2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

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DELIVERING CREATING IMPACT CHANGE

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Advancement Project proudly releases its 2009 Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact.

Transcript of 2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

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DELIVERING

CREATING

IMPACTCHANGE

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DELIVERING

CREATING

IMPACTCHANGE

ANNUAL REPORT 2009

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DEAR FRIENDS AND SUPPORTERS

This report provides us a space to reflect on the achievements of 2009 while looking beyond the horizon with a renewed energy and sense of duty.

Relevance, impact, innovation, and partnerships were the definitive themes of 2009: relevant in our activities, impactful in our actions, innovative in our methods, and true to the mainstay of our model—partnerships with community organizations.

The events of this past year marked several significant milestones, as we also encountered many challenges in our ongoing pursuit of a just democracy through access to high-quality education, affordable housing, immigrant rights, and economic justice.

In preparation for the 2010 mid-term elections, our Voter Protec-tion Team published two comprehensive assessments of its 2008 voter protection efforts, detailing successes and targeting areas for improvement. Our team of seasoned lawyers, local advocates and communications specialists used the “off-year” to raise awareness of potential problems where they may develop, build partnerships, conduct trainings, and push for reform of election administration at the local, state, at federal levels.

In 2009, Advancement Project—a national civil rights organization that uses legal,

communications, and policy expertise to strengthen grassroots-based and commu-

nity-led solutions to inequitable conditions undermining the promise of democracy—

celebrated our 10th anniversary, commemorating a decade-long commitment to

creating change and delivering impact in communities of color.

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As first responders, we acted, taking every measure necessary to protect the most fundamental democratic right, the right to cast a ballot and be counted—operating as both guardian and watchdog. This included improving poll worker training, working towards settlement of litigation, beating back potentially harmful laws governing voter registration and election administration, and speaking out against regressive campaign finance reform.

In 2009, Advancement Project also responded with a timely YouTube video in the wake of the virulent and hateful rhetoric surrounding the confirmation of Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotamayor. The video pushes back against the use of hateful words that carry the power to deeply wound and divide.

The Immigrant Justice Program published an in-depth report, a telling narrative that reveals the need to reform an exploitative and monopolistic taxicab industry in Prince George’s County, MD. After nearly three years of struggle, this report sets the stage for the approval of a new taxicab code and a complete overhaul of the county’s taxicab industry. We are hopeful that this will greatly improve the livelihood of cabdrivers.

We collaborated with the Right to the City Alliance, conducting workshops and focus groups in cities across the country to document and give voice to urban communities most impacted by lack of access to affordable and decent housing.

Finally, after four years of advocacy, Advancement Project’s Ending the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Track Project and partner Florida State Conference NAACP celebrated a major victory, as the Florida legislature voted unanimously to change its overly punitive disciplinary policy. The new policy has the potential to

greatly reduce the devastating impact the previous policy has had on children, families, and communities throughout Florida by focusing on alternatives to expulsion and referral to law enforcement. Our team used 2009 to lay the foundation for an even more aggressive national campaign to address the school-to-prison pipeline in 2010.

Advancement Project, in all our efforts, strives to bring about change, embrace inclusion, and inspire movements—from the ground up—that foster universal opportunity and a just democ-racy. We hope these pages provide encouragement. We want to thank our generous contributors and devoted community partners. We continue to need your vital support, as there is much work yet ahead.

Judith A. Browne-Dianis Gerald Torres Co-Director Chairman of the Board

Penda D. Hair Co-Director and Co-Founder

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HIGHLIGHTS

After a busy period of election-related activity in 2008, Advancement Project entered a year of transition. Maturing into our second decade, while continuing to work on the ground, we also focused on advocacy at the federal level, aware that national advocacy can achieve policy transformations with maximum sustainable impact on local communities.

Advancement Project developed several policy and research documents to strengthen our advocacy. We also prodded the administration of President Barack Obama to move more forcefully to rectify racial injustices.

In 2009, during a year of assessment and change, Advancement Project engaged in strategy development for 2010 and continued efforts to address barriers to the ballot, open doors of educational opportunity and reform overly harsh school discipline policies, spotlight the national affordable housing crisis, and defend the rights of immigrant communities through protecting basic American liberties, leading to significant accomplishments:

2009

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■■ Advancement Project delivered high-impact policy recommen-dations by testifying three times before Congress and before an Ohio state panel on election reform.

■■ Through our Ending the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Track Program, Advancement Project won enactment of a new law in the state of Florida governing school discipline. The new law rejects the kind of zero-tolerance policies that led to Viktoria King’s 2008 suspension—a Beaufort County, NC, case in which the Southside High School sophomore was given a ten-day suspension for her involvement in a fight. King was subsequently suspended for the remainder of the 2007-2008 school year (under the principal’s recommendation) and denied access to alternative educational opportunities. The new law is the most significant state-level action against the school-to-prison pathway since opponents of these measures began to press for more just school disciplinary mechanisms.

■■ In Florida, Advancement Project’s Voter Protection Program and partners beat back what program director Elizabeth Westfall calls a “horrendous” proposal to reshape rules governing voter registration, election administration, and campaign finance.

■■ Advancement Project realized our long-held goal of infusing legal education with a unique brand of community lawyering when we launched a legal course, Community Lawyering: Dismantling Structural Racism and Creating Social Change, at the Georgetown University Law Center.

■■ Organizational expertise spurred carefully researched docu-mentation, delivering impact through the creation of powerful

tools to bolster advocacy efforts. These reports included A Change Agenda: Lessons from the Ground, Barriers to the Ballot: The 2008 Election and Beyond, Uncovering Flaws in Election Administration, and Dispatching Injustice: Cab Drivers’ Struggle in Prince George’s County.

