Power Station

At a time of profound turmoil in America community-based and national nonprofits are demanding big bold social change. Progressive nonprofits are the frontline of movements with the capacity to remake inequitable systems affecting the environment, health care, housing and immigration. This is consequential culture-shifting work and nonprofits need infrastructure and staffing that is commensurate to the challenge. Linda Nguyen launched Movement Talent to position social change work for success by connecting the right people to the right organizations. She draws from her considerable experience in recruiting, sustaining and developing staff at Community Change and leverages her relationships with movement organizations. Linda has an ambitious goal, viewing candidates beyond their fit for a particular group. She looks at the potential of each candidate to staff a high-capacity movement for change. And she is placing staff into many organizational roles because it takes more than a great executive director to mak

In 1964, the US Supreme Court ruled on a lawsuit challenging how electoral districts were drawn and political representation was apportioned. Such cases were inevitable as people moved from urban to rural areas and new immigrant populations settled into both. The Supreme Court ruled that electoral districts of state legislative chambers must be of roughly the same population providing for a one person one vote rule. Redistricting is the process of redrawing district lines based on the most current data from the Decennial Census. When it is politicized, the outcome is gerrymandered districts that favor one group at the expense of another. At California Common Cause, Jonathan Mehta Stein leads a statewide effort to democratize the redistricting process with the participation of those who have the most at stake. He credits Kathay Feng, whose successful ballot initiative enshrined community-based redistricting into California law. Jonathan views redistricting as one critical way to strengthen our political instit

The current assault on voting rights in America is both predictable and shocking. We saw it in full force during the 2020 presidential election when then President Trump’s appointee Postmaster General Louis DeJoy stripped mailboxes and “lost” ballots in targeted areas. Right now, state legislatures are devising new maneuvers to subvert the ability to vote by people of color. They include almost insurmountable barriers to the ballot box, from requiring copies of ID with requests for a mail-in ballot to banning the distribution of food and water for weary voters at voting sites. National nonprofits are rising to this historic occasion, challenging these punitive measures in courts and advocating for passage in the US Senate of the John Lewis Voting Rights Act. And new strategies are evolving and operationalizing. In this episode, Leigh Chapman, a lawyer who has been on the frontlines of these legal challenges and national campaigns, now goes deeper as the executive director of Deliver My Vote. Leigh breaks down

Sometimes an image is so powerful it breaks through political rhetoric, media noise and sears into the soul. A recent video of Afghani children being foisted over the Kabul airport wall and into the arms of American soldiers resonates in this way. What we don’t see is the organized process underway by Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services (LIRS) to help Afghans who supported the U.S. Military as translators, drivers and guards, flee Afghanistan and resettle in America. LIRS has been at the forefront of this work for 80 years and is now mobilizing a network of churches, nonprofits and volunteers to welcome these families. CEO Krish O’Mara Vignarajah knows that in these divisive times even resettlement work will be politicized, and Afghan families will be demonized. And LIRS not only resettles families it advocates in Congress for immigration policies that are long overdue. Having lived the refugee experience and served at the highest levels of the State Department during the Obama Administration she is com

Bright Beginnings is so much more than a beautiful and inviting space for a first-rate day care center. It is a nonprofit organization founded 30 years ago to provide evidence-based education, therapeutic and social services to children and parents who are experiencing homelessness. And it is based in Washington DC’s Ward 8, an historically Black and underinvested community that is now leading its own renaissance. Dr. Marla Dean, an exceptional educator, leads Bright Beginnings with a two-generation approach to breaking the cycle of poverty. It starts with caring for children from birth to 5 years old in ways that enable them to meet developmental milestones in a safe environment. The care extends to parents, giving them specialized support and resources. You can imagine how essential this connection is when parents, largely women, are raising children while homeless. Now they are working in frontline jobs, from hospitals to grocery stores during a pandemic. Dr. Dean and her team are also policy advocates, wo

