Blog

Join us for a previously recorded Breaking Bread conversation series on housing justice in DC, including dialogue on protecting tenants’ rights, affordable housing development and preservation, public housing redevelopment, and more.

Organizations like Bread for the City work with staff to ensure their understanding of the historical trauma experienced by Black communities at the hands of the health care system and what it means to be antiracist. Bread for the City requires all staff, including medical providers and board members, to attend an Undoing Racism Community Organizing Workshop hosted by the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond. Bread for the City patients who are interested in attending the training can do so free of charge.

Starting next week, residents in Wards 7 and 8 will not need to come to the Northwest Center, which is located in Ward 6, for medical assistance. Bread for the City is opening its health care center in the newly named Michelle Obama Southeast Center of Bread for the City, 1700 Good Hope Road, SE on Monday, October 4, 2021. The new facility will bring BFC’s primary medical, dental, and vision care services east of the Anacostia River for the first time in the organization’s history.

It feels good to be rewarded for your hard work, especially when it’s benefiting the community.  Congratulations to Rebecca Lindhurst, she was selected by The District of Columbia Bar Foundation as the 2021 Jerrold Scoutt Prize recipient. It’s awarded to attorneys who have a history of working in the nonprofit sector, especially those providing direct services to low-income communities. Rebecca is a Managing Attorney for Bread for the City’s housing practice and Community Lawyering Project and has worked for the organization since 2002.  I interviewed Rebecca about receiving this award and why her community work is important for residents in DC.

Before reading this blog post, I want you to stop and think about the word “Nurse.”

Like most people, I’m sure a few images enter your subconscious thoughts. Bedpans, stiff white scrubs, or maybe you have seen a few too many episodes of Grey’s Anatomy and envision a steamy scene with Dr. McHottie. (Tempting for a mid-afternoon daydream!) But for me, nursing is much more of a phenomenon than that.

Many people in Washington D.C. are still struggling to find a consistent income to pay their rent and people still need assistance because of the pandemic. Last month, Bread for the City attorney, Jack Meaney  the Festival of Tenants, a community event held by the Cancel Rent Coalition in D.C., where there were informational booths, community activities, and resources for tenants. The event was held in Ward 5 to target Councilmember Kenyan R. McDuffie, who has not yet pledged his support for the coalition’s demands.

Housing literally saves lives—and the combination of COVID-19 and DC’s underinvestment in deeply affordable housing will undoubtedly further racial inequity.

Bread for the City is focused on bringing an anti-racist lens to every part of our mission and that includes our generous supporters. BFC believes that our donors of color aren’t centered enough in our work. BFC knows that fundraising has white supremacy roots and is working to both acknowledge the history and be the antidote to fundraise in an antiracist way.