Orange County Justice United

Close to 90 Justice United leaders gathered at our Countywide Leaders Meeting Thursday night to ratify the launch of our listening campaign, pledging to engage 1,000 members of their institutions over the next four months. The purpose of the campaign is to strengthen the relationships within and between our institutions, and to identify the top pressures impacting our communities countywide. 

The Listening Campaign has two parts: 

1) Face to face conversations between 200 Justice United leaders in March for the purpose of building public relationships, trust, and understanding between our many diverse institutions and communities.

Turnout Goal: 15-20 members from each participating institution to one of two relational meeting events in March (see below).  

2) A training series in April that will equip all participants with the ability to organize a series of listening sessions in their institutions: small group conversations of 10-15 people, for the purpose of identifying the top pressures facing our communities and surfacing shared interests and concerns.

Turnout Goal: 5-10 members from each participating institution to attend training in April (see below). 

Relational Meeting Events

Justice United will organize two virtual relational meeting events to bring our members together in conversation. Events will open with brief training, and then participants will be broken out into groups of two several times over the course of the evening. Turnout Goal: 15-20 members from each participating institution

The relational meeting events will be the same -- choose the day that works best for you!  

Relational Meeting Event 1
Thursday, March 4, 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Please Register in Advance Here

Relational Meeting Event 2
Tuesday, March 9, 7:00 PM - 8:00 PM
Please Register in Advance Here

Listening Session Training

The listening session trainings will be the same -- choose the day that works best for you!  

Justice United has organized two workshops in April to teach leaders how to organize and facilitate a listening session in their community. Turnout Goal: 5-10 members from each participating institution

Listening Session Training 1
Tuesday, April 13, 7:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Please Register in Advance Here

Listening Session Training 2
Monday, April 19, 7:00 PM - 8:30 PM
Please Register in Advance Here

Close to 90 Justice United leaders joined gathered on Zoom Thursday night during our Countywide Leaders Meeting to hear progress reports from our issue campaigns and to shape and ratify a vision for making change in 2021. Progress reports from our active campaigns are listed below. 

Campaign to Increase Teacher Diversity and Bi-Lingual Staff at Orange County Schools

Dr. Monique Felder, OCS Superintendent, and key OCS staff attended our meeting to report progress increasing teacher diversity and bi-lingual staff across the school district. A few key takeaways: 

- hiring of African American teachers is increasing slowly, but steadily;
- bi-lingual staff, by raw numbers, has significantly increased from 2019-2020 to 2020-2021;
- funding for beginning teacher support programs has helped increase retention. 

The full report from OCS is available here. 

Campaign to Improve Conditions in Local Mobile Home Parks

Increasingly, Orange County mobile home parks are being purchased by out of town hedge funds and investment firms, who then raise the rent, charge outrageous fees and fines, and neglect infrastructure. Mobile home parks are the last, largest class of affordable housing left in the county. 

With the support of Justice United, neighborhood leaders in three local mobile home parks have been able to hold the owners of their mobile home parks accountable to resolving substandard conditions and unfair treatment. See a chart here with updates on what we have accomplished together. 

Leaders have committed to developing long term neighborhood associations to continue this work, are attending organizing training, and are working with Justice United in a new partnership with ROC USA to identify potential opportunities to buy their parks and run them as cooperatives. 

2020 Individual Donor Campaign

Justice United exceeded our 2020 Individual Donor Campaign goals, raising $22,826 (goal = $20,000). The funds raised will support Justice United's general operating expenses incurred during the training and development of local leaders with the capacity to act effectively and address injustice across Orange County. Justice United will organize a 2021 Individual Donor Campaign in the late spring, early summer. More information about this will be available soon. 

For the last year, Justice United has supported neighborhood leaders in three local mobile home parks in organizing their communities and holding the park owners accountable to address serious concerns including failing septic systems, failing wells, dangerous trees, and excessive rent hikes, fees, and fines.

We've made promising progress! See the chart below for a summary report of improvements made in each park this year.

With your support we have been able to continue to this important work and help win real, tangible progress on concrete issues. THANK YOU!

This work is not yet over, and Justice United remains committed to monitoring this progress in the new year.

Click on the chart below to view and download the updates as a PDF file.

Across the nation, the COVID-19 epidemic and killings of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery, and Breonna Taylor unveiled what we have always known: that America is not working for all of us. It is working only for some of us at the expense of
somebody else. In the midst of these crises Justice United leaders answered the call to build and exercise our collective power from the bottom up, and to begin to create a new political and economic reality that ensures equity for all.

This year we have organized and delivered hundreds of members from our institutions and won significant investment in our community. Download our mid-year report below to learn what we have accomplished together so far!