Grantmaking

Progressive Movement: A set of people and organizations that are working together towards a set of modern and new ideas, policies, and practices that advance social and racial justice and equity.

Power: The ability to achieve purpose, including having the influence or control of the resources necessary to achieve that purpose.

Power Building: An approach to increase capacity to achieve a purpose in the key arenas where decisions are made and rules are set. We must address power as it currently exists and where it is most often exercised, building different types of power to do so.

Governing Power: The ability to win and sustain power within multiple arenas of decision-making in order to shift the power structure of governance and establish a new common sense of governing (a new governing paradigm that replaces neoliberalism).

Progress Alliance plays several roles in addition to grantmaking —

• Strategic Partnership and Coordination: Progress Alliance is highly collaborative and we aim to be a resource and strategy partner with our grantee network and larger political community. That means providing capacity building resources, facilitating connections between organizations, funders, and other stakeholders in our networks, and plugging in as a strategic thought partner. In the past this work has included:

  • PA staff serving on issue or strategy-based coalitions and steering committees for ballot initiative campaigns

  • Raising millions of dollars in aligned funding to directly support collaborative projects, campaigns, or coalitions

  • Providing fiscal sponsorship to incubate new projects and organizations

  • Convening our grantee network with mainstream political partners

  • Conducting landscape assessments to identify gaps in the progressive movement’s infrastructure and working with partners to fill those gaps through the launch of new capacities

• Donor Organizing: Our model is based on organizing donors to align with and support the progressive political movement, with BIPOC movement leaders at the forefront of developing strategy. We believe that we cannot make adequate social change by following the models that have failed communities of color for hundreds of years, in which systems and institutions — including both philanthropy and traditional political systems — have intentionally excluded and harmed these communities. We support donors in committing their resources while ceding, sharing, and leveraging their power in support of the movement. We are building a learning community where donors learn from our partners and from each other. In practice, this looks like providing educational and engagement opportunities through events, trainings, communications, donor advising, and intentional relationship-building.

• First Mile: We coordinate the First Mile Circle — a donor circle that supports progressive candidates of color in down ballot races across Washington state who are bold, transformational, and accountable to the communities they represent. Donations are given directly from donors to candidate campaigns, with First Mile’s community partner recommendations serving as a BIPOC-led, community-informed process for determining which candidates to support, which reinforces the ties between candidates and their communities. PA is the founding and host organization for First Mile, meaning it is our staff who are convening our community partners, fundraising to bring in donor’s pledges, hosting events to hear from candidates, communicating with members, and more.

Our detailed annual grantmaking list is shared with Progress Alliance donor members, donor prospects, and partners in our Annual Report and upon request.

Progress Alliance staff conduct landscape research prior to making new investments, which includes informational interviews with leaders working in a particular geography, issue area, or community that we aim to expand our funding in. We are also in continuous conversations with our grantees, partners, and other funders to stay up to date on new projects and organizations in the progressive community.

At this time, our grant processes are invite-only. Progress Alliance is not a foundation and does not have an endowment. We're a donor alliance, which means we fundraise every dollar we grant out each year from our donor members. Over three-quarters of our annual grantmaking budget is committed in multi-year funding cycles to a core set of partners, so our budget flexibility is limited and our growth must be slow and intentional.

Timeline: The majority of our funding is provided as unrestricted general operating grants in two or three-year commitments so our network has stable funding to plan around. However, we also consider one-year grants where appropriate for a time-limited project or campaign, or to test mutual compatibility with a new partner before moving to a longer-term commitment.

We have two primary grant scopes: Core Grants and Movement Capacity Grants

• Core Grants are for our long-term organizing infrastructure partners who are building explicit political power with a constituency base and contributing to a strong multiracial, cross-class, community-led progressive movement.

• Movement Capacity Grants are for our partners who provide crucial tools and capacities to support the efficiency and effectiveness of our movement’s organizations. Rather than organizing a community, they are supporting the ecosystem of organizations who do this work. This includes key capacities such as research and polling, narrative development, data infrastructure, and more.

Grant Amounts: Our grant sizes for Core Grants and Movement Capacity Grants range between $25,000 to $100,000 annually.

Capacity Building Support: In addition to providing general operating funds, we have an annual budget set aside for smaller grants (generally up to $15k) to support capacity building projects and emergent opportunities that grantees can request at any point by contacting PA staff.

Criteria we consider in selecting grantees includes:

• Explicit political power-building focus and impact and/or explicit focus and impact in developing and providing tools / information / capacity that strengthens the progressive movement in Washington State

• Transformative long-term impact in at least one of our five core capacity areas

• Alignment with our Theory of Change and strategic goals

• Anti-racist in values, execution of work, and impact

• Clear accountability to Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) communities

• Centering the leadership and knowledge of BIPOC communities

• Geographic and tactical diversity to build a cohesive and impactful statewide progressive movement and create the conditions for meaningful political change

• Emphasis on the progressive movement’s biggest gaps – including tactics, tools, and communities that are under-resourced

• From a 501(c)3 or a 501(c)4 organization as determined by the IRS, or a project that is fiscally sponsored by such an organization*

*Contractors and non-sponsored projects may be considered on a case-by-case basis. In addition, our c4 arm has an affiliated Washington State Political Action Committee - Voter Action - which provides funding to various campaigns, initiatives, and independent expenditures. More information about that work can be found on the Voter Action website.

Expectations of Grantees — Trust and Mutual Accountability: As a funder, we don’t demand a particular set of metrics – grantees set their own goals and metrics for success. We also know that conditions change and strategy evolves – to us, accountability looks like communication, transparency and authenticity, not commitment to a rigid set of outcomes that are not responsive to changing circumstances. Grantees are accountable to the communities they serve first and foremost. We fund groups that help us fulfill our mission, and we trust people to do their work well and know what their community needs. We work to keep barriers low with simple application processes and minimal reporting requirements, and are open to continuous feedback about our processes to ensure we are meeting our accessibility and equity goals. We aim to be a thoughtful strategic partner that grantees can come to for support and guidance. We acknowledge that power dynamics are inherent in funder/grantee relationships and aim to collaborate in a way that consciously dismantles white supremacy, and is rooted in trust, mutual respect and accountability, connection, authenticity, and bold risk-taking.

Progress Alliance is not a foundation. We're a donor alliance, which means we fundraise every dollar we grant out each year from our donor members. Members make contributions that are personally meaningful for them. We do not have a minimum gift amount.