WHAT WE VALUE
LCF exists to unleash the power of Latinos in California. LCF’s core values reflect the rich and diverse Latino culture and history. These values guide our commitment to honor people, families, and communities.
TRUST
LCF’s work is rooted and established on trust. We trust that our community partners understand the solutions that can best address the issues they face. We trust that the organizations we fund know how best to use the resources invested in them. We trust that our corporate and foundation partners share our goals and aspirations for the Latino community. LCF has built processes and a working environment that fosters mutual trust and respect of all our partners and honors the role each one plays in advancing our mission.
FAMILY and UNITY
LCF knows that anything is possible when we work together. Our team, Board, community partners and donors are tied together by a mutual commitment to support and lift up the next generation of Latinos. LCF has built the largest network of Latino philanthropists by welcoming donors into a family of changemakers and trailblazers. We open our homes, share meals together, and collectively decide how best to invest resources that will transform our communities into places youth and families can thrive. We take time to honor our history and backgrounds and build strong ties that unite our work beyond grantmaking. Our donors become interwoven into the lives of our community partners and vice versa.
LEADING FROM A PLACE OF STRENGTH
Latinos have made enormous contributions to the social and economic wellbeing of our nation and state. LCF is committed to elevating these assets and leading from a place of strength. Latinos are generous and committed to improving the lives of their families and communities. We work to leverage this commitment and the will for collective action to create opportunities for change. We seek to accomplish our mission not because there is a need to be met; but simply because as Latinos thrive the state and the country will thrive.
CHANGE, NOT CHARITY
LCF is in the business of accelerating change and progress. We serve as a catalyst that promotes positive and proactive solutions that heal communities, create opportunities for youth to thrive, and engage the largest ethnic group of California in civic and political action. LCF is not interested in charity. We aim to partner with donors and funders that want to invest in enduring, systemic and revolutionary changes to the status quo.
HOPE
Hope is what fuels our work and daily commitment to push forward. Hope that positive change is possible when power and will are applied and leveraged for the common good. We know that the systems and policies that have failed our families and communities can be fixed or replaced. We draw upon the collective history and strength of all immigrant communities that have settled in the U.S., a country guided and governed by a declaration that ALL men and women are created equal and have a right to pursuit happiness.
JOY
At LCF we choose JOY! Life is too short, and the work of social justice is hard. This is why we will press into joy. We will choose to celebrate our people – from our artists to our community leaders. We will choose to celebrate our culture – our music, our food, our history. We will choose to celebrate our wins, big or small. We will choose laughter even amidst heartache and loss. Joy is medicine for the soul and antidote to pain. Because of it, we can build movements that will stand the test of time, trials, and tribulation. With it, we are an unstoppable force for real social change.