Over a long political life, Edward Roybal was true to a consistent theme. He fought for the material needs and civil rights of Latinos, both new immigrants and those with deep generational roots in the United States. When he was elected to Congress in 1963 he committed to making Latinos a force in the American political landscape. In 1976 Rep. Roybal founded the National Association for Latino Appointed and Elected Officials (NALEO), creating the infrastructure needed to spur community activism and support a new generation of civic leaders. This work, now led by NALEO’s esteemed CEO Arturo Vargas is more relevant than ever. At a time in which, as Arturo explains, our democracy is most fragile, Latinos need to be heard and counted. And no political party should assume their allegiance because Latino voters are consequential on both sides of the aisle. NALEO is unique in the civil rights eco-system for its dedication to Latinos at all levels of public service. And Arturo Vargas is uniquely suited to lead this c

The human brain, as Rinku Sen explains, loves and is even addicted to stories. A highly respected author, organizer, and political strategist driven to achieve racial and gender justice, Rinku has amplified the stories of many people whose voices are rarely heard, or communities fully represented in mainstream media. Now, as executive director of Narrative Initiative, Rinku is transforming the ways in which nonprofits communicate their stories to policymakers and the press. The work goes deeper than positioning organizations to be heard. Rinku and her team are a singular resource for nonprofits that are motivated to expand beyond strategic communications-the practice of setting short term policy goals supported by an organizing campaign and the communications strategy needed to advance it. They are experts in developing narratives that appeal not to supporters but to those whose minds must evolve to make big social change possible. It is a bold, ambitious and long overdue agenda. As America’s history with sla

Thirty years ago, six parishes in Chicago came together with a shared mission. They resolved to do more than pray about conditions that overwhelmed local neighborhoods, from drugs and crime to a lack of jobs and housing. Each parish donated $5,000 to jumpstart a safety-focused organizing campaign. They could not have foreseen that their investment would evolve into The Resurrection Project, a powerhouse nonprofit whose template for community development is based in putting faith and values into action. While the Resurrection Project has generated over half a billion dollars into neglected neighborhoods, from affordable housing to childcare centers, homeownership and leadership training, its success is measured in the relationships it fosters. Raul Raymundo, who stepped up to lead that campaign is now CEO of the Resurrection Project and he leads with singular purpose. He learned activism from his mother and maintains a faith, not only in his church but in his fellow Mexican Americans who have enriched Chicago

What do you think about when you see abandoned buildings and overgrown plots of vacant land? More importantly, how do you feel if they are fixtures in your own community? Dr. Akilah Watkins, CEO of the Center for Community Progress, sees the physical manifestation of housing segregation, disinvestment and other federal policies that have generated a devastating wealth gap in Black and Brown communities. And she has felt the despair those conditions evoke in people who experience them every day. Akilah envisions a better future for communities when deteriorated spaces are transformed into vital community assets. Her team is highly skilled in community organizing, real estate financing, land banking and bill drafting, all requirements in bringing the vision to life. The Center invites residents to reimagine deteriorated spaces as affordable housing, parks, businesses and land banks. And it partners with municipalities to identify the resources, changes in zoning ordinances and state enabling legislation needed

Dr. Mary Calderone was a trailblazer in the normalization of contraception and family planning. Her tenure at Planned Parenthood Federation of America left her alarmed by how uninformed young people were about their bodies and human sexuality. In 1964, she founded SEICUS-Sexuality Information & Education Council of the US-to develop what are now regarded as our foremost guidelines for sex education from kindergarten through high school. Now rebranded as Sex Ed for Change, SEICUS is led by Christine Soyong Harley, an equally visionary change maker. Christine is navigating a shift in the sex education conversation and providing a seat at decision-making tables for all communities. Preventing unplanned pregnancies and disease transmission are still goals but there is a much broader landscape to tackle. Young people deserve curricula and public policy centered on LGBTQ and students of color, building a culture of consent, and developing interpersonal skill sets based in empathy, kindness and inclusion. Sex ed

