Core Grantees

ABEN assists young people in reaching their full potential through programs designed to empower Black students and their educators.The organization works with a wide range of partners who are committed to moving towards the provision of African-centered education – a pedagogy that includes ideas and practices from African cultural groups and centers the needs and interests of Black children and communities.

ABEN integrates and disseminates research findings, education strategies, and culture through offering professional development opportunities, student-focused programming, and curricula. Specifically, ABEN supports and partners with educational institutions – schools, churches, nonprofit organizations, educators, researchers, parents, corporations, and foundations – to ensure Black students reach their full potential.

In 2023, ABEN celebrated its twentieth anniversary. The organization also published a new book: A Soul-Centered Approach to Educating Teachers, which illustrates the importance of spaces of excellence for Black children through portraits, narratives, and essays. In June, they hosted their 18th Summer Institute – Pedagogies & Practices for Successfully Reaching African American Students – at Stanford University. The Institute was attended by a sold-out audience of educators, parents, and supporters committed to participating in productive discussions to improve pedagogy and amplifying the voices and experiences of the African diaspora. 

The Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) is a grassroots, member-led, statewide community organization working with more than 15,000 members across California. ACCE is dedicated to lifting up the voices of everyday Californians, neighborhood by neighborhood, to fight for the policies and programs needed to improve our communities and create a brighter future. 

The ACCE Contra Costa chapter works on tenant rights and housing advocacy through low-income resident organizing and coalition-building in Contra Costa County in cities such as Richmond, Antioch, San Pablo, and Pittsburg.

In 2023, ACCE Contra Costa won a groundbreaking tenant anti-harassment ordinance in Antioch, where they also organized to hold the Antioch Police Department accountable for police violence and excessive use of force. In San Pablo and Pittsburg, ACCE members submitted tenant protections bill packages to their city clerks, a critical step in putting rent control, just cause, and tenant anti-harassment on the 2024 ballot.

In the past year, the organization focused on raising awareness of the harmful health impacts of gas stoves and worked with the City of Richmond and the Building Trades Council to build a pilot program to decarbonize homes. Additionally, ACCE Contra Costa continued its work with the Richmond Our Power Coalition, which works to advance a just transition in the city towards a regenerative, non-extractive economy.

The Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) Oakland is a grassroots, member-led, statewide community organization working with more than 15,000 members across California. ACCE is dedicated to raising the voices of everyday Californians, neighborhood by neighborhood, to fight for the policies and programs needed to improve our communities and create a brighter future.

The ACCE Oakland chapter engages in member-led campaigns focused on tenant rights and housing advocacy in Oakland and statewide. They organize primarily across the Oakland Flatlands in districts 3, 5, 6 and 7 around issues of displacement, housing affordability, habitability, and equitable city policy.

After winning the longest rent strike in Oakland’s history in 2022, Oakland ACCE members amplified the lessons learned from that victory by co-hosting the California Community Land Trust Network 2023 conference in Oakland, where they presented on tenant organizing to activists from across California and beyond. Oakland ACCE also continued its ongoing work organizing in coalition for A People’s Budget in Oakland, which would prioritize investments in jobs, parks, the arts, and housing instead of giving more money to the police.

This past year, the organization continued to focus on the flatlands of Oakland in districts 3, 5, 6 and 7 on issues of displacement, housing affordability, habitability, and equitable city policy.

The African American Art & Culture Complex is a space for Black creatives from across the Bay Area to present, gather, and learn, while being a space for all to experience Black art and culture. 

Located in the historical Fillmore/Western Addition neighborhood of San Francisco, AAACC is one of the premier Black arts and cultural institutions in the San Francisco Bay Area. They provide a wide variety of art and cultural programming for youth, adults, and families – including visual arts, digital arts, and performance arts. They also offer subsidized offices; administrative services; and access to rehearsal, performance, and exhibition space to some of the most celebrated African American arts and culture organizations in the region.

In 2023, AAACC launched its “Season of Black Art” showcase featuring hundreds of Black artists, arts events, speaker series, and performances between October 2023 and February 2024. Its annual Wakanda Winter Wonderland Festival brought hundreds of families together over three days in December. It featured their popular “Dollhouse Day,” where kids get to take home a free doll for the holidays. AAACC also oversaw over $2 million in designated funds for arts and culture through San Francisco’s Dream Keeper Initiative and distributed artist grants through its Ubuntu Resource Program and Fund for Building Wellness, a radical self care program. 

In addition to all their programming, AAACC also sponsored the 19th annual International Queer Women of Color Film Festival; co-hosted the inaugural San Francisco Women’s Policy Summit, Shift Happens; and hosted the Black Family Reunion as part of the Fillmore District’s Juneteenth Freedom Celebration.

Alena Museum is a social change-driven organization dedicated to preserving and amplifying the voices of the African diaspora. Through spatial and art activism, the organization illuminates historical truths, confronts present-day realities, and envisions a more equitable future for Black Oakland and the global Black Diaspora. 

Since its founding in 2017, Alena has centered cultural placekeeping as a foundational practice for sustaining presence and impact. The organization has activated a range of spaces over the years, and its current home—located at 935 61st Street—serves as a wellness hub that includes co-working space for up to five arts and cultural practitioners, free community event venue, and beginning in Q4 of 2025, the workspace for its R3 Project resident artist. 

Alena Museum also engages the public through its art activism programming, having participated in festivals such as Juneteenth, Life is Living, and the Malcolm X Jazz Festival, among others. The organization’s current multi-year public arts initiative is supporting Black Cultural Zone’s R3 Project. The R3 Project kicked off in 2024, and Alena Museum will leverage its experience in large-scale public art installations to bring the important mission of the R3 Project to life. 

APEB provides culturally-sensitive, non-judgmental, and effective services to all people in Alameda County living with and vulnerable to HIV. The organization is guided by a commitment to transforming lives through health and wellness. From HIV testing to housing services and much more, APEB aims to reduce the number of new incidences of HIV, serve people living with HIV and AIDS, and end stigma and discrimination.

In 2023, APEB continued their life-saving work providing HIV prevention services, referrals for HIV-preventing medications (PrEP/PEP), food and clothing support, housing support, and case management to hundreds of East Bay residents. Data from the organization’s work in 2022 showed that nearly half of all clients were LGBTQ+, and the vast majority of clients identified as Black. 

As part of their commitment to transforming lives through health and wellness, APEB hosted a Thanksgiving Food Bank providing groceries and hot meals to Oakland residents. They also co-hosted Oakland’s 35th World AIDS Day Block Party, with free HIV testing, health information, music, games, prizes, and family-friendly fun.

APEN is an environmental justice organization building power in California’s Asian immigrant and refugee communities. Since 1993, they have built a membership base of Laotian refugees in Richmond and Chinese immigrants in Oakland. With its members, APEN devises campaigns to make our communities more just and healthy places where we all can thrive.

