Strengthening Regional Connectivity

Abortion funds are changing the landscape of how healthcare works in this country by radically re-thinking what should happen when someone picks up the phone to access a health service. As unending state-based restrictions continue to severely impact access to abortion, regional connectivity will be central to ensuring people seeking abortions have what they need.

Collaboration is core to a streamlined abortion funding experience. This requires protocols, secure systems, and relationships grounded in trust among abortion funds. We are working to build strong regional hubs that coordinate service delivery across states: disbursing funding, arranging travel, and engaging callers in political analysis.

In the next year, NNAF will continue to develop a regional strategy across the network through in-person and online conversations aimed at building trust and improving service delivery. We see the immense power of regional and network-wide connectivity to foster widespread change in service delivery and in larger organizing efforts.

An example of this has been at the intersection of abortion access and immigration justice.

• In the early to mid-2010s, funds in Texas began sharing more with the network about how ID requirements and ICE highway checkpoints posed a barrier to undocumented callers.
• The #AbortionBeyondBorders campaign, led by West Fund and Frontera Fund, called attention to how borders unfairly impact a caller’s access to abortion.
• Recently, the Lilith Fund fought back against a local ordinance which co-opted the immigration rights struggle for anti-abortion purposes, by declaring the town a “sanctuary city” for “unborn children”.
• In Florida, Broward Women’s Emergency Fund joined local immigrant justice groups to organize weekly protests at the Homestead migrant child detention center, calling attention to the treatment of pregnant people in prison and the quality of life for children who are detained.
• In Ohio, Women Have Options members volunteer with local immigration advocacy and aid groups, using their own efforts to draw attention and raise money for this issue.

Ideas and issues organically spread within our network, leading to insights and strategies rooted in local and regional wisdom. We are so much stronger as a network and as movements when we share knowledge and collaborate. When we build power together we are not only addressing the barriers of today but fighting for a future where our communities and legislatures celebrate and protect our autonomy.

This is why we say: fund abortion, build power.