             Unilever Gift
Ben & Jerry's Foundation |
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Grant Recipients List for the 1st Cycle, 2004Albany Park Neighborhood Council $10,0004419 North Kedzie 3rd floor Chicago, IL 60625 APNC develops local leadership to organize and advocate for their concerns, including quality education, affordable housing and sustaining diversity in their neighborhoods. Funding was provided for Project Y, a youth-led organizing initiative to improve police-youth relations, increase access to higher education for immigrant students and promote interfaith, intercultural dialogues among the young people of Albany Park. American Home Day Care Workers Association $10,000 16 W. 25th Street Baltimore, MD 21218 AHDCWA is a membership-based, democratic effort to mobilize family child care providers who receive state vouchers to care for poor children. Providers will organize to win timely payments from the state, increased wages and health insurance benefits. AHDCWA will also train providers to deal with urban environmental health problems. Using a combination of direct action, negotiations with state officials and legislative initiatives they will work to win better working conditions for childcare providers. Calumet Project $10,000 7128 Arizona Avenue Hammond, IN 46323 Calumet Project is a grassroots coalition of labor, religious, and community organizations working for social and economic revitalization of Northwest Indiana. Funding was provided in support of the Coalition for a Clean Environment in East Chicago, which is fighting a proposed Confined Disposal Facility to be sited near two schools. This facility would take the toxic waste dredged from the Indiana Harbor and keep it in an open pit for 30 years. Center for Environmental Health $7,500 528 61st Street Oakland, CA 94609 CEH works to protect the public from environmental and consumer health hazards by changing corporate behavior through education, litigation and advocacy. Funding was provided in support of Green Roundtables for Healthy Hospitals which will bring together decision-makers at hospitals with other stakeholders to share resources and case studies of successes and challenges, to spur the industry to greater achievements in protecting public health through pollution prevention in hospital practices. Colonias Development Council $10,000 1050 Monte Vista Avenue Cas cruces, NM 88001 CDC works to improve the quality of life in southern New Mexico's colonia communities through community organizing and leadership development. Community Alliance of Tenants $10,000 2710 NE 14th Avenue Portland, OR 97212 CAT is a tenant-controlled, tenant-membership organization working to educate and empower tenants in Oregon to demand safe, stable and affordable housing. Funding was provided in support of the Housing Justice Program which is organizing tenants to fight for improved living conditions and increased stability in gentrifying neighborhoods while also organizing for a regional solution to the affordable housing crisis. Community Youth Organizing Campaign $10,000 1213 Race Street Philadelphia, PA 19107 CYOC was founded by a pan-Asian group of 12 youth and two adults to develop the leadership abilities of youth to organize their own working class communities to fight for social justice. Funding was provided in support of the Chinatown Project, which engages recent immigrant Chinese youth fighting for change around immigrant worker issues. The youth work as community organizers, investigate conditions through one on one visits, build relationships of trust with workers in the community and use popular education to facilitate collective discussions with and develop leadership capacities of adult workers. Concerned Citizens For A Better Tunica County, Inc. $10,000 PO Box 2249 Tunica, MS 38676 Concerned Citizens is a broad based community leadership development, education and training organization working to empower citizens, both youth and adult, to participate effectively in the decision making process and impact the formation of public policy. General support funding was provided to support youth leadership development, education policy organizing, environmental racism work, community democracy work, organizational development trainings and to enhance their use of technology for organizing. Farm Worker Pesticide Strategies $10,000 5721 31st Avenue NE Seattle, WA 98105 FWPP is a new organization that has organized and is coordinating an alliance of farm workers and their advocates, labor advocates, environmentalists and others who are jointly implementing a strategy to end farm worker pesticide exposures. Using education, advocacy, media work, research and organizing, FWPP is working to secure stronger policies and better enforcement to protect farm workers and their families from toxic pesticide exposures. Gay-Straight Alliance Network $10,000 160 14th Street San Francisco, CA 94103 GSA Network works to empower youth activists fighting homophobia and transphobia in schools throughout California. General support funding was provided in support of their three program areas: Building and Networking GSAs, Identifying and Developing Student Leaders, and Transforming School Climate through Policy Advocacy and Organizing. Homes for Families $8,000 14 Beacon Street Boston, MA 2108 Homes for Families is a collaborative of families who have experienced homelessness, service providers and advocates, working to end family homelessness through permanent and emergency solutions. Funding was provided in support of the Leadership Development Project's Public Policy Series, which prepares parents who have been homeless--primarily women of color--to organize and advocate to end family