We’re Stronger Together

Since joining The Chicago Community Trust three years ago, I’ve been thinking about ways to ensure those most affected by our decisions are part of the decision-making process. Echoing the profound words of a great professor back in my college days: “The community deserves more than just a seat at the table – the community is the table.” Being active in my community, starting at a young age, from farms to churches to a mutual aid group, I learned a lot. But, most importantly, due in part to my reticent nature, I learned the value of listening.

Back in September 2022, on my first day as an impact coordinator, I was invited to sit in on a meeting where staff discussed shortening the standard grant application. Everyone agreed on the need – the real question was how. Questions like: “How many pages is the right number of pages?” and “How much time on average should each application take?” came up in the discussion. Out of that meeting, I asked someone why not involve the folks who will be most affected by these decisions. And I never stopped asking – until an opportunity arose.

We Rise Together: For an Equitable & Just Recovery was always intended to be guided by diverse community perspectives informing the direction for the funding, and I would say the initiative has been effective in that regard. From early community conversations, we learned that mental health services, immigration services, and safe places for youth were among the top community concerns. Having that in mind, we’ve prioritized supporting developments like Studio Yogi, Latinos Progresando’s new headquarters, and BUILD Chicago, which are now serving their neighborhoods in one or more of those areas of concern. And while this was relatively successful community engagement, it ended after they answered “What do you need?” We wanted to explore what would happen if we further asked, “How can we get it done together?”

So, we launched the Together Fund – a pilot at the Trust involving 20 community members living and working in the neighborhoods we serve to direct $1.6 million in grants across the South and West sides of Chicago within the local business and workforce development sectors. During that one-year commitment, community advisors determined a particular focus for the request for proposal (RFP), developed the RFP, set the scoring criteria, reviewed the applications, and made final grant recommendations.

The community members identified two areas where they wanted to focus. One was local business support, with grants for mid-stage businesses and worker co-operatives. The other area was youth workforce development. In four years, We Rise had not funded in these areas, so it was eye-opening for us that community members prioritized them.

There is a growing buzz in the philanthropy world around trust-based philanthropy and participatory grantmaking, I can give a vote of confidence that it works. We gained valuable insights from how community advisors approach grantmaking, and community members benefited by learning the funder’s perspective.

It’s common for a funder to be hesitant to include more voices in grantmaking decisions, as it may prolong or complicate the process. But I can say without a doubt that the cost of committing the additional time and intentional planning is well worth it. But don’t take it from me, among many other positive remarks on this initiative, we heard from one community advisor, “This is what true co-design looks like.”

With participatory grantmaking, we are seeing meaningful differences in not only the types of grants We Rise has made over the past four years, but a more mindful grantmaking process, which is what really speaks to the success of this approach. My greatest desire for this pilot is that it becomes more than an approach and instead a common practice.