Dear LIFT Community,
On Sunday, our team in Los Angeles woke up to a report in the LA Times of leaked audio from a behind-closed door meeting held by Los Angeles City Council members regarding the redistricting process for our city. LIFT strongly condemns the dehumanizing, racist, anti-Black, homophobic, anti-Semitic, colorist and anti-Indigenous sentiments that were shared and the planned gerrymandering to exclude these communities. We are appalled and deeply saddened by this harmful display. Angelenos deserve more from leadership. We must do better. We add our voices to the resounding call for the the immediate resignation of Los Angeles Council members Nury Martinez, Gil Cedillo and Kevin De León.
White supremacy’s aim is to divide marginalized communities. As Heather McGhee states in The Sum of Us “Zero sum thinking – that what is good for one group has to come at the expense of another – is what has gotten us into this mess. Our fates are linked: an injury to one is an injury to all.” We still find hope in the knowledge that when we focus on bridging and bringing communities together, we can be stronger as a whole.
We believe in a simple idea: That the love and support found in trusted relationships is what is needed to overcome complex challenges and create transformative change. It is the very reason that relationships, collaboration, and partnership are at the heart of our work.
LIFT is committed to ensuring all Angeleno families, especially those who have been purposefully excluded, have equitable opportunities to thrive in the face of systems that are supposed to support and represent, but which instead foster a lack of trust and disenfranchisement.
We honor and embrace a diverse and multi-racial City of Angels and believe that all families should have the same opportunity to succeed (and to fail) with equal chance to be seen and heard for their humanity and potential.
LIFT remains committed to work on the unity and solidarity of Black, Brown, Indigenous and marginalized communities and for the healing that it will take to move forward.
In Solidarity,
