JustVA Fund Grantees

Human Rights for Kids is a non-profit organization dedicated to the protection of children’s rights. We envision a world where society protects children from violence and harm, and provides treatment and care to those children who do suffer harm, including those who come into contact with the criminal legal system. A central focus of our work is advocating in state legislatures and courts for comprehensive legal reform for children consistent with the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child.

RISE for Youth is a nonpartisan campaign committed to helping shape a new restorative model of juvenile justice by promoting the creation of community-based alternatives to youth incarceration. We work to educate and create opportunities for leadership development and employment for youth with lived experiences within the juvenile justice system. We create opportunities for young people to help transform systems that have, in many instances, had significant and lasting impact on their lives. We center the voices of impacted youth and communities to challenge racial injustice in Virginia.

Marijuana Justice Virginia (MJVA), founded by Black organizers in 2019, is cultivating a Black-led and liberated space in the Commonwealth of Virginia to dismantle the War on Drugs through equitable legalization. MJVA works to Repeal the criminalization of the plant and people, Repair the community to clear records and demand Reparations from cannabis tax revenues in order to refund Black futures.

Nolef Turns’ mission is to reduce recidivism by supporting and advocating alongside those with court and justice involvement. Our vision is to be a leader in decreasing the prison population by supporting and empowering those who are most affected by crime, trauma, and incarceration.

Nolef Turns was founded in Richmond, Virginia in 2016. Our organization was initially designed to be a resource center for those impacted by felonization but quickly was thrust into the political arena. Our founders were personally impacted by being disenfranchised and effectively muted for years by a system rooted in racism. We fight to break down barriers to carceral systems by uplifting and empowering those who have experienced those systems firsthand.

OAR envisions a safe and thriving community where those impacted by the legal system enjoy equal civil and human rights. Through our upstream work, which focuses on liberation, we are confronting and dismantling individual racism and racism in the legal system and across all systems. Our downstream work allows us to journey with individuals of all genders returning from incarceration and their families. We also offer alternative sentencing options (including community service) and develop new diversion programs so people can avoid the trauma of imprisonment and instead help the community thrive. OAR has a collective, racially just, and liberated culture.

The all-volunteer organizations Coalition for Justice; Resource, Information, Help for the Disadvantaged & Disenfranchised; and Virginia Defenders for Freedom, Equality & Justice work together to promote justice in Virginia’s prisons and jails and play leading roles in the Virginia Prison Justice Network. CFJ counsels hundreds of prisoners and publishes a monthly newsletter sent to 1,300 prisoners in all state prisons. RIHD is a legislative advocacy organization that sponsors statewide Mobile Justice Tours and lobbies the General Assembly for systemic change. The Defenders counsel prisoners, address issues in the Richmond city jail and organize the annual Prison Justice Rally at the State Capitol.

Virginia Community Voice (VACV) is a 501c3 organization with a mission to equip neighbors in historically marginalized communities to realize their vision for their neighborhoods, and prepare institutions to respond effectively. Virginia Community Voice does work through two programs: 1) RVA Thrives, community engagement that builds neighborhood leadership over decisions affecting Richmond’s Southside; and, 2) Community Voice Blueprint, training, coaching, and improvement processes that teach institutions how to equitably engage and make decisions with historically marginalized groups.

Virginia Organizing is a non-partisan statewide grassroots organization dedicated to challenging injustice by empowering people in local communities to address issues that affect the quality of their lives. Virginia Organizing especially encourages the participation of those who have traditionally had little or no voice in our society. By building relationships with individuals and groups throughout the state, Virginia Organizing strives to get them to work together, democratically and non-violently, for change.

Organizar Virginia es una organización imparcial de base a nivel estatal dedicada a luchar en contra de la injusticia dándole poder a la gente en las comunidades locales para que puedan exponer sus preocupaciones que les afecta en su vida diaria. Organizar Virginia especialmente fomenta la participación de aquellos que tradicionalmente han tenido poca o ninguna voz en nuestra sociedad. Estableciendo relación con grupos o personas individuales a través del estado, Organizar Virginia sigue luchando para que trabajemos juntos, democráticamente sin violencia por cambio social.

Founded in 2013, the Virginia Student Power Network is a multi-issue grassroots network of radical young organizers from universities across Virginia who are building power for democratic, diverse, and accessible education, as well as social, racial, and economic justice on our campuses and beyond. VSPN envisions a future of collective liberation, in which all communities evolve beyond policing and the carceral state, everyone has access to truly affordable higher education, and students, faculty, and workers hold their educational and governmental institutions accountable.