■■ Innovative and powerful communications vehicles emerged, including the new online publication Root & Branch and the videos Sonia Sotomayor: You Be the Judge and Right to Vote. Right to Vote depicts the excitement of the 2008 presidential election and the need to secure—in our Constitution—the most sacred American ritual, the right to vote.

■■ Racial justice advocates and supporters came together in a successful celebration of Advancement Project’s decade of work and partnership at the 10-Year Gala and Awards Presenta-tion, “Collective Voices for Racial Justice,” at the Renaissance Mayflower Hotel. The gala featured Sweet Honey in the Rock, an internationally renowned and Grammy Award-winning all-woman African-American a cappella ensemble.

Advancement Project’s staff dedicates itself to working with organizers and organizing communities to analyze the electoral map and eliminate areas where voters are disenfranchised, students wrongly sent to jail, and immigrants treated as criminals. Together, we intend to move forward, advancing a just democracy where African Americans and Asian Americans, Latinos and Native Americans, low-income people, and immigrants are granted their full civil rights.

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Voter Protection Program

Advancement Project’s Voter Protection Program involves securing and protecting voting rights and holding public institutions and officials accountable for providing full access to voting. The heavy reliance of voting rights gatekeepers from jurisdictions across the country on our Voter Protection Program’s expertise may be the best indicator of the program’s relevance: Advance-ment Project has long-delivered results and trustworthy data to election officials, who turn to us, at the local and state level.

ThE VoTER PRoTECTion PRoGRAm foCuSES on:

■■ Voter registration education and training for groups on the ground

■■ Continuing maintenance and verification of voting rolls after registration

■■ Training of poll workers to address inadequate preparation prior to election day

■■ Equitable and proper allocation of polling place resources

■■ The overuse of provisional ballots

Florida

In 2009, Advancement Project assisted a coalition of national and state-based groups that worked aggressively to prevent the enactment of a harmful voter suppression bill in Florida. It was a coordinated campaign that included a meeting with Florida Secretary of State Kurt Browning to push for expan-sion of early voting, among other issues—the first-time voter protection groups representing communities of color had met with the secretary. We advocated his support of much needed reforms to election codes and accepted a mid-March invitation for members of Advancement Project’s Florida team to speak before the Democratic House Caucus to discuss election reform.

At the end of March, Advancement Project and a coalition of advocates became aware of partisan efforts in the state Sen-ate and House to introduce voter suppression bills. If passed, changes to election laws detailed in each bill harnessed the potential to disproportionately disenfranchise voters. Those changes included disallowing photo identification from senior centers as an acceptable form of identification, requiring that any change of address be updated at the board of election at least 29 days before any election, and prohibiting voter advocates from coming within 100 feet of any voters in line at the polls.

Advancement Project immediately enlisted our 42-member coalition to sign a letter calling on Governor Charlie Crist to oppose the bills. The coalition’s passionate and aggressive action also included letters to senators, alerts to members—which sparked hundreds of calls and emails to the Senate and House Elections Committees—as well as an editorial memo

Advancement Project strives to remain relevant in our efforts, shaping programs that allow us to act

swiftly and strategically as first responders to address disparities and inequities facing communities of color. By

responding when and where marginalized populations require the combination of cutting-edge communica-

tions and advocacy training—in unison with policy analysis and legal action when necessary—Advancement

Project distinguishes itself as a high-impact change agent.

RELEVANCE

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drafted by Advancement Project that led to editorials appearing in newspapers across the state. Under pressure, the push to pass the bills was ultimately abandoned, a major victory for voters.

In an undertaking that Westfall says “crystallized all of the work Advancement Project does to tactically put together a campaign,” the Voter Protection Program team mounted vigorous, spirited, and ultimately victorious advocacy to block passage of Florida legislation that would have introduced unfair registration rules, freedom of speech restrictions, and regressive campaign finance reform, among other setbacks. Grassroots partners called and emailed state legislators to urge them to defeat the measure. The New York Times quoted Westfall’s charges about the draconian character of the proposed legislation, SB 956. Numerous radio stations, alerted through Advancement Project press outreach, invited project staff for guest appearances and interviews. Communications strategies also included the distribution of facts and analysis to newspaper editorial boards.

“Editorials were all in our favor throughout the state,” observed Advancement Project senior attorney Kathryn Boockvar. “They all had a huge effect on killing the bills.”

Ohio

At the same time, “we made excellent headway in Ohio on provisional ballot reform,” reports Westfall. Advance-ment Project’s staff attorney Donita Judge told summit participants that 40,000 of 208,000 provisional votes cast in the November 2008 election—nearly 20 percent—in Ohio were rejected. This represents a substantial number of uncounted votes, as recent races, including the 2000 presidential election, have been decided by razor-thin margins.

Collaborating with Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, as well as state and local organizations, Advancement Project successfully advocated the incorporation of our proposals into HB 260. The Ohio House of Representatives resoundingly approved the measure. The state senate has yet to show the same support, but Advancement Project and our partners will continue to urge passage of this important reform.

A Change Agenda : Lessons from the Ground

Advancement Project reached out to the incoming members of President Barack Obama’s administration with a comprehensive set of priorities in A Change Agenda: Lessons from the Ground. This transition paper, produced

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jointly with the Advancement Project California office, reflects the multifaceted work of Advancement Project in conjunction with community groups and local activists. It opens by calling upon the new administration to reinvigorate the implementation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Court decisions and lack of enthusiasm for enforcement in the executive branch have significantly weakened the act in recent years. Additionally, Change Agenda’s 36 proposals touch upon a range of racial justice issues, including the need to increase graduation rates and to mandate uniform implementation of voter protection laws.

