About
Mission
Build a permanent and powerful progressive movement in Washington state supported by a network of committed donors.
Vision
A Washington state that is a healthy, just place to live, where government serves the public interest, our communities have self-determination, and we all benefit from a fair and sustainable economy that supports people and a healthy environment.
Values
Working in solidarity to build a welcoming and thriving multiracial, cross-class community where everyone can come together to solve problems.
Accountability to community, grantees, partners, and those most impacted by politics and policy.
Changing the system through democracy in order to address the root causes of issues.
Abundance in our approach to grantmaking, resourcing, and building relationships.
Collective action powered by people to solve problems through organizing.
Racial justice as the foundation of our democracy and the progressive political movement.
Progress Alliance was founded in 2006 to strengthen the progressive movement in Washington state. Instead of focusing on single campaigns or individual issues, we took an infrastructure approach — investing in leadership development, community-based organizations, and tools and capacities that all communities can leverage to win on their issues. We identify gaps in our movement's infrastructure and work to fill them, pursuing opportunities and addressing threats that stand in our way of success. We focus on the health of the state's progressive movement across multiple issue areas and over time — it is no one else’s job to tend to this underlying foundation.
Impact
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We organize donors as critical actors in our movement to give in a strategically aligned way, pooling resources to make grant investments in the organizations and initiatives working for a healthy democracy and racial, gender, economic, and environmental justice.
Grantmaking: Since our founding we have granted over $15 million from our pooled fund, and stewarded over $6 million in additional restricted funds to key programs.
Launching new capacities: We have provided seed funding and support to help launch more than 10 new programs and organizations with focuses ranging from data infrastructure, to candidate recruitment and support, to narrative development, to organizing young people in politics.
Aligning funding: We collaborate with individual and institutional funders to co-fund emerging opportunities. In prior years we have helped to organize up to $600,000 of additional funds to key priorities.
Organizing donors: We unite our community of donors behind a shared vision and membership philosophy, and host several educational events per year to ground us in our values, desired outcomes, and strategies.
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We work to elevate and support the leadership of communities who have traditionally been pushed out of the democratic process — including Black, Indigenous and People of Color, young people, and LGBTQ people — as the center of a successful movement for a representative multiracial democracy.
Increasing political power in communities of color: Approximately three-quarters of our annual grantmaking goes to organizations explicitly building power in communities of color through a variety of approaches, including community-led policy development and co-governance strategies, issue and electoral organizing, developing leaders of color to run campaigns, serve on boards and commissions, lobby their electeds, run for office, and more.
Electing a representative government: In 2019 we launched the First Mile Circle — a first of its kind program in the country to support progressive candidates of color in down ballot races. In the first five years of the program, our cross-class, multi-racial donor circle moved $1.96 million in total to 161 progressive candidates of color across 30 of Washington state’s 39 counties, helping 83 community leaders win and step into public office. These wins have contributed to increased representation at all levels of office, from city and county councils to port commissioners, judicial seats, state legislature, and more.
Working for a complete Census count of historically undercounted communities and an equitable redistricting process: We worked in partnership with the Washington Census Alliance to disburse more than $1.1M of support for community-based organizations and leaders to get an accurate count in 2020. This BIPOC-led coalition coordinated the most robust Census organizing program in our state’s history — resulting in a nearly 5% increase in self-responses over 2010’s count, putting Washington at the second highest response rate in the country.
Winning policies that increase voter power and strengthen our democracy: We support policies and initiatives to build a more representative and responsive democracy, with victories that include the Seattle Democracy Voucher approval in 2015, Automatic Voter Registration and Washington Voting Rights Act (WVRA) passage in 2018, and Seattle Ranked Choice Voting approval in 2022.
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We aim to be a resource and strategy partner with our grantee network and larger political community — this includes capacity building, strategic partnership, facilitating connections, and investing in spaces where our partners are building shared strategies and in tools that support their working together effectively.
Capacity building: We provide grantees with additional as-needed capacity building grants — beyond our baseline general operating funds — for hard-to-fund needs that strengthen their organization, such as board development, data systems and technologies, strategic planning processes, coaching, and more.
Strategic partnership: We meet with grantees annually, or more often as needed, to act as a sounding board as they develop strategies and programs. We also sit on steering committees or at coalition tables as requested by partners.
Facilitating connections: We partner with both community-based organizations and traditional political institutions to strengthen the progressive movement, often helping to bridge these relationships and supporting groups to align or coordinate strategies. We also facilitate connections between our grantee partners and donors with common interests.
Thank you
To our photography contributors: Amiran White, Lisa Merrill, Sharon Chang, Tara Gimmer; Unsplash contributors Markus Spiske, Jon Tyson, Etienne Girardet, and Rob Walsh; campaigns De-Escalate WA Initiative 940, Stable Homes Initiative 19-001, and Takele Gobena for SeaTac City Council; and grantee organizations Nuestra Casa, OneAmerica, Pacific County Voices Uniting, Pro-Choice Washington, Puget Sound Sage, Rural People’s Voice, The Washington Bus, Washington Community Alliance, Washington Immigrant Solidarity Network, Washington State Budget & Policy Center, and Washington CAN.