Through building an organized movement, APEN strives to bring fundamental changes to economic and social institutions that will prioritize public good over profits and promote the right of every person to a decent, safe, affordable quality of life, and to participate in decisions affecting their lives. Though APEN holds this vision of environmental justice for all people, their work focuses on Asian immigrant and refugee communities.

In 2023, APEN helped secure $9.25 million in public investments to build a new, larger Lincoln Square Park and Recreation Center in Oakland Chinatown to assist residents before, during, and after disasters. The new center will provide cooling, warming, clean air, backup power, food storage, and emergency information and trainings in the languages people speak at home. 

APEN also assisted the St. Mary’s Gardens affordable housing complex for seniors in accessing funds to install solar panels. This was possible thanks to California’s historic $1 billion investment in solar for renters through Solar on Multifamily Affordable Housing (SOMAH), legislation which APEN and its members helped pass in 2015.

In 2024, EBCF also funded APEN Action, the 501(c)(4) organization mobilizing residents around nonpartisan lobbying, ballot measures, and voter education. With EBCF’s support, APEN Action pushed to place the “Polluters Pay” measure on the ballot. The effort was so effective that Chevron agreed to a $550 million settlement before the measure was even voted on.

Bay Area Community Land Trust converts for-profit rental properties into permanently affordable, democratically run, cooperative housing for lower income households in order to foster economic and racial equity. BACLT has ten properties in Berkeley and Oakland, totaling 98 homes with over 130 residents. They actively participate in advocacy for local, regional, and statewide policies to reduce barriers to and support the growth of CLT and Co-op developments.  

In 2024-2025, BACLT organized with Berkeley TOPA coalition to advocate for tenant ownership and community owned housing. They also advocated for a number of statewide policies preserving housing and protecting it from speculative investors. 

Bay Area Plan is a social justice organization that develops leadership and builds the power of parents to transform schools so that all students achieve success. They work primarily with students of color and their parents in all nine counties of the Greater Bay Area.

In May 2023, the organization made the strategic decision to pause their programming to allow for evaluation and reassessment of their programs. Bay Area Plan brought on a consultant to conduct a wellness check and community assessment to help distill the strengths, areas of growth, and opportunities ahead, and plan to emerge stronger with a new strategic direction.

Bay Rising is a growing alliance of progressive, community-led organizations across the Bay Area. They organize working-class voters and voters of color year-round, working to shift the power back to local communities and empower residents to co-govern alongside elected officials. Through its political power-building and voter engagement programs, Bay Rising empowers the people who are most marginalized in Bay Area communities to lead the way for a government that centers racial, economic, and environmental justice.

This year, following ongoing community input organized by Bay Rising, Oakland City Council approved increased funding to hire a staff position to implement Democracy Dollars – public campaign financing vouchers that Oakland residents can give to participating candidates to support their campaigns in the 2026 election and beyond. City Council also added discretionary funds for the Oakland Public Ethics Commission to support implementation of Democracy Dollars. 

In 2023, Bay Rising collaborated with Local Progress Impact Lab to launch the Progressive Governance Lab, a six-month program for a diverse slate of elected officials. The alliance co-launched the Begins With Home movement for Bay Area housing justice. The movement aims to increase investments in affordable housing, advocate for policies to help renters live free from eviction and rent gouging, and create permanent supportive housing to help people experiencing homelessness gain stability and support. Bay Rising also worked in collaboration to publish a renter protections storybook, designed to help advocates, decisionmakers, and the media better communicate what’s at stake for Bay Area communities and how housing solutions can benefit everyone.

Anticipating the demands of the 2024 election year, Bay Rising also made deeper investments to embed resilience in the fabric of their organizational culture in 2023. They held restorative retreats through a partnership with Windcall in order to provide their team and member organizations with the necessary support and tools to navigate the work ahead.

Black Cultural Zone Community Development Corporation builds experiences for youth, foster community well-being, address displacement, and uplift Black culture through arts, health, and community development initiatives in Oakland.  

The East Oakland Black Cultural Zone Collaborative (“the Collaborative”) was formed by the Eastside Arts Alliance and several nonprofit organizations located in East Oakland to develop the Black Cultural Zone. The Collaborative designated the East Oakland Black Cultural Zone as the 50 square blocks from High Street to the San Leandro Border and focused on implementing arts and cultural strategies as well as engaging artists and community members in art activism. 

Since 2014, the Collaborative has worked with a coalition of residents, government agencies, churches, and grassroots organizing, and community groups to help keep Black people in East Oakland. Through their strategy of building power, securing land, and directing more dollars to community-driven projects, they are working to secure a foothold in East Oakland that finally allows their neighborhoods to thrive. 

BCZCDC’s most recent accomplishments include significantly expanding arts and culture programming within the Oakland Unified School District, as well as implementing visual arts, music, and podcasting classes across multiple schools, with a projected contract value of over $92,000. Concurrently, their partnership with Alameda County for Community Engagement and Resilience has continued to deliver vital healing services, operate the BCZ Healing Hub with expanded wellness offerings, and build community capacity through our EBAN Lit Leadership Academy. Furthermore, the RE-MEMBER, RESIST & RE-CLAIM (R3) Initiative has made substantial progress towards establishing a permanent cultural facility, engaging in policy advocacy for essential cultural spaces, and leveraging technology to preserve and re-present Black history and culture. 

In the fiscal year 2025/26, the Black Cultural Zone (BCZ) has made significant strides in preserving and revitalizing East Oakland’s Black community. A monumental accomplishment was securing city approval for the Liberation Park Market Hall and Cultural Hub and the Liberation Park Residences developments, which will provide 119 units of affordable housing and dedicated spaces for Black artists and entrepreneurs. This landmark decision, along with a major fundraising success that secured $100 million for the “Rise East” initiative, underscores BCZ’s commitment to community-led development. Additionally, Liberation Park has remained a vibrant hub, hosting expanded “Saturdays in THE ZONE” events like the Umoja Outdoor Roller-Skating Rink and the Levitt Vibe Summer Concert Series, all of which serve to strengthen the local economy and foster a thriving community. 

BOP builds Black community power and develops leaders in Oakland and across the Bay Area. BOP is a central leader in reimagining public safety and works directly with impacted youth and their families to achieve racial, social, and economic justice.

BOP strengthens community by creating safe Black spaces for people to come together and heal. They are working to improve the school system by ending the criminalization of Black and brown youth in Oakland and beyond. BOP practices multigenerational organizing to develop a new generation of Black leadership to build a community of trust, love, and consciousness.

