A Milestone for Movin’ Out: Announcing Our New Vision, Mission, and Values Statements
The Board of Directors of Movin’ Out, along with our entire staff, recently worked together with EQT by Design to complete a critical step toward embedding racial equity into the core of our organization. I am very pleased to share the results of this important work: our new vision, mission, and values statements will guide us as we grow into our next chapter.
Vision - Our dream for the future
Thriving communities inspired by people with disabilities that provide equitable, accessible, and affordable housing for all.
Mission - What we do
Movin' Out advances disability justice by co-creating safe, affordable, community-integrated homes.
Values - How we work
Equity - Recognizing and disrupting disparities in housing access by empowering the most marginalized people.
Community - Collaborating, cooperating, and partnering to build and sustain vibrant neighborhoods.
Wellness - Creating and prioritizing conditions that positively impact mental, physical, and financial wellbeing.
From its very beginning, Movin’ Out was a social justice organization. In 1992, just two years after the Americans with Disabilities Act was signed into law, a group of parents of adult children with disabilities formed Movin’ Out to challenge the status quo of segregation and institutionalization for people with disabilities, and instead drive social change to create a new approach to housing opportunities. They built the organization on the core principles of community integration and self-determination, a concept that the United Nations describes as an “integral element of basic human rights and fundamental freedoms.”
Nearly 30 years later, the National Disability Institute issued its 2019 report entitled “Financial Inequality: Disability, Race and Poverty in America,” in which they explain how those three forces intersect. In summary:
Poverty causes disability,
People in poverty are less able to treat disabling conditions and to mitigate their impact,
Disability causes poverty, and
Race is linked to poverty and disability.
In particular, they report that, “African Americans are more likely than Non-Hispanic Whites to have a disability in every age group… [and] even when adjusting for education level, African Americans with disabilities are more likely to be in poverty than other disability groups.” Significantly, the report states that, “African Americans are not only more likely to have a disability, but the impact of disability on their lives appears to be greater than on their white counterparts.”
In response, as part of our 2019 strategic plan for the subsequent 3-5 years, the team and Board at Movin’ Out acknowledged racial disparities as a top factor impacting the organization and the communities we serve. Our team members began participating in racial equity training, and we contracted with BIPOC diversity, equity, and inclusion experts to help us redesign our recruitment process. This new approach included revised position descriptions in which we removed requirements and language that could inadvertently perpetuate racial bias. People of color now comprise 36% of our Board of Directors and 53% of our staff, including in multiple leadership positions.
In 2020, Movin’ Out’s Board of Directors agreed to establish and clarify racial justice as an explicit pillar of our organization. We engaged EQT by Design to guide us through the process of determining what changes and/or new actions were needed to integrate thoughtful consideration of racial equity to ensure our operations and programs help to advance racial justice. The result of that initial engagement was the creation of our Racial Equity Roadmap with three non-linear phases: Building Our Foundation, Deepening Our Work, and Expanding Our Reach. We are now working to integrate the Racial Equity Roadmap into our new strategic plan, to ensure these efforts are prioritized and sustained into the future.
We look forward to sharing more concrete actions in the coming months.