Belonging in Oakland: A Just City Cultural Fund

Deadline: 13-Jul-20

Belonging in Oakland: A Just City Cultural Fund is a new multi-year program that will fund Oakland cultural practitioners of color to radically reimagine a racially just city.

In Year One of the program, Reflect & Reimagine grants will support breathing space and idea generation for what a just Oakland could look like, feel like, and be.

The Fund is a unique public-private partnership inspired by the values lifted up in the City of Oakland’s cultural plan, Belonging in Oakland. The partnership brings together the cultural equity vision of Oakland’s Cultural Affairs Division, the racial justice mission of the Akonadi Foundation, and the power building commitment of East Bay Community Foundation (EBCF).

About the Fund

The COVID-19 pandemic has given rise to unprecedented challenges and has laid bare longstanding structural inequities of the society – evidenced in the repeated targeting of Black lives by state-sanctioned power, the continued invisibilizing of indigenous peoples, and the dehumanization of undocumented workers. They acknowledge the extraordinary circumstances that the cultural sector of communities of color are facing and recognize that undermining the culture of a people is an attack on their very being. They believe that lifting up the cultural imaginations of the Black/Indigenous/People of Color communities will create the visions that the society so deeply needs.

In its first year, this program will offer Reflect & Reimagine grants to support the sector as it navigates these uncertain waters and dreams of the tools, methods, and solutions not only for keeping the most vulnerable communities afloat, but visions for their ability to thrive.

Year One: Twelve Reflect & Reimagine grants of $25,000 will be awarded in this round.
For Years Two and Three, the Fund will seek applications for the implementation of communitycentered cultural projects that amplify the voices of people most impacted by systemic racism and inequality. Though Year One grants may help to strengthen applications for Year Two and Year Three implementation grants, applicants need not have received a Year One grant to be eligible to apply in later years.
Funding Match Requirement: There is no funding match requirement for this grant.
Peer Learning: Awardees will be invited to participate in peer sharing and learning activities. (Frequency and content will be determined by the cohort of awardees in collaboration with the Fund leadership team.)
Project Requirement: At the end of the grant period, awardees are to submit a work in their preferred medium or a written piece that expresses or explains their idea for a radically imagined, racially just Oakland related to the community they are rooted in.

Eligibility Criteria

The purpose of the program is to support cultural practitioners of color to creatively reimagine Oakland as a truly racially just and culturally equitable city. The Fund acknowledges and values the complexity of intersectional experiences of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, ability, faith, class, and other identities and encourages projects that honor these complexities as assets for a just Oakland.
Applicants must be:
- a cultural practitioner of color who is based in and rooted in Oakland
- a group/collective of cultural practitioners led by people of color based and rooted in Oakland
- an Oakland-based cultural organization led by people of color AND must have
- 501(c)(3) nonprofit status, or
- a mission-aligned 501(c)(3) fiscal sponsor.
Groups/collectives of cultural practitioners may include non-Oakland-based members, but must be led by Oaklanders; and may not be exclusively made up of people of color, but must be led by people of color.
501(c)(3) fiscal sponsors are not required to be led by people of color nor does it have to be located in Oakland.
If awarded a grant, the fiscal sponsor of a project must be prepared to submit a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that outlines the mutual obligations of the fiscal sponsor and the person or entity it is sponsoring.