In 2023, BOP worked in coalition to successfully keep open five majority Black schools that had been slated for closure by the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) Board of Education. They also released the “People’s Budget for School Safety,”  a roadmap to ending the criminalization of children in OUSD and an outline of what it will cost to do so. As it has for years, the organization kept up consistent pressure on the district’s implementation of the 2020 George Floyd resolution to eliminate the Oakland School Police Department. BOP also continued its additional programming, including their Baby BOP arts and literacy summer program for kids and listening sessions about community safety in East Oakland. 

The Center for ArtEsteem, formerly Attitudinal Healing Connection, is a longstanding Black-founded and led arts organization serving communities across the Bay Area from their home base in West Oakland. The organization empowers individuals to be self-aware and inspired through art, creativity, and education, making positive choices to break the cycle of violence for themselves and their communities. 

ArtEsteem, the organization’s award-winning art and literacy program, has inspired students since 1995 through the integration of arts into classroom academic coursework. In addition to art classes for children and youth, ArtEsteem provides professional development and training for educators in art curricula to help teachers develop visually engaging and hands-on methods that improve student involvement, comprehension, and critical thinking. The program has served over 75 historically underinvested schools and their communities, directly and indirectly reaching over 100,000 children, youth, and families in Oakland and the greater Bay Area. 

In 2022, The Center for ArtEsteem acquired approximately 5,000 square feet of land and property in West Oakland to ensure its sustainability in Oakland as the city transforms. They have successfully completed Phase 1—the gut renovation of a “Classic Box” style two-story building—and are currently raising funds to complete a second building from the ground up for Phase 2 of “Building the Center for ArtEsteem.” The organization aims to revitalize its roots within the Hoover-Durant neighborhood and create a permanent sanctuary for the West Oakland community that provides space for creativity, the arts, and community-strengthening. The new center will allow them to double the number of children, youth, and families served per year, more than triple the number of children and youth served per week in on-site classes, and double the number of on-site art, healing, and community workshops and events per year. 

CBE builds people power in California’s communities of color and low-income communities to achieve environmental health and justice. The organization and its members prevent and reduce pollution and build green, healthy, and sustainable communities and environments. CBE provides residents in heavily polluted urban communities in California with organizing skills; leadership training; and legal, scientific, and technical assistance, so that they can successfully confront threats to their health and well-being.

In 2023, CBE’s 16-year Freedom to Breathe campaign culminated in the demolition of AB&I Foundry, the largest industrial source of air pollution in East Oakland. The organization also negotiated a community benefits agreement with Raven SR Bioenergy Project. This included $500,000 over the next 10 years for community reinvestment in Richmond and a commitment from Raven SR to adhere to strict air pollution limits and air quality controls. 

CBE also commissioned the film “Toxic Tour,” produced by CBE East Oakland and local filmmaker Cheryl Fabio. The film follows the organization’s effort to raise awareness of toxic facilities within the East Oakland community. It premiered on January 23, 2024, at the New Parkway Theater.

CHDC provides affordable housing opportunities and services to enable low- and moderate-income residents to gain better housing and financial stability. The organization’s approach to community development engages residents and ensures that the whole neighborhood benefits from affordable housing and neighborhood services.

In 2023, CHDC celebrated the reopening of Hacienda Heights in Richmond, an affordable housing community with 150 homes for seniors aged 62 and over. CHDC’s project, Eden, provides high-quality affordable housing for families and formerly homeless individuals in the City of Richmond. It received $3 million in federal grants for its 38th Street Supportive and Family Affordable Apartments project. 

CHDC also made an impact through direct service. Their annual pre-Thanksgiving food distribution program served 300 families and seniors. The organization also co-hosted the biannual Willie Spears Cleanup in North Richmond. Nearly 20 garbage containers and five metal containers were filled, serving 450 residents.

Community Ownership for Community Power Fund (COCP) just launched an Integrated Capital Fund, designed by movement leaders in community ownership and housing justice. The fund channels capital directly to historically marginalized communities, providing the resources needed to acquire, govern, and sustain real estate for the long term. 

COCP just launched an Integrated Capital Fund, designed by movement leaders in community ownership and housing justice. The fund channels capital directly to historically marginalized communities, providing the resources needed to acquire, govern, and sustain real estate for the long term.  

Cooperation Richmond is a Black-led nonprofit cooperative developer dedicated to empowering low-income communities of color in Richmond and surrounding areas to build wealth. Since 2017, they have provided cooperative business education, training, mentorship, and financial support.  

Cooperation Richmond has been building out integrated capital infrastructure to support worker-owned cooperatives in West Contra Costa through partnerships with SEED Commons, which will manage a loan fund, and EBCF, which opened a West CoCo small business fund.  

Destiny Arts Center is a North Oakland-based, BIPOC-led cultural institution that believes that art and movement give young people a vehicle for self- and community expression. The Center was founded by Black and Queer dancers and martial artists in 1988. They use movement-based arts to uplift youth voices, supporting pathways for young people to express themselves as they advocate for justice and equity; fight against systemic racism; and build a community where everyone feels seen, valued, and free. 

Destiny serves youth aged 0-24 and their communities through programs in dance, martial arts, somatics and mindfulness. All offerings are pay-what-you-can or free to participants, to maximize access, particularly within marginalized communities. All programs begin with a collective grounding and meditation and conclude with a circle where every participant contributes—either through movement or words—to prompts about their feelings or experience. Destiny serves nearly 6,000 young people annually, at our North Oakland center and at over 50 school and community sites throughout the Bay.  

Within Destiny’s community, 90% of participants identify as youth of color, with 78% coming from low-income households. In the Oakland East Bay region, these communities have faced systemic inequities, yet they also embody rich traditions of cultural resistance and resilience. Decades of redlining and disinvestment have disrupted social and cultural networks while deepening health disparities. In response to these challenges, Destiny launched the CARE (Community/Arts/Relationships/Education) team, a wraparound support and referral service designed to provide holistic care for youth and families.  

Young people and families come to Destiny to engage in movement arts and remain in a community where they are seen, valued, and embraced. When empowered to express themselves and build connections, young people become agents of personal and social transformation. 

East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative is a Black-led, community-centered development coop that facilitates BIPOC and allied communities to cooperatively organize, finance, purchase, occupy, and steward residential and commercial properties and arts spaces, taking them permanently off the speculative market, creating community controlled assets, and empowering communities to cooperatively lead a just transition from an extractive capitalist system into one where communities are ecologically, emotionally, spiritually, culturally, and economically restorative and regenerative.  

In 2024, EB PREC partnered with Collective Action and Land Liberation Institute to acquire its newest property, Omni Commons, a radical community organizing space in North Oakland that was at risk of foreclosure. By removing Omni Commons from the speculative market and bringing it under new BIPOC-led management, EB PREC is preserving an organizing space, protecting cultural spaces, and transforming the space into one that welcomes and empowers community to thrive. 

