News Release 5.22.2025
Impact Fund Makes Grants of $165,000
One grant funds a case seeking to protect the North Santiam River in Oregon (pictured) from agricultural pollution.
News Statement 5.22.2025: Impact Fund Makes Grants of $165,000
Berkeley, CA, 5.22.2025 – The Impact Fund has granted $165,000 in its spring grantmaking cycle to fund five impact lawsuits. These cases include efforts to challenge a proposed factory farm in Oregon, recognize children’s constitutional climate rights in Canada, and ensure equal access for transgender students in South Carolina.
“Today, in the midst of attacks on vulnerable communities and our environment, it is more important than ever to fund the lawsuits fighting back against greed and discrimination. We’re grateful to be supporting our grantees’ critical work,” said Impact Fund Executive Director Lindsay Nako.
The Impact Fund made a grant to the Center for Food Safety to support an environmental justice case challenging a planned large-scale chicken factory farm owned by Foster Farms in Linn County, Oregon. This concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) would house 3.5 million chickens annually, generating more than 4,500 tons of chicken litter waste per year and contaminating the nearby North Santiam River. According to the case, the resulting pollution will significantly harm the health and livelihoods of the nearby community, which is primarily made up of elderly residents and low-income farmers who strongly oppose the factory farm. The case aims to protect the surrounding community by preventing the farm from being built. The case additionally seeks to set positive legal precedent that would help rural communities across the country address the harmful impacts of industrial agriculture.
Athabasca Glacier, British Columbia, Canada. The glacier has lost over half its mass in the last 125 years.
A grant was awarded to Our Children’s Trust to support a climate justice case brought by fifteen youth activists in Canada. The case challenges the Canadian government’s promotion of fossil fuel production as unconstitutional under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. While Canada is one of the world’s fastest warming countries, it is also one of the world’s top producers of fossil fuels and has missed every climate pollution reduction target it has set for itself. The case alleges that the effects of government-sanctioned greenhouse gas pollution will cause significant physical and mental harm to Canada’s youth, who will spend the coming decades experiencing severe heat waves, droughts, wildfires, storms and more. The lawsuit asks the court to recognize Canadian children’s constitutional climate rights and declare that the government has a duty to develop a science-based climate recovery plan.
Every child should be allowed to use a bathroom that aligns with their gender identity.
The Impact Fund also made a grant to civil rights law firm Wardenski P.C. to support a case on behalf of transgender youth in South Carolina. In July 2024, the South Carolina state legislature enacted a law restricting funding for public schools that permit transgender students to use gender-appropriate school restrooms. As a result, schools across the state have banned transgender students from using restrooms that align with their gender identities. The case alleges that this law violates the civil and constitutional rights of the more than 3,000 transgender students attending public schools in South Carolina. The goal of the litigation is to obtain an injunction preventing the law from being enforced. During a time of increased hostility towards transgender youth across the country, this case aims to ensure that the rights of transgender students are protected and respected.
Elissa Gershon, Chair of the Impact Fund’s Grant Advisory Committee, said: “The grantees we've funded this quarter are fighting against powerful interests to protect the environment and the rights of transgender students — work that furthers our goal of building a more equitable world.”
ENDS
For more information and photography, contact:
Teddy Basham-Witherington 415.845.1206 / comms@impactfund.org
About the Impact Fund
The Impact Fund was founded in December 1992 to help advance economic, environmental, racial, and social justice through the courts. Originally envisioned as a purely grantmaking organization, the Impact Fund has made 807 grants totaling $10,255,129. Click here for Grant Criteria and information about Grant Deadlines.
Since its inception, the Impact Fund has grown to include both advocacy and education in its range of services. Today, the Impact Fund litigates a small number of cases directly, authors amicus briefs, provides a substantial amount of consulting to civil rights practitioners free of charge, and presents an annual conference for plaintiff-side class action practitioners, a training institute for budding public interest class action practitioners, and numerous seminars and webinars. Click here for the 2024 Annual Report.
What Is Impact Litigation?
Impact litigation is a lawsuit, often a class action, where the outcome of the case may have effects that reach beyond the parties to the case and advance economic, environmental, racial, and/or social justice for a community or a larger group of people who may not have access to the courts on their own.