The Herman and Frieda Miller Foundation recently awarded its second round of grants for its new Innovation Fund.

The Innovation Fund is broadly conceived as a resource that supports innovations, tools, and practices that help social justice organizations and their allies improve conditions and institutions in pursuit of an involved, informed, and active public.

The Fund complements the core grantmaking program of the foundation that funds organizing and advocacy in Greater Boston and Eastern Massachusetts.

The seven grantees represented a diverse set of organizations that were experienced at community organizing and advancing public policy. Most represented strong coalitions and all were working in concert with other community partners. Nearly all of the projects had a regional or statewide emphasis.

Boston Center for Independent Living
Boston, MA
$40,000 Disability Advocates Advancing Our Healthcare Rights coalition involving “dual eligibles,” individuals with chronic medical conditions in addition to a disability, in the implementation of national and state health care reform initiatives in Massachusetts

Brazilian Immigrant Center
Boston, MA
$50,000 to expand the outreach and training of physician members of the Massachusetts chapter of a national association of doctors organized to build a just and equitable health care system

Community Labor United
Boston, MA
$40,000 to pilot an artists-in-residence program that helps community organizers integrates arts and cultural skills and practices into their advocacy campaigns

Essex County Community Organization
Lynn, MA
$40,000 to scale-up faith-based organizing in North Shore communities by training clergy to be lead organizers in a regional organizing campaign focused on jobs and economic development

Massachusetts Alliance Against Predatory Lending
Boston, MA
$45,000 to support the launch of a statewide publicity, education, and organizing, campaign designed to reach out to homeowners at risk of foreclosure, refer them to specialized legal clinics, and engage them in advocacy that challenges illegal foreclosure

Massachusetts Transgender Political Coalition
Boston, MA
$35,000 to develop media and communication framework and strategy that educates the public about the transgender community and transgender rights

Neighbors United for a Better East Boston
Boston, MA
$30,000 to pilot Comite Defensa del Barrio, a block-level organizing and leadership development strategy that reduces isolation of new immigrants affected by anti-immigration policies and supports organizing that addresses their concerns

Right Question Institute
Cambridge, MA
$50,000 to develop a training program that helps helps low-income people acquire and use self-advocacy skills in encounters with health care systems