Transgender communities are once again being scapegoated and targeted by the conservative right. While the current crises demand our attention, our Black Trans movement leaders are quick to remind us that these emergencies are the inevitable result of long-term under-investment in trans communities.

This plenary offers the funding of “Black trans joy” as a framework for understanding how funders can appropriately support transgender communities, our families, and our allies for the long-term–even in the face of immediate unrelenting attacks on our rights and on our humanity. Rather than falling into familiar patterns of putting out fires and letting the right dictate our agendas, “trans joy” helps us get out of reactive bust-and-boom cycles, and into pro-active movement building to advance truly liberatory visions for the future.

Plenary speakers will speak to what “Black trans joy” means to them, and how trans communities nationwide are using this concept to continue to create spaces where we can still build and thrive in hostile climates–long-standing work that is often not visible to funders. The framework can encompass a myriad of funding priorities, including but not limited to healing justice, safety, and spiritual care; community care and power-building; racial and gender justice; and arts, culture, and other narrative change work. Speakers will share how these innovative approaches and projects have evolved, especially during these last several years of heightened crisis, and how funders can continue to support their development.

Speakers:

• Bré Rivera (Black Trans Fund)
• Imara Jones (TransLash)
• Shea Cutliff (Contigo Fund)
• Devin Lowe (Black Trans Travel Fund)
• Morticia Godiva (Black Trans Travel Fund)

We’ve heard it before: “We can’t fund trans groups because…” This session will walk participants through some of the most commonly-heard reasons why foundations resist funding transgender-led groups, or fail to fund them at greater levels commensurate to the need. While some of these stated reasons are based in interpersonal bias, others are the result of structural racism, patriarchy, ableism, and transphobia that are more difficult to resolve. We’ll interrogate where this resistance comes from, and help each other brainstorm strategies and tools to overcome these obstacles. This is a judgment-free zone to move us all forward in supporting trans organizations and movements. We will talk through concrete examples, but please also bring anything you are struggling with to share and learn. You will be able to share anonymously.

Facilitators/Speakers:

• Rebecca Fox (Astraea Lesbian Foundation for Justice)
• Kay Taylor (Wellspring Philanthropic Fund)
• Rye Young (Philanthropic Consultant)

In response to the unprecedented coordinated legislative attacks on transgender communities in the Southeast and Midwest, several trans-led intermediary funds and their allies are launching the Trans Futures Funding Campaign at Funding Forward. The campaign’s goals are to raise $10 million in new general operating support in 2022 to build the infrastructure and capacity of transgender groups in these regions, and to strengthen partnerships among donors and intermediaries to expand funders’ ability to invest in these groups for the long-term. Join us at this session to hear more about the campaign’s goals and vision for how funders of all types can join this effort to help trans communities under attack not only survive today, but to plan to build power for trans futures across the country.

Speakers

• Aldita Gallardo (the Fund for Trans Generations)
• Alexander Lee (Funders for LGBTQ Issues)
• Chantelle Fisher-Borne (Funders for LGBTQ Issues)
• Kiyomi Fujikawa (Third Wave Fund)

As lawmakers and politicians across the country seek to rob trans youth and their families of their rights, how do we respond to this political moment with a better understanding of how these attacks are part of right wing political strategies spanning at least the last four decades? How has philanthropy’s own historical patterns of investing in and failing to invest in LGBTQ and wider social justice organizing in these regions impacted movement efforts–for good and bad? How can we use this insight to support critical strategies for long-term organizing?

Join us to hear from Southern-based movement organizations that are responding to this political climate with clarity about the historical patterns of discrimination and violence that have brought us here. Our speakers will share how Southern movement organizations are responding to the urgency of the moment, while continuing to nurture the infrastructure we need for long-haul work to build political power. Join us to learn how funders can adapt their funding strategies to cause less harm and move resources in ways that are more responsive to movement efforts.

Speakers

• Glo Ross, Moderator (Arcus Foundation)
• Steph Guilloud (Project South)
• Loan Tran (Southern Movement Infrastructure Exchange)
• Wynston Sanders (Gender Benders and Campaign for Southern Equality)
• Daroneshia Duncan-Boyd (TAKE)

The Southern Movement Infrastructure Exchange aims to build a space for strategizing, skill-sharing, and relationship building that allows our movements to thrive. Through political education series, gatherings, collaborative experiments, and capacity building/technical assistance, we hope to build a big bench of movement actors (i.e. across philanthropic, intermediary, and grassroots organizations) who can lead with political clarity about our relationship to money and funding. In this session, we will cover both the technical aspects of “money moving machinery” as well as the values, politics, and frameworks informing movement-led resource mobilization, especially as it relates to the kind of capacity building and technical assistance made available to movement organizations. Join us to hear from southern leaders and organizers leveraging resources in ways that preserve the integrity of southern movement work in order to transform and build power.

