Despite market volatility in 2023, the Red Oak Opportunity Foundation (ROOF) pulled together to distribute over $90,000 to East Bay nonprofits.
The funds were distributed to 21 charities that directly benefit East Bay communities. These nonprofits support the unhoused, at-risk youth, women and children in need, the environment, educational- and arts-based programs, mental health services, social justice, food insecurity, and much more.
Here are a few of the great organizations that we supported. We encourage you to learn and support them as well. Watch for more updates on Red Oak’s blog, where you can sign up for email updates here.
CENTRAL STAGE is a community theater in Richmond that has emerged as a cultural and performing arts center for the Persian and Iranian communities of the East Bay. It’s a volunteer-based organization and the only local creative space operated by and for this community. By providing this venue, they foster open expression, enabling experimentation and development in the arts. The center hosts small plays, musical performances, talks, film screenings, and other events.
Central Stage is a progressive center for both artists and local supporters to meet and collaborate. It has provided support and a haven for the community through past and recent turmoil in and around Iran.
DARVAG THEATER GROUP was founded in Berkeley in 1985 with the dual mission of exploring creative expression in theater arts and maintaining a vital living connection with the group’s Iranian heritage. Darvag’s repertoire consists of contemporary Iranian works, new plays by group members, and Farsi translations of classic and contemporary works from other languages. The group performs at the Central Stage theater mentioned above.
EAST BAY CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS has been around since 1968. They offer diverse youth and young adults opportunities to grow and excel as learners, creators of art, and contributors to their communities. The center provides broad and strategic community-based and public school performing arts access programs; rigorous individual and ensemble training; an intensive six-year, interdisciplinary diploma program; advanced internships; and commissions for new works of art. Their students, partners, and audiences deepen their experience and engagement with the impact of music, theater, dance, and media-making from a critical selection of the world's great cultures.
The center is passionate about the power of art to create beauty and new ways of seeing the world. Located in in the heart of Richmond, more than 50,000 student artists from all walks of life have benefited from the organization over the years, enabling them to think, lead, and contribute to the world around them.
BAY NATURE INSTITUTE, located in Berkeley, is an independent non-profit organization that produces publications, a website, and community and educational events throughout the Bay Area. Their goal is to honor the region’s legacy of environmental advocacy and motivate people to consider nature by connecting them to their natural world. Their writers, photographers, and artists cover science and nature, conservation and recreation. The organization has developed into a vital part of the Bay Area’s green communications infrastructure, aligning with many other Bay Area green initiatives.
If you have questions about the organizations mentioned above, or about ROOF in general, reach out. And we hope you will donate to ROOF, too.
