Ensuring Civic Engagement Grantmaking Guidelines

The Katz Amsterdam Foundation and Charitable Trust invest in organizations committed to expanding the scope of civic engagement, voter education, voting access and fighting legislative battles to ensure all eligible voters have true and equal access to the ballot.

Katz Amsterdam provides general operating support to organizations advancing inclusive democracy in Arizona and North Carolina. We support organizations focused on:

• Voter education and advocacy including: voter registration and education, mobilization and grassroots organizing, building and supporting leaders and coalitions.
• Improving election access including: legislative and election administration policy, fair redistricting and combating gerrymandering, legal challenges to harmful policies that restrict voting access.

We hope our partners:

• Work to reach populations, underserved communities and communities of color.
• Engage in deep and meaningful base-building and advocacy.
• Have leadership and staff with lived experience aligned with the organization’s mission and/or proximity to the work.
• Focus on uplifting and engaging communities of color.
• Demonstrate an understanding of the political landscape and their opportunity to impact meaningful and pervasive change.
  • Understand how inequality impacts communities of color.
  • Envision and articulate what true justice and equity are for their communities.
  • Identify impediments caused by forces of opposition.
  • Have strategic plans to overcome those challenges.
• Have developed strategic planning that demonstrates how their work will (over time and in some cases immediately) build sustainable and transformative change for marginalized populations.

Recognizing that communities are best served when their advocates come from within, Katz Amsterdam strives to support organizations that are community-based, community-driven and community-defined.