Join the grassroots movement for social justice in Hawaiʻi!

Support social change from the roots up!

As the inimitable Zora Neale Hurston wrote, "There are years that ask questions and years that answer." 2020 asked a lot of each of us - What kind of nation are we? What does the path forward look like? How can we care for each other? I am moved to share that 2021 has offered hopeful answers.

In January, I joined the Hawaiʻi People's Fund's inaugural Giving Project cohort, a hui of twenty multiracial, multigenerational, gender-diverse, cross-class community members who share a vision for a more just and equitable Hawaiʻi.

As a collective, we are on a 6-month journey of learning, connecting with community-embedded groups, and fundraising $100,000 that we will redistribute back to grassroots organizations fighting for social justice across movement areas (while learning from and leveraging HPF's 50-year history of activist-led grantmaking expertise).

I am humbly asking that you join and support me on this journey by donating $25, $50, $100, or any amount that feels right for you!

• If 32 people donate $25, we'll meet this goal!
• If 16 people donate $50, we'll meet this goal!
• If 8 people donate $100, we'll meet this goal!

UPDATE: STRETCH GOAL IS NOW $3,500 — I chose to raise $2,021 from my personal network for two reasons: to match my own meaningful contribution amount and to honor the hope I feel for this and coming years.

The funds we raise will be matched TWENTY TIMES OVER by my fellow Giving Project hui members' own fundraising efforts and will be used (by those very same hui members and me) to make grants that shift community funds directly to community movements.

This collective giving is a powerful way to shift $ toward local social justice, food security, mental health, storytelling, cultural perpetuation and preservation, worker organizing, land back movements, and so much more. HPF's grantees are embedded/beloved in the communities in which they work (because they ARE community). Your kōkua can help ensure that these grassroots orgs have the resources they need to continue their important work.

You can read more about the Hawaiʻi People's Fund, what we weʻre up to, and all of HPF's grantees at the linked sites. Please feel free to reach out directly with any questions or to get more deeply involved!

+++

Sample HPF grantees include:

ʻAha Wāhine Kūhinapapa: ʻAha Wāhine Kūhinapapa: gathers wahine to inspire, inquire, invest, and invigorate each other with ʻike, aloha, and kuleana. Formed in 2011 in response to numerous inquiries from Hawaiian women seeking knowledge and opportunities for personal and professional development, they partner with indigenous businesses and organizations that elevate the status of wāhine, have environmentally friendly policies and practices, and are fair and charitable within their communities

Hawai‘i Women in Filmmaking: Hawaiʻi Women in Filmmaking is a feminist nonprofit organization committed to achieving intersectional gender equity in filmmaking. They are a creative and safe space where film and media-makers connect, create, mentor, and inspire current and future generations of women to explore and pursue careers in the field of filmmaking. The program provides a platform for young women to tell their stories and be agents of social change through film.

Native Stories: Native Stories is a non-profit audio content platform and production house focused on providing access to authentic stories and experiences – of its people, place, perspective, history and culture – in service to those that came before us and the understanding of life that should be passed down through generations and around the world. It provides access to outside and in-house produced content through a mobile app and website.

The Pōpolo Project: The Pōpolo Project is a Hawai‘i-based nonprofit organization that redefines what it means to be Black in Hawai‘i and in the world through cultivating radical reconnection to ourselves, our community, our ancestors, and the land, changing what we commonly think of as Local and highlighting the vivid, complex diversity of Blackness.