This year Liberty Hill is honored to recognize three amazing individuals with awards at our annual Upton Sinclair Award Dinner. Our honorees truly demonstrate the spirit of our gala theme–Our Movement, Our Moment. Their collective contributions have paved the way and extended the path for activists and organizers across many diverse movements over the years. We are honored to celebrate their work and accomplishments. 

Making grants is one way to empower communities, but it takes leaders to transform funding into progress. That’s where Liberty Hill’s Commissions Training Program comes in. The program prepares local progressives to expand their influence and leadership by serving on boards and commissions, which wield significant political power across L.A. County.

Find out what powerful change our social justice partners have been fighting for on the frontlines. 

By Joe Rihn

Liberty Hill Foundation offers Special Opportunity Fund Grants to provide tactical, quick-turnaround dollars for organizations seeking support for timely capacity-building opportunities. A recent SOF Grant was just what an Antelope Valley organization called The Community Action League needed to tackle a pressing local problem of police abuse and racial discrimination tied to Section 8 housing.

By Crystal Shaw, Contributing Editor

Just in time for Trans Pride L.A., Liberty Hill Foundation has partnered with Gender Justice LA in an effort to uplift and acknowledge the lives of all Trans people, and honor the ones we’ve lost along the way in the fight for acceptance and equality.

LINKS TO RECENT NEWS MEDIA ARTICLES ON LIBERTY HILL AND  THE ORGANIZERS WE SUPPORT

ECONOMIC JUSTICE

L.A.’s minimum wage increase to $15 per hour by 2020 was big news this past month, thanks in part to the hard work of several Liberty Hill organizing partners. See Refinery 29 for an article that cites figures gathered by the Garment Worker Center (GWC) and Restaurant Opportunities Center-LA (ROC-LA). The Los Angeles Daily News quoted Giselle Mata of Alliance of Californians for Community Empowerment (ACCE) calling for an earlier implementation date for the wage hike. ACCE members were also quoted in an article about how the new law will apply to workers who spend only part of their day within City limits. Read it in the L.A. Times.

KPCC reported on a related story. SB 588, a bill recently passed by the California State Senate, aims to strengthen protections against wage theft and help workers collect wages they are owed. The article quotes Alexandra Suh of the Koreatown Immigrant Workers Alliance (KIWA) on how difficult it is for victims of wage theft to reclaim their stolen earnings.

LINKS TO RECENT NEWS MEDIA ARTICLES ON LIBERTY HILL AND  THE ORGANIZERS WE SUPPORT

CHANGE

The 33rd Upton Sinclair Dinner was one for the books.  Honorees and program participants alike delivered poignant speeches that were both motivational and moving.  Relive those moments again - or experience them for the first time as you watch Upton Sinclair Award Honoree and Erika Alvarez speak to a room of visionaries, rabble rousers and activists .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQKhkbYriik

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-gn7-uVRd7Y

By Michele Prichard

Members of Clean Up Green Up coalition before hearing at L.A. City Hall June 2013.

If you care about creating a cleaner, greener L.A. and preparing for the impacts of climate change, you’ll want to take a look at two new initiatives that environmentalists have promoted to have a big impact on the future of our city.