Power Station

The time to determine the future of American democracy is literally now. We are casting our votes on who will represent us in Congress and on ballot measures that are referendums of the rights and values of our citizenry. While the stakes of participation are high and the divisiveness of this political era is extreme, it is not unprecedented. Some 120 years ago, America's fractures led to a citizen powered Progressive Era, in which ballot initiatives countering rising authoritarianism and corporate greed flourished. Americans voted to counter corruption, reform the exploitation of child labor and advance campaign finance reform. In this election cycle, some 164 measures are on ballots in 40 states, ranging from those that would weaken women's bodily autonomy and the rights of trans children to those that expand voter protections. This week's guest, Chris Melody Fields Figueredo, leads the Ballot Initiatives Strategy Center, a singular resource for citizen-led progressive change making. She is also a consummate advocate across geographic and even partisan lines, for an America that includes all of us. She believes in, and supports, the constellation of leaders across the United States who are powering democracy at the ballot box and beyond. Vote!

America's housing crisis is not new. The movement for tenant's rights, the production of affordable housing, breaking barriers to home ownership and prevention of homelessness has been in full force for decades. The National Low Income Housing Coalition has been on the literal frontlines of organizing, legislative and legal campaigns to undo public policies that have generated generational harms for people of color. Over time, the Coalition and a legion of organizational partners have produced significant wins, from passage of the Community Reinvestment Act to Housing Choice Vouchers and the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit Program. Now they are calling for large scale public investment in a new set of housing solutions that would fundamentally transform access to safe and affordable housing for all. But to get there, housing needs to be elevated in the national conversation, and the Coalition has a plan for that. On this episode of Power Station I speak to Chantelle Wilkenson, VP of Strategic Partnerships and Campaigns about the change making initiatives she is leading, from storytelling podcasts to cultivating renters as voters and expanding the cohort for housing justice. I could not be more excited to see the fruits of this dynamic labor.

Where does dehumanization start and how is it cultivated over time to rationalize how we, individually and collectively as a nation, feel about and by extension treat others at home and across the globe? How do we recognize and interrogate the preconceptions we hold about entire populations, biases that justify their dislocation, the bombing and eradication of their schools, universities and hospitals and the deaths of tens of thousands of men, women and children? These are some of the questions that arose from my conversation with Mara Kronenfeld, CEO of UNRWA USA, the NGO that supports the United Nations Refugee and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees founded in 1949 upon the creation of the state of Israel. The agency was meant to be temporary, a source of education, food and healthcare until a just and durable political solution was created. Now, 75 years later, the initial dislocation of 800,000 Palestinians has grown to 5.6 million people who have not returned home, and thousands of staff provide humanitarian support in Gaza, the West Bank, Easy Jerusalem and Jordan every day. One very bright spot is that donations to UNWWA are increasing exponentially. Priests, Rabbis and Muslim clerics are calling out for change.

We use the word community a lot these days, it denotes the people and places we are connected to and those which we support and admire. To see a welcoming community in action, pay a visit to Martha's Table. As its President and CEO Tiffany Williams explains on this episode of Power Station, it is built on shared values and powered by love for community in its programming, from early childhood education to emotional wellness and access to produce markets. The community that Martha's Table serves is viewed as neighbors, not clients, and the health outcomes its interventions have generated are measurable and transformational. Tiffany's capacity and passion to both meet the needs of the many neighbors she interacts with and advocate for policy changes based in data and equity are critical in these most demanding and chaotic of times. We talk about what neighbors are enduring, from the loss of SNAP benefits to proposed changes to Medicaid. We also talk about the community building that Martha's Table leads, starting with listening to and amplifying their voices every day. This nonprofit's evolutionary journey will see its neighbors through all these setbacks and into a future that all communities deserve.

Eric Ward knows something about courage. He has demonstrated it for over 40 years, infiltrating alt-right groups in the rural Pacific Northwest to reveal what animates its followers, advancing American scholarship about antisemitism as a gateway to white nationalist movements globally, and speaking out about how this authoritarian moment is a reaction to 75 years of Black civil rights struggles and wins in this country. And now he is asking us to be courageous, to use our words and our actions, to live our values and to let go of the self-imposed fractures within the movements, organizations and sectors that prize democracy. This, Eric tells us, is the path to a future as a multiracial and inclusive America. There are countless compelling threads to what Eric shares on this episode of Power Station, but what resonates most for me is that when we fail to act on this imperative the burden is borne by our most vulnerable communities. Eric tells the story here, powerfully and with a surprising amount of hopefulness and joy. It starts with just showing up.

