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Over the past few years you’ve heard us talk about the trials and challenges we’ve faced as a community and as an organization. We navigated through turnover, the uprooting and rebuilding work necessary to center Black Liberation and Indigenous Sovereignty, and battled the continuing effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. This year, however, marked a turning point in our organization. In 2022, we ushered in a new era of joy, wellness, intention, and audaciously interrupting white supremacist tendencies that are often interwoven into the concept of “professionalism.” We are so honored to be sharing this transformation with you.

During this era of transformation and wellness, we’ve continued to do our most heartfelt and urgent work, to move resources to progressive, grassroots organizations throughout Idaho, Montana, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming. With the end of the year just around the corner, we’re especially excited to celebrate three recent grant cycles that just closed: the 2022 Queer Justice Momentum Giving Project, the Native Led Organizing Grant in collaboration with Potlatch Fund, and our 2022 Rapid Response & Seed Grants! All told, SJF will make nearly $4.4 million in grants in 2022!

The full round-up of 2022 grants include:

The 2022 Displaced Tenants Fund is the culmination of years of political organizing to move money to communities who have been historically displaced in the Seattle area. SJF was honored to be part of the process of granting out the third and final round of grants from this project to nine organizations, totaling $2,485,000.
The 2022 Base Building Grant is the second and final disbursement of our Fund 4 the Frontlines campaign. This unrestricted funding will award $1,000,000 in total to four organizations that will receive the funding over a 5-year period.
The Rural Organizing Community Grants, which were open to organizations in Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming. We are excited to deepen relationships throughout our funding region by granting ten awardees $15,000 each.
The Native-Led Organizing Grant, in collaboration with Potlatch Fund, SJF committed to disbursing $300,000 in grants to Native led organizations to build collective power and resources in their communities. We just completed this grant cycle, and we are so excited to share the full announcement at the start of 2023!
We are in the process of closing out the 2022 Queer Justice Momentum Giving Project which will award over $440,000 through several multi-year grants to LGBTQIA+-led organizations.
And finally, we awarded 14 Rapid Response & Seed Grants this year!

Today we want to highlight the 2022 awardees of our Rapid Response & Seed Grants, two very special grants that often go unsung due to their rolling deadlines and perennial nature. Rapid Response grants exist to support grassroots organizations responding to fast-moving attacks and opportunities; Seed grants support emerging formations in the early stages of their development. Here’s a snippet about two of this year’s Rapid Response & Seed grantees, with the full list of grantees below.

Oregon Futures Lab | 2022 Rapid Response Grantee

The Oregon Futures Lab Education Fund is a Black, Indigenous, and people of color led organization that builds and grows BIPOC civic engagement across Oregon to increase representation in community and elected leadership. They will use the Rapid Response grant to fund their BIPOC Legislator School, designed to help the largest cohort of BIPOC legislators in Oregon’s history navigate the opportunities and intense challenges ahead.

Radical Rest | 2022 Seed Grantee

Leading with love, Radical Rest is dreaming a future in which body-mind-spirit- community-environment are understood to be inextricably interconnected and central to wellness. They conceive of a time when the legacy of capitalism, settler and extraction colonization and body supremacy no longer defines our orientation to our bodies or delivery of wellness services. They see a world where wellness work is structural, preventative, culturally-relevant, community-driven and is equally accessible to all. Radical Rest is a healing justice collective of practitioners and educators centering the holistic wellness needs of the BIPOC community through access to culturally responsive, health justice events and services and opportunities for anti-oppressive education.

The creativity and radical dreams of the awardees of the Rapid Response & Seed Grants inspire SJF to think more emergently, imagine more audaciously, and move more nimbly. We’ve set a goal to raise $25,000 before the end of the year that will go entirely toward the 2023 Rapid Response & Seed Grant Fund. Will you make a donation by December 31 to help reach that goal?

Donate to the 2023 Rapid Response & Seed Grant Fund!

Be sure to type “Rapid Response & Seed” in the comment section!

Thank you for all the ways you have continued to support SJF by attending our events, sharing our work, and donating to sustain this work. The programs and grant awards would not be possible without our funders, members, and supporters. We are honored to be in community with you all.