WHO WE ARE

The Grassroots Collaborative unites eleven membership-based organizations in Illinois in order to create policy change on local and statewide levels.

Our alliance spans diverse ethnicities and a variety of organizing networks; including low-wage service employees, the homeless, senior citizens, immigrants, peace activists, faith leaders, and residents of poor and working class neighborhoods.

We are driven by the notion that disenfranchised people, despite their differences, have broad common interests and can come together to improve all of their lives. By bringing together organizations across movements, especially labor and community, we have built a broad and deep base necessary for fighting the corporate interests working against all of our constituencies. As a 501c(3) organization, Grassroots Collaborative does not support or oppose any candidate for elected office. Grassroots Collaborative’s sister organization, Grassroots Illinois Action is a 501c(4) and does endorse candidates for elected office.

OUR MEMBERS

Action Now Institute

Action Now is a grassroots organization of working families, organized in low and moderate income communities in the Chicago metro area. Action Now works on issues that advance the interests of working families, such as foreclosure, quality education, access to healthcare, living wage jobs, clean and safe neighborhoods, immigration rights and former prisoner rights.

American Friends Service Committee

The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) carries out service, development, social justice, and peace programs throughout the world. Founded by Quakers in 1917 to provide conscientious objectors with an opportunity to aid civilian war victims, AFSC’s work attracts the support and partnership of people of many races, religions, and cultures. In Chicago, AFSC is working to limit military recruiting in public schools, as well as organizing taxi drivers to win better working conditions and a living wage.

Brighton Park Neighborhood Council

Brighton Park Neighborhood Council (BPNC), founded in 1997, is a community-based grassroots organization uniting individuals, block clubs, churches, schools and businesses in the Brighton Park neighborhood. BPNC’s mission is to create a safer community with a strong infrastructure, improve neighborhood schools, provide a voice for our youth and stabilize the local business and housing structure. BPNC serves a low-income working class neighborhood on Chicago’s southwest side.

Chicago Coalition for the Homeless

The Chicago Coalition for the Homeless (CCH) organizes and advocates to prevent and end homelessness based on the belief that housing is a human right in a just society. Founded in 1980, CCH is a non-profit organization that works with people hurt by homelessness. CCH focuses their efforts on ending homelessness by addressing root causes, including the lack of affordable housing, the lack of living-wage jobs, the lack of health care, discrimination and violence. CCH is committed to fighting until every person has a place to call home.

Chicago Teachers Union

 

The Chicago Teachers Union is an organization of educators dedicated to advancing and promoting quality public education, improving teaching and learning conditions, and protecting members’ rights.

Enlace Chicago

Enlace Chicago is dedicated to making a positive difference in the lives of the residents of the Little Village Community by fostering a physically safe and healthy environment in which to live and by championing opportunities for educational advancement and economic development.

Illinois Hunger Coalition

In 1988, the Illinois Hunger Coalition (IHC) was established as a statewide membership organization to develop collaborative relationships to eliminate hunger in communities throughout Illinois. IHC seeks to organize low-income communities to develop strategies to promote social justice and ultimately eliminate hunger by addressing the underlying causes. In Chicagoland, IHC organizes Anti-Hunger Action (AHA) comprised of forty community-based organizations representing diverse low-income communities. IHC believes that citizen participation is critical to eliminating unnecessary hunger. IHS is currently fighting to win school breakfasts for all hungry children, as well as working to build the leadership of Latino communities in Chicago’s Back of the Yards neighborhood.

Jane Addams Senior Caucus

Jane Addams Senior Caucus is a multiracial, grassroots organization led by concerned seniors in the Chicago metropolitan area. We cross neighborhood, racial, religious and socio-economic lines to find common ground upon which to act on our values. Through leadership development, organizing and popular education, we use the power of our collective voice to work for economic, social and racial justice for all seniors and our communities.

Logan Square Neighborhood Association

Leaders Shaping Neighborhood Action/ the Logan Square Neighborhood Association is a community-based organization advancing diversity, leader development, and models for engagement as the catalyst for social justice. LSNA organizes for affordable and decent housing, quality neighborhood public schools, opportunities for our children to succeed from birth through college/career, and immigrant rights.

Organization Neighborhoods for Equality: Northside (ONE Northside)

Organization Neighborhoods for Equality: Northside (ONE Northside) organizes people from over 100 institutions, as well as individual community residents, from Rogers Park, Edgewater, Uptown, Ravenswood, North Center, Lake View, and Lincoln Park in Chicago.  ONE Northside’s mission is to build collective power to eliminate injustice through bold and innovative community organizing by developing grassroots leaders and acting together to effect change.  ONE Northside works on issues related to affordable housing, economic justice, education, violence prevention, mental health justice and youth.

Service Employees International Union – SEIU – Healthcare Illinois Indiana

More than 85,000 workers across Illinois and Indiana are united in Healthcare Illinois and Indiana. Members work in the home care, child care and healthcare industries caring for patients, seniors, people with disabilities and children. They stand together not only to improve their jobs, but to assure that all Americans have access to affordable, quality care; to push for sensible immigration reform; to hold big business accountable for its impact on their communities and to elect politicians who support working families. Healthcare Illinois and Indiana was formed as a merger of three local unions. In May 2009, Locals 4, 20 and 880 merged industry representation, membership, operations and campaigns as one independent union, maintaining affiliation with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).