For This California Funder, a Big Pledge for AAPI Communities Is All About Building Power

A youth-led anti-Asian Violence march in san francisco. Sheila Fitzgerald/shutterstock

In response to the increase in violent attacks against Asian Americans, including the mass shooting in Atlanta last month, hundreds of funders, individual donors and business owners have signed onto statements and made donations in solidarity with AAPI communities. And while advocates and community leaders have pointed out that increased philanthropic support is long overdue, we have seen some notable funding responses in the past few weeks.

One such commitment came from what might initially seem an unlikely source—the California Endowment, a grantmaker primarily concerned with healthcare. The endowment recently announced it is committing $100 million over the next 10 years to support Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) organizations throughout the state, doubling its previous commitment. 

According to the California Endowment, the investment will provide resources to “ensure grassroots organizations can build and expand a power infrastructure that advances health equity, racial justice and transformative solidarity.”

Established in 1996, the California Endowment is a private statewide foundation that seeks to “expand access to quality healthcare for underserved individuals and communities, and to promote fundamental affordable improvements in the health status of all California.” The endowment, however, takes a more holistic approach to the topic, believing that health is closely connected to community. 

For the past 10 years, the California Endowment has been implementing a strategy called Building Healthy Communities. With the strategy set to end this year, the grantmaker is in a crucial transition period and looking to make some changes. This includes the doubling of its investment in AAPI-led organizations.

While the move reflects the organizational shift that’s in the works, “the investment responds to the significant spike in violence toward AAPI communities reinvigorated since the start of the pandemic, and the horrific mass shooting that took the lives of eight people in Atlanta, six of whom were Asian women,” according to the foundation’s announcement. The commitment is meant to provide immediate support to AAPI community groups, deepen relationships and understanding of AAPI issues, and support anti-racist power-building with long-term change in mind.

“As we work toward a more inclusive state and nation, we have a responsibility to acknowledge these horrific Anti-Asian attacks and work toward healing the trauma the AAPI community has endured,” said Dr. Winston Wong, a member of the TCE board of directors, in the announcement. “The pandemic has exposed the ugly history of Anti-Asian hate in this country. Now more than ever, funding such as this is critical in moving the needle on racial equity.”

A changing strategy

The California Endowment focuses its work on four areas: health and healthy systems, school and environment, community development, and justice reinvestment, which seeks to prevent people from entering the criminal justice system. 

Going forward, the endowment will rely on two core principles to advance work in these four areas—community power-building and racial and health equity. 

“As we are pivoting to this new strategy, we really asked ourselves... what are we doing about Asian Americans, and are we doing enough in terms of investing in that community infrastructure, given where we want to go, which is building power focused on racial justice?” said Ray Colmenar, managing director of programs and partnerships.

Colmenar explained that there are several components to the response they landed on. The first was to deliver rapid-response grants to support both the endowment’s partners on the ground and the communities that are being attacked. 

“We’ve been hearing from our grantees, even from some of our non-grantees, just how dire things are in the community, and then how stretched our community partners are,” said Senior Program Manager Jonathan Tran, who, like Colmenar, was instrumental in developing this new line of work. “So on the rapid-response side, it’s providing support for the organizations... that are on the front lines of supporting community members that are impacted, but doing it in a thoughtful way that doesn’t criminalize other communities, that’s really focused on healing and racial justice.”

Colmenar added that while the immediate aid is important, “we didn’t want our response to be like a disaster response, because we know that this has been happening for a long time and the solution requires a long-term strategy.” 

As part of its initial strategy, the California Endowment is also looking to increase the visibility of Asian Americans. The endowment seeks to give Asian Americans a platform to tell their stories. Tran said that while it’s great that Asian celebrities and performers have come out in support, it’s important to “get to the folks that are really, really impacted by it.”

“In the week or the weekend after the shooting in Atlanta, one of the things that stood out for us is that there were no Asian Americans on any of the morning talk shows on Sunday, on any of the political conversations,” Tran said. “And so much of the dialogue on the national level was happening without Asian American communities at the table and people making decisions about our communities without our communities’ input.”

Among the organizations that the foundation has already been supporting are the Stop AAPI Hate website—which is anchored in part by one of the endowment’s grantees, Chinese for Affirmative Action—and AAPIs for Civic Empowerment, which is an alliance of statewide organizers that work to mobilize AAPI voters. 

“When we [look] at our data, we know we can do a lot better,” said Colmenar. “Our aim is to build on the investments we’ve already made, try to strengthen those organizations, and then identify additional partners that can kind of cover the breadth of our AAPI communities in California.”

