Grants &

Guidelines

Program Areas

Hello and welcome!

Abortion Access, Community Organizing for Racial Justice and Urban Environmental Justice are Conant Family Foundation’s primary funding areas. 

Two additional funding areas will be added later in 2026: Immigrants Rights and Palestinian Rights.

Abortion Access

Abortion care is essential health care.

The Abortion Access Program Area supports access to safe, affordable, and legal abortions. Organizations selected for funding receive one-year general operating grants. Three categories have emerged as priorities:

  1. Increasing access to self-managed medication abortion (mifepristone and misoprostol)

  2. Chicago-area abortion services, financial support, and transportation/housing needs

  3. Abortion access and women's health care information in southeast states

​Some of the organizations that receive funding are in states with bans and restrictions; their inclusion here does not in any way describe their activities. Please click on each organization for more information.

There are no formal guidelines to apply; if your organization aligns with these categories, please send an email of introduction.

Community Organizing for Racial Justice

This Program Area utilizes participatory grantmaking, shifting decision-making power to an external Grants Team of Chicagoans with lived experience of racial injustice as well as proximity to the issues and communities the Foundation seek to engage

Additional information on our participatory grantmaking process can be found on this page.

A new participatory grants team will be assembled in 2026. They will identify the funding focus area(s), develop guidelines and post an open application process here by May. Please check back for updates at that time.

2023, 2024 & 2025 Grants

The following organizations received the amount indicated each year, for three years in a row.

AFIRE $15,000  

Chicago IWOC $25,000

We Are Dissenters $15,000

Equity And Transformation $15,000

Free Us: Chicago EM Collective $25,000

Illinois Coalition to End Permanent Punishments $25,000

Liberation Library $25,000

MAMAs Activating Movements for Abolition & Solidarity $25,000

Nebula Mutual Aid $25,000

Not Me We $25,000

Organized Communities Against Deportation $15,000

The Final 5 Campaign $25,000

Urban Environmental Justice

The vision of the Urban Environmental Justice Program Area is that all Chicago residents live in environmentally safe communities.

Low-income communities and communities of color experience disproportionately higher levels of air, water, and soil pollution and contamination. Nonprofit organizations addressing environmental injustice in these communities are the focus of this Program Area. 

Grants are made to organizations that identify environmental hazards, involve their communities in identifying solutions, and advocate for justice and remediation.

Eligible applicants will be Chicago-area nonprofit organizations that are a) led by those directly impacted, b) include community members in decision-making, and c) accountable to the communities they seek to improve.

Grants are not restricted and are awarded annually. There are no formal guidelines to apply; if your organization aligns with these categories, please send an email of introduction.

2025 Grants

Alliance of the Southeast $25,000

American Indian Center $25,000

Chicago Frontlines Funding Initiative $150,000

Friends of the Parks $25,000

Sweet Water Foundation $25,000

Funding
Collaborations

The Conant Family Foundation is proud to partner with other foundations on issues that align with our mission.