The City of Alexandria and the Northern Virginia Urban League (NVUL) reached an agreement on December 31 for the City to purchase the Freedom House Museum in order to preserve and interpret this National Historic Landmark for future generations. The building, located at 1315 Duke Street, was once part of the headquarters for the largest domestic slave trading firm in the United States. From 1828 to 1861, five successive firms forced as many as 50,000 enslaved adults and children from the Chesapeake Bay area to the slave markets in Natchez, Miss., and New Orleans by foot or ship.

The City plans to enlist partners to help us restore the building and expand the exhibits to tell the story of the domestic slave trade and those who were enslaved.

ACT for Alexandria is embarking on a journey with our colleagues across the City to achieve a future when race no longer predicts one’s outcomes in life; when everyone has what they need to thrive, no matter what neighborhood they live in, the color of their skin, their gender, or where they were born.

As Alexandria’s community foundation, this vision of a vibrant community is core to our work.  To move this vision forward, we are launching our Racial Equity Capacity Building Initiative, including

• Workshops that address what it means to be an ally for racial equity and build bridges to ensure equity, opportunity and inclusion for everyone. These one-day workshops will be open to everyone in the community.
• A Design Lab with participants from the workshops to capture feedback about their desired continued learnings around racial equity with the goal of creating a peer cohort group, which began in October 2019.
• A six-month Learning Lab to equip leaders in effective racial equity implementation in their organizations.
• Community conversations that bring people together for dialogue to build deeper understanding and surface new ideas and solutions.
• Capacity-building grants that help nonprofits build know-how and knowledge about racial equity with their staff, board and constituents.

ACT’s Racial Equity Initiative is made possible by the generous support of the Meyer Foundation, Bruhn Morris Family Foundation, and Kaiser Permanente.

Learn About Our Racial Equity Capacity Building Opportunities:

Allyship workshops:  What does it mean to be an ally for racial equity? ACT hosted seven sold-out Allyship workshops in 2019 and will host a six workshops in 2020. The confirmed dates include: January 29, March 24 (for Board members only), and May 14. Additional dates will be announced. The Allyship workshops are led by Whitney Parnell, Executive Director and Co-Founder of Service Never Sleeps to learn more about how to use their areas of privilege to advance racial justice and what it means to adopt an allyship lifestyle. These one-day workshops will be open to individuals living in or serving the Alexandria community. If you have any questions or would like to be notified of future workshops, please contact brandi.yee@actforalexandria.org.