OVERVIEW: Human rights is the Libra Foundation’s largest area of giving and serves as the basis for its three grantmaking initiatives: Criminal Justice and Social Justice, Environmental and Climate Justice and Gender Justice.
IP TAKE: While this is not the most accessible funder, it is remarkably transparent about where its money goes. It does not accept unsolicited proposals, but prospective grantees can email general inquiries to the foundation’s staff, profiles of whom are posted on its website. It’s responsive and somewhat approachable. Grants are typically for general support. It is open-minded in regards to how it makes grants and what it chooses to fund. However, this is a crowded grantmaking space. Grants fund organizations for multiple-cycles making it harder for new groups to gain attention. Libra Foundation grants are competitive.
The Libra Foundation’s grants also tend to come in the form of multi-year commitments in the $500,000 to $1 million range to large organizations focused on coalition building. Global funding generally supports organizations that are based in the U.S. The foundation’s recent priorities include racial justice in the U.S., reproductive rights and community-led climate change initiatives. This funder supports a range of regional, national and international organizations, although most of its global grantees are based in the U.S. and focus on building collaborations between smaller, community-led groups.
PROFILE: The Libra Foundation was founded in 2002 by members of the Pritzker Family. In 2017 the foundation’s board hired Crystal Hayling to lead the foundation in its essential work: supporting “frontline organizations building a world where communities of color thrive” and “working towards justice and equity that center the voices and experiences of those disproportionately harmed by systemic oppression.” Based in San Francisco, the foundation’s three stated program areas are community safety and justice, environmental and climate justice and gender justice.
Grants for Global Security and Human Rights
Human rights funding stems from all three of Libra’s thematic programs. Recent grantees include large global nonprofits and NGOs to which the foundation tends to make large, multi-year commitments. Specific areas of interest include multi-national coalition building, advocacy, policy development and “communications strategies for social change.” One grantee, the Texas-based Border Network for Human Rights, organizes communities near the U.S.-Mexico border to advocate for immigration reform and human rights. Other past grantees include the Fund for Global Human Rights, the Global Fund for Children, the Global Fund for Women, Human Rights First and Columbia University Law School’s Human Rights Institute.
Grants for Racial Justice and Indigenous Rights
The Libra Foundation provides broad support for racial justice and indigenous rights organizations in the U.S., with grants originating from each of its three program areas. In 2020, the foundation made a three-year commitment of $2.5 million to Black Voters Matter’s Capacity Building Institute, which aims to “increase power in marginalized, predominantly Black communities” through voter education, civic engagement and leader development initiatives. The foundation has also given to Black Organizing for Leadership and Dignity, the Black Census and Redistricting Hub and the Tides Foundation’s Black Men Build initiative.
Grants for Criminal Justice Reform
Criminal justice reform grantmaking constitutes a large portion of Libra’s community safety and justice grantmaking. Recent areas of specific interest include “community-driven” alternatives to incarceration and ending the “disproportionate surveillance of low-income communities of color.” One recent grantee, the Campaign for the Fair Sentencing of Youth, aims to end extreme sentencing for convicted minors, including life without parole. Another grantee, Operation Restoration, supports currently and formerly incarcerated women and girls with education, employment, counseling and case management services. Other criminal justice grantees include Restorative Justice for Oakland Youth, the Network on Women in Prison, Los Angeles’s Initiate Justice, the Formerly Incarcerated and Convicted People and Families Movement and the Tides Foundation’s Life Comes from It initiative.
Grants for Climate Change and Clean Energy
Libra’s climate change grantmaking aims to support “organizations led by and for people and communities who are directly impacted or on the frontlines of climate change and environmental harm.” Grantmaking in this area overlaps significantly with the foundation’s racial and indigenous justice work. The foundation’s climate change funding is global in scope, but most grants support U.S.-based organizations. Recent multi-year grants have supported the Global Greengrants Fund, the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, EarthRights International and the Asian-Pacific Environmental Network. In the U.S., the foundation has given to the California Environmental Justice Alliance, Montana’s Indigenous Environmental Network, Pesticide Action Network North America and Chicago’s Center for Neighborhood Technology, which is committed to sustainable urban development in the interest of building equitable communities.
Grants for Women and Girls
Libra supports women’s and girls’ causes via its gender justice initiative, which aims to dismantle gender-based oppression. Grantmaking in this area has focused on reproductive health and justice, gender-based violence and coalition building among organizations in areas disproportionately affected by gender injustice. Global grantees include the African Women’s Development Fund, the Global Fund for Women, the International Planned Parenthood Federation and Women’s Link Worldwide, which works to advance the rights of women facing multiple forms of oppression. U.S. grantees include New Mexico’s Coalition to Stop Violence Against Native Women, the National Domestic Workers Alliance, the National Network of Abortion Funds and the Chicago Foundation for Women.
Grants for LGBTQ Causes
The Libra Foundation’s gender justice program also supports organizations and initiatives that protect the rights of queer, gender nonconforming and trans people. While this is a smaller area of grantmaking at this time, the foundation’s interest in LGBTQ causes has increased in recent years. Grantmaking is global in scope and has supported several organizations involved in coalition building. Recent grants have gone to the Astraea Lesbian Fund for Justice, the Black LGBTQIA+ Migrant Project, the Trans Justice Funding Project and Trans United.
Important Grant Details:
The Libra Foundation made about $25 million in grants in a recent year. Most of its grants fall in the $75,000 to $500,000 range, but some of the foundation’s multi-year commitments have reached the $2 million to $4 million range. For additional information about past grantees, see the foundation’s grantee partners page.
This funder does not accept unsolicited proposals for funding, but organizations may reach out with general inquiries via LinkedIn. The foundation posts biographies of its team members on its website.
PEOPLE:
Search for staff contact info and bios in PeopleFinder (paid subscribers only).
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