Black-led Organizations in Arizona to Support
written by Trinity Miracle & Instituto Staff | Updated: January 2026
Arizona is home to many thriving Black-led organizations. Whether you are looking to volunteer, donate, or are interested in more information about how to get involved, there is a Black-led organization somewhere in Arizona to support. Our embrace of Black organizations championing change is a year-round effort, not defined by a single month or moment in time.
Here are Arizona-based organizations that are anchors in the Black community here, providing political homes, deeper connections, resources, and empowerment:
Arizona Birthworkers of Color
Arizona Birthworkers of Color (AZBOC) is an organization dedicated to the growth, fellowship, and support of people of color within birth-related fields in Arizona. AZBOC, founded in 2016, is a collective group of people of color who offer services that support families before, during, and after childbirth. They provide space for the individual journeys and specific challenges of community-based Birthworkers who without organizations like AZBOC, would likely work alone in silos.
They provide opportunities for growth both personally and professionally, allowing Birth Workers to show up well and whole for the families they serve. Through hands-on skill-building workshops, professional development, leadership training, and self-regulation awareness, Birth Workers can sharpen their craft in a safe environment with love, respect, and dignity.
Arizona Coalition For Change / Our Voice, Our Vote Arizona
Arizona Coalition for Change (AZC4C) (C3) is a Black-led organization with a dynamic multicultural team that empowers everyday people to transform their community through building civic power, leadership development, and community collaboration. They advocate for lasting progressive public policies that change the dynamics for Arizona communities by putting people first and taking on our nation's most pressing issues.
Our Voice, Our Vote Arizona (OVOV) (C4) is an organization committed to advocating for sustainable progressive public policies that address the most pressing issues in Arizona communities. They build power by mobilizing voters, training the next generation of leaders, electing champions into office, and holding elected officials accountable. They organize around voter, economic, racial, and youth justice, and advocate for legislation that empowers and protects Black people from equity to the fight against policies that disenfranchise Arizona communities.
In 2020 alone, the organizers at AZC4C and OVOV registered 10,141 new voters, with the largest team of Black canvassers in the state.
Arizona DEMOCRACY RESOURCE CENTER
Arizona Democracy Resource Center is a Black-led and South-Phoenix based organization that envisions a future where democracy truly works for everyone. That means building a system that is accessible, inclusive, and accountable to the people it’s meant to serve. AZ DRC’s programs include rights restoration and legal support, community resource organizing, mutual aid, community resilience, and policy advocacy.
Atabey Outdoors
Atabey Outdoors is the only BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color) led organization providing outdoor adventures to BIPOC youth in the area. Atabey is unique in that currently, 100% of their Outdoor mentors and administrative team are Women of Color (WOC).
Historically, Women of Color lack representation in outdoor spaces. It has roughly been 60 years since the 1964 Civil Rights Act, meaning that BIPOC, specifically the Black community, has only been legally allowed to recreate in outdoor spaces with white people for 60 years. To combat this, they provide safe & fun outdoor adventures for BIPOC girls ages 8 to 12 by combining outdoor adventure with enrichment activities that encourage social, emotional, physical, and mental growth.
Black GIRL BROWN GIRL COLLECTIVE Inc.
The Black Girl Brown Girl Collective (BGBGC) Inc. is a South Phoenix, Arizona-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to closing the gaps in art for women—particularly women of color—by expanding economic opportunities and increasing visibility through platforms, education, and cultural events. Their vision is to build an arts hub in South Phoenix that nurtures women artists through residencies, workshops, events, and other art-related opportunities, creating a safe and sustainable space where their voices, creativity, and economic futures thrive. Their offerings include HERarts n Crafts Classes where women-of-color instructors teach everything from sewing to ceramics. One of their most popular family-friendly events of the year is the Queens Rise Art Walk, which celebrates local women artists through an interactive evening art walk.
Black Lives Matter Phoenix Metro
Black Lives Matter Phoenix Metro is a Black, Queer, and Femme-led organization that works towards liberation by practicing abolition to seek true freedom of mind, body, and community. They do this through various ministries where they study decoloniality, provide community members with support and resources, foster community engagement, write blueprints for a new world, cultivate healing, and create art.
BLACKNET AZ
BlackNet AZ is a coalition of dedicated organizations and leaders committed to the advancement and strategic collaboration of the Black community in Arizona. Their purpose is to connect organizations and individuals that share a goal of empowerment and positive change, to be a resource hub, and to empower organizations and individuals. They host community events, including Juneteenth cookouts and free grant-writing workshops for Black nonprofits.
