The People’s Life Fund releases our requests for proposals at the beginning of each year. Our deadline is usually the end of March. Please check the homepage of this website or check our PLF Facebook page in January to get the link to our current RFP.
If you have trouble using the online form, or if you have questions, feel free to reach out to us at nowartax@riseup.net or 510-842-6124.
History – At once time there were over 50 alternative funds operating in the U.S. to serve as repositories for money which is not paid in taxes to the federal government. Today, there are still several around the country that are still active. A portion of the money in each fund is given away each year by its members for a broad range of positive, life-affirming purposes.
In 1971, war tax resisters in the San Francisco Bay Area formed the People’s Life Fund (PLF). Every year PLF members put out a call for proposals and select local projects that are doing the work we wish our taxes were supporting. Grants are made to groups whose work falls within one of the priority areas described below.
The People’s Life Fund’s granting priorities are (in order of priority):
1. (Highest Priority) Provision of essential day-to day human services which the government is not adequately furnishing, together with educational or other work that identifies and seeks to change the root causes of the problem.
2. (Second Priority) Provision of essential day-to day human services, but not necessarily providing an explicit analysis of the problem.
3. (Third Priority) Education or action, in the spirit of nonviolence, aimed at social, economic or political change.
In addition to the above priorities, the People’s Life Fund favors projects serving the Northern California area, and small organizations with annual budgets of less than $200,000. Preference will be given to groups that challenge privilege and injustice and are led by the same constituencies that are being served. We are giving special priority to groups that are working in the areas of Youth, Economic and Racial Justice, Environmental Sustainability, Resisting US involvement in wars of aggression, and/or addressing the Housing Crisis.
The PLF does not fund the same organization two years in a row. We request a simple report by the end of the year that a grant is received. If you have received a grant and haven’t already sent in a report, please submit a PLF Grant Report Form for your most recently received grant before reapplying.
Grants are given in a public (virtual) awards ceremony on, or around, Tax Day, and recipients are expected to be present to receive their grant so that they can tell the community about the work they are doing. We also ask that recipients to list the PLF among their funders as: War Taxes Redirected by People’s Life Fund. A short report on the use of PLF grants by recipient organizations is requested once funds have been spent.
People’s Life Fund applications are screened and grants are made by any members of the PLF who choose to attend meetings in February and March of each year. Any person who, in the past two years, has made a contribution to Category C or has had a positive balance in Category B is a member of the PLF. In addition, one may become a member of the Fund by volunteering time or resources to the work of the Fund. Granting decisions are made by consensus of the members involved.
Loans
Loans are made on a limited basis from the People’s Life Fund to organizations whose overall purpose is to provide human services or aid to low-income persons, to promote nonviolent action or education, and/or to promote alternative economic projects and relationships. Please contact us if you want more info. on applying for a loan.