EOYDC develops the social and leadership capacities of youth and young adults (ages 5-24) so they are prepared to excel in their education, career, and service to their communities. Founded in 1978, EOYDC provides free after-school and summer programming to over 1,000 young people every year. The organization’s ultimate goal is to ensure that Oakland’s youth are prepared to have meaningful, well-paid careers that leverage their talent and passion. Through educational, cultural, artistic expression, and recreation programs, EOYDC seeks to meet the holistic needs of each individual child.

EOYDC has a lasting impact on the youth they serve. One hundred percent of EOYDC’s high school graduates completed high school within four years and enrolled in a college degree program. The CEO is an alumnus of EOYDC herself, as are 60 percent of the organization’s staff.

In 2023, EOYDC helped launch Rise East, a $100 million initiative that grew out of a community-led vision to develop a Black cultural zone in East Oakland. Oakland has been selected to receive $50 million in philanthropic capital, unlocked by local giving. Rise East is now securing an equal-sized investment from local foundations, businesses, and donors who recognize the unparalleled opportunity to build and rebuild the Oakland our communities deserve.

EastSide Arts Alliance is a collective of cultural workers who live and work in East Oakland. Our mission is to unite art with activism to work for community empowerment and cultural development, and to build bridges between the disenfranchised, racially divided communities we serve. 

ESAA has taken the lead in demonstrating equity innovations in cultural arts. We provide space, support, and programming for marginalized communities, especially communities of color, low-income communities, re-entry populations, undocumented youth and adults, survivors of sex-trafficking, houseless families, people with disabilities, transgender, gender nonconforming and LGBTQ+ people to share their own cultural traditions and innovations; learn about the history and cultural traditions of other communities; and use the arts as a tool for identifying and expressing their views on issues that affect their lives and their community. Through progressive programming and cultural organizing, EastSide Arts Alliance promotes community sustainability for future generations through self-determination, political and cultural awareness, leadership development, and power building. 

The EastSide Cultural Center presents free youth art classes, cultural programming, public art projects, ongoing gallery exhibitions, community town halls, and the annual Malcolm X JazzArts Festival, currently in its 25th year. We work with numerous organizations and community groups to present hundreds of events every year. Additional projects include: Bandung Bookstore, a community gallery and archives, weekly open mic for poets, a theater residency program, and monthly documentary and feature film screenings presented by scholars and artists. Recent accomplishments include deepening our partnership with Palestinian Youth Movement, presenting a series of programs and an amazing participatory poster show – helping to offer alternative stories on the current crisis. We are also working with Mam women who live in the neighborhood. Presenting theater works that feature them and their textile skills. This is an act of empowerment in the face of fears around deportation. 

The East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy (EBASE) addresses the root causes of economic injustice by developing strategic alliances among community, labor, and people of faith to build power and create change with low-income workers and communities of color.

EBASE champions a holistic “whole worker approach” to organizing, addressing everything workers need to thrive. The organization works with East Bay community members to develop transformative campaigns at the intersections of social, economic, and racial justice. They connect good jobs to affordable housing and better health; link worker organizing with empowerment and immigrant rights; and demand a cleaner environment as part of equitable development.

In 2023, EBASE’s worker rights campaign won the landmark decision of $400,000 in back wages to hotel workers, the City of Oakland’s largest settlement in its history – thanks to a new city department that EBASE helped create and launch. In Concord, they launched their first ever Tenant Leadership Institute, developing leadership and community among tenants who in turn organize tenants in their buildings and neighborhoods. 

Convening the Raise the Roof coalition in Concord, EBASE led the passage of a tenant anti-harassment policy and is on the verge of winning an historic just cause and rent stabilization ordinance in Concord. 

EDEN Community Land Trust incorporated as a 501c3 in May 2025, making it the first CLT to serve the Unincorporated Eden area of Alameda County, an underinvested area in the East Bay. EDEN CLT was created by community members who wanted to bring more local decision–making and community control to the unincorporated areas in order to transform their neighborhoods and ensure that they all have high-quality, permanently affordable homes. They have been working with the county to preserve mobile home communities for existing residents.  

Eden CLT incorporated as its own 501c3 in May 2025, making it the first CLT to serve the unincorporated areas of Alameda County. They have been working with the county to preserve mobile home communities in the unincorporated areas for existing residents.  

The Ensuring Opportunity Campaign is a collaborative effort of diverse stakeholders working to end poverty and improve economic security in Contra Costa County by addressing structural causes at the policy level. Using an “inside-out” strategy, Ensuring Opportunity brings the voices of impacted community members to elected leaders and government agencies and ensures that the community has a seat at the governing table.

In 2023, Ensuring Opportunity worked in coalition to pass a tenant anti-harassment policy and advance a strong just cause and rent stabilization ordinance in Concord. They also emceed and guided 200 attendees through a lunch and learn webinar: “The Epicenter of Evictions: Moving from Crisis to Solutions in Contra Costa County.” Attendees came away with an increased understanding of the injustices that renters face in eviction court; learned about how to replicate policy wins in other jurisdictions; and explored solutions to the county’s eviction and homelessness crisis. 

Recently, the organization successfully passed Guaranteed Income through Measure X, securing no-strings-attached cash for individuals. They have also organized with the community and the Board of Supervisors to further adopt community priorities for Measure X. Additionally, they have continued their partnership with the County Office of Racial Equity & Social Justice, supporting community leaders in their advocacy work.

FIAEB is committed to faith-rooted organizing and leadership development in Alameda and Contra Costa Counties on immigration issues, community safety/anti-violence, anti-displacement, economic justice, and other member-identified campaigns. 

In 2023, FIAEB organized 36 “Ceasefire in Oakland” night walks and eight Richmond peace walks. They partnered with 90 allied congregations, schools, and community organizations and held six leadership development trainings, in which they trained 90 community leaders to build power towards equity in housing, jobs, education, access to health care, and vibrant, safe communities. 

FIAEB held 10 meetings and actions on illegal dumping, hosted an immigration forum with 300+ participants, held a D.A. town hall with over 490 participants, and held 15 housing research meetings and actions. 

FIAEB also sent 115 leaders to statewide housing actions in Sacramento, in which housing justice organizations from across California came together to fight for and win SB 567 to protect low-income renters from unjust evictions and exorbitant rent increases; AB 1418 to prevent discriminatory evictions and give people with criminal records more options for housing; and SB 4 to allow faith-based institutions to build affordable housing on lands they own.

In 2024, the organization focused on voter outreach and engagement in preparation for the fall election and secured $2 million for the City of Oakland’s Ceasefire program.

Feed Black Futures is a Black, queer, women-led organization building climate-resilient food systems grounded in gender and racial justice. Since their founding in 2020, they have evolved from a mutual aid effort into a regional force for food sovereignty, Black land stewardship, and healing-centered leadership. Their work is rooted in the lived experiences and leadership of Black caregivers, femmes, and formerly incarcerated women—communities most impacted by climate crisis, incarceration, and food apartheid. 

