The Needmor Fund for Social Justice’s Core Grants Program provides general operating support to groups engaged in the work of community organizing.
Donor Name: Needmor Fund
State: Selected States
County: All Counties
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 05/15/2025
Size of the Grant: Not Available
Grant Duration: Grant Duration Not Mentioned
Details:
Needmor’s Core Grants Program will focus on supporting community organizing in the Midwest — specifically an eight state region that includes Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Ohio, and Wisconsin. Grantees funded through this program are eligible to receive funding for up to three years, after which an organization may not apply for at least two years.
Criteria
While Needmor embraces the opportunity to fund emerging organizations, its commitment remains to supporting strong, effective community organizing. It therefore seeks to support groups that:
- Organize primarily low- and moderate-income people, as evidenced by demographic/ statistical data indicating social and economic distress
- Have a multi-issue agenda that reflects an intersectional approach to addressing issues associated with race, economic justice, and equality
- Demonstrate a commitment to long-term base building and effectively link issue work to building organizational power
- Are democratically run and consist of a dues-paying membership base, with deep member engagement and a process for both developing and regenerating a strong cadre of leaders over time
- Have developed a power analysis and a clearly defined plan for challenging/altering the dynamics of power within their communities
- Engage in direct action and have demonstrated the ability to win concrete victories of increasingly larger scale
- Have a vision to continually build and aggregate power, enabling them to take on bigger policy issues and expand its base of allies to increase its impact over time
- Are well managed, engage in strategic planning, and have a sound budget and diversified fundraising plan
- In addition to meeting the above basic criteria, Needmor is interested in funding groups that:
- Organize across lines of race, class, gender, and traditionally excluded communities; and, promote the principles of diversity, equity, and inclusion
- Are linked to and leverage the power of faith, labor, and community into powerful organizations
- Demonstrate a willingness to work collaboratively for the purpose of building collective power to achieve systemic change at the regional, state, and national level
- Are connected to larger organizing networks that are working to implement new, broad, and creative public policies that address systemic issues facing low- and moderate-income communities
- Integrate voter engagement strategies and the expansion of democracy into the building of powerful community organizations
- Demonstrate the ability to develop an agenda that frames issues of relevance to both urban and rural constituencies
- Recognize and address the impact of global corporatization as it relates to issues of economic and environmental justice
- potential for attracting the interest and support of other funders.
For more information, visit NFFSJ.
