BACKGROUND

Decolonizing Wealth Project is an Indigenous-led racial justice organization that envisions a world where racial equity has become a societal norm – where new systems ensure everyone can live their best lives, thrive in their cultures, and heal from generations of colonial trauma. Decolonizing Wealth Project (DWP) was established in 2018 to disrupt the existing systems of moving and controlling capital by offering truth, reconciliation, and healing from the ails of colonization through education, radical reparative giving, and narrative change. 

The California Truth & Healing Council (the “Council” or “CTHC”), created by Executive Order N-15-19, bears witness to, records, examines existing documentation of, and receives California Native American narratives regarding the historical relationship between the State of California and California Native Americans in order to clarify the historical record of such relationship in the spirit of truth and healing. The Council’s mission is facilitated by the Governor’s Tribal Advisor and includes representatives from California Native American tribes, relevant state and local agencies, and other relevant non-governmental stakeholders. 

We believe that CA Native people have an unprecedented opportunity to leverage this political moment to advance healing for tribal communities across California.  In order for the process to be maximized, CA tribes and Native-led organizations need resources to be engaged in the state’s process – to both inform and shape it and to hold the government accountable for its promises to Native people. There is also an opportunity for CA Native tribes and Native-led organizations to begin to coordinate and organize efforts centered on truth, healing, and repair across the state to advocate for state-level reparative action.

To this end,  Liberated Capital, a fund of Decolonizing Wealth Project, launched a multi-year grantmaking initiative, the California Truth and Healing Fund, to support the engagement of California Native American families, communities, tribes, and organizations to engage in the work of truth and healing. This includes opportunities presented by the Truth and Healing Council process and beyond. 

In an effort to create transparency and role clarity, we’d like to share that the CA Truth and Healing Fund operates independently of the State of California.  Its work is grounded in the mission of the Decolonizing Wealth Project, a global non-profit organization. Funding decisions will be guided by an advisory board of California Native Americans.

FUNDING PRIORITIES

The funding priorities of the California Truth and Healing Fund are listed below and will shift over time as the work progresses. Current funding priority will be given to activities that advance truth and healing efforts for California Native communities, utilizing the following strategies: capacity-building & technical assistance, advocacy and movement-building, and healing. More information on the strategies are below: 

1. Capacity-Building & Technical Assistance 

For Tribes and Native-led organizations interested in capacity-building efforts as they relate broadly to truth and healing efforts, such as

• Tribal history, research, and narrative work to document truth-telling towards healing and repair, such as digitizing tribal history, research, narratives, documentation of land loss, cultural items, or archival material, etc.  This may include efforts to record first-hand accounts and first-person narratives that capture oral history, clarify and correct the historical record, address grievances, and/or promote truth-telling.
• Capacity-building for Tribes, including resources for legal support, capacity-building for Land Back claims, retrieving historical documentation, engaging anthropological or scientific support to support claims, capacity building for how to create tribal land trusts, capacity building regarding tribal co-management, and/or other tribal planning needs. This does not include resources to purchase land. 

2. Advocacy and Movement-Building

For Tribes & Native-led organizations to be more deeply engaged in local, regional, and state advocacy efforts to influence state and local agencies to be more proactive with community consultations and to deliver on their promises to communities, past present, and future, including: 

• Efforts to spread awareness and increase community engagement of CA Native Americans in opportunities for truth and healing, including logistical or capacity support to address barriers to attending and engaging in the Council meetings and hearings. The fund will prioritize statewide and regional organizations and coalitions that can provide awareness, and create community engagement and logistical or capacity support to engage and influence the Council. 
• Efforts to bring together California Native Americans intra or inter-tribally to engage with the Council process or to engage in independent truth and healing work with and among tribes.
• Funding for convening and gathering across tribal communities and Fund grantee partners to strategize, connect, share, learn, and prepare for future advocacy efforts.

3. Healing

Support for traditional healing programs or efforts connected to tribal or intra-tribal Truth & Healing processes. This includes efforts focused on healing through cultural mentorship, storytelling, and traditional artistic expression.

CONTACT US

For questions, including assistance with the content of your application, please reach out to us at carlos@decolonizingwealth.com, with the subject line: CA Truth and Healing Fund. For technical assistance with the JustFund platform, contact info@justfund.us.