Feed Black Futures launched a Leadership Council, a cohort of Bay Area community members, who will steward a mutual aid fund, support land access initiatives, and co-create political education offerings for the broader membership. Their leadership ensures FBF’s strategic direction reflects the lived experiences and priorities of our people. 

FIERCE (Families and Individuals Equitably Rooted in Collective Empowerment) Advocates amplifies the voices of Black, Latinx, and other parents and caregivers of color to advance equitable access and opportunities so that all youth can have quality education, and all families can achieve emotional and physical well-being. 

Headquartered in Richmond, the organization empowers communities so healthy families can blossom and realize their full potential. By providing healing-centered care, leadership development, and activating inclusive parent-led advocacy, FIERCE Advocates support the personal and collective transformation of parents and caregivers as they reclaim their power. 

In 2023, FIERCE Advocates became an independent organization, reintroduced itself with a new name, grew the staff team, and expanded its reach. Its team of parent fellows built power and leadership by connecting with other parents at schools, housing communities, and beyond to exchange ideas on transforming education. Hundreds of community members participated in cooking, art, and fitness workshops; life coaching; and emotional well-being support groups throughout the year.

The organization also graduated nearly 30 women from their CoCo doulas training program this year and welcomed more than 50 babies. According to a 2023 survey, the FIERCE Advocates doulas program is making great strides in maternal health. Ninety-one percent of women surveyed felt their doula contributed positively to their birth experience; 90 percent of babies born in the program were delivered full-term; and 75 percent of babies born in the program were vaginal births.

In 2024-2025, the organization was able to re-launch its Community Education Leadership Institute (CELI), a program that supports Black and Latinx board leaders in strengthening their advocacy for social justice.

FAJ builds a strong and empowered Filipino community by organizing constituents, developing leaders, providing services, and advocating for policies that promote social and economic justice and equity. FAJ serves Filipinos who call the East Bay home through its offices in Oakland’s Chinatown and Union City. 

FAJ celebrated its 50th anniversary this year. The organization has been an advocate for immigrant and civil rights since 1973, serving at-risk middle and high school-age youth, low-wage workers vulnerable to exploitation, and newly arrived immigrants and undocumented people. Its programs are rooted in Bayanihan principles, a Filipino demonstration of social justice values where a community comes together to help those in need.

In 2023, FAJ engaged over 1,000 neighbors through door-to-door voter canvassing in Hayward. The organization mobilized over 70 volunteers and incorporated integrated voter engagement throughout its programs. Through its CalGrows project with the California Department of Aging, they certified and trained more than 60 caregivers. Because community care is an important value for FAJ, the organization also held a free community healing clinic. By bringing together healers of different modalities and practices, they were able to offer acupuncture, yoga, massages, and more.

The Jakara Movement is a grassroots community-building organization empowering, educating, and organizing Punjabi Sikhs and other marginalized communities by advancing their health; education; and economic, social, and political power. The organization is committed to gender equality and caste abolitionism to develop powerful, informed, and organized youth leadership, locally-rooted residential power, and community capacity to build a better future for all.

In 2023, the Jakara Movement marked another successful year of offering life-changing programs for young people. They held their annual collegiate youth conference, Lalkaar 2023, at UC Davis. Through their Bhujangan Leadership Academy, young Singhs and Kaurs spent a week in the Sierra Mountains developing internal strength, building self-esteem and confidence, and creating brotherhood and sisterhood. The Jakara Movement also continued community empowerment by organizing impactful community health events and 5K runs, facilitating food distributions, and starting a community farmers’ market.

The Jakara Movement’s community advocacy was also a vital part of their work in 2023. They published results of a 300+ person survey showing the impact of the Madera Hospital closure on the Sikh community and beyond. Thanks to their work in the capitol in 2023, the California legislature declared the 1984 anti-Sikh violence in India a genocide.

Lift Up Contra Costa Action is a coalition of grassroots community organizing, advocacy, and labor organizations that builds political power, fights for policies, and holds local elected officials accountable. 

As a county-wide civic engagement coalition dedicated to amplifying the voices of Black people, people of color, and working families, LUCC unites over 100,000 Contra Costa residents who are members of Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment, Asian Pacific Environmental Network, Communities for a Better Environment, the Contra Costa County Central Labor Council, the East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy, SEIU Local 1021, SEIU Local 2015, the Safe Return Project, the Richmond Progressive Alliance.

The organization’s vision of Contra Costa includes workers having dignity on the job families having the right to grow in their homes and thrive in their health; safe communities; a growing economy; and an engaged democracy. They organize to support politics and politicians that are responsive to the challenges Contra Costa communities face.

A highlight from the last year is the organization’s work to pass a rent stabilization ordinance in the City of Concord.

Monument Impact is a community-based nonprofit dedicated to building skills, resources, and power towards economic prosperity among immigrants, refugees, and low-income residents in Concord and surrounding communities. The organization primarily works in the Monument Corridor.

In 2023, Monument Impact launched ELEVATE Concord, a family economic equity pilot, in collaboration with the City of Concord. that provides a guaranteed income of $500 a month for a year to 120 families. The organization also worked in coalition to bring an ordinance for rent stabilization and just cause for eviction to the Concord City Council and won a tenant anti-harassment ordinance in Antioch. The organization’s community engagement team attended the 2023 California Renter Power Assembly in Fresno, hosted by Tenants Together and Homes For All – a conference to build power towards winning rent control and social housing for every Californian.

The organization served 24,000 people in 2023 through programs focused on workforce development, health, housing advocacy, and emerging business support for immigrant entrepreneurs. 

Over the last year the organization has focused on community engagement, supporting community members involvement at city council meetings, offering career support and economic advice for community college students, and forming a Mayor’s Apprenticeship Program.

MUA is a member-led organization made up primarily of low-income immigrant women who work in domestic service. The organization utilizes healing justice as part of its dual mission of promoting personal transformation and building community power for social and economic justice. 

Through its innovative leadership development model, MUA trains members to plan and implement programs and lead its social work. MUA has local, statewide, and national influence through its campaigns led largely by undocumented Latina domestic workers. 

In 2023, MUA reached more than 1,040 immigrant women through street outreach via a team of existing MUA members and recruited 165 women as new members. The organization opened a new community center in Union City, launched a community garden and a Mayan loom workshop, and hosted several trainings in facilitation, peer counseling, labor counseling, and fundraising. Over 70 women graduated from their leadership training sessions this year, with 30 obtaining their CPR certification. MUA’s English language classes were full to capacity throughout the year, and they also grew their Mam Group, with 30 women participating in meetings in the Indigenous Mayan language, Mam.