Black Phoenix Organizing Collective / Black Political Cultivation Arizona
Black Phoenix Organizing Collective (C3) is building Black power through political education, leadership development, and the creation of independent, self-reliant, and generative alternatives to systems of oppression. In addition to political education, they center reproductive and birth justice, disability justice, and mutual aid.
Black Phoenix Organizing Collective launched their campaign “Why I Didn’t Call”, to collect surveys, storytelling sessions, and interviews throughout Phoenix, Arizona to help build a shared understanding of why community members do not feel safe calling law enforcement.
Black Political Cultivation Arizona (C4) is an all-Black, queer, femme, and nonbinary-led grassroots political organization.
They are flexing their creativity and passion in elections, organizing, and public policy work to dismantle the systems that categorize our vibrant identities as targets and keep people poor and caged.
black river life
Black River Life is an African Diaspora-centered creative studio and nonprofit collective that provides news, media, and cultural arts community-building grounded in shared experiences of migration, resistance, healing, and joy.
Black River Life leverages cultural arts and media to explore how who we are, where we are, and how we got here. As part of moving the narrative of Blackness forward, they work to:
Create cultural events and media that explore Black migration and displacement
Partner with fellow artists and community members on creative activations around these themes
Help diverse Black-led nonprofits and small businesses use film, video, and photography to tell their stories
Provide political education on racial equity and justice
Black River Life is committed to reflecting the truth of African Diaspora lives, through all our joys, challenges and triumphs.
The Council on American-Islamic Relations Arizona (CAIR-AZ) is a grassroots civil rights and advocacy group that enhances the understanding of Islam, protects civil rights, promotes justice, and empowers American Muslims.
Through media relations, government relations, education, and advocacy, CAIR puts forth an Islamic perspective to ensure the Muslim voice is represented. In offering this perspective, CAIR seeks to empower the American Muslim community and encourage their participation in political and social activism.
Desert Star Institute For Family Planning
Desert Star Institute for Family Planning is a Black Woman founded and led organization that creates equitable access to reproductive health care for womb-bearing people while centering Black and Indigenous people of color. Founder and Board-Certified Gynecologist, Dr. DeShawn Taylor (she/her) provides clinical women’s health care, abortion services, gender-affirming care, and sexual health services.
Desert Star Institute for Family Planning was born out of an increasing demand for abortion training that Dr. Taylor was not able to meet within her clinical practice alone and has evolved into a Reproductive Justice Organization.
Although abortion is required learning in medical schools, there is no robust curriculum.
In 2017, Dr. Taylor, along with a dedicated team of reproductive rights advocates and medical students, began Desert Star Institute for Family Planning which is now among the few Black-led and community-centered institutes in Arizona.
Girlfriend culture
Girlfriend Culture was born from the collective dreams, legacy, and vision of three women—Lindsay, LaShunda, and Iliamari—each committed to reshaping wellness and community for Black women. United by their dedication to healing, they created an organization that honors the ancestral legacies and unique needs of Black women, rooted in collective strength, joy, and a commitment to community care.
Girlfriend Culture is dedicated to creating safe, community-centered spaces for Black women to rest, heal, and reconnect. Through curated retreats, shared resources, and culturally-rooted wellness practices, they provide a sanctuary where Black women can nourish themselves and each other. Girlfriend Culture honors their ancestral legacies and supports Black women in reclaiming their well-being and embracing holistic, joyful lives.
Instituto Lab is a proud fiscal sponsor of Girlfriend Culture.
Grassrootz Books and Juice Bar
Grassrootz Books and Juice Bar is a Black & worker-owned bookstore in the heart of Eastlake Park, one of Phoenix’s historically Black neighborhoods, which played a central role in the Civil Rights Movement in Arizona. The park was home to many civil rights rallies and visits from civil rights leaders, and was the starting point of many civil rights marches to the Arizona State Capitol. Given this, a bookstore centering activism, education, and economic development, alongside housing its many Black-authored titles, was the ideal location to honor both the area’s legacy and the mission of Grassrootz.
To browse their catalog, or check out their event calendar click HERE.