Kiki Louya is a disruptor in an industry she loves and is determined to transform. She started working in restaurants at 15, learning every aspect of the business, eventually graduating from culinary school, becoming an executive chef and a restaurant owner. That journey included first-hand experience with injustices that are prevalent in restaurant life, from racial discrimination to sexual harassment and wage theft. And it propelled her into a more activist role within the industry. In 2018, Kiki became the first executive director of Restaurant Workers Community Foundation, which invests in nonprofits that serve and advocate for workers and organizes those in the industry, from managers to servers and cooks in determining how to fix broken systems. RWCF raised and distributed $7 million in relief funds for workers, including those not eligible for unemployment benefits and those struggling with mental health challenges. Most importantly, Kiki is energizing a powerful network of people and organizations who

There are many metrics for effective leadership touted by the corporate and nonprofit sectors, but I doubt that lived experience is among them. It is just one of many strengths that Dr. Bambie Hayes-Brown brings to her leadership of Georgia Advancing Communities Together (Georgia Act), a statewide association that advocates for safe housing and vibrant neighborhoods for all. The mission is critical in a state where 333,000 residents are very low-income, 72% pay more than 50% of their income on rent and utilities, and in rural communities, tarps often stand in for roofs. It matters that Dr. Hayes-Brown earned multiple degrees while homeless and a mother of three. She is also a licensed real estate broker and has managed residential properties, which deepens her conviction to make the industry more people centered. And she is an engaged member of the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s Board of Directors. Even the aggression of white nationalists could not deter the caravan she led through rural counties to

The culture of empathy that characterizes the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) can be traced to its origin story. Two women whose sons were diagnosed with schizophrenia, connected. They struggled to help their children and cope with the associated stigma. And both had been identified as the root cause of their son’s schizophrenia. What started as a series of kitchen conversations 40 years ago became NAMI, the nation’s largest grassroots mental illness advocacy organization. NAMI supports and organizes families touched by mental illness into a force for effective policy change. On this week’s episode, Daniel Gillison, NAMI’s CEO, examines how the mental health field has evolved and where it is stuck. We learn about the generational shift in perceptions that has motivated pop culture icons to become mental health advocates. But the alarming criminalization of people with mental illnesses, particularly in communities of color, persists. The potential for taking the police out of mental health intervent

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, thousands of Haitian and Cuban nationals escaped repressive regimes for the promise of safety and a better future on American shores. But once here their experience has been starkly disparate. Cubans were welcomed as political refugees, but Haitians, survivors of Duvalier’s brutal dictatorship, were detained without due process rights in Miami’s infamous Krome Detention Center. Their path to citizenship has been tenuous at best with former President Trump’s termination of Temporary Protective Status (TPS) making deportation probable. President Biden has since extended TPS protections for Haitians. Marleine Bastien, executive director of Family Action Network Movement (FANM), explains that Haitians are their own most fierce and effective advocates. A celebrated advocate in her own right, Bastien views the Haitian community in Miami as a village. For the village to be successful, families must achieve stability, which FANM makes possible through a menu of wrap-around services.

So much goes into bringing fruits and vegetable to our tables. It starts with farmers who because of rising costs are increasingly selling off their land, often family legacies, to corporations and international investors. It relies on farmworkers brought to the United States on H-2A temporary visas who once here, migrate across states to harvest crops requiring a specialized workforce. In Florida, the nation’s second largest agricultural producer, farmworkers are subjected to environmental hazards, heat stress and pay based on piecework. As medical anthropologist and farmworker advocate Dr. Antonio Tovar explains on Power Station, the agricultural industry is complex, risky and historically discriminatory. He wants Congress to listen to farmworkers and small owners for policy solutions, not just industry lobbyists, in the run-up to the 2022 Farm Bill. The Florida Association of Farmworkers has researched the impacts of heat stress on workers and the National Family Farmworker Coalition is modeling how small