Publications: Documenting 2008

Advancement Project’s Voter Protection Team and two national partners issued the study Uncovering Flaws in Election Admin-istration, detailing information gathered from calls received by two national voter hotlines during the 2008 presidential and primary general elections. Made to hotlines operated by InfoVoter Technologies, in partnership with media outlets such as CNN and the Tom Joyner Morning Show, the unfiltered calls revealed several of the systematic flaws and failures in election administration.

“For many,” says Voter Protection Program director and senior attorney Elizabeth Westfall, “the 2008 margin of victory overshadowed the election’s challenges,” adding that some “thought a new Congress and a new president would fix all these problems.” But we found there could be no letup in the reform-ing of voting systems. The organization produced significant documentation, including a comprehensive report in December and a mid-year collaborative analysis of November 2008 voting difficulties.

At year’s end, Advancement Project issued a comprehensive report assessing the 2008 election process in five battleground states—Florida, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia—where voter protection efforts were intensively focused. The December release of Barriers to the Ballot: The 2008 Elec-tion and Beyond, a report illustrating trends that improved election administration as well as trends that resulted in the disenfranchisement of thousands of voters, represented the culmination of the year’s studies. We mounted press briefings to introduce the report to the public in the five states, resulting in widespread coverage.

Congressional Testimony

When the U.S. Congress focused on voter protection issues in July, it called upon Advancement Project experts. Congress heard testimony from Westfall and Advancement Project Managing Director and General Counsel Edward Hailes, Jr. Westfall called upon Congress to standardize rules on the use of provisional ballots and require states to offer paper ballots when mechanized voting equipment is insufficient to meet demand. Hailes testified before the House of Representatives Subcommittee on Elections, also calling for uniform standards for the use of paper and provisional ballots.

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ADVAnCEmEnT PRoJECT’S ChAnGE AGEnDA CALLS foR:

■■ A comprehensive public health approach to defeat gangs and violence

■■ An end to the schoolhouse-to-jailhouse track

■■ Improvement in the quality of and access to early childhood education

■■ Policies that address the housing crisis in poor and urban communities

■■ Protections for low-wage workers during disaster reconstruction and redevelopment

■■ Establishment of uniform voting standards and protections throughout the country and affirmation of the right to vote

inclusive Development

We have continued, through our Inclusive Development Program, to provide ongoing support to displaced New Orleans residents who have been denied access to affordable housing upon returning home.

In August, Representative Maxine Waters (D-California) convened a public hearing in New Orleans to gather information on the city’s redevelopment. She specifically inquired about a program established to assist homeowners affected by Katrina by buying them out or providing them meaningful assistance. As chair of the House Financial Services Committee Subcommittee on Housing and Community Opportunity, Waters and her colleagues also examined the construction of public housing units. The congresswoman pressed federal and state officials to step up financial support to low-income New Orleanians.

Advancement Project senior attorney Anita Sinha worked closely to assist long-time public housing resident and leader Stephanie Mingo in preparing for the hearing. Mingo offered her

first-person testimony—“the voice of truth”—about the many problems she and her former neighbors have faced in finding a place to live.

Sinha also testified, capturing the problems of unemployment, homelessness, and displacement in New Orleans. Her testimony also pointed out key problem areas such as the lack of housing options for displaced public housing residents and the failure to award jobs to public housing residents as required by law.

Our Inclusive Development Program team pushed for job devel-opment in several other cities. In the San Francisco Bay Area, for instance, our analysis revealed that the Oakland housing authority had no minority business contracts. To address this and other priorities, the program intensified its contact and communication with officials of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) in 2009.

“Collaborating with grassroots

organizations in cities

throughout the country,

Advancement Project has

cultivated a comprehensive

understanding of school

discipline and its unintended

consequences.

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Ending the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Track

Since 1999, Advancement Project has led the effort to end harsh discipline policies by conducting groundbreaking research and advocacy to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline. Collaborating with grassroots organizations in cities throughout the country, Advancement Project has cultivated a comprehensive understanding of school discipline and its unintended consequences. Advancement Project, as well as other experts and advocates, have documented deep disparities in the application of these codes, with African-American and Latino students disproportionately affected by their overuse. Students of color are seven times more likely to be disciplined than their white peers, according to analysis and statistics.

Children suspended for minor conduct offenses are forced from an academic track and funneled into the juvenile justice system, an environment in which they are more and more likely to be arrested for these conduct violations. Through extensive policy research, drafting of progressive school codes of conduct, and identification of sustainable solutions, Advancement Project’s pursuit to end this troubling trend has resulted in significant declines in out-of-school suspensions and arrests in many districts including Denver, Baltimore, and Chicago.

Expertise, Advocacy, and Resources for Communities

In 2009, advocacy at the federal level began in earnest when the U.S. Department of Justice indicated to Advancement Project an interest in addressing the problems of zero-tolerance programs.

We also began to organize so that the expected 2010 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA – No Child Left Behind) incorporates alternatives to zero tolerance.

Our education staff realized the importance of creating models of action that grassroots activists—faced with discriminatory zero-tolerance programs—can follow in their own struggles. To move forward, says project director and senior attorney Jim Freeman, the project expanded to new locations, ramped up its technical assistance, and developed more organizing tools. This included launching the www.stopschoolstojails.org website and an updated version of the Ending the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Action Kit.

“The Florida victory has contributed

to a growing national movement

to reform zero tolerance policies,

a movement that has inspired

foundations to scale up resources

and funding.

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Advancement Project’s staff has also initiated a monitoring and accountability effort, encouraging the educational community to see that laws, regulations, and guidelines are just a starting point for putting an end to the schoolhouse to jailhouse track. School districts and schools need strict accountability, bolstered by vigorous training and internal accountability mechanisms.

