Black Lives Matter network establishes $12M grant fund
NEW YORK (AP) — An influential group behind the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement has established a fund worth more than $12 million to aid organizations fighting institutional racism in the wake of the George Floyd protests.
On Wednesday, the Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation said it was setting aside $6 million from money it received in donations to support black-led grassroots organizing groups. Last week, the foundation unveiled a separate $6.5 million fund for its network of affiliate chapters.
Beginning July 1, affiliated chapters can apply for unrestricted funding of up to $500,000 in multi-year grants, the foundation announced. Grants from both funds will be administered through a fiscal sponsor, said Kailee Scales, managing director of the foundation.
“In this watershed moment for black power building ... it is critical that we democratize giving to ensure all of us have access to the resources we need to reverse centuries of disinvestment in black communities, and invest in a future where we can all be connected, represented and free,” Scales said in a statement to The Associated Press.
According to the network’s website, the organization has more than a dozen active chapters, including Boston, Chicago, Washington, D.C., and Detroit, as well as in Canada. Its newest chapter is in South Bend, Indiana.
The foundation told the AP it has received more than 1.1 million individual donations at an average of $33 per gift since the death of Floyd, a black man who died May 25 pleading for air as a white Minneapolis police officer held a knee to his neck for what prosecutors said was nearly nine minutes. The surge of financial support adds to roughly $3.4 million in net assets the BLM global network had on hand last year, according to a 2019 financial statement of Thousand Currents, the...
