Seven Questions for Borealis Philanthropy President Amoretta Morris
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Borealis Philanthropy President Amoretta Morris
In January 2021, Borealis Philanthropy, the Minneapolis-based progressive grantmaking intermediary, named Amoretta Morris its new president after an extensive national search.
“We must listen to the voices of those closest to injustice, now more than ever,” said Borealis Program Associate Nichelle Brunner when the decision was announced. “As a queer, Black woman from the South, Amoretta has been organizing for change for the last 20 years. She brings an incredible movement and organizing track record, a depth of intersectional analysis, and a lifelong commitment to advocating for and with the very social movements Borealis supports.”
Morris was born in Alabama, grew up in Houston, and spent the past two decades in the public and philanthropic sectors, including stints at the Annie E. Casey Foundation, as a fellow with the Funders Network, and the District of Columbia Public Schools.
Morris officially took the helm at Borealis on February 16, 2021, and now oversees an institution that has awarded over $77 million to organizations serving BIPOC, queer and trans, immigrant and movement-driven communities over the past seven years. She is Borealis’ second president, after founder Margarita “Magui” Rubalcava.
I caught up with Amoretta a few weeks after the one-year anniversary of her tenure to discuss her influences, the best advice she’s ever received, and the most exciting part of the job so far. Here are some excerpts from that discussion, which have been edited for clarity.
What made you decide you wanted to work in the nonprofit sector?
I don’t know that it was a choice. When I was young, I wanted to either be an Alvin Ailey dancer or the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. The Alvin Ailey dream was just a bit out of my reach, so I focused on saving the environment. My plan was to go to college, work for a few years, go to law school, and then work my way up in the EPA.
When I got to college and was spending time in computer labs, I realized that I missed the work I was doing as a student board member and facilitator for our campus YMCA. I fell in love with working with young people and I knew that was the change that I wanted to make. I switched majors, and that pushed me into advocacy and the nonprofit sector.
Who are your biggest influences?
I have so many influences—my family, my friends, the young people that I used to organize alongside. In this moment, the people I find myself looking to most often are other Black women leaders in philanthropy. In all of my roles, it has been other Black women in the field who have pushed me and supported me.
I especially think about Allison Brown. She was the executive director of the Communities for Just Schools Fund, and before that, she worked as a program officer at Open Society Foundations and was an attorney for the Department of Justice. She passed away in 2020. Like me, she moved between the government and philanthropic sectors, and I am so deeply inspired by her life.
It was a surreal time when she passed because we couldn’t gather for funerals. I remember attending the memorial virtually and thinking about how I needed to step up my contribution to our communities in a way that honors the legacy of women like Allison, who has given so much for progress and change.
Like Allison, there are so many women in philanthropic institutions who inspire me with their clarity of purpose and integrity. I was sharing with somebody recently that at one point, in a prior role, my entire reporting chain of command was Black women. That would have been so rare just a decade ago. It’s still rare now, so to be able to have had the experience of being led by and supported by people who look like me is not something that I take for granted.
What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?
To dream bigger and to show up as my whole self in what I do. While that’s super clear to me now, it’s been said to me in different ways by different people. I am a very linear thinker. I had my four college years planned out and what I was going to do afterward. As they say, “best-laid plans…”
And so one of the things that folks have pushed me to do is to not box myself in and to dream beyond that. That’s a muscle that I still have to practice. I also think it is something that collectively, in the field, we have to practice.
I think the other part of what was impressed upon me, in terms of when I’m dreaming, is to do it as my whole self. When I think about the person who gave me this advice, I realized I was separating out parts of myself. I was separating out “here’s how I lead in my faith community” and “this is what I’m doing at my day job for philanthropy.” This person was pushing me to look at what it means to integrate all of those pieces and lead from there.
My mission is to facilitate personal and community liberation—period. I want to help people get free. That’s inner work, it’s also outer work. It is structural work, it’s metaphysical work. It’s also about public policy. It’s about our thoughts and what we’re holding in our head in our heart. It’s not an either/or mentality, and I’m so appreciative of the people who reinforced that idea for me.
What makes you optimistic about the state of philanthropy?
More funders are willing to walk their talk, even when they don’t know how, even when the walk might be a little unbalanced and unsure. I think, as a sector, there are more of us who are grappling with how we hold and share power, and our communities and institutions are going to be better for it.
It’s great to receive calls from other institutions inquiring about what we learned with our participatory grantmaking. Even organizations that are still holding on to decision-making authority are making bigger and bolder investments, and they’re making them with fewer strings attached. We’re seeing more flexibility that’s allowing for learning and adaptation.
It’s all good news because we have to fund leaders and solutions at the scale of the problem. People have it heard before, but we’re not going to solve decades-long problems in a one-year grant cycle on a $50,000 grant. Holding unrealistic expectations is not serving anybody, and the solution is to be able to work with others so that we can unlock more resources for the movement- and power-building work that it’s going to take to meet that radical goal, that radical dream.
You joined Borealis as CEO a little over a year ago. What has been the most exciting part of the job so far?
The opportunity to meet and learn from our grantee partners has been so exciting. At Borealis, we have nine collaborative funds and they are resourcing leaders and organizations who are at the front lines of movements. These movements range from community safety and equitable journalism to queer and trans liberation to disability justice and inclusion.
As a queer Black woman raised in the South, who has lived at the intersection of so many of these movements, I am honored to be able to dedicate every day to amplify our grantee partners, to mobilize resources to them, and to do it alongside staff who come from the same communities that we’re serving.
I think the other part—I’m not going to call it exciting, I don’t have an adjective for it—is how working with our partners reduces some of my own anxiety when I think about the world around us. When I’m getting the news or on social media, it can be overwhelming and there’s a tendency to think, “Wow, I’m just one individual.” Being connected to the powerful work that communities are doing keeps me going because otherwise, it can be immobilizing to take in all of that worry.
What was the last great book you read?
bell hooks’ “All About Love.” I was pushed to read it after her death and I’m also participating in a virtual book club diving into her trilogy on love, and I’m so grateful that I did because it’s incredible.
One of my spiritual teachers told me once that at our root, we are acting from one of two emotions—love or fear. I want to strengthen my skills to act from love and the book is helping me to explore that in so many realms.
I also just started Priya Parker’s “The Art of Gathering.” It’s setting off all sorts of fireworks in my head. I picked it up after hearing her on Brené Brown’s podcast. I’ve been training and facilitating in groups for decades and I’m also the convener among my friends and associates. I would have loved this book no matter when it came into my life, but at this particular time, it’s even more necessary as we are navigating the return to meetings and gathering.
What advice would you give nonprofit leaders seeking funder support at this time?
Trust that you and your team have the knowledge about the community you’re serving. I think part of that trust is also about being honest about the true cost of doing what you do.
Oftentimes budgets are too lean, and that’s because we’re used to making a dollar out of 50 cents. We’re also in a space where doing good in the world is hard. I’ve worked extensively in community-based violence prevention, and that’s given me a different perspective of the importance of having mental health support and trauma-informed practices inside the organization. The structural violence and interpersonal violence that our communities are dealing with deeply affect the people who are tackling these issues.
The days of just powering through and acting like everything is OK are gone—and those days should be gone. It’s OK to not be OK and to be honest about how not being OK is going to affect the work. So when I say to be honest about the cost of doing work in a community, those are the types of things I’m talking about. It means building in the time in your calendar to make sure that staff are getting support—and asking funders for it.