“What it comes down to is ‘what does the teacher do with individual students?’” Freeman says. Advancement Project is encouraging parents to organize to demand that schools adhere to more just and equitable disciplinary codes. Such campaigns can help move more people to challenge the serious and deeply entrenched obstacles to educational opportunity.

To support the full range of organizing against zero tolerance and other inequitable disciplinary systems, we began laying

plans for a 2010 national action camp for student organizers. We also revised and reissued our Ending the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Action Kit, intended to help mobilized communities (parents, youth, advocates, and educators) understand and begin to address the schoolhouse to jailhouse track, creating learning environments that lead students on a path to college, rather than prison.

In 2009, Advancement Project collected a host of resources in the www.stopschoolstojails.org website, created as a one-stop shop for grassroots advocates, officials, and concerned educa-tors. Site content includes current news articles; issue briefs and other analyses; updates on the local, state, and regional groups; and other materials.

Florida Victory

Perhaps most significantly, the project delivered major impact in Florida, where the state passed legislation limiting zero-tolerance policies. With our partners, we laid the groundwork for this victory in 2008, when we presented findings and recom-mendations to Florida Governor Charlie Crist, a presentation that built on seven years of work in six Florida school districts.

The 2009 Florida law—which starts from the premise that keeping students in school serves the whole public, now and in the future—has generated interest well beyond the state. “There hasn’t been a zero-tolerance state-level initiative as significant” as the Florida law, Freeman observes. It “created a strong statement on the need to decriminalize school-based behaviors and find alternatives and look at racial dispropor-tionality.” This victory has contributed to a growing national movement to reform zero tolerance policies, a movement that has inspired foundations to scale up resources and funding.

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Attorney Bill Quigley, an Advancement Project partner, says that because of the organization’s willingness to be a “full-service” advocacy partner in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, “I can tell you that they’ve made an actual concrete impact on the policies and procedures particularly for poor people, African Americans, Latino workers, and the like all along the Gulf Coast.”

Voter iD Laws

Our Voter Protection Program team continued its work to defeat requirements that voters show photo identification before casting their ballots, concentrating on legislation proposed in the state legislatures of Pennsylvania and Mis-souri. Such requirements have a disproportionate impact on African Americans, Latinos, and low-income voters. One in four African Americans, one in five seniors, and 15 percent of poor Americans do not hold up-to-date photo identification. Such measures can limit the voting rights of students, seniors, people displaced from the Gulf Coast in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and many others.

“We found out in late March that this new voter ID bill [in Pennsylvania] had been introduced requiring photo ID for all voters,” said Advancement Project senior attorney Kathryn Boockvar. “We and partners from all over the state collaborated in producing a massive public outreach campaign, calling state senators telling everybody we could think of.”

In Missouri, Advancement Project joined with state partners including Secretary of State Robin Carnahan to prevent a similar proposal from moving through the legislature. Carnahan argued that the measure could disenfranchise as many as 230,000 registered voters. We knew that blocking this proposal would have huge consequences.

“Every time this resolution was put on the calendar in committee, and when it passed out of committee, we would put news about it at www.mofairelections.org, get people to go down and testify and flood legislators with calls,” said Denise Lieberman, our Missouri-based voter protection attorney. “We kept up the pressure to the very last day of the legislative session until the bill died.”

Root & Branch

Those who control public discourse on racial justice will have the greatest effect on structural racism over time. Coverage of racial justice issues in today’s hyper saturated media

Carefully chosen priorities, innovative approaches, embraced partnerships, and a disciplined adherence to

our organizational theory of creating change shape Advancement Project’s ability to commit to racial justice

campaigns with maximum impact.

IMPACT

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environment is superficial at best, and more commonly, absent altogether. Advancement Project stepped forward with our own antidote to the dearth of coverage. We launched an ambitious new organizing and communications publication: the quarterly online magazine Root & Branch. This smart, visually appealing publication illuminates on-the-ground quests for racial justice.

Articles in the summer and fall 2009 issues of Root & Branch included analyses of housing and political struggles (such as the article “Multicultural Alliances in Redistricting”), a critical review of the best-selling nonfiction book Outliers, a profile of the United Workers of Baltimore, and many other articles. The publica-tion represents the culmination of two years of planning and builds on the web-based Community Justice Resource Center, a repository of Advancement Project’s action toolkits and justice resources.

The response to the new publication has been incredibly positive. We hope that Root & Branch, a centerpiece of our commitment to public communications as an integral, essential element of Advancement Project’s overall strategy for change, will become a go-to source for grassroots organizations.

10th Anniversary Gala

We commemorated our 10th anniversary—and celebrated the beginning of a new decade—in a fabulous dinner and gala in Washington, DC, on October 29. Advancement Project co-directors Penda Hair and Judith Browne-Dianis recalled, “What started as little more than a dream coupled with the grit and passion of a few people back in 1999 has grown into a dynamic, effective national organization.” The festive occasion offered a moment to reflect on how extensive—substantively and geographically—Advancement Project’s reach has become. The gala acknowledged partnerships that have fueled our work and helped create new relationships with potential partners and donors.

The inaugural Advancing Democracy Awards, presented to individuals and organizations in recognition of their outstanding contributions to ensuring a just democracy, honored several of Advancement Project’s partners and supporters:

■■ New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, a renowned journalist, honored for his fearless reporting of race and race issues, politics, and urban affairs.

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■■ Jenner & Block LLP, for their leadership in providing public service and pro bono advocacy, particularly in Advancement Project’s ongoing efforts to defend the right of return for displaced residents in New Orleans post-Katrina.

