Decolonizing Wealth Project Announces $20M Campaign To Advance Reparations Movement

The Decolonizing Wealth Project (DWP) announced a $20 million commitment to help advance reparations across America over the next five years.

According to a DWP release, due to the rising backlash over the call for more diversity, equity, and inclusion following the deaths of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor, the campaign will further the call for reparations through three major initiatives: direct grant-making through the #Case4ReparationsFund, a new information resource hub for the movement, and new public opinion research and messaging guidance for the reparations movement.

DWP Founder and CEO Edgar Villanueva unveiled the campaign in Atlanta at the end of the Alight. Align. Arise Conference hosted by Decolonizing Wealth earlier this week.

The three-day conference brought together more than 200 community leaders, policymakers, business leaders, funders, and celebrities to discuss local and national reparation efforts and the steps required to close the racial wealth gap. Speakers who attended the conference include author Ta-Nehisi Coates, 1619 Project creator Nikole Hannah-Jones, California Reparations Task Force Member Dr. Cheryl Grills, and actress Ericka Alexander.

“Decolonizing Wealth Project is excited to launch a new campaign bringing funders and stakeholders together with the shared goal of winning federal reparations and reparative policies across the country,” Villanueva said in a statement. “Used in the right way, money can be medicine to heal from past traumas. By providing the movement with key resources and tools, we can help turn the concept of reparations into reality for Black people in America.”

The $20 million campaign has launched with a new round of direct grant-making totaling $3 million that will be deployed this year, along with other resource and educational programs to support the reparations movement over the next five years. The fund has already donated more than $4 million to numerous BIPOC-led organizations since it was started in March 2021.

The DWP is also partnering with the Boston University Center For Antiracist Research to launch a new reparations digital information resource hub later this year. The hub will educate the general public, media, and stakeholders about reparations and track news, research, and resources for the reparations ecosystem.

Additionally, DWP has tapped Dr. Janay Cody to fight present-day perceptions around reparations and identify key messaging needed to change the hearts and minds of Americans across different backgrounds.

The reparation effort has gained traction since 2020 as several states, including California and Massachusetts, announcing reparation initiatives. Last summer, Los Angeles County paid reparations and returned ownership of a beachfront property known as Bruce’s Beach to the Black descendants of the couple who owned the land.

In 1912, Charles and Willa Bruce purchased the property and built a successful beach resort—one of the few places where Black families could enjoy the lush amenities of a lodge, cafe, and dance hall, which the government took in 1924 through eminent domain.