How is legislation enacted? Do you picture Capitol Hill staffers scrambling to draft bills they have little connection to? Or back-room deal-making with corporations? That happens but more often nonprofit advocates press for legislation that will mitigate harms caused by policy making based in race and racism. Enacting legislation for the public good, let’s say decreasing carbon emissions and increasing access to affordable housing, impacts all sectors, nonprofit, public and business, so why not bring them together at the policy development table? That is exactly what leaders in the Impact Economy-an eco-system of nonprofits, entrepreneurs and investors driven to do good and do well-have advanced by creating The Desktop Manual, a digital guide to policy making. It supports collaboration across sectors and ensures that all sectors are invested in and accountable to the outcomes. In this episode of Power Station, John Holdsclaw and Mark Newberg break down a new paradigm for making change possible. It starts wit

Larry Curley has felt the destructive force of US government policy on Native Americans first-hand. A member of the Navajo Nation he lives with the legacy of dislocation and stripping of identity caused by the Removal Act of 1830 and the Assimilation Act of 1887. He has directly experienced the Termination Act of 1953 and Relocation Act of 1956 as blunt instruments of a federal power grab. As a young and fearless advocate in 1978, he drafted Title VI of the Older Americans Act, requiring federal funding for elders to be deployed to tribes instead of states. And to guarantee that elders were taken seriously by policy makers he founded and now leads the Native Indian Council on Aging. NICOA is a force to be reckoned with. During the pandemic, which stole 5000 Native lives, predominantly seniors, its leaders adapted by advocating through Zoom. They are now gearing up for an in-person conference to build a policy agenda focused on the physical, mental and spiritual needs of Native elders. It will be based in wisd

How would you undertake the bold, ambitious and critical mission of building a path to citizenship for the over 775,000 undocumented African, Jamaican, Latinx, Haitian and Asian immigrants who raise families, bolster the workforce and create communities throughout the state of Florida? This is the charge that Maria Rodriguez, executive director of the Florida Immigrant Coalition, embraces. She is also focusing on the 1 million immigrants in Florida who are citizens as partners in change making. FLIC is where influential member organizations, from labor unions to service providers and faith-based organizations come together and leverage their considerable powers to advocate for the community. And this hub for movement building is generating big wins on the issues that matter to immigrants, from wage theft to access to DACA and the election of candidates who share the immigrant experience. FLIC is leading this movement in the state run by Governor Ron DeSantis, a striving Trump acolyte who resists progress at e

Those of us fortunate enough to have survived the Trump era, police violence against Black and Brown communities, a global pandemic and a punishing economic fallout, bear responsibility for what comes next. Organized resistance by impacted communities has forced the beginnings of a power shift but that alone will not ensure a more equitable future. Transformation requires going to the bones of truth. White people in powerful positions have enacted public policies in race and racism for centuries. The only way to counter this injustice is to explicitly advance policies founded in racial equity. And not just any policies. The heart of structural change is embedded in tax and fiscal policies. Erica Williams, the new executive director of the DC Fiscal Policy Institute is exactly the right person to meet the challenges and opportunities of this moment. She has lived the consequences of unjust policies and led a state-based network of fiscal policy advocates at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities. Erica an

In 2021, our nation’s deep political divide is reflected in a flood of legislation targeting LGBTQ people. The 1,100 bills now pending in state legislatures are in part the handiwork of GOP leaders who are threatened by changing cultural norms and growing public support for the LGBTQ community. They are particularly fixated on demonizing transgender children and criminalizing doctors who care for their needs. But there is also a surge of pro-LGBTQ bills, including proposed bans on conversion therapy and discrimination in the workplace. And we are in a pivotal moment at federal level too. This could be the year to finally enact the Equality Act, which amends the Civil Rights Act of 1964 by extending protections against discrimination in employment, housing and public spaces to include sexual orientation and gender identity. Fran Hutchens, Executive Director of Equality Federation, describes this moment as a reaction to the movement’s cultural, policy and political gains over the 20 years. The Federation’s memb