■■ New Orleans activists Bobbie Jennings, Odessia Lewis, Stephanie Mingo, and Gloria Williams, for their inspired service on the front lines of the fight for public housing residents’ right of return. These remarkable leaders truly exemplify fortitude and perseverance, overcoming their individual circumstances to represent and speak out for the most vulnerable of the Katrina Diaspora.

■■ Open Society Institute, for their long and dedicated support of Advancement Project and our efforts, as well as their mission to build vibrant and tolerant democracies whose governments are accountable to their citizens, on a global scale in more than 60 countries.

■■ Denver-based education action organization Padres y Jóvenes Unidos, for their invaluable partnership in helping Advancement Project address the overuse of harsh school disciplinary codes in the Denver Public School System, as well as their remarkable record of success in mobilizing their com-munity, developing new leadership, and eliminating the barriers to academic achievement and college access faced by young people in Denver.

Internationally beloved a capella vocalists Sweet Honey in the Rock provided entertainment and inspiration for the 250 gathered supporters, while the mantra invoked by spoken word artist Mike Molina, “be encouraged,” aptly captured the spirit of the Advancement Project family.

“What started as little more

than a dream coupled with

the grit and passion of a

few people back in 1999 has

grown into a dynamic, effective

national organization.

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Community Lawyering: Dismantling Structural Racism and Creating Social Change

Advancement Project’s theory of change has always relied heavily on the notion that our approach to racial justice struggles must be modeled and replicable to anchor social justice efforts. As such, we were thrilled with the 2009 launch of a new course at the prestigious Georgetown University Law Center in Wash-ington, DC. Advancement Project developed a hands-on course in social change lawyering, drawing on the work of established theorists of social justice law and upon our own history. This seminar, Community Lawyering: Dismantling Structural Racism and Creating Social Change, ushered in a new model of lawyer-ing at the law school consistent with Advancement Project’s founding principles.

Judith Browne-Dianis, Jim Freeman, and Edward Hailes, Jr. teach law students that “innovative ‘community lawyers’ have returned to the best traditions of civil rights practice by using a wide array of skills” for problem solving. Students are required to develop case studies of existing or proposed racial justice cam-paigns and are encouraged to develop new and innovative ways of conveying those studies to their classmates. Advancement Project expects the clinic to cultivate a new generation of public interest attorneys and advocates—even Supreme Court justices.

Sonia Sotomayor: You Be the Judge

The 2009 nomination and confirmation of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court served as a lightning rod for heated, and at times hateful, public rhetoric on race. Opponents of racial justice argued that Sotomayor was a “racist” based on her view that having a Latino heritage will allow her to bring a diverse and unique perspective to the Supreme Court. Alarmed by the rising swell of anti-Sotomayor invective, Advancement Project sprang into action, developing a web-based video to alert viewers to the dangers posed by such recriminations.

Posted to YouTube on the AdvancementProjectDC channel, the eight-minute video, Sonia Sotomayor: You Be The Judge, tackles the widespread use of hate speech employed by Sotomayor’s opponents, warning viewers of the potentially deadly impact of such speech. The video includes footage of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. asserting his oft-repeated maxims that “truth crushed to earth will rise again” because “no lie can live forever.” You Be the Judge reminds viewers “words have weight,” imploring “stop the hate.”

Right to Vote – the Video

“You might be surprised to know we don’t have a constitutional right to vote in America. From state to state, county to county, voting requirements vary.”

This is the message of another Advancement Project video, developed by our Right To Vote initiative as part of continuing public education and analysis conducted in support of a constitutional

Advocates will likely never realize a just democracy if we insist on adhering only to old ways of mobilizing,

litigating, communicating, and advocating. That is why Advancement Project is an organization of

thoughtful strategists, unafraid to break with outdated practices. In 2009, we brought this innovative spirit

to our development of a new academic course for law students, to improving strategic communications

efforts, and to community development interventions.

INNOVATION

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amendment that would provide an explicit federal guarantee of the right to vote. Without such guarantees, states can and do establish widely varying, and sometimes arbitrary, laws governing the voting process. This lack of uniformity leaves the door wide open for undermining and abusing voter rights.

The video conveys the celebratory, patriotic, proud attitude of many who voted in the 2008 election—a moment described by Hailes as “an awesome, incredible election.”

“I’m 25 years old and I’m finally voting,” says one African-American man. “Everyone’s voice counts,” asserts another voter. Challenging weary outlooks on voting, the video conveys the preciousness—and precariousness—of voting rights in the United States.

Equity in the Stimulus Act

Congress passed the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009, popularly known as the Stimulus Act, to create jobs and stimulate the depressed economy by funding various public projects. Through our Inclusive Development Program, with analysis done in collaboration with the California office, Advancement Project has taken a novel, community-focused approach to monitoring ARRA, to discern whether stimulus funds are, in the words of Anita Sinha, “going to the communities that need recovery or to line the pockets of the same old fat cats.” In the San Francisco Bay Area, for example, $9 million in stimulus funds went toward improvements to the ferry that connects San Francisco with Marin County, an exceptionally wealthy suburb, while public transit systems used by low-income people have been shortchanged.

Program staff members have been assisting state coalitions such as the New York Stimulus Alliance and other partners in determining if jurisdictions are spending the money equitably, and, when necessary, filing claims to rectify misappropriation of the funds. We assist local and state groups in identifying the proper targets for lodging concerns and complaints about ARRA, and have lodged claims with the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Transportation. In advance of an October 15 federal report on stimulus spending, we issued Ensuring Equitable Recovery: A Guide to Stimulus Jobs Data, offering practical, step-by-step advice and contact information to enable communities to assist grassroots advocates in following the money.

“I’m 25 years old and I’m

finally voting,” says one

African-American man.

“Everyone’s choice counts,”

asserts another voter.

