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The Build Back Better Act has the potential to help the nation grow, as framed by the White House, “from the bottom and middle-out" by providing families with funding for childcare, expanding access to affordable housing, education, and health care, and enforcing tax laws on the extremely wealthy.
How can corporate philanthropy be responsive to the demands of this moment? It's a question rooted in the very nature of a capitalist economic system, where corporations focus on maximizing returns exacerbates inequities. Into that mix, corporate foundations and champions of social responsibility mobilize their companies’ resources and talent to restore community balance and advance social good.
2024 promises to be a momentous year for democracy—locally, nationally, and globally. Over 4 billion people are living in countries with major elections this year. In the United States, we will also face familiar but obstinate challenges, including the dearth of local news and youth disaffection with voting and institutions. We will also face challenges that are new in this digital era, namely disinformation turbocharged by generative AI that has enormous power to deceive voters, undermine trust, and destabilize our information ecosystems.
As the political economy ebbs and flows, California finds itself dealing with significant budget deficits more frequently, which ultimately impacts our state’s most historically marginalized residents. Cuts to important programs impacting housing and homelessness, the social safety net, climate resiliency programs and much more have a disproportionate and adverse effect on women and children, low-income families, rural communities, and neighborhoods of color. Nonprofit and direct service organizations often see an uptick in their clients during economic downturns and are compelled to fill the gap without augmentation in funding and resources.
When I started at Hirsch Philanthropy Partners, I had a few impressions. First, I was sensing a desire for big change in Bay Area philanthropy that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. I was engaging in conversations about race, power and decision making, which were the kinds of conversations I was having previously in the nonprofit space. I also discovered that several Bay Area grantmakers were already doing grantmaking differently, bringing diverse communities closer to the center of their work and challenging power dynamics. It felt like a ripe time for change.
Young people are fired up! They see injustices in their communities and existential threats to their futures - a severe housing and homelessness crisis, inflation and stagnant wages, democracy under threat and a loss of rights, and extreme climate impacts - all of which are felt disproportionately by Black, Indigenous, Latinx and other people of color communities.
In 2020, we witnessed philanthropy make major commitments and promises to resource Black-led organizations and movements as part of a renewed reckoning with racial justice after the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and countless other Black lives. Historically, Black-led power-building efforts have been at the forefront of transformative change but have been consistently underfunded and under-resourced. The sudden surge in resources allocated to Black-led nonprofits and power-building organizations over the last four years highlights the urgent need to invest in the leadership and visionary ideas for dismantling systemic racism and advancing an inclusive, multiracial democracy. Now, the question remains whether the investments so far are truly sufficient to provide long-term support for Black power-building organizations and their vital work.