Mitchell Kapor Foundation Weblog

If you haven’t already, it’s not too late to send in your census form and it’s not too late to remind your friends and family to do the same.

Do you already know how important it is for people of color and low-income communities to send back their census forms, but still need some talking points to convince everyone around you? Check-out Color of Change’s census website, www.colorofchange.org/census, to find out how much money each filled out and returned census form is worth to your community (for even more Census numbers, visit the Brookings Institution online).

Want to know what percentage of households where you live have already mailed back a form? See how your neighborhood, and every neighborhood in the United States, is doing at  www.CensusHardToCountMaps.org (courtesy of the Funders Census Initiative, CUNY and our colleagues at the Hagedorn Foundation) or 2010.census.gov/2010census/take10map/ (courtesy of the Census Bureau).

You only get one chance every ten years, so … fill it out, spread the word, claim the money, and build political power in your community!

Local update: Oakland physically divided in Census returns | National update: For all things census, see Terri Ann Lowenthal’s important, informative and entertaining Census Project Blog. And, the Ford Foundation’s Funder Census Toolkit.

I’m sure you’ve all read the articles, seen a bit of the video footage, or caught a blog or two on the linkage between racism and reform on the heels of the passage of the Health Care Bill last week. The shift from accusing President Obama of not being a U.S. citizen and forcing Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor to publicly apologize for describing herself as a “wise Latina” to spitting on Representative Emanuel Cleaver and screaming the ‘n-word’ at Representative John Lewis was seamless and to be expected. This hatred has been fostered and fomented by leaders in the Republican party, encouraged by the non-stop media coverage from all ends of the political spectrum, and driven by a fearful white mass who is nervous about the changing demographics in their communities.

Along with these clear links between Racism & Political Reform, this moment is also a clear example of the difference between the Law and Justice. I urge you to consider the following questions:

• What would happen if it were Black, Latino, Arab, Native American or Asian protesters waving guns at political events, spitting on elected officials, or yelling slurs at Representatives?
• What would happen if it were Black, Latino, Arab, Native American, or Asian elected officials screaming “No You Can’t”, “Liar”, or “Baby Killer” to their colleagues in public debate?
• What would happen if it were a Black, Latino, Arab, Native American, or Asian publicly stating their desire to kill the president?

You could be assured if any of the above scenarios was the case, the perpetrators would be incarcerated, ostracized, and placed on the fridge of public debate as opposed to the center. The law in the above cases would work to it’s fullest extent, but as the perpetrators of the crimes are white the threats and acts of extreme violence are transformed from ‘terrorist’ to ‘minor threats’. For example, the longest charge for plotting and publicly threatening to kill President Obama was one month. Justice would insure equal protection and punishment, but this debate about race and reform reveals that the Law is far from anything equal.

Almost four years after Measure O was passed by 69% of voters, Oakland will begin to use instant runoff voting (IRV) for the city’s mayoral and council elections  this November.   We expect the move to strengthen democratic participation in Oakland elections by eliminating the need for June primaries, when voter participation rates, particularly among people of color and youth, have been as low as 15%.

Instant runoff voting is a voting system where voters rank candidates in order of preference, eliminating the need for separate runoff elections when one candidate does not reach a 50% threshold.  As FairVote explains, “instant runoff voting elects candidates who have majority support, accommodates voters having better choices (alleviating concerns about the dreaded ’spoiler effect’) and encourages winning candidates to reach out to more people.”  (See a video demonstration below.)

After successfully campaigning for IRV’s implementation in Oakland, one of our key partner organizations, Oakland Rising, and its four organizational members, APEN, EBASE, the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, and Causa Justa :: Just Cause, will be contacting over 20,000 voters to explain how IRV works in the lead-up to the November elections. As Oakland Rising Executive Director Esperanza Tervalon-Daumont testified before City Council’s 6-2 vote in favor of moving forward with IRV, “We will make sure that Oakland voters know what to do when they step into the voting booth on November, 2010.  Oakland Rising is ready.”

For us, the story of how Oakland adopts instant runoff voting and the impact it will have is one strong example of how election reform and community-based organizing strategies work together to ensure, as the Foundation’s wesbite reads, “that people of color are fully and proportionately engaged in civic processes (organizing and voting) that impact the creation of public policy, and that the integrity of the election systems that we use to select public sector policymakers are robust and trustworthy.”

For our funder colleagues interested in learning more about this area of work, join the Funders’ Committee for Civic Participation this Monday for their April First Monday Call, Election Reform as a Strategy for Building Power in Communities of Color.

We’ve just completed a process to identify new key partner organizations. And while the bulk of our funding will support this cohort, I want to reiterate to the broader community that we are still able to consider quarterly grant requests for special opportunities and efforts like convenings and tech-related work.

If you’re interested in learning more, please feel free to check out our regularly-updated guidelines (or keep reading the blog) and contact us to discuss your ideas.

Just got word from Dion Ward at Northern California Grantmakers that the Kapor Foundation was mentioned (among others) in today’s Chronicle of Philanthropy for supporting Census outreach efforts.

In the coming weeks we hope to sponsor a funder briefing with NCG on the Census. Stay tuned for that announcement. Meanwhile, I’m glad the buzz is growing around the importance of the Census (I saw four different messages on BET this past weekend), and glad we could add our voices to the mix!

Yesterday I heard a terrific briefing at the Haas Jr. Foundation (Thanks Cathy and Ted!) on the California redistricting process, which stands to be a great experiment in participatory democracy or  a hugely controversial process stunted by our national polarity. Or maybe some of both.