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When Hurricane Katrina ravaged her city, Stephanie Mingo, a long-time housing advocate, left her New Orleans home cling-ing to a floating refrigerator. In spite of the trauma, Mingo has continued her activism in the post-Katrina period, fighting to make sure that there is enough public housing for low-income families in the “reconstructed” New Orleans.

Abay Geday arrived in the United States years ago from his native Ethiopia and, like many of his fellow immigrants, became a taxi driver. Geday probably never imagined that he would be pushed into organizing for cab driver rights, but he has done so, bringing along an eclectic, sometimes fractious, band of cabbies with him.

“When we’re at the table,” he says, “we’re all cab drivers with equal importance to the movement.”

Advancement Project forged a new collaboration with Advocates for Children’s Services, a statewide project of Legal Aid in North Carolina, when we filed an amicus brief in the North Carolina case of Viktoria King. King had been suspended from school for defending herself in a fistfight, and the Beaufort County school system refused to allow her to attend an alternative school during her suspension.

“The suspension put me behind a lot. I couldn’t take honors and AP classes, and had to repeat a math class,” King said. Advancement Project, Advocates for Children’s Services and other groups contended that the school district should not deny students their right to education through long-term suspensions.

Mingo, Geday and King—and thousands of other allies for racial justice—propel Advancement Project’s full-on battle for

equity.By determined example, their experiences—and often their partnerships—inspire and guide Advancement Project’s quest for creating change and delivering impact.

Such undaunted fighters have charted the course as Advance-ment Project’s dedicated attorneys, on-the-ground advocates and other staff members have engineered a leading-edge “action tank” to take on community struggles in every region of the continental United States. We are committed to infusing the organization’s work with relevance and innovation, impact and collaboration. These are the qualities that have fueled Advance-ment Project’s continued growth. Advancement Project has become an organization of great depth and breadth—one that thoughtfully takes on an array of issues, all of which connect to the broader struggle to eradicate the structures of racism in the United States. Advancement Project has covered the map, undergirding community struggles in New England, Mid-Atlantic, Southeast, Midwest, Plains States, Southwest, and West Coast communities.

Just as our staff embraces partnerships, the organization’s collaborators embrace Advancement Project’s approach. Reflecting on his organization’s cooperation with Advancement Project on voter protection work, Juan Mursuli of Democracia USA and Democracia Ahora says, “When you work with people who are passionate and direct and honest and authentic, not only does it make the work more enjoyable, but it also makes it more effective.”

Few topics spark the enthusiasm of Advancement Project staff like discussions about our partners in creating

change. Collaboration with leaders like housing activist Stephanie Mingo and taxi driver Abay Geday goes

to the heart of Advancement Project’s unique, community-centered, grassroots-oriented method of work.

PARTNERSHIPS

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20 I Advancement Project ANNUAL REPORT 2009

immigrant Justice

While each Advancement Project program has developed productive partnerships that dot the map from Miami northwards and to the San Francisco Bay Area, observers can easily discern the vitality of these collaborations in the achievements of the Immigrant Justice Program.

To promote economic opportunity, the program has become immersed in the struggles of the mostly immigrant taxicab drivers of the metropolitan area of Washington, DC. In July 2009, Advancement Project released Dispatching Injustice: Cab Drivers’ Struggle in Prince George’s County. The study —and our comprehensive advocacy association with the Prince George’s County Taxi Workers Alliance—mapped the unsavory web of semi-secret taxi ownership and control that works against the drivers. The alliance, under the dedicated leadership of Abay Geday, strives to augment the power and economic interests of drivers by improving the quality of the entire industry.

The Prince George’s County, MD, drivers, like many throughout the United States, endure nearly untenable working conditions. Low wages and high fees payable to the cab companies from whom they rent their cabs frequently force the drivers to work 12-hour days, seven days a week. Drivers often pay more than half of their earnings to the cab company owners in an industry in which ownership is highly concentrated. At a time when costs rose markedly throughout the entire transportation industry, the taxi drivers alliance had to lobby the county council for a modest

“As the only organization

in the country with expertise

in reforming the taxicab

industry by promoting

civic participation among

cab drivers, we have received

requests for assistance from

drivers in five additional

jurisdictions, and other

cab-driver led coalitions

have replicated the model

in Los Angeles and Austin.

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Advancement Project ANNUAL REPORT 2009 I 21

increase in cab fares. Many cabs in the county, furthermore, are unsafe and do not meet emission standards.

Dispatching Injustice found that in spite of some steps toward reform, the industry “remains in great disarray and urgently in need of carefully crafted comprehensive change.” Based on interviews and other research conducted over a two-year period, the study detailed the industry’s lack of accountability and recommended that the county declare a moratorium on many of its taxi procedures until reforms are in place. It provided a factual foundation for the drivers’ attempts to get the county government to legislate important industry reforms, a campaign of which Advancement Project is an integral part.

As the only organization in the country with expertise in reforming the taxicab industry by promoting civic participation among cab drivers, we have received requests for assistance

from drivers in five additional jurisdictions. Other cab-driver coalitions have replicated the model in Los Angeles and Austin. Advancement Project continues to advocate community-led change through replicable models.

Key Partnerships

The Florida state branch of the NAACP has been “a great friend and ally” of Advancement Project since its doors opened. Its leader, Adora Obi Nweze, says Advancement Project has been an “incredible advocate” for ending the schoolhouse to prison pathway; the branch also works closely with our Voter Protection Program team.