Literacy is so essential to how we live, communicate, learn, build relationships, and participate in society that we rarely consider how many people in our lives and communities have not had access to it. The numbers tell a story that demands our attention and requires a solution that is embedded into our social systems. Today, 140 million American adults cannot read beyond a 5th or 6th grade level. This is a crisis and a generational barrier to parents who want their children to succeed but are unable to assist them in the journey. As Dr. Heather Jenkins, my guest on this episode of Power Station says, we have a history in this country of gatekeeping the pathway to literacy. As President and CEO of The Literacy Lab, she is building and implementing a model of learning that demonstrates what is possible when we value our educators and the children in their care. Dr. Jenkins wants to know why America's literacy emergency is not a national conversation. After learning about the efficacy of the Literacy Lab's training, teaching, professional development and advocacy you will wonder why this vital organization's work is not headline news.

Our origin stories all too often predict our economic futures. Those born into households without livable incomes and durable assets, lack the resources needed to meet their material needs, let alone their aspirations for home ownership. And they did not arrive there by accident. Public and corporate policymaking has intentionally excluded people of color from lending opportunities, in particular mortgages and small business loans, deepening a racial wealth gap that has proven difficult to bridge. But, as Sasha-Gaye Angus, my guest on this episode of Power Station reminds us, public policymaking can also solve for historical inequities by expanding opportunities for affordable home ownership, a key strategy for creating generational wealth. As President and CEO of MANNA, Inc, a nonprofit champion of affordable housing in Washington, DC for 45 years, Sasha brings deep expertise in housing finance, new construction, preservation of rental units and a profound commitment to community building. MANNA Inc. remains true to its vision for making affordable housing accessible but now it is building and innovating at scale. Her own origin story, like that of MANNA itself, is rooted in love for community and a belief in what we can achieve together.

Why are we continuously surprised when we learn about the latest cruel, punitive and democracy-defying actions taken by a president who does not care about the rule of law and who has leveraged his own party in Congress to diminish human, civil, immigrant and voting rights in America? This question is particularly relevant for nonprofits whose missions are antithetical to this administration and whose leaders are the first to speak out against legislative and funding setbacks. It is understandable, but not wise, that beleaguered nonprofit leaders are looking to the mid-terms to change the course of this political moment. To better understand how nonprofits should approach their next steps I sought out veteran political strategist and crisis communications advisor Jennifer Kohl for answers. In this episode of Power Station, Jenn, CEO of Chrysalis Communications warns us that a positive outcome in the upcoming elections will only fuel the president's campaign of retribution. Jen shares what can happen when organizations stop doing business as usual and instead make an all-hands on deck plan for the inevitable next crisis. It turns out that catastrophic thinking can be transformed into a blueprint for building power.

It is no surprise to listeners, many of whom are in the trenches of strengthening under-invested communities, that few strategies are as impactful as Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs). These U.S. Department of Treasury-certified nonprofits operate in communities that banks do not serve, leaving them starved for capital and financial education. In many rural communities and in Indian Country specifically, CDFIs are often the only lending institutions available. It is important to note that low-income and communities of color carry the legacy of redlining and other public policies and corporate practices that intentionally barred low-income and people of color from small business loans and mortgages. It took years of grassroots action to move Congress to enact the Community Reinvestment Act and the Reigle Act, both of which are standout legislative solutions. On this episode of Power Station, Pete Upton, (Ponca Tribe of Nebraska) CEO of the Native CDFI Network, talks about how his on-the-ground members serve and invest in Native citizens across our nation, generating businesses, expanding homeownership and seeding generational wealth in Indian Country. He is a convener, bringing federal leaders, Native CDFI leaders and philanthropy to a common table to celebrate successes and advocate for what is needed and owed.

Sometimes a single data point tells a story that cries out for our attention, reflection and action. In California, 35,000 people, two thirds of whom are Black and Brown, are serving life sentences in the state's prison system. Nationally, 200,000 men and women are serving life sentences, one of every 6 prisoners overall. And while the criminal justice system is long overdue for structural reform, we also need to examine, name and repair both the public systems, from housing to healthcare, that fail to meet basic needs and our societal failure to intervene when young people are struggling and showing signs of distress. It is the life's work of Keith Wattley, my guest on this episode of Power Station, to provide prisoners who have served decades behind bars with the legal and therapeutic interventions they did not receive earlier in life. Doing so uncovers that the violence and trauma they experienced led them to perpetrate violence on others. Uncommon Law, the game changing nonprofit organization that he founded 20 years ago makes navigating California's parole process and a pathway home possible. Imagine, as Keith says, if we all had the right to heal.