SOUTHERN COMMUNITIES DESERVE BUDGET EQUITY
We believe Southerners thrive when their local governments include community in budget decisions and allocate resources equitably. We help make this possible by bringing together local budget advocates to learn, share strategies, and build a supportive network for lasting change.
What is Local Budget Equity?
Local budget equity is the just and fair allocation of government resources to create the conditions for all residents to participate and thrive. Too often, disinvestment in communities or services becomes a pattern, and public dollars are allocated in ways that benefit some and ignore other residents completely. Now that seismic shifts have taken place in the federal funding landscape, it is more important than ever that advocates and grassroots organizations hold local governments accountable in making spending decisions.
SEAP has partnered with The New School’s Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy to create a local budget equity community of practice, where equity-centered advocates and government officials can learn together as they work to align local government dollars with their visions of thriving communities.
Learn more about the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy’s Budget Equity Project.
The Community of Practice
The local budget equity community of practice meets bimonthly to discuss their work to address budget equity in their communities.
The community of practice is composed of about 50 advocates from 33 organizations from the South and beyond. They’ve committed to a year of learning together about topics such as preemption, revenue strategies, housing policy, coalition management, narrative strategies, and more. The community of practice also hosts additional small group meetings, where budget advocates can share best practices, struggles, and deepen their connections with other professionals in real time.
Convening Local Budget Advocates
In Summer of 2024, The New School, SEAP, and Mobility Alliance hosted the first Local Budget Equity Convening in Austin, TX. This convening brought an opportunity to provide networking and skill building to local budget advocates. Conversation with participants following the event showed a deep desire to continue working and learning together, and remain connected with fellow community leaders also doing budget advocacy work.
In Spring of 2025, budget advocates and local government leaders from across the country came together in Phoenix, AZ, for the 2025 Local Budget Equity Convening, hosted by SEAP and the New School Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy, with support from the Mobility Alliance and the Urban Institute. Attendees shared successes, frustrations, and strategies for making budget processes more transparent, equitable, and inclusive and discussed breaking down barriers to community involvement, building stronger relationships between advocates and government officials, and pushing for policies that ensure resources are distributed fairly.
The event reinforced a simple but powerful truth: when communities have a real voice in budget decisions, they can drive meaningful change. It built momentum in and appetite for collective local budget equity work so successfully that plans are underway to host another convening in Spring of 2026.