homelessness. The series prepares and engages participants in shelter recruitment, voter registration, letter-writing campaigns, legislative advocacy, planning HFF's advocacy priorities and taking on leadership roles on the HFF board and staff and in the wider community. KAHEA: The Hawaiian Environmental Alliance $10,000 PO Box 27112 Honolulu, HI 96827-0112 KAHEA works to protect Native Hawaiian customary and traditional cultural practices and Hawai'i's fragile environment. It serves the unique role of amplifying diverse voices from each Island to form a unified response to critical issues that threaten Hawai'i's culture and natural resources and provides a link between the environmental and Hawaiian communities. Funding was provided in support of their efforts to secure adequate protection for the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, the largest marine protected area in U.S. controlled waters. Louisiana Bucket Brigade $10,000 1036 Napolean Avenue New Orleans, LA 70115 The LABB works with communities that neighbor petrochemical plants to improve their health by reducing toxic emissions. The LABB teaches community members to use air sampling buckets and other tools to monitor and expose industrial pollution as it happens. They organize and empower residents to fight pollution and protect their health through community education and training regarding emissions and health data, public record research that exposes dangerous plant operations, publicizing leaks, accidents and emissions via the web, and providing ongoing strategic advice and planning for community groups' campaigns. Massachusetts Campaign for Single Payer Health-Care $10,000 Mass-Care Boston, MA 2108 MASS-CARE is a grassroots, activist-run coalition representing over 80 consumer, labor, senior, professional and civic organizations dedicated to bringing about a universal, single-payer health care system in Massachusetts. Members volunteer across the state to educate, organize and mobilize the community in order to achieve the goal of creating a groundswell of support for single-payer health care. General support funding was provided in order to increase staff capacity. Organized Parents Against Lead $10,000 1192 Westminster Street Providence, RI 2909 OPAL is a parent-led group that organizes parents of lead poisoned children to influence public policy relating to childhood lead poisoning and hold slumlords accountable for deteriorating housing stock in Rhode Island. Polaris Institute $10,000 231 Elm Avenue Mill Valley, CA 94941 The Polaris Institute provides accessible and strategic research for grassroots activists on the corporate players shaping public policy on a number of key issues related to globalization. Funding was provided for a partnership with Students for Progressive Action at the University of Missouri for a one-year, student-led education and action campaign to focus critical attention on the use of university infrastructure and research to develop environmentally risky genetically engineered crops and foods. The project revolves around an innovative tool - a map of the university that exposes corporate biotech research on campus. Prairie Rivers Network $5,000 809 South Fifth Street Champaign, IL 61820 Prairie Rivers works to protect the rivers of Illinois and promote the health and beauty of watershed communities. By providing information, sound science and hands-on assistance, PRN helps citizens and groups become effective river conservation leaders. Funding was provided in support of the Ditch the Dredges Project which will initiate reform of the 130-year old Illinois Drainage Code that empowers commissioners to dredge and clear cut streams to speed water off agricultural land with no public input and no regard for environmental impacts. Restaurant Workers Association of Koreatown $10,000 3465 W. 8th Street Los Angeles, CA 90005 RWAK organizes and empowers Korean and Latino restaurant workers to work together to protect their rights, improve their working conditions and to work with other organizations and communities to improve the lives of workers and immigrants. General support funding was provided. Rural Vermont / REAP $10,000 15 Barre Street Montpelier, VT 5602 Rural Vermont is a statewide grassroots organization of farmers and other citizens that is dedicated to building a prosperous rural life for all rural Vermonters. Funds were provided in support of the Farm Policy Network - Sustainable Farming Initiative, the goal of which is to identify a clear agricultural vision and priorities for the state and to build an activist network that is informed and committed to moving the state of Vermont toward sustainable, small-scale farming. Sadie Nash Leadership Project $10,000 157 Montague Street Brooklyn, NY 11201 SNLP is a grassroots organization comprised of young female leaders from New York City public schools (ages 14-19) who have come together to create an educational and activist community committed to social justice leadership development. SNLP participants seek to question and redefine the nature of leadership and to promote perspectives and practices that are cooperative, accountable, ethical and effective. Students 4 Justice/One Nation Enlightened $10,000 2629 Jasmine Street Denver, CO 80207 S4J is a youth-led organizing project that trains youth leaders and organizers to build a youth voice to bring power to those directly impacted by educational and criminal injustice and to fight for the changes they would like to see in their world. Sunflower Community Action $10,000 1528 North Broadway Wichita, KS 67214 SCA is a multi-racial, grassroots neighborhood organizing group that works to build individual and collective power of people impacted by