The San Francisco Chronicle recently ran a front-page article describing the process and the need for a pool of candidates who reflect the diversity of our state. The article drove me to look closer at the selection process for the California Redistricting Commission, which will be comprised of 14 citizen applicants, some randomly selected and others not. Criticisms of the lopsided applicant pool notwithstanding, the selection process alone promises to be thrilling, kind of like a civic lottery. I even checked out the application, which is due on Friday, February 12th. There has been a last minute push to spread the word to communities of color; I even received a video message in my personal email from the Northern California district director of my fraternity encouraging brothers to consider applying if we met certain eligibility criteria required by Proposition 11, which was passed by voters in 2008 to create the commission:

• Are a registered voter and have voted in at least two of the last three general elections.
• Have had consistent voter affiliation for five years.
• Had no conflicts of interest as outlined here.

If you, dear California voter, meet these criteria and are interested in participating in a process that will shape the immediate electoral future of our state, you have a week to get your name in the hat!

Happy New Year everybody! Like many others, I’m glad to see the dawn of a new decade.

There are many things that I thought I’d never see happen, or that I’d be quite elderly before they did. Aside from the obvious and much-talked about one, I also never envisioned gay marriage being legal (although in precious few places, but still…). And as a native North Carolinian, I never thought I’d see the day when smoking was banned in public places in my home state.

During my childhood, tobacco was king. My high school is named after a tobacco baron. My grandfather, uncles, cousins, and stepfather all worked in the local tobacco company. It was steady agri-industrial work for high school grads with limited opportunities in the newly integrated/de facto segregated south.  I spent a summer sweeping the floors of a cigarette factory after my first year of college. And one of the nation’s fiercest basketball rivalries (go ‘heels!) plays out along the folksy-named Tobacco Road.

While North Carolina started to diversify its economic offerings in the 1980s, the tobacco industry still exerts a strong presence in the state. So imagine my surprise when I saw that, as of the beginning of this year, North Carolina restaurants and bars can no longer allow smoking (California fully enacted similar legislation in 1998).

This was a nice affirmation that change does come. And to paraphrase my grandmother, it “may not come when you want it, but it’s always right on time.” Let’s keep that in mind as we continue to work for equity, justice, and access during the coming year.

Just returned from a full week on the East Coast, where I experienced weather-related lows and highs (24F in Washington and 86F in Miami) and attended two mightily impactful meetings.

The Funders Committee for Civic Participation winter convening was chock full o’ learning and strategizing opportunities. Yours truly had the honor and pleasure of not only attending my first meeting as a newly-elected member of the Steering Committee, but also chatting with Lani Guinier, our keynote speaker. Professor Guinier, now serving on the faculty of Harvard Law School, is a prolific academic and author. She is perhaps best (and unfortunately) known for being thrown under the bus by a panicky first-term Bill Clinton during hearings about her nomination as Assistant Attorney General.

Professor Guinier continues to challenge traditional thinking about race and power in the U.S. She spoke with this rapt audience about the “electocracy” and questioned whether our current electoral system truly allows for representation. Actually, it wasn’t that simple; her assertion is that there are precious few spaces for public discourse around determining policy issues. She cited promising examples in Porto Alegre, Brazil, and domestically, in Chicago with a collective budgeting process (and thanks, Professor, for emailing me the article!).

FCCP participants also heard and discussed much new information about a precipitous drop-off in potential participation in the mid-term elections. Many voters who were energized by last year’s presidential elections are turned off, burnt out, or simply not motivated to vote in 2010. A similar civic burnout may also hamper participation in the dicennial census, due to kick off in March. Both of these events – elections and the census – have huge implications for communities across the nation – redistricting and reapportionment of Congressional seats, budget allocations according to population shifts, governor-ships, and the President’s policy agenda.

Just when I thought we might have a little respite, 2010 promises to be a tough year. Kudos to FCCP for yet another stellar meeting of the minds. These opportunities for funders synch up are always valuable and serve our individual and collective work well.

I also had the great pleasure of attending the “Transformational Leadership Retreat” sponsored by the Open Society Institute and the Knight Foundation in Miami. Organized by and for OSI’s Campaign for Black Male Achievement grant recipient organizations, this three-day convening provided a forum for networking, reflecting, and most importantly, galvanizing around a common agenda for promoting efficient and effective work with black men and boys in programs throughout the nation.

After dodging a contamination scare, and without betraying any confidences from the conversation circle, I found it liberating to finally break the unspoken tension around the role of gender equity and inclusion in this work – namely, how do we appropriately and respectfully include women in this male-focused work? While we collectively recognize the importance of focusing on this very “endangered” demographic group, we also need to develop an appropriate gender lens – what do we mean, exactly, when we talk about “manhood”?

While the discussion was impassioned and even tense, it was a very necessary bridge to cross as we try to work together as a community to ensure better pathways and futures for young black men and their families, neigbhorhoods, and greater communities.

All in all, the trip was simultaneously terrific and sobering. And I got to wear shorts and a pea coat in the same week.

Over the past week, a few job announcements have come into my mailbox. Thought I’d compile distribute them. Please send broadly to those who might be qualified. I’m especially interested in promoting the ED position at our sister organization, Level Playing Field Institute. Let’s find some great people for these organizations and efforts!

Level Playing Field Institute: Executive Director;  Education Programs Associate

Women’s Foundation of California: Development and Communications Director

Community Housing Partnership: Executive Director