SPARK Reproductive Justice NOW

SPARK Reproductive Justice NOW serves as an entry point and leadership pipeline for new social justice leaders, and a political home for Black women and young people, centering Black queer women, trans folx and folx living outside the gender binary. They utilize arts, culture and media to build resources for and shift narratives about our communities. SPARK engages in power building through grassroots organizing, advocacy, knowledge-building, and political development of our base and members in Georgia and across the US South.

NIRH has partnered with SPARK and Feminist Women’s Health Center (FWHC) over several year to advance reproductive freedom in Georgia; together we designed and implemented a multi-year proactive policy strategy, grounded in the reproductive justice framework, to shift the public and political landscape on abortion access. In 2019, FWHC and SPARK brought together a coalition of social justice organizations to discuss reproductive justice and a comprehensive 2020 policy agenda, including defunding crisis pregnancy centers, expanding Georgia’s Medicaid coverage for postpartum people, and increasing childcare funding. Along with this coalition and NIRH’s support, both partners put together and hosted a series of town halls across the state of Georgia with various activist communities. In 2018, the two organizations focused on moving proactive reproductive health legislation, including the Whole Woman’s Health Act that would codify the fundamental right to abortion into Georgia law. This project involved collaboration with SiX. SPARK is currently working as part of a cohort of organizations in Georgia on a long-term initiative to develop and advance an abortion rights vision, engage a new and broad base of supporters, and reduce shame and stigma by publicly promoting the affirmative value of abortion.