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The
Community Organizing Toolbox
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CASE STUDY #8: THE JAMES IRVINE FOUNDATION
Foundation Funding of CO: How the James Irvine Foundation helped to form a California group dedicated to naturalization and civic participation.
In 1996, the James Irvine Foundation targeted California's Central Valley as a place of particular need. Known as America's breadbasket, the Valley is the richest region of agriculture production in the history of the world. It is also home to many of the state's poorest residents, large numbers of whom are unnaturalized legal permanent residents. The Valley leads the state in unemployment rates, which have hovered nearly 50 percent higher than the state average since the 1970s. By focusing significant grantmaking on the Valley, the Foundation acknowledged that the region has been underserved by philanthropy.
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Central Valley Partnership For Citizenship The Partnership's work centers on citizenship - assisting newcomers to learn English and naturalize by means of experiential curricula in civic engagement. As complementary aspects of the overall Partnership strategy, member groups prioritized strengthening nonprofit leadership in the Valley and addressing public policy concerns. The partners have:
Larry Ferlazzo, executive director of Sacramento Valley Organizing Community, a strong CO group that is affiliated with the IAF, is one of the key leaders involved in the Partnership. He believes that it offers far more than the sum of its parts: We're an organizing group, not a naturalization organization. But because of the Partnership we now have the technical resources to effectively assist people to become naturalized. Other groups that are tremendously proficient at naturalization are learning from us about civic participation. |
Rather than devising an "innovative" grants initiative from outside the Valley, the Irvine Foundation regularly convened representatives of prominent community organizations inside the Valley. Many - including lead staff from several CO groups - had never met each other before. After many meetings, as a degree of trust developed among them, they found that they were pursuing similar goals and that they had much to learn from one another. Working together, the Foundation and the organizations formed the Central Valley Partnership for Citizenship - a "learning collaborative" with a common purpose: to build throughout the Central Valley voluntary, self-perpetuating capacity for naturalization and full civic participation.
The partners meet quarterly to teach one another, coordinate efforts and conduct joint campaigns. A faculty member from the University of California at Davis serves as the group's "learning coach." A communications consultant is helping the partners use video in outreach, training and documentation. A technology specialist assists in upgrading the computer systems of member groups, who are now using e-mail and a common Web site to improve their communications across the far reaches of the Valley.
The Irvine Foundation provides core support for each partner organization and works strategically with them. It takes a seat at the Partnership table, but makes very clear that the community organizations are the key to the Partnership's success.
Craig McGarvey, the Irvine Foundation's program director responsible for the Partnership strategy, is very clear about the value of this collaborative work and of the importance of CO in building community. McGarvey believes that CO is synonymous with "experiential, community-based, adult education in democratic participation." He believes that CO, seen in this light, is the essential life-blood of achieving and sustaining healthy communities.
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More Lessons for Funders New to CO In the past, CO funders have met with organizers and others to discuss funding needs for the entire CO field or for CO in their particular regions. Proceedings and other information about some of these gatherings are available from the grantmakers involved.55 Occasionally funders and organizers have formed partnerships to jointly plan and carry out activities designed to attract increased resources for CO. These partnerships may hold important lessons for funders new to CO. NFG staff and leadership can provide helpful information on these partnerships.56 |
McGarvey says that, "Only collective community problem-solving can lead to positive and needed change. People come together, often guided by a community organizer, to identify issues important to the quality of life in their communities, to make and implement plans for improvement. Through this shared experience, they develop skills, knowledge, attitudes and relationships. These are the building blocks of community. ... The organizer is a lead educator, not teaching at the front of a classroom but behaving in such a way that others are encouraged to take responsibility to learn. The learners encourage others to learn." The Partnership stresses:
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54 Drawn from the James Irvine Foundation's 1998 Annual Report and a forthcoming paper written by Craig McGarvey.
55 Over the past decade or so, the following grantmakers are among those who have convened or participated in meetings to discuss funding needs of the CO field: Ford, James C. Irvine, San Francisco, Surdna, New York, New World, Unitarian Universalist Veach Program at Shelter Rock, Public Welfare, Jewish Fund for Justice, Charles Stewart Mott, and many others, as well as the Neighborhood Funders Group and the National Network of Grantmakers.
56 Two of these currently operating are: an effort coordinated by the Southern Empowerment Project (SEP) in Tennessee that involves numerous CO groups and several foundations; and an effort sponsored by the French American Charitable Trust with its ten anchor groups.