Join us in celebrating COC victories!
Housing justice for Tampa families
When Palm Communities LLC took over management of the Holly Court Apartments in Tampa, Florida, and attempted to unfairly evict families with long-term leases earlier this year, Color Of Change mobilized. The leasing company was flooded with calls, text messages and petitions from COC members demanding that tenants be kept in their homes.
COC’s rapid-response campaign, led by campaign director Amanda Jackson in Baltimore and regional field manager Jae Passmore on the Florida organizing team, helped protect the tenants by putting pressure on the leasing company.
The company agreed to make repairs to the units and keep tenants in their homes. Six Black families were kept in their apartments thanks to the collaborative efforts of dedicated local Tampa activists and organizers and thousands of COC members.
Economic justice: Citibank ends overdraft fees
Account holders with Citibank no longer are being charged overdraft fees, returned item fees and overdraft protection transfer fees, in large part, because of the advocacy work of Color Of Change.
As of June 19, 2022, Citibank dropped those fees for all U.S. retail banking consumer deposit accounts.
Citibank was not alone in charging customers. Banks siphoned $15.4 billion in overdraft fees from customers in 2019, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Nearly 45% of the fees were paid by Black consumers.
Citibank, the nation’s fourth-largest bank, had been charging a $34 fee, up to four times a day, for customers not enrolled in overdraft protection.
Color Of Change fought back with a campaign led by an Economic Justice vision group targeting the top 10 banking institutions.
Color Of Change contacted Citibank directly and demanded the company put an end to such predatory and financially damaging practices that were harming Black communities.
More than 3,000 members signed a COC petition demanding that banks eliminate their overdraft fees. Members also donated money or told us their story of how overdraft fees had impacted their bank accounts and lives, several of which are shared here.
The efforts by COC’s Economic Justice vision team of Amanda Jackson, Gabrielle Rejouis, Angel Han, Imani Brown and Erica Mateo – and boosted by COC members – paid off. Citibank announced earlier this year that it would drop overdraft fees beginning in the summer.
The change is expected to yield tangible financial benefits for Black communities.
Overall, Capital One also has dropped overdraft fees, Bank of America has reduced its fees and PNC, Chase and Wells Fargo have changed some of their policies but still charge customers for overdrafts.
Amanda Jackson, campaign director on the Corporate Accountability Team, said the work continues. Overdraft fees are just the tip of the iceberg, she said. “We will continue working to hold (banks) accountable by tracking their racial and social justice efforts and contributions and their lending and equity practices overall.”
To your good health
Good Housekeeping and Prevention magazines announced on June 7, 2022, that they no longer will use body mass index (BMI) as an indication of health in their reporting.
Color Of Change pushed the publications to use their platforms to highlight the harmful applications of BMI and to encourage less stigmatizing and more reliable ways of measuring a person’s overall health.
Black people have been disproportionately impacted by the limitations and harms of BMI, including being shut out from fertility treatments, gender-affirming surgery and organ transplants, to name a few.
COC campaigned during the past year against the use of BMI as a reliable indicator for health and pushed for removal of BMI ranges as an eligibility requirement for health services.
As an alternative to BMI, the publications stated in articles published in June and July that they now encourage their readers to request that their health care providers “avoid weight conversations and instead order blood work to focus on (their) personal health markers.”
“These publications have huge audiences,” said Stasia Hansen, a campaign researcher with COC’s Corporate Accountability Team, who led the push for the important change.
“Removing the subtle, regular reinforcement that BMI is a measure of health will help to de-link it from people’s own assessments of health,” Hansen said. “Because of the BMI’s inherent racism, it disproportionately discriminates against Black people when used in a medical or medicine-adjacent space.
“This win is a step in the broader work to end fatphobia, which also disproportionately impacts Black people,” she said.
Hat’s off to COC!
PR Daily honored Color Of Change on July 14, 2022, with an award for Best Cultural Event or Celebration for COC’s Black History Now Awards.
With nominations from members across the country, COC held the free live streamed event last February to honor the heroes in our communities – students, educators, legislators and advocates – who have stood against the forces seeking to ban discussions of race in classrooms and books that center Black lives from public school curricula and libraries.
With journalist and commentator Roland Martin as host, COC’s Black History Now Awards program also featured awarding-winning author, educator and performance poet Alyea Pierce; New York Times bestselling author George M. Johnson; and R&B singer-songwriter Charity.
The inaugural program was led by COC’s Media, Culture and Economic Justice and Media & Storytelling teams.
Now that the event has been recognized as one of the best in the country, we’re looking forward to opening nominations for the 2023 awards in the next few weeks. We hope you’ll nominate a changemaker from your community!
Our work
Color Of Change leads campaigns that build real power for Black communities. We challenge injustice, hold corporate and political leaders accountable, commission game-changing research on systems of inequality and advance solutions for racial justice that can transform our world.
To learn more, join or donate to our mission, visit colorofchange.org