Many Fronts, One Movement: The 13th Annual Celebration of Grassroots Organizing
A huge gathering of social movement organizations to celebrate our collective work over a lobster meal!
Celebrating Movement Work in Boston with 15 organizations at the Annual Celebration of Grassroots Organizing
On Saturday, June 28, CLVU joined the 13th Annual Celebration of Grassroots Organizing with 15 local social movement organizations. The 13th annual Celebration of Grassroots Organizing in Boston honors the groundwork that was built by leaders and allies meeting local community needs. Leading the movement for Black lives, uplifting youth voices, supporting LGBTQIA+ rights, and defending communities from the harms of gentrification and displacement, policing, deportations, climate change and much more – our fights are inter-connected. We all know this collective work is more important than ever, and none of our work can get done in siloes. The partners raised over $200,000 to support our local social movement work in housing justice, workers’ rights, civic engagement, environmental justice, youth justice, restorative justice, and more! The traditional meal at this fundraiser is lobster — because how often to we get to gather together over a lobster meal!? Lots of other food options are offered too.
CLVU Executive Director Denise Matthews-Turner spoke at the event, emphasizing our shared goals as social movement organizations and the importance of working together and uplifting each other’s work. Here is a snippet from her remarks:
“This afternoon is what ‘Many Fronts, One Movement’ looks like. Just look around. People connected to different organizations. Working in different neighborhoods. Organizing around different issues. Using different strategies. And yet we’re all here because we believe something fundamental: No one organization can build the world we’re trying to create.
The world we’re working toward cannot be won through a single campaign. It won’t be won by housing organizers alone. Or environmental justice organizations alone. Or immigrant rights advocates alone. Or youth organizers, worker centers, or organizations fighting for racial justice acting alone.
The systems that create inequality, displacement, environmental racism, exploitation, and exclusion are deeply interconnected. None of us chose these separate fronts. They were created by systems that divide people’s struggles.
Our work is to help people see those connections—and to build a movement that’s just as interconnected as the challenges we face. That’s why this Celebration matters.“
In my other life, I’m a quilter. One thing quilting has taught me is that strength doesn’t come from one piece of fabric. It comes from many pieces joined with intention. I think movements are built the same way.
The world we seek is simply too large to fit inside any one organization.
It takes all of us.
The Annual Celebration of Grassroots Organizing is not just a fundraiser; it is a space to connect with the organizers and community leaders making this work happen every week. It’s a place to gather, hear stories, build community, and help us keep this vital work alive. The fundraiser also provided Spanish interpretation and childcare. Want to attend next year? Let us know and stay tuned for next year’s celebration — there are plenty of ways to get involved and to support making it happen!
Partner Organizations: Alternatives for Community & Environment, Asian American Resource Workshop, Boston Ujima Project, City Life Vida Urbana, The City School, Families for Justice as Healing, GreenRoots, Haymarket People’s Fund, I Have a Future, Matahari Women Workers’ Center, Muslim Justice League, Neighbors United for a Better East Boston, New England Community Project, Stories Inspiring Movements, The Youth Justice & Power Union
Spotlighting a partner organization: Youth Justice and Power Union (YJPU)
One of the 15 partner organizations is Youth Justice and Power Union, a powerful group of youth organizing to organize, basebuild, and lead campaigns. YJPU centers the voices of Black and Brown youth across the city. YJPU leaders go around the city asking residents directly what they need from Boston’s new participatory budget and inviting them into the process. In line with CLVU’s mission and vision, YJPU aims to build collective power that confronts systemic issues at the root through organizing and direct action. And their most recent organizing has focused on proposing a City budget that meets the needs of its communities rather than increasing money spent on policing.
Most recently, Mayor Wu and the Boston City Council voted to slash the proposed funding from youth jobs, affordable housing, elder support, Boston’s participatory budget, food access, and Boston Public Schools while *increasing* the police budget by over $4 million. YJPU’s organized proposal for the FY27 budget allocates $6 million go towards youth jobs and $5.25 million towards affordable housing. Rather than the $474 million currently funneled into policing, YJPU is asking the city to invest in the things that actually keep communities safe and thriving such as secure funding for youth workers to receive good, livable pay year round and truly affordable housing. However, Mayor Wu and the Boston City Council have passed a proposal contributing only $750K towards youth jobs, and $2 million towards housing vouchers. As of now, the City gives less than $10 million of its own budget for building new affordable housing, and most of it is STILL TOO expensive.
YJPU is also asking for $2.6 million for community-led mental health crisis response, and $40-plus million to expand participatory budgeting itself. The fight for rent control and the broader people’s budget movement happening at YJPU looks like communities deciding, together, where the money goes and who it’s actually for.
We are strong as a movement when young people are organizing and we are centering youth voices!
CLVU as a critical social movement partner
City Life Vida Urbana (CLVU) plays a critical role to build working-class power across Massachusetts by supporting individuals and families in forming and sustaining negotiating pówer through Tenant Associations to resist mass displacement. Our weekly anti-displacement meetings are the heart of CLVU’s sword and shield organizing model, offering a space for tenants and small homeowners to strategize, build leadership, and take collective action against evictions, unaffordable rent increases, and foreclosures. Whether it’s tenants at 10 Wilmore St in Mattapan organizing against $500 rent hikes, or the long-standing victory of the Fairlawn Tenant Association fighting for rent control, working-class tenants all over the state show what’s possible when people come together to fight back. Active and past tenant associations like 168 Gove and 6 Humphreys Place are powerful examples of community-led resistance to displacement and speculative corporate landlords. Donate to CLVU today!
As we celebrate our organizing, rent control work continues until we win!
Our coalition was back in front of the State House last week because our State Legislature can still act on rent control. They have until July 31 to move rent control legislation forward this session, and we are keeping the pressure on. We either pass rent control at the State House now, or it’s back to the ballot in 2028– with an even bigger and stronger coalition. Our coalition is phone banking legislators to tell them we need them to pass rent control.
ACT NOW: Call or Email legislators
Your state legislators need to hear from you. Urge them to pass rent control legislation. We need to show that we are here to stay and will keep fighting until we win. Stay tuned for more upcoming rallies/actions.