strategies is absolutely consistent with efforts to advance racial equity....

Read the full Q&A with Jocelyn Fontaine and Anita Ravishankar, Vice President and Director of Criminal Justice Research, Arnold Ventures.

(Photo credit: Todd Spoth)

It's time for philanthropy to invest in Black women: A commentary by Maria S. Johnson

Many of us are feeling disillusioned by the current state of affairs in the United States. This includes the rollback of reproductive rights, white supremacist mass shootings, rising costs for basic needs, and shortages of essential items like baby formula—which are occurring as we are still enduring a pandemic that has taken more than a million lives.

Reporting indicates that Black women and girls are disproportionately affected by these events. Black mothers have limited access to quality prenatal care and access to abortions. Black grandmothers who were community and charitable pillars were targeted and murdered at a supermarket, and low-income Black women are facing insurmountable rising costs and housing instability. All of this can feel overwhelming, insurmountable even. I get it. And yet, there is something we can do: fund Black women and girl leaders.

As a Black woman from the South, I have lived, worked, and been educated in racially hostile spaces, subjected to racist and sexist slurs, and doubted and thwarted throughout my life. I have also witnessed the power of Black women and girls to create beloved communities and alter the trajectories of their and others’ lives when offered resources and opportunities. Coming from that reality, I learned early on that we all need support to thrive. For as long as we have lived in this country, Black women and girls have been on the ground addressing many of society’s most pressing ills. Moreover, Black women and girls have bravely looked beyond societal problems to imagine and create new futures in which not only Black women and girls but everyone can live safe, happy, liberated lives.

This resourcefulness and visionary approach are hallmarks of Black women and girls, but philanthropy fails them....

Read the full commentary by Maria S. Johnson, founder and chair of the Black Women and Girls Fund in Baltimore.

(Photo credit: Getty Images/Drazen Zigic)