Bay Rising

Bay Rising is a regional network of over 30 community-led organizations advancing equity, rights and resilience for the people hardest hit by increasing racial and economic inequality in the Bay Area. We are building a regional infrastructure to support coordinated and strategic organizing, civic engagement, and public policy change efforts led by our constituents: low-income, working-class communities of color. Our agenda includes improving the quality of low-wage jobs, increasing affordable housing and development without displacement; building co-governance models; protecting voting rights and expanding democratic governance; increasing transit equity; and increasing racial and environmental justice. As a “backbone” organization, Bay Rising brings together network leaders and organizers to design a shared long-term strategy; coordinate framing, messaging and campaigns; and jointly fundraise. We collectively allocate resources – money, expertise, trainings, facilitated spaces – to on-the-ground organizations to: - Build skills and capacity to recruit and engage members, manage campaigns, win local and state policy measures, and run sustainable organizations - Share information and analyses, and build relationships for future collaboration - Reflect, recharge and inspire creativity Bay Rising also offers local organizations shared infrastructure: communications, digital organizing, arts and cultural strategy, shared accounts and data management, and media monitoring. In the next two years, a special focus will be on expanding our reach outside of the urban centers of San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland, to bolster organizing and civic engagement infrastructure in strategic places of need and opportunity – especially suburban communities of color most impacted by inequality.