government and corporate policy-making decisions. Funding was provided in support of the Newcomer Access Project, which is working to improve the quality of life for Kansas Hispanic immigrants by winning access to driver's license, higher education, and banking services. The project will also fight predatory lending and train new low-income Hispanic leaders to speak for themselves. Utah Environmental Congress $10,000 1817 S. Main Street Salt Lake City, UT 84115 UEC is Utah's only grassroots statewide organization dedicated to protecting Utah's National Forests. They recently completed the most comprehensive roadless survey ever conducted by a grassroots group in the country and have unveiled a statewide National Forest wilderness proposal. Continued funding was provided to support UEC's Forest Monitoring Program. Vermont Democracy Fund $10,000 7 Court Street Montpelier, VT 5602 VDF is a nonprofit organization that helps citizens become advocates on issues that affect them by providing organizing and strategic planning support along with policy development and research. Funding was provided in support of the Dairy Farmers of Vermont, an organized group of milk producers who are trying to regain power over the economics of milk production. The farmers are taking the unprecedent step of engaging in collective bargaining with milk cooperatives and processors in order to gain a fair price for the milk they produce and to develop a long-term, sustainable plan for Vermont agriculture. Western Land Exchange Project $10,000 PO Box 95545 Seattle, WA 98145-2545 WLXP conducts research, outreach and advocacy toward federal land exchange policy reform. The processes involved in land trades between the BLM and USFS and private parties--often resource extraction industries--is convoluted and the public interest and environmental protection is not usually served in these deals. WLXP works with the public agencies, community groups, the media and other environmental groups to advocate for reform of the system. Western Shoshone Defense Project $10,000 PO Box 211308 Crescent Valley, NV 89821 Continued funding was provided for the WSDP Cultural Preservation Program/Mining & Environment Program to promote unity through traditional Western Shoshone cultural practices and build a strong defense against exploitative practices on W. Shoshone land. White Dog Cafe Foundation $7,500 3420 Sansom Street Philadelphia, PA 19104 WDCF is a non-profit organization working to help build a local living economy for the Greater Philadelphia region. Funding was provided in support of a Local Farm Product Distribution Pilot project. The project will work directly with 10+ farmers to help them build a distribution and marketing alliance. This will serve as a model for farmers nationwide struggling with distribution and transportation issues. Women's Project $10,000 2224 Main Street Little Rock, AR 72206 The Women's Project is a multi-issue organization which organizes grassroots individuals and communities against racism, sexism, homophobia and other oppressions. Funding was given in support of the Positive Women Project and the Alternatives Project, which organizes and provides leadership training for groups of formerly incarcerated women, grandparent caregivers, and HIV+ women. The goal is to empower these women and their families to challenge the policies and institutions which fast-track poor people and people of color to jail and create barriers for successful community re-entry. Young Women's Project (YWP) $10,000 1328 Florida Avenue NW Washington, DC 20009 YWP is a multi-cultural organization that builds and supports teen women and girl leaders so they can improve their lives and transform their communities. Funding was provided in support of the Foster Care Campaign which seeks to improve the lives, rights and opportunities for DC youth living in foster care group homes through the passage and implementation of regulations, peer-led issues and rights trainings and materials, leadership development, and the creation of teen-led institutions. Harlem Reclamation Development $700 1850 Park Avenue New York, NY 10035 Funding was provided to create a community-based movement to stop the increasing evictions of poor and low-income residents from their homes in the new gentrifying Harlem. Missouri Forest Alliance $1,000 20 Crabapple Ct. St. Louis, MO 63132 Funding was provided to support a part-time project coordinator to facilitate outreach and coordinated action on the part of Missouri's conservation community and citizenry in general to achieve lasting protection of Missouri's public forests. Olive Branches $1,000 251 South Norton Avenue Los Angeles, CA 90004 Olive Branches is a project which unifies LA community groups that want green spaces and connects them to funding agencies that promote the environmental, recreational and health benefits of green space in underserved neighborhoods. Funding was provided to support the cost of translating their website into Spanish. San Diego Economic Conversion Council $1,000 4452 Park Blvd. San Diego, CA 92116 Funding was provided for the San Diego Permaculture Center, a project to promote ecological and sustainable communities through ecologically-based design that meets human and environmental needs. Western Wildlife Conservancy $1,000 68 S. Main Street 4th floor Salt Lake City, UT 84101-1523 Funding was provided in Support of the Utah Wolf Forum (WUF), a coalition of several conservation organizations that have united to assist citizens and public officials of Utah in developing a gray wolf conservation and management plan and to ensure that the result is a genuine conservation plan for the species, not just a management plan focused on lethal control. |