The Justice Funders office is located on the unceded land of the Lisjan Ohlone people, now known as the East Bay in the San Francisco Bay Area. We recognize that we, like all non-Indigenous people in the Bay Area, have inadvertently benefitted from the genocide waged against the Lisjan Ohlone people and the theft and occupation of this land.
We believe that philanthropic institutions, as stewards of wealth that has been accumulated through the extraction of Indigenous lands and the exploitation of communities of color, have a particular responsibility to contribute to the healing of the lands they occupy and to enter into a restorative relationship with their local Indigenous communities.
To move towards being in right relationship with the Lisjan Ohlone people, Justice Funders encourages our members of the Bay Area Justice Funders Network and the larger Bay Area philanthropic community to pay the institutional Shuumi Land Tax to support the critical work of the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust to return Indigenous land to Indigenous people.
If you are with a Bay Area philanthropic institution and are seeking support and resources around paying institutional Shuumi Land Tax, please reach out to Ariel Luckey at Sogorea Te’ Land Trust (ariel@rematriatetheland.org).
To learn more about Shuumi Land Tax for foundations, please check out the following:
- A Growing Number of Bay Area Foundations Are Paying “Land Taxes” to Native Peoples (read here if you do not have an Inside Philanthropy subscription)
- From Learning to Action: A Foundation’s Journey to Paying Shuumi Land Tax (Medium post)
- It’s Tax Season! Philanthropy, let’s Pay Shuumi (Medium post)
- Giving Shuumi: Philanthropy’s Role in Redistributing Wealth and Supporting the Return of Indigenous Land (webinar recording)
- Giving Shuumi Part 2: Exploring the Extractive Origins of Philanthropic Wealth and Moving Towards Repair (webinar recording)
- Shuumi Land Tax Guidance for Foundations (Sogorea Te’ Land Trust webpage)
There are also two important Resource Guides on supporting the work of rematriation (the return of Indigenous lands to Indigenous hands) and Indigenous sovereignty:
- Rematriation Resource Guide by Sogorea Te’ Land Trust
- Resource Guide for Indigenous Solidarity Funding Projects: Honor Taxes & Real Rent Projects by the Indigenous Solidarity Network and representatives from the Sogorea Te’ Land Trust, Real Rent Duwamish and Manna-hatta Fund
Please also see these related resources from allied organizations:
- Land Reparations & Indigenous Solidarity Toolkit by Resource Generation
- Indigenizing Philanthropy blog series + webinar by Cultural Survival
- Philanthropy in Indian Country resource center by First Nations Development Institute
- Investing in Native Communities Portal by Native Americans in Philanthropy
We encourage our philanthropic allies across the U.S. to learn whose land you are on, support your local Indigenous communities and pay land taxes in other parts of the country:
- Yunakin Land Tax — Ramaytush Ohlone (San Francisco, CA)
- Wiyot Honor Tax — Wiyot Nation (Humboldt Bay region, CA)
- Kuyaam Nahwá’a Guest Exchange — Tongva (Los Angeles region, CA)
- Real Rent Duwamish — Duwamish Tribe (Seattle, WA)
- Honor Native Land Tax — Tiwa/Pueblo (Albuquerque, NM)
- Manna-hatta Fund — American Indian Community House (New York City, NY/Lenape, Wappinger, Haudenosaunee, Matinecock land)
No amount of money will undo the damage caused by colonization, land theft and attempted genocide; bring back the lost lives; or erase the centuries of suffering that Indigenous people have endured. Paying Shuumi Land Tax is one step in a long-term process of healing and repair in which philanthropy can play an important role, in proportion to the resources and power that our sector directs.