Instituto
Photo by Shaunté Glover
Instituto builds power with low-income and communities of color in Arizona through training, coaching, and sharing resources for organizations and leaders. Founded in 2019, our first program was the Monzón Fellowship. Among the inaugural cohort was Shelley—a proud young Black organizer rooted in South Phoenix. Her vision and voice shaped how we all showed up for one another at Monzón. She challenged her fellows to learn from Black and Indigenous voices and experiences. Because of the passion and leadership she demonstrated at Monzón, she became the organization’s first deputy director of training and engagement in 2020. Then, in 2022, she became Instituto’s first-ever executive director. Since becoming a director, she has led three Monzón cohorts, ensuring each group of leaders includes a more diverse set of backgrounds than the previous one. She has grown and built our team to have a Black Feminist framework at the core of our work.
One of her projects includes Black Emergence: Traveling Mercy to the Desert Sun. Inspired by Shelley’s grandmother, McDell Otha Jackson, the project is about uplifting the powerful roles of Black American grandmothers in shaping families and communities, told through stories of resilience, migration, and their legacy as matriarchs. In 2026, we will premiere a documentary film, in partnership with Black River Life, on her family’s experience and the broader impacts of gentrification and displacement on Black communities here in Phoenix and across the U.S.
Mass Liberation Arizona
Mass Liberation Arizona is a community-centered organization seeking to decarcerate and divest from the criminal (in)justice system, believing all prisons, detention centers, and jails should be abolished and rather invest in solutions that strengthen our communities. As a movement, they are working to end mass incarceration by building a world that values people over property, healing over punishment, and liberation for everyone. They are led by those most impacted by the system and center Black liberation because they believe in doing so, everyone gets free.
The organizers at Mass Liberation Arizona are amazing in their accountability work, most recognizably in exposing anti-Black government officials that occupy space in offices like the Maricopa County Attorney, and the Phoenix Police Chief, both of which directly hold power over incarcerated people.
Sudanese American Community Center of Arizona
The Sudanese American Community Center of Arizona (SAC) is a cultural, social, and charitable organization for the pride of the Sudanese Americans, promoting and celebrating the Sudanese heritage and cultural identity. They engage their community through hosting festivals and cultural events, workshops, and seminars. They also organize sporting events and youth activities, have an established Sudanese Women’s Society, and prioritize aiding community members with the transition into the local American society.
Shining Light Foundation
As a conduit for change, Shining Light Foundation brings together community, governmental, and private organizations to address community concerns. In collaboration, they provide solutions that positively impact, heal, and educate these communities for years to come. They stand out through community activism, community engagement, servant leadership, and advocacy.
The Black History Mural Project is one of the Shining Light Foundation’s most remarkable projects. This mural project was created to educate society about Black historical figures and their impact on shaping the United States as we know it. Their project illustrates that Black contributions to society are not limited to mainstream figures, by highlighting Black folks who have made breakthroughs and differences in a variety of fields, industries, and categories. In 2022, their goal was to paint 365 murals and 1,095 black figures across the country and work closely with school officials to facilitate the educational component of the project. They are continuing to expand this project in 2023, and beyond.
Tomorrow We Vote
Tomorrow We Vote is a non-partisan, issue-focused organization devoted to informing today’s youth about their voting rights, issues impacting their communities, and removing the stigma tied to engaging in the democratic process. Their program uses a customized education-based classroom curriculum to teach young people to become engaged and encourage them to vote.
As a Black and Brown-led Arizona organization, they reach out not only to the youngest-aged voters, but aim to educate those in marginalized communities who lack access to this historically gatekept information.
4 the luv
4THELUV Foundation is an organization driven by a passionate commitment to support the most vulnerable members of society, our youth. Through their tireless efforts, they provide critical resources to those facing hunger, displacement, or challenging circumstances.
Their focus extends beyond immediate assistance; they are dedicated to empowering at-risk youth with educational programs, mentorship, and resources that pave the way for a more promising future. Guided by compassion, integrity, and a community-centric approach, 4THELUV believes in fostering resilience and creating sustainable solutions that uplift lives and build a stronger, more inclusive society.
Their programming includes Youth Mental Health Workshops, the Leadership and Fitness Program, Operation Trail Trek, a program designed to instill leadership skills, outdoor proficiency and community engagement for ages 8-14 years old, water drives, and more.
“Supporting Black-led organizations is a year-round act. These organizations provide political homes, deeper connections, resources, and means of empowerment to Arizonans. Their work deserves to be invested in, supported, and further made visible, so that every community member in need knows that somewhere in Arizona, an organization has their back.”
We hope to see this list continue to grow as Arizona’s Black community grows and more organizations and groups are created. If there’s an Arizona-based, Black-led organization you recommend we add to this list, please email us at comms@instituto.io.
