We acknowledge and honor the fundamental value and dignity of all individuals without regard to race, gender, age, sexuality, ability, religion, national origin, gender identity, and other identities.

We pledge to create and maintain an environment that respects diverse traditions, heritages, and experiences within our organization and the communities in which we serve.

We value the visible and invisible qualities that make you who you are.

We welcome the unique perspective and experience that every person brings to advance our mission and fight for the health, education, and financial stability of every person in our communities.

We recognize that structural racism, ethnic discrimination, and other forms of oppression have contributed to racial disparities. These disparities existed in the past and persist in the present in our community and across our nation.

We acknowledge that these inequities are the result of policies and practices that work to marginalize entire populations of people, preventing their voices from being heard and restricting or denying their access to educational, economic, and other opportunities.

We unequivocally denounce racism and all forms of racial and ethnic discrimination. They undermine the well-being and vitality of our community.

Carthage Area United Way seeks to dismantle disparities and strives to engage our entire community, especially those whose voices have traditionally been marginalized, in the shared work of fortifying equity and empowerment. We do this in the following ways:

We commit to equitable treatment and elimination of all forms of discrimination based on race or ethnicity at all organizational levels and throughout all programs at Carthage Area United Way, and we expect our funded partner agencies to work toward those goals as well.
Together with our partners, we will work to ensure that all persons in our community have the resources, support, opportunities and networks they need to thrive. To accomplish this, we commit to the leveraging all of our assets (e.g., convening, strategic investments, awareness building, advocacy) to create more equitable communities.

We will reflect equity and diversity in our organizational governance, volunteer structure, staffing, purchasing, funding decisions, and policies.

Through our commitment to equity, we will strive to be a role model in our community, joining with other organizations to strengthen an effective human service system that reaches out to all people in our community.

Join us in denouncing racism and embracing diversity, equity, and inclusion for every person in our communities and across the nation.

Anti-Racism Statement