Speakers

• Loan Tran, Moderator (Southern Movement Infrastructure Exchange) 
• Allison Scott (Campaign for Southern Equality)
• Ricky Bratz (Queer Mobilization Fund, Southern Vision Alliance)
• Nijeeah Richardson (Southern Vision Alliance)
• Britney Nesbit (Wealth Reclamation Academy of Practitioners)

Since November 2020, the Southern Power Fund has moved over 12 million dollars to over 325 organizations, groups, and formations in 15 states across the US South and Puerto Rico. In the next five years, the Southern Power Fund aims to raise and redistribute $100 million more to Southern movement work. The SPF aims to redistribute funds to groups and organizations that often go unnoticed and are deeply under-resourced by traditional philanthropic efforts. Led by a team of Southern organizers representing both long-standing organizations and new formations throughout the region, the work of the Southern Power Fund (SPF) reflects the reality that BIPOC LGBTQ activists and organizations are leading some of the most brilliant and creative work throughout the region. Join us to hear key lessons learned about how SPF is working to redistribute funds in a way that is aligned with the vision and needs of Southern movement organizations during these times.

Facilitator/Speakers:

• Stephanie Guillod (Project South)
• Aesha Rasheed (SONG)
• Valencia Gunder (The Black Collective)

Join us to learn how southern funders are working in authentic partnership with LGBTQ communities to define funding strategies and move resources in response to what LGBTQ organizations actually need during these times. You’ll hear from grantmakers who work with community-driven grantmaking committees as well as from funders who have figured out how to respond to the needs of their grantees through a responsive grantmaking practice based on grantee feedback, recommendations, and co-learning models.

Facilitator/Speakers

• Kelli King-Jackson (Coach and Philanthropic Consultant)
• Joél Junior Morales (Contigo Fund)
• Libby Kyles (Tzedek Social Justice Fund)

Please join Funders staff for a fun hour of conversation and connection before signing off the conference for the day. Our goal with this session is to create a structured space for conference participants to meet new peers. We will use breakout rooms to set up three rounds of speed networking intermixed with large group hangout time. Icebreaker prompts will be provided, just bring yourself and your favorite afternoon snack.

Saida Agostini-Bostic, president of Funders for LGBTQ Issues, will offer reflections on the state of funding for LGBTQ communities and our work to chart the future of Funders for LGBTQ Issues.

Funders for LGBTQ Issues has a long history of tracking the scale, scope, and impact of philanthropic support for LGBTQ communities from U.S. Foundations. We are proud to continue this transition with the publication of the 2019-2029 Tracking Report: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer Grantmaking by U.S. Foundations (forthcoming June 2022).

This session will offer a first look at findings from the 2019-2020 Tracking Report and an analysis of the current landscape of philanthropic investment for LGBTQ communities. In addition to sharing key report findings, the research team, including staff of Funders for LGBTQ Issues and Strength in Numbers Consulting Group, will describe adaptations to the research process and opportunities for future work. Following the presentation, participants will be invited to be in dialogue with the research team and each other about ongoing efforts to improve data and reporting and share input on how our research program can support our shared advocacy agenda.

Speakers:

• Somjen Frazer (Strength in Numbers Consulting Group)
• Erin Howe (Strength in Numbers Consulting Group)
• Alyssa Lawther (Funders for LGBTQ Issues)
• Andrew Wallace (Funders for LGBTQ Issues)

The last several years of crisis, global disruption, and unprecedented opportunity have brought renewed attention to how our organizations can better support our team members. The call to help our colleagues continue to work effectively, sustainably, and more humanely has placed new urgency on how our organizational cultures align (or fail to align) with our values. In this session, “people and culture” and HR professionals from a range of grantmakers will engage participants in frank discussions of practices and policies adopted during this time of heightened crisis. How are we taking care of our people during the pandemic? What experiments do we want to make permanent, and how does all this “internal” work relate to our foundations’ missions? While human resources staff and those with organizational culture responsibilities hold much of this work, during the pandemic, we all realized we all have something to contribute. Staff who are interested in advocating for change within their foundations–with formal human resources job duties or not–are especially encouraged to attend.

Facilitator/Speakers:

• Surina Khan (Women’s Foundation of California)
• Katie Carter (Pride Foundation)
• Cathy Kapua (Trans Justice Funding Project)
• Marvin Webb (Funders for LGBTQ Issues)

The Visibility Impact Fund is honored to bring together two VIF founders and two VIF grantee partners to discuss the whys and hows of granting for bi+ specific work. While people attracted to more than one gender comprise over half the LGBT community, funding for bi+ specific needs is extremely low. Through the presenters’ personal stories and examples of how bi+ organizations are partnering with other nonprofits, presenters will provide information about needs that are specific to the bi+ communities and ways they can be addressed. Session participants will have a chance to explore ways their organizations can shift organizational mission and culture to better include and promote the wellbeing of bi+ communities within their existing areas of concentration. Organizations focused on BIPOC and trans/gender non-conforming funding will find significant intersections with bi+ communities and are encouraged to attend.

Facilitator/Speakers

• Neil Assave (Visibility Impact Fund)
• Camille Holthaus (Visibility Impact Fund)
• Khafre Abif (Bi+ Georgia)
• Fania Sipili (United Territories of Pacific Islanders Alliance (UTOPIA)