A key partner to the Inclusive Development Program, Right to the City, brings together 60 grassroots organizations in seven cities. We collaborate with Right to the City to examine

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Partnerships

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ADVANCEMENT PROjECT PARTNERSHIPS

2000-2009

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low-income housing policies in New York, Miami, Providence, and other cities. Right to the City is a young and dynamic coali-tion fighting urban displacement of low-income people. Its work touches on criminal justice, environmental justice, and other issues. This close alliance has produced workshops and focus groups in six cities to discuss concerns of low-income neighbor-hoods in order to inform actions in 2010 and beyond. Other partners in the work to address affordable housing and other urban issues include well-established organizations such as the Miami Workers Center and smaller groups such as Survivors Village in New Orleans.

To produce the report Uncovering Flaws in Election Administration, Advancement Project teamed with Voter Action, a national watchdog entity based in Seattle, and the NAACP Voter Action Fund. The report analyzed thousands of calls to the MyVote hotline, an emergency call center promoted by morning talk show host Tom Joyner. Callers to MyVote, most of them Af-rican American, provided extensive anecdotal information on obstacles they faced as they attempted to register or to vote. The three partners released the report in July to coincide with congressional hearings on voter protections.

Advancement Project also celebrates our associations with reform-minded state and federal officials responsible for voter protection, the right to vote, housing development, transporta-tion, and education. The close cooperation with Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner led to a pending legislative reform effort for voter protection, and collaborations with many state attorneys and legislators have had similar impact.

As we move ahead to expand opportunities for all students to learn, to safeguard voting rights in the 2010 elections and beyond, to enable immigrants to live with dignity, and low-income city residents to have homes and services, we will continue to rely on like-minded individuals and organizations creating change and delivering impact in schools and statehouses, neighborhoods and newspapers, law centers and labor halls.

Partnerships are “a great part of the job,” says Jim Free-man, director of the Schoolhouse to Jailhouse Program. “As strong relations develop over years, they become deeper and richer. There’s a comfort of working together. This enables us to accomplish so much more.”

“As strong relations develop

over years, they become

deeper and richer. There’s a

comfort of working together.

This enables us to accomplish

so much more.

22 I Advancement Project ANNUAL REPORT 2009

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Advancement Project ANNUAL REPORT 2009 I 23

Our education team also devoted itself to preparing for the expected 2010 reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. In 2010, we will continue to focus on breaking the school-to-prison pipeline by expanding and replicating our successes, continuing to build an infrastructure for a national grassroots movement, and influencing federal law and policy.

Our busy transition period of strategic action, dialogue, research, and communication laid cornerstones in 2009 for a second decade of intensified—and expanded—advocacy. Many of Advancement Project’s activities in this year have set the stage for a 2010 of substantial interaction with and responsiveness to grassroots initiatives. We hope to continue our close collaboration with public housing residents, immigrant communities, voting rights advocates, and student activists, among others. Among these are voting protection efforts underway in anticipation of the 2010 mid-term elections, and continuing to engage youth and community groups, as well as funders and activists in efforts to dismantle the schoolhouse-to-jailhouse track following a successful school-to-prison pipeline action camp in August 2010.

To establish an important research project on firm footing, Advancement Project joined with the Right to the City coalition and other national and regional groups to convene a series of community dialogues about increasing the availability of housing that is genuinely affordable for low-income city residents. In six cities, Advancement Project and our partners convened eight focus groups—six in English, two in Spanish—to hear

directly from public housing project residents about their concerns. These focus groups were an all-important part of the participatory action research for a 2010 report on housing strategies.

Advancement Project will also focus efforts in 2010 on preserving a fair chance at representation through the drawing of districts in communities of color. Redistricting determines how seats are drawn, as well as who will compete in elections. To preserve political power in vulnerable communities, Advance-ment Project will encourage the development of unity plans, as communities of color must find a way to work together. We hope that creating Advancement Project Unity Tables will provide the forum for groups to come together to strategize, and address changing demographics on a national scale and their potential impact. We will use GIS mapping and analysis, compiled together with the California office, to educate and train localities and leaders. This effort will require strong advocates and vigilant protectors. The key question is whether the ability of minorities to vote and elect candidates of their choice is diminishing through this process.

With these and other activities, we will strengthen our capacity and resolve to continue to build our partnerships while remaining relevant, impactful, and innovative in all that we do.

LOOkING FORwARD2009 was a year of reflection, celebration, and strategic development. Advancement Project com-

memorated our 10th anniversary, deepened our engagement with the Right to the City Alliance, set

the conditions for an overhaul of the taxicab industry in Prince Georges’ County, documented voter

protection efforts from the historic 2008 election cycle, and initiated planning for a School-to-Prison

Pipeline National Campaign and historic actioncamp. Looking forward, in 2010, we hope to remain

true to the themes of relevance, impact, innovation, and partnerships, which inspire our efforts.

Page 24: 2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

24 I Advancement Project ANNUAL REPORT 2009

ADVANCEMENT PROjECT

CONTRIBUTIONS LIST 2009

Abay G. Gedey

AFL-CIO

Alan and Nancy Bedell

Alexis Johns

Anonymous

Austin Algernon

Bauman Foundation

Bill Lann Lee, Esq.

Brennan Center for Justice

Carnegie Corporation of New York

Carole Blake **

Carolyn N. Lerner, Esq.

Carousel 30

Charles Crockett

Chris Findlater

Christopher Edley, Jr., Esq.

Cross Currents Foundation

Daniel and Laurie Boockvar **

Debey Omonijio

Deloitte, LLP

Democracy Alliance

Doran Designs

Edit Reizes **

Edward Hailes, Jr.

Election Administration Fund of Tides Foundation

Emeka Njoku

Erica L. McKnight

Forman Foresight, LLC

French American Charitable Trust

Gailon McGowen

Gerald Torres, Esq.