Long-term goals

The second component of the new commitment is part of the endowment’s longer-term strategy, which is to build relationships and to increase the understanding of what’s really happening in the community. 

Gaining a better understanding of the core issues in communities will inform the new 10-year plan, which, as Colmenar describes, is “building that power infrastructure in community and focusing on racial justice and racial solidarity so that all our communities in California are achieving health opportunities and other opportunities that contribute to health.”

According to Tran, the lack of data about Asian American communities has had a significant impact on the narrative of whether there is need in those communities. 

“Asian Americans are the fastest-growing immigrant group in the United States, and we’re the fastest growing political electorate, as well. But so little data is collected about our communities.... That totally masks the real challenges that a lot of Asian Americans face,” said Tran, highlighting Southeast Asian communities and Pacific Islanders as examples. 

With such an enormous amount of diversity among Asian Americans, it’s also true that experiences in California differ greatly from region to region. As such, the California Endowment will have regional conversations with AAPI groups in different parts of the state to better inform what they can do to help.

“If we want to make systemic change, either on policies or systems, we know that those grassroots organizations need support, they need research, they need legal advocacy, they need policy advocacy, they need communications support,” added Colmenar. “Many of the leaders need a bigger platform so they can tell your own story and they can be the go-to people for responding to questions or issues that are affecting our community.”

Philanthropic gap

A significant issue, which many have pointed out in recent weeks, is that there is a severe lack of philanthropic investment to Asian American organizations. Last month, Asian American Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy (AAPIP) published a report that found that only 20 cents of every $100 spent in philanthropy goes to AAPI-led organizations. 

“While the AAPI population in the United States more than doubled in size, foundation funding for AAPI communities flatlined, totaling a mere $174 million in 2018—even when overall philanthropic giving was rising,” the report found.

Tran stressed that the endowment was careful not to compare how much is given to Asian organizations versus other people-of-color-led groups. “It shouldn’t be a competition among the community-of-color-led organizations,” Tran said. “Maybe the question is actually, what’s the [amount of] people-of-color-led organizations funding versus non-POC, and actually having that conversation. So I think we want to be careful on that framework and I think the lack of attention to AAPI communities is a byproduct of that.”

On that note, as part of its longer-term goals, the California Endowment is looking to build relationships and to stand in solidarity with other communities of color.

“Anti-Asian violence isn’t happening in a vacuum, right? It’s in the context of additional killings of people of color by police, still the ongoing ravages of the pandemic... Asian American communities don’t exist in a vacuum, and neither does our funding in support of those communities,” said Tran.

A crucial aspect of its investment, according to both Tran and Colmenar, was ensuring that it wasn’t done in ways that would create greater division among communities of color. Rather, success means changing how the foundation supports anti-racism work overall and building solidarity in order not to pit one community against others in ways that threaten progress.

Moving forward

While there’s no exact timeline on when the grants will go out, Tran said it’s their goal to get the rapid-response side of things out as quickly as possible. For the long-term power-building, they want to provide enough time for those conversations to take place. The first regional conversation will likely take place within the next month or month and a half. 

Tran added that he hopes the California Endowment’s efforts will signal to the field of philanthropy “about the need to invest in AAPI power-building, especially the organizations that are working in solidarity with other communities of color and making that a priority for the field of philanthropy, because I think the 20 cents for every hundred dollars is heartbreakingly low.”

He also hopes others begin to understand just how crucial Asian Americans will be in advancing justice. 

“In order to achieve, for example, health coverage for all, we’re going to need Asian American demographics as part of that fight, working in solidarity with undocumented Black and brown folks.… When it comes to restorative justice, that Asian Americans are going to have to be part of that dialogue, and Pacific Islanders in particular are disproportionately impacted, so just raising the visibility of Asian American communities as part of the fight in each of those respective systems.”

For the California Endowment, the investment goes far beyond simply giving money to organizations.

“The dollars is just one piece of it,” said Colmenar. “It’s really what’s underneath it—what are the dollars for?—and I think what we’ve tried to do with the endowment strategy is really be aligned with our values and our mission and our strategic direction... It’s not just about the dollars; it’s about the kind of leadership, the kind of vision, the kind of values that our partners are going to advance.”

Tran added: “For me, I think this is a watershed moment for the community to inspire a new generation of activists that are committed to working toward racial equity, and our hope is that this investment is part of that ripple effect down the line.”