WILPF Board Budget Builds Bridges to the Future with Bequests

In Ghana, a WILPF member directs her attention forward.

by Darien De Lu
WILPF US President

February 2023

Here we are, in a new year, but still here we see the global and national problems that both preceded and grew in extent in 2022. Looming ahead is the 2024 election year. So what is WILPF going to do?

What we’re doing is building bridges between generations and into the future! Thanks to generous bequests in 2021, we have the ability to build capacity now. We rely on our members to use that capacity for issue actions, branch building, and community collaboration. You can join your energies to national and local WILPF to help with this bridge-building!

When Hopson, Bishop, Guignon, Weiss, Traylor Birnie, and Yingling designated inheritances for WILPF, they were investing in and caring for a world they could not live to see. They’re counting on us to use their money wisely. As the Board considers WILPF’s 2023 budget, I believe we can all appreciate the opportunity they’ve given us – and our responsibility to discern how and when to take action with those funds.

WILPF in 2023 is an organization with many members over age 65. The COVID pandemic has profoundly restricted our organizing as well as affected us all individually. We are called upon to be resilient and flexible – including in finding new ways to build bridges and reach out to others. Currently our WILPF communications model relies primarily on media that younger people scarcely use:

• emails
• websites
• phone calls
• magazines

WILPF offers political actions, skills trainings, issue presentations, and helpful discussions – but how do we get the word out?

One part of our bridge-building is designing WILPF ways to work with multi-faceted communications. In addition to all of the above media, we’ll look at connecting with our members and the public through texts and what I call anti-social media – including by supplementing eNews articles with videos on YouTube and TikTok.

As our outgoing Treasurer, Jan Corderman, said in her January report to the Board, "the Bequests we received in 2021 give us opportunities." She also noted the following, in reference to WILPF’s 2022 and 2023 budgets:

We’ve invested bequest income to effectively handle important fundraising work with new Staff positions.  We’ve increased the allowance for Issue Committees.... It is likely that we’ll have other recommendations to consider for action at the January 31 [Board] meeting.

Yes – I anticipate that the Board will be discussing a number of carefully considered staff expenditures in our 2023 budget. As I envision it, in 2023 we’ll buy some additional instruments, put new strings on our violins, and wax our bows; we’ll select the right sheet music, tune up, and do some rehearsing. We want to be ready for 2024 – to make harmonious and powerful music, so that we can dance together through that very important election year!

Let’s start on the branch level for 2023, my Year of the Branch. After three years of pandemic, the Board will look at how to assist branches with diverse local membership, issue, and outreach activities. I expect we’ll fund a new organizer position to work with branches, along with one or more paid interns. Also, branches will likely have access to new micro-grants to help fund local initiatives. Would you like to strengthen your branch through an oral history project? If there’s enough interest, we might also help fund such efforts.

We’ll want to build on the development plans initiated in 2022, including expanding last year’s development social media work into new platforms. And in other WILPF work areas, we want folks to hear about WILPF! To keep publicizing our program work and organizational presence we’re looking to continue the budgeted 2022 social media and communications funding. We may also increase coordination and communications initiatives – including working together with allied groups. We’re working smart as well as hard!

Our budget is a chart of our priorities for 2023. You can contact me at President@wilpfus.org with comments, or email any of the Board members. (Find Board contact information here.) To request our brochure on how to leave a legacy, email info@wilpfUS.org .