About Us

We are a collaborative philanthropic effort that centers community-driven solutions to the urgent need for housing justice in vibrant neighborhoods across California.

Photo credit: ELACC

We believe

Gentrification and displacement are not an inevitable byproduct of community development. To meet the needs of communities most affected by housing injustice, we provide:

Investments

in community-led organizations to build power for housing justice

Strategic coordination

across community organizations and across funders

Connections

and funding to share best practices and strategies across grassroots efforts

Best practices

in supporting community-driven solutions that are accountable to communities

Together we are shifting the current paradigm of housing

We support communities gaining control of the land on which they live – not just for profit but for the well-being of the people that live there.

Conversations across California about housing justice

X mins Organization

What we learned from conversations with renters across the state

7 mins Organization

How we ran a successful tenant rights campaign across California

4 mins Organization

Community organizing is a means of building power. Without community organizing there may be more housing built or there may be some changes around the policy related to housing elements or planning policies, but there will not be a true and more transformative change around decommodifying housing and ultimately no substantial wins.

STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBER

There is a growing consensus among groups large and small in California around pushing for social housing. We’ve all long asked the questions connected to scale, but it’s not just about land trusts, it’s about getting people to realize there’s a different way to look at ownership. And there are paths to decommodifying housing.

I think that’s just going to be a very exciting area of work in the coming years.

COMMUNITY ADVISOR

Things that we thought would take years to do are happening in a matter of months. The pressure we built in the first few years really got traction and came to a head during COVID. We were able to really move the needle in these four years. 

COMMUNITY ADVISOR

Having a strong public foundation partner that is so deeply aligned with our values around racial justice and power building is unique, because it’s an opportunity to partner on not just issue areas but to fund in a way that sometimes we can’t fund it, or to experiment in ways that we often are not able to experiment in our own foundation. 

STEERING COMMITTEE MEMBER

Our Approach

We invest in the leadership of communities directly affected by unjust housing policies with the goal of ensuring they have the power to determine what their communities look like.

We all have a role to play in growing power and resources for housing justice. The Fund for an Inclusive California is comprised of community organizations, funding partners, staff and our consulting team.

Community Advisors + Nonprofit Partners

ACCE Institute

region icon Bay Area | Los Angeles | Statewide

ACLU Southern California

region icon Inland Region

ACT-LA

region icon Los Angeles

Burbank Tenants’ Rights Committee

region icon Los Angeles

California Rural Legal Assistance, Inc.

region icon Central Valley

Catholic Charities of the Diocese of Stockton

region icon Central Valley

Causa Justa :: Just Cause

region icon Bay Area

Community Power Collective

region icon Los Angeles

Congregations Organized for Prophetic Engagement (COPE)

region icon Inland Region

East Bay Alliance for a Sustainable Economy

region icon Bay Area

East Bay Permanent Real Estate Cooperative

region icon Bay Area

Eastside Arts Alliance

region icon Bay Area

Eden Community Land Trust

region icon Bay Area

Faith in Action Bay Area

region icon Bay Area

Faith in the Valley

region icon Central Valley

Filipino Advocates for Justice

region icon Bay Area

Fresno Barrios Unidos

region icon Central Valley

Glad Tidings Community Development Corporation

region icon Bay Area

Housing Now!

region icon Statewide

Inland Congregations United for Change (ICUC)

region icon Inland Region

Inland Equity Partnership (Project of: Inland Equity Community Land Trust)

region icon Inland Region

Innercity Struggle

region icon Los Angeles

Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance (KIWA)

region icon Los Angeles

LA Voice

region icon Los Angeles

Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability

region icon Central Valley

LiBRE: Long Beach Residents Empowered

region icon Los Angeles

Little Tokyo Service Center Community Development Corporation

region icon Los Angeles

Los Angeles Center for Community Law and Action

region icon Los Angeles

LOUD for Tomorrow

region icon Central Valley

North Bay Organizing Project

region icon Bay Area

PICO California

region icon Statewide

Power California

region icon Central Valley

Public Counsel

region icon Los Angeles

Pueblo Unido Community Development Center

region icon Inland Region

Regional Tenant Organizing Network

region icon Bay Area

Right to the City Alliance for Homes for All California

region icon Statewide

Social Justice Learning Institute for the Uplift Inglewood Coalition

region icon Los Angeles

Southeast Asian Community Alliance

region icon Los Angeles

Starting Over, Inc.

region icon Inland Region

Strategic Actions for a Just Economy (SAJE)

region icon Los Angeles

Tenants Together

region icon Statewide

Time for Change Foundation

region icon Inland Region

TODEC (Training Occupational Development Educating Communities) Legal Center

region icon Inland Region

Funding Partners
 

Akonadi Foundation

Amplify Fund at Neighborhood Funders Group

California Community Foundation

Chan Zuckerberg Initiative

East Bay Community Foundation

Liberty Hill Foundation

San Francisco Foundation

Sunlight Giving

The California Endowment

The James Irvine Foundation

Weingart Foundation

Staff & Consultants
 

Dana Ginn Paredes, she/her

Debayani Kar, she/her

Gopika Setlur, she/her

Jen Thom, she/her

Constellation Communications

Peggy Saika, she/her

Executive Director

Jazmin Segura, she/her

Director

Narce Cuevas, they/them

Program Coordinator

Maricela Piña, she/her

Community Center Evaluation and Research

Committed for the long run

The Fund for an Inclusive California was designed as a three-year initiative.

In that time we have developed deep relationships that have allowed us to learn immeasurably about what it takes for philanthropy to support grassroots power building.

It also made it clear that three years is just the beginning.

Codesigning with community vision at the center

We began with a call to action to mobilize resources for communities’ vision for equitable development across California.

At the very beginning, Common Counsel Foundation and funding partners knew that we needed to begin building partnerships with community leaders to ensure our resources were driven by their experiences and vision.

We had to start somewhere, and so we began with the knowledge that was in the room, connected with nonprofits to get their input on which organizations and coalitions were critical to include in a power-building fund focused on housing justice.

Organizers pivoting to meet the moment

The pandemic revealed and accelerated what organizers already knew.

The pandemic sharpened the inequities communities have been organizing around for years.

The call for housing justice, and recognition of housing as a human right in the face of the environmental, health and economic toll of this time could not be clearer. Organizations pivoted and expanded their roles for the survival and well being of their communities.

A bold and unapologetic vision for housing justice

We are launching a collaborative process that centers local leaders to develop a bold vision for the next phase of work.

In the year ahead we continue our relationships and commitment to power-building strategies as key drivers for housing justice and equitable development, and are planning the the next phase of the fund. During the planning phase, we continue to align our collective efforts and amplify the leadership of Community Advisors – the Black, Indigenous and people of color movement leaders – who have guided the strategy of the Fund for an Inclusive California since its inception.