Last year, the organization achieved several policy wins through their coalition work including passing SB686 and Measure NN, and working for equitable implementation of Measure Z. They have doubled their membership and have a newly established member hub in Union City.

My Eden Voice partners with community members to advocate for services and protections in  the unincorporated areas of San Lorenzo, Ashland, Cherryland, and Hayward Acres in Alameda County. The organization was born in 2018 to unite grassroots community organizations in the Eden Area to build community power and advance community-based campaigns that bring resources, investments, and greater equity to unincorporated communities.

In 2023, My Eden Voice successfully organized for the release of Dominique Walker, founder of Moms4Housing, from Santa Rita Jail. They also organized members to urge Alameda County courts to slow down a surge in eviction cases and released “In the Shadows of Eden: Rising Rents, Evictions, and Substandard Living Conditions in Unincorporated Alameda County” – the first report ever on the needs of renters in the Eden Area. 

The organization continued to offer free monthly know-your-rights workshops for tenants in urban unincorporated areas of Alameda County throughout the year and opened a new office in the heart of Ashland. 

Northern California Land Trust (NCLT) is a Black-led community land trust whose mission is to remove land from the speculative market and incubate, develop, and support permanently affordable housing on community-owned and governed land throughout the Bay Area. The oldest CLT in California, NCLT develops, acquires, rehabs, and sells affordable housing; leases offices and homes to nonprofit organizations, cooperatives, and co-housing communities; rents affordable apartments to low, very-low, and extremely low-income households; and governs and stewards properties in partnership with residents and community members. 

NCLT recently partnered with residents who led the anti-displacement initiative to acquire multifamily buildings in Berkeley & Oakland, averting potential sales to speculative buyers.  

Oakland Community Land Trust (OakCLT) works to expand and preserve housing and economic development opportunities for Black, Latinx, Asian, other communities of color, and low-income residents of Oakland. They acquire housing, land, and other critical community-serving real estate and steward them in trust to ensure that they remain affordable forever.  

OakCLT has been working with the City of Oakland’s Department of Housing and Community Development, the Housing Accelerator Fund, and community partners to develop public funding sources to preserve affordable housing in neighborhoods under displacement pressures, with specific carveouts for land trusts and co-ops, a rarity in the affordable housing field. 

A city chapter of Bay Area Rising, Oakland Rising educates and mobilizes voters in low-income Flatlands neighborhoods to speak up for and take charge of the issues impacting their lives. Oakland Rising is highly engaged in coalitional efforts related to redistricting and anti-displacement work in East and West Oakland neighborhoods. 

As a collaborative of racial, economic, and environmental justice organizations, Oakland Rising uses the civic process to build political power for and with BIPOC, working-class, immigrant, and formerly incarcerated community members to bring about systemic change.

In 2023, Oakland Rising organized to ensure that Oakland’s limited public financing program would be reinstated as an interim measure for the 2024 election, while awaiting the 2026 launch of Oakland’s Democracy Dollars program – publicly funded campaign finance vouchers for Oakland residents. They also successfully organized to convince the Alameda County Board of Supervisors to approve a ballot measure to make the election process more transparent, efficient, equitable, and cost-effective by consolidating its special elections with existing state primary election days. Oakland Rising’s canvassing events reached thousands of voters, laying the groundwork for more victories in 2024.

In the past year, Oakland Rising continued to be highly engaged in coalitional efforts throughout the city towards redistricting, anti-displacement work, and economic justice efforts. Oakland Rising Action led integrated voter engagement efforts around the 2024 elections, developed General and Primary Voter Guides, and conducted voter rights education.

Parent Voices Oakland (PVO) is a parent-led grassroots organization that advocates for affordable, accessible, quality child care. PVO organizes and empowers families with the highest need to build effective campaigns for economic and educational justice. They are a Black-led organization focused on building power among Black and brown parents to transform the systems that impact their lives.

In 2023, PVO organized to win childcare family fee reform in California, resulting in nearly $100 million going back into parents’ pockets every year. They also co-hosted community events and collected over 500 surveys in partnership with the City of Oakland’s Talking Transition initiative, a citywide initiative that gives the microphone to Oaklanders whose voices have long been ignored in conversations about their city government and invites them to co-author the next chapter of Oakland’s future. 

Through their training program, they engaged and supported 124 new parent leaders. Together, PVO parents fought for and won $14.4 million dollars in general purpose funding to sustain and expand Oakland Head Start programs during the 2022-2023 year; protected 52 Head Start jobs; and saved three Head Start sites in low-income Oakland neighborhoods from closure.

Power California leads voter and civic engagement with youth throughout the state, focusing on cities with large youth populations in Contra Costa County. It is a multi-racial civic organization made up of on-the-ground community partners in urban, suburban, and rural communities. Power California builds the power of young people of color and their families to participate in and lead systems of government at all levels and to ensure that voters and elected leaders mirror the rich diversity of our communities.

In 2023, Power California expanded its membership by more than 3,400 young people, launched its first statewide bill package, had 60 meetings with legislators and their staff, and brought members to lobby legislators in Sacramento. Its statewide field campaign, centered on young voters of color, had 13,105 contacts, identified 10,316 supporters, and activated 190 volunteers.

Prospera partners with Latina entrepreneurs to launch social enterprises that foster cooperation, economic independence, and well-being in immigrant communities. Through culturally specific programs and popular education, Latina entrepreneurs come together in a safe space to take risks and access the networks, tools and the capital they need to launch, grow, and become successful owners of cooperative enterprises and achieve economic independence and well-being.  

In 2024, Prospera supported 370 entrepreneurs, of whom 95% are Latinx, women, and low income. They recently launched their Randi Randi Fund, a community governed revolving loan fund providing non-extractive capital to Latina entrepreneurs. 

REAL People’s Fund (RPF) is a $25M+ power building initiative advancing economic justice in the East Bay through a community-governed integrated capital fund, power building, and enterprise support. RPF has made $3.2M+ in non-extractive, integrated capital investments (loans, grants, and a pilot redeemable equity investment) to 25 businesses; developed a robust pipeline of 70 businesses; provided holistic business support to 48 businesses seeking sustainable growth; and built an innovative movement building strategy with BIPOC entrepreneurs and worker owners who are fighting for policy and systems change.  

Since launching in 2022, RPF has made $3.2M+ in non-extractive, integrated capital investments (loans, grants, and a pilot redeemable equity investment) to 25 businesses; developed a robust pipeline of 70 businesses; provided holistic business support to 48 businesses seeking sustainable growth; and built an innovative movement building strategy with BIPOC entrepreneurs and worker owners who are fighting for policy and systems change.  

Repaired Nations provides education, funding, and infrastructure for Black-owned cooperatives. These approaches work together to help Black entrepreneurs start and grow cooperative businesses. Their community education programs teach the nuts and bolts of starting a cooperative, including hard and soft skill development.  