Getachew Gurracha

GYMR Public Relations

Harmon Cooper

Harris Lithographics, Inc.*

Heather Booth

Helenia Fund of Jewish Communal Fund

Home Front Communications

J.C. Pennington

Jack & Belinda Walker

Jamin Raskin

Jenner & Block, LLP

Jewish Community Endowment

Joe Alvarez

John Johnson

John Nields

Joy Bunton

Judith Reed

Karen Miller **

Kathryn Boockvar and Jordan B. Yeager

Ken Grossinger and Micheline Klagsbrun

Khakan Babar

Kumiki Gibson

Laura Murphy

Lawrence and Suzanne Hess

Lida Rodriguez-Taseff, Esq.

Linda Earley Chastang, Esq.

Lisa Haynes

MadWolf Technologies

Marcia Yeager **

Margaret B. Webster

Maria Echaveste, Esq.

Mark Schmitt and Holly Yeager

Marlene and William A. Herzig **

McCune Foundation

Mehri & Skalet, PLLC

Michael Dwayne Jenkins

Mitchell Kapor Foundation

Monique L. Dixon, Esq.

MoveOn.Org

NAACP National Voter Fund, Inc.

National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, Inc.

News Generation, Inc.

Nichelle M. Elliot

Open Society Institute

Patton Boggs, LLP

Paulette Brown

Penda D. Hair and W. Neil Eggelston

Peter & Marian Edelman

Phil & Anne Robin Isom

Philippe and Kate Villers

Public Welfare Foundation

Page 25: 2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

Advancement Project ANNUAL REPORT 2009 I 25

Randy Kreiss

Relman, Dane, and Colfax, PLLC

Robert Richie

Rock Creek Strategic Marketing

Ron & Debra Usher

Rosalie Holmes Stroman

Ross Bricker and Nina Vinik

S. Donald and Emily Sussman

Scott Levy

Service Employees International Union (SEIU)

Sheila Thomas, Esq.

Skadden Fellowship

Southwest Airlines Co.*

Stephen R. English and Molly Munger

Stoneman Family Foundation

Suzette Malveaux

Sweet Honey in the Rock*

Tanya Holcomb

The Atlantic Philanthropies

The California School Employees Association

The Elias Foundation

The Ford Foundation

The Leo J. and Celia Carlin Fund

The Praxis Project

Thomasina Williams

Tides Foundation

Timothy Holst

Timothy M. Jones and Darlene Jackson-Jones

United Mine Workers of America

Virginia Boockvar **

Wayne Jordan and Quinn Delaney

William J. Murphy

Working Assets/CREDO Grant Making Fund

* In-Kind

** In Memory of William Boockvar

Page 26: 2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

ADVANCEMENT PROjECT

STATEMENT OF ACTIVITIES for the YEAR ENDED DEC 31, 2009

unrestricted Temporarily Restricted Total

REVEnuE AnD SuPPoRT

Contributions and grants $1,832,495 $3,370,894 $5,203,389

In-kind contributions 305,575 - 305,575

Proceeds from fundraising events, net of cost of direct benefit to donors of $203,428

26,354 - 26,354

Interest income 24,544 - 24,544

Other income 15,000 - 15,000

Unrealized gains on investments 5,290 - 5,290

Net assets released from restrictions 3,769,564 3,769,564 -

Total 5,979,452 398,670 5,580,782

ExPEnSES

Program services 5,427,540 - 5,427,540

Management and general 526,217 - 526,217

Fundraising 517,040 - 517,040

Total 6,470,797 - 6,470,797

Change in net Assets 491,345 398,670 890,015

net Assets, Beginning of Year 1,136,542 2,762,859 3,899,401

net Assets, End of Year 645,197 2,364,189 3,009,386

Page 27: 2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

ABOUT ADVANCEMENT PROjECT CALIFORNIA (AP CA)

AP CA focuses on making big public systems work more effectively for low-income residents, especially low-income children and youth. AP CA has played major roles in shifting several billion dollars of public resources toward low-income families by relying on a collaborative, multi-disciplinary blend of data analysis, media skills, mapping, legal and policy work, and one-on-one persuasion.

our core programs include

Urban Peace

Our Urban Peace program area focuses on the unjust suffering of low-income communities of color squeezed between epidemic gang violence and harmful or indifferent law enforcement practices. We believe that without freedom from violence, no other freedoms are possible. Low income, high crime, and racially isolated communities cannot advance while in the grip of destructive gang violence and dysfunctional law enforcement agencies.

Schools for All

Our education work aims to ensure sufficient educational access and school facilities for low-income children, from early education through 12th grade. We focus on three key areas: early education and care, K-12 facilities, and K-12 finance.

The Healthy City Project

The ultimate goal for our Healthy City Project is to facilitate data-driven and community engaged policy making for low-income communities of color throughout the region. Healthy City pursues this goal with two distinct strategies: 1) the development of the highly acclaimed online tool HealthyCity.org and 2) the provision of direct technical assistance to large public policy initiatives.

AP CA Leadership

Co-Directors

Constance L. Rice Co-Director

Molly Munger Co-Director

Stephen R. English Co-Director

John Kim Co-Director Director of Healthy City Project

Management Team

Susan Lee Director of Urban Peace Program

Kim Pattillo-Brownson Associate Director of Education

Sharon Scott Dow Director of Governmental Relations

Charles Watson Director of Operations

Page 28: 2009 Advancement Project Annual Report: Creating Change, Delivering Impact

AdvancementProject

...Just Democracy!

OUR MISSION

To develop, encourage, and widely disseminate innovative ideas, and pioneer models that inspire and mobilize a broad national racial justice movement to achieve universal opportunity and a just democracy.

1220 L Street NW, Suite 850 • Washington, DC 20005 • P 202.728.9557 • F 202.728.9558

www.advancementproject.org