By Brittany Owens, Jennifer Olney, and Emily Davis
The Greater Washington Community Foundation has long been committed to centering equity and inclusion in our work to build thriving communities. As we embark on our new strategic vision with a focus on advancing economic justice, we are building on a rich history of social justice grantmaking and community leadership initiatives as we reaffirm our institutional commitment to racial equity and inclusion.
Racial Equity and Inclusion Within Our Organization
Before The Community Foundation even began developing its new strategic plan – and even before COVID-19 illuminated the racial inequities in the Greater Washington region and across the country – our staff had started on a learning journey during the summer of 2020. Team members gathered over lunch to hear each other’s personal experiences and learn more about systemic and historical racial inequity through pieces like The Case for Reparations, by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
These initial informal conversations led to the formal creation of a Racial Equity and Inclusion (REI) Workgroup composed of staff members from each team in the organization. The REI Workgroup’s ambition is to make sure our staff have the same baseline understanding and can be more immersed in the history of systemic racism that has shaped our society. In early 2021, the REI Workgroup partnered with Association of Black Foundation Executives (ABFE) to facilitate a months-long multi-day series of trainings for all staff about systemic racism and policies, and later to introduce our staff to assessment tools to help shape our processes, policies, and procedures through an REI lens.
Since those workshops and learning sessions, our internal teams have worked together to ensure we continue to uplift BIPOC voices and experiences through all that we do. We have used what we learned from these trainings to revisit our internal processes and institutional infrastructure to make sure they reflect our values for racial equity in pay, voice, contracting, hiring, governance, and in our grantmaking process. For example, our Operations and Finance teams worked to develop a vendor selection policy that prioritizes BIPOC vendors for various aspects of our work - from consultants to catering, and much more.
Prioritizing Racial Equity and Inclusion Within The Broader Community
We also seek to center racial equity at The Community Foundation by actively engaging people and communities most impacted, particularly as we pursue solutions and investments. This includes more intentionally directing investments towards BIPOC-led nonprofits and BIPOC individuals and communities.
To implement REI in our grantmaking, our internal REI Workgroup and Community Investment Team researched best practices for grantmaking with a REI lens. We decided to ask all applicants to provide data showing the racial/ethnic composition of the organization’s management staff, other staff, and board members. We also want to know whether or not the organization’s management, staff, or board are majority people of color – and if not, what are their plans to increase the number of people of color in leadership positions. In addition, we are encouraging applicants to share the work they are doing to close the racial wealth gap, so we can understand the scope and scale of efforts happening across the region and where we might play a role.
Finally, during the pandemic we adopted several Trust Based Philanthropy practices to provide our nonprofit partners with much needed flexibility and to ease the administrative burden on them. We’ve decided to make several changes permanent – including simplifying reporting requirements and offering more multi-year grant opportunities – as we continue to move toward adopting a Trust Based Philanthropy model that helps to “advance equity, shift power, and build mutually accountable relationships.”
Our Commitment to Racial Equity and Inclusion Moving Forward
REI is central to our work and our values at The Community Foundation. By sharing our REI Journey, we hope that it will inspire and offer some lessons learned to other organizations as they continue to invest in REI efforts internally and externally. This is a work in progress, but our commitment to this work remains steadfast.
For more information about our commitment to Racial Equity and Inclusion, read our 10-year Strategic Plan!