Repaired Nations recently acquired and are developing a two-lot site in West Oakland into community-owned and stewarded affordable housing and a business support center. 

Restore Oakland serves as a movement incubator where communities most harmed by racial inequities have opportunities to heal, build strategies for solidarity, and create a shared vision for community safety and economic empowerment in their neighborhoods. 

Restore Oakland is based in Oakland’s Fruitvale District.Their mission is to create models of safe and thriving communities and economies. Their community space in Oakland brings residents together to build wholeness, a sense of safety, and democratic wealth.

In 2023, Restore Oakland mobilized over 500 people to defeat the $81 million Santa Rita Jail expansion. After years of mounting community pressure led by Restore Oakland and the Care First Community Coalition, the construction of the jail expansion was upended for the foreseeable future. Restore Oakland also won $19.2 million in new funding for mental health and housing in Alameda County to prevent incarceration of vulnerable people. 

Growing its team in 2023 allowed Restore Oakland to organize more than 1,000 residents and supporters and win an unprecedented $22M in new funding for under-resourced populations. At the programmatic level, it increased attendance at its weekly circles by 50 percent from the year prior, to a total of 673 people in 2023.

Richmond Art Center is a BIPOC-led organization that has been sharing art and creativity with the community since 1936. Driven by the belief that art is vital for personal expression, community connection, and equity in Richmond, Richmond Art Center’s programs serve as a catalyst for learning and living through art. Core in-house programs include Arts Education activities that encourage hands-on, lifelong learning through art-making, and Exhibitions that showcase innovative local work while amplifying underrepresented voices. Richmond Art Center also runs off-site initiatives that bring free, high-quality art-making experiences to schools and community sites. 

In fiscal year 2024-25, Richmond Art Center’s Arts Education Programs served over 3,000 students through classes, workshops, and drop-in art-making activities, with 67% attending at no cost. Among these, 1,700 Richmond youth participated in studio-based classes, afterschool programs, youth art tours, and free family open house events. Programs spanned multiple disciplines and skill levels, emphasizing equitable access and cultural responsiveness. 

In the galleries, the Exhibition Program supported artists by providing opportunities to create and present new work, amplifying underrepresented voices, offering financial compensation, and fostering community engagement and leadership. Notable exhibitions included The View from Here: Artwork by Artists at San Quentin and Philadelphia’s State Correctional Institution; Right Here, Right Now: A Biennial of Richmond Art; Art of the African Diaspora (featuring work by over 150 artists of African descent); and John Wehrle: Time & Tide, a retrospective spanning 50 years of work by the iconic Richmond-based muralist. In total, 558 artists exhibited their work, 73.5% of whom were BIPOC, and 7,250 people attended the exhibitions and related public programs, all free to the public. 

Richmond Just Transition Fund – Initiated by local frontline organizations to direct funding for projects that support an interconnected, aligned, and strong Richmond Our Power Coalition, comprised of labor, health, environmental justice, community, local business, housing advocates, racial justice organizations, youth, and workers. It drives systemic change by supporting policy development that ensures frontline communities have a voice in shaping their future, investing in public education to raise awareness, and grassroots organizing to mobilize residents for accountability. Through these efforts, the Fund works to shift power back to those most affected by systemic inequities, fostering a just and sustainable future.   

In 2024-2025, the Richmond Our Power Coalition, which governs the Richmond Just Transition Fund, awarded 12 grants to organizations that directly serve Richmond residents and advance a Just Transition of Richmond’s economy.

Richmond LAND – Contra Costa’s first community land trust, Richmond LAND builds grassroots power for community-controlled land. As a CLT, they remove land from the speculative market to protect homes for working-class families, and conserve land for long-term community needs and permanent affordability, not corporate profit.

Richmond LAND is partnering with Urban Tilth (another EBCF partner) to build out a North Richmond Eco Village, which includes 18-22 high-quality, sustainably constructed, cottage units.  

Rising Juntos is a community-powered organization that builds leadership and voice among low-income families of color – primarily immigrant moms – for a healthy, safe, and equitable Contra Costa. They advances family well-being and racial, economic, and social justice by shaping public decisions and investments.

Rising Juntos supports resident leadership through political education, coaching, and collective action to build a diverse base of youth, parent, and senior leaders. They increase power by bringing families into the movement, forging cross-cultural unity, and building strategic partnerships to shape our communities. Together, they advocate for public policies for healthy children and equitable communities. 

In 2023, Rising Juntos made great strides in housing justice throughout the region. In San Pablo, Rising Juntos’ members submitted proposed rent control and just cause legislation to the city council. They also worked in coalition to win Antioch’s anti-harassment ordinance and collaborated on the housing justice ordinance in Concord. In Richmond, Rising Juntos helped seat the first monolingual Spanish speaker on Richmond’s rent board.

In the past year, their main priorities have been rent control, just cause, and anti-harassment.  Also in the past year, the organization has worked with residents and kids to design their own parks using Prop 68 funding, and are in the middle of an 8-year campaign to pass rent control and just cause in Concord.

Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) the Bay

works to improve restaurant workers’ lives by building worker power and uniting workers of various backgrounds around shared goals and values. It is an Oakland-based food-service workers’ rights organization building a future with higher wages, better working conditions, and greater equity in the Bay Area.

Its work is anchored by advocacy that helps restaurant workers advocate for rights in the workplace; policy efforts to create an equitable restaurant industry; and education programs that provide restaurant workers with skills trainings and political education. Its CHOW (COLORS Hospitality Opportunities for Workers) Institute provides in-depth and advanced professional training in both front- and back-of-the-house restaurant skills at no cost to either employers or employees.

In 2023, ROC crafted the Restaurant Worker Bill of Rights and succeeded in getting it introduced in Congress. In Oakland, thanks to the work of ROC the Bay as a part of the Lift Up Oakland Coalition, Oakland minimum wage workers received a raise on January 1, 2023, to $15.97 per hour. The organization also hosted multiple classes and know-your-rights workshops throughout the year. 

Roots Community Health Center uplifts those impacted by systemic inequities and poverty through medical and behavioral health care; health navigation; workforce enterprises; housing; outreach; and advocacy. It provides services in Oakland, Alameda, Berkeley, and San Jose.

As part of the Rise East group, Roots Community Health Center has collaboratively raised approximately $26 million for East Oakland revitalization projects. In 2023, they opened Glow360 Candles, a soap and candle-making social enterprise that provides good jobs in East Oakland. Roots also expanded their advocacy work by filing a lawsuit against Pulse Oximiter manufacturers over inaccurate readings for people with darker skin. They continued hosting health-focused community events in Oakland, including Black Breastfeeding Week in Oakland and the Back to School Resource Fair. 

