About Us
Who we are
Started in 2001, the Southern Rural Black Women’s Initiative for Economic and Social Justice (SRBWI) is a network of over 2,500 women and young women across the Black Belt of Alabama and Georgia, and the Delta in Mississippi. SRBWI works alongside women and young women across this 77 county region – counties designated as “persistently poor” by the United States Department of Agriculture. SRBWI provides organization, training, staffing, activities, and opportunities to further nourish local leadership capacities; engage in advocacy and public policy agendas; develop asset-based economic development models to lift women out of poverty; and connect with other groups committed to gender and human rights, economic and social justice.
SRBWI State Leads are BAMA Kids, Inc. in Alabama, the Southwest Georgia Project for Community Education in Georgia, and the Children’s Defense Fund’s Southern Regional Office in Mississippi. All Black Women-Led organizations. Oleta Garrett Fitzgerald, Director of the Children’s Defense Fund’s Southern Office, serves as SRBWI’s Regional Administrator.