In 2023, Roots provided 11,526 medical visits for adults and children; distributed 10,650 COVID test kids; conducted 11,304 health navigation/barrier removal visits; and served 5,614 clients through pop-up food markets. They continue to provide reliable, consistent community health updates through their weekly People’s Health Briefing series, a component of the Trusted Voices Campaign, livestreamed every week.

RYSE is a movement led by young people that ensures dignity for youth, their families, and their communities. RYSE programs focus on equity within education and justice systems; youth organizing and leadership development; community health and healing; and expressive media, arts, and culture. It provides services in Richmond.

Their work envisions strong, healthy, united communities where equity is the norm, and violence is neither desired nor required, creating a strong foundation for future generations to thrive — a time and place where youth have opportunities to lead, to dream, and to love.

In 2023, RYSE completed the RYSE Commons Campus as a new and expanded space for young people in Richmond. The campus is a hub for healing, personal development, play, expression, incubating ideas, performances, art, launching businesses, exploring technology, and connecting with universities and partners. The Health Justice Center was completed shortly afterwards, creating a liberatory healthcare center that offers health and health justice services to community members. 

In addition to completing construction of RYSE Commons, the organization continued leading Contra Costa’s Restorative Justice Diversion program for youth, held youth-led arts-based healing workshops for teachers, and launched RYSE’s first Summer Youth Policy Institute. RYSE also partnered in the community-led creation of the first Contra Costa County Office of Racial Equity and Social Justice. 

Safe Return Project is invested in building a powerful base of formerly incarcerated people at the political, social, and economic levels locally in Contra Costa and across the state of California to address the root causes of poverty and the impacts of the criminal justice system on Black people and communities of color.

In 2023, Safe Return Project launched the Latinx Young Men’s Support Group and Sister Circle Support Group in Contra Costa County. Together with the community, Safe Return rallied against racism in the Antioch police department and successfully raised awareness of a longstanding pattern of racism and abuse. 

At the statewide level, with the support of community canvassing, Safe Return won the historic AB28 gun safety legislation package; won AB1418 to make “crime-free” housing laws unenforceable; and won AB 1226 to help incarcerated parents maintain contact with their kids.

In the past year, the organization celebrated its 6th cohort of the Richard Boyd Fellowship, a program that focuses on healing from the trauma caused by incarceration and supports fellows in getting involved in the organization’s mission.

Sogorea Te’ Land Trust is an urban Indigenous women-led land trust based in the San Francisco Bay Area that facilitates the return of Indigenous land to Indigenous people through the practices of rematriation (to restore a people to their rightful place in sacred relationship with their ancestral land), cultural revitalization, and land restoration. Sogorea Te’ owns and stewards agricultural land, parks, open space, and ceremonial territories in Alameda and Contra Costa counties. 

In 2023, Sogorea Te’ Land Trust partnered with Movement Generation to return 43 acres of land to Indigenous care in the unceded Bay Miwok territory of the East Bay Area. They also worked to pass the Rinihmu Resolution through the Oakland City Council, which supports Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and amends the memorandum of agreement (MOA) at Rinihmu Pulte-irekne, the land return in Joaquin Miller Park. While access to the land formerly known as Sequoia Point was returned through a cultural easement, many of the Trust’s activities are restricted by the zoning of the area, making the Rinihmu Resolution key to moving forward. 

Recently, Sogorea Te’ Land Trust and Eden Housing announced the return of three acres of land along the San Lorenzo Creek in Castro Valley to its ancestral caretakers. Sogorea Te’ Land Trust also celebrated the return of the West Berkeley Shellmound Sacred Site to Indigenous hands. The Shellmound is a registered historic landmark that was named as one of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places by the National Trust for Historic Preservation after development plans threatened its destruction. 

Finally, Sogorea Te’ Land Trust also partnered this year with K-12 educators within Alameda, Contra Costa, Solano, Napa and San Joaquin Counties to create the Lisjan Nation Curriculum Collective. 

Sustainable Economies Law Center (SELC) provides direct legal support to cooperatives and other social enterprises; trains and supports lawyers and other legal workers; produces legal guides, resource libraries, and sample documents to make laws that impact economic justice and worker ownership more accessible to communities; and spearheads policy campaigns to remove barriers for worker-owned cooperatives.

SELC recently launched a new website: http://co-oplaw.org, a free legal resource library supporting democratic, worker-owned businesses and the people who run them. 

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The Hannah Project Partnership for Academic Achievement is a community-based education and cultural organization which seeks to build community and promote the value of achievement among low-income Black and Latinx youth and their families.

The organization’s inclusive and culturally focused programming is intentionally designed to build the capacity and confidence of students and their families to achieve their dreams and be actively engaged in their communities. They promote youth development and education through academic support, college access scholarships, and leadership and mentorship programs for middle and high school students; they facilitate summer reading retention through the Hannah Freedom School, a full day summer literacy program for third through eighth grade students. As a convener, they also inform and amplify the voice of parents and other constituents to be effective advocates for their children and for school transformation. The organization also invests in changing the face of teachers and administrators through their Teacher of Color Pipeline, which focuses on identifying and developing new teacher prospects.  

The Hidden Genius Project trains and mentors Black male youth in technology creation, entrepreneurship, and leadership skills to transform their lives and communities. Services are provided in Oakland.

Hidden Genius was founded in 2012 by five Black male entrepreneurs/technologists who were concerned with the dramatic juxtaposition between the high unemployment of Black male youth and the plethora of career opportunities within the local technology sector. The organization works to connect young Black men with the skills, mentors, and experiences they need to become high-performing entrepreneurs and technologists in a 21st century global economy.

This year, the Hidden Genius Project hosted 2023 Brothers Code in Chicago, a groundbreaking convening teaching youth about AI, ChatGPT, robotics, and more. They launched the fourth cohort of Genius Founders in their Alumni Venture Seed Fund, and their team returned to London in 2023 to host Tech Slam UK programs for the third time. The Project opened their Ubuntu Center, a teen tech center in Oakland, and partnered with RYSE Village to host programming. Their 15 month Intensive Immersion program continues to expand, serving youth in Oakland; Richmond, CA; Los Angeles; Atlanta; Chicago; and Detroit. The organization also laid the groundwork to expand to Baltimore in spring of 2024. 

Uptima Entrepreneur Cooperative provides holistic and culturally relevant education, advising, and community to support diverse entrepreneurs in creating thriving businesses in service to their communities. They have supported more than 700 individuals to start, plan, grow, fund, lead, and keep their businesses in their communities, including cooperatives and coop conversions

Over the past year, Uptima’s East Bay work included business advising for REAL People’s Fund’s entrepreneurs, Business Academy for small businesses and cooperatives in the East Bay that is currently in the process of getting approved as an institute of higher education with the California Bureau of Private Postsecondary Education, SCALE Network (collaboration with CAMEO and CalOSBA), and a new partnership with Antioch Business Resource Collaborative.