Mission
Our mission is to promote the continued existence and resiliency of the U.S. abortion delivery sector so that abortion seekers have timely and equitable access to quality abortion care.
The RAD Team
The RAD team is strategic, pragmatic, and focused on impact.
Our team brings over
years of combined experience in reproductive health and abortion rights, along with:
In-depth knowledge of the landscape
We understand the ever changing legal, economic & environmental landscapes, as well as the escalating pressures on abortion providers.
Strong relationship network nationwide
We know providers, allies, and funders across the country through years of work in the field, and have strong, trusted relationships.
Agile and responsive approach
Our knowledge base and relationships enable us to pivot quickly in response to changing external challenges.
Leadership
Melanie Zurek
Chief Operating Officer and Interim Co-Executive Director
Melanie Zurek develops and oversees RAD’s information and operating systems, structures and processes – with particular attention to RAD’s capacity to respond quickly and strategically in a complex and volatile external environment. Prior to RAD, she served for 15 years as Executive Director of Provide, Inc. working to integrate abortion content into high-need, low-resource general health and social service settings.
Meg Cavanaugh
Chief Program Officer and Interim Co-Executive Director
Meg Cavanaugh co-developed and leads RAD’s funding and technical assistance program to provide responsive funding and other resources while also maintaining a strong strategic direction. She brings over 20 years experience driving performance improvement and business sustainability programs with women’s health providers in positions at Columbia University OB/GYN, Guttmacher Institute, and Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
Janet Crepps
Director, Regulatory Assistance for Abortion Providers
Janet Crepps co-developed and leads RAD’s in-house team of attorneys to provide pro-bono legal compliance assistance and other resources to Independent and Planned Parenthood abortion providers and their allies. A celebrated champion of independent abortion providers, Janet has spent her career fighting abortion restrictions and their impact, including over two decades litigating and providing compliance assistance at the Center for Reproductive Rights.
Christine Rodriguez
Director of Funding and Technical Assistance
Christine Rodriguez leads RAD’s funding and technical assistance program to provide response funding and technical support to independent abortion providers. Christine has 15+ years of experience in the nonprofit and public sector, working primarily on harm reduction-oriented drug user health policy and programming. Most recently prior to RAD, she oversaw a grantmaking and technical assistance portfolio at AIDS United. Christine earned her M.P.H. from University of California, Berkeley and her B.A. from Pomona College.
FAQs
A funding intermediary helps connect donors to the groups and causes they want to fund. A funding intermediary can offer grantmaking infrastructure, field expertise, and knowledge of grantees to support more effective (and, often, additional) investment in its sector.
RAD acts as a grantmaker for charitable donors that want to support the independent abortion delivery sector, which is made up of an array of taxable and tax-exempt entities. RAD also leverages our sector knowledge and grantmaking capacity to bring new and additional charitable funds into the field; connects funders and grantees that might not otherwise work together; and provides expertise and guidance to both funders and grantees.
RAD is supported by more than two dozen private charitable foundations. Some of these foundations give anonymously; those that give publicly include: the Coalition for Gender and Reproductive Equity, the Lisa and Douglas Goldman Fund, Schusterman Family Philanthropies, and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
RAD offers multiple funding streams. Our regular, ongoing funding stream is the Access, Quality, and Sustainability (AQS) fund, and independent abortion providers can apply for AQS funds at any time. The specific processes and timelines for our different funds vary, but generally include the following steps:
- The applicant completes a short pre-application form with basic information about the facility or project and the activity to be funded
- The applicant has a call with RAD staff to talk about the application and next steps
- The applicant submits an application with more information about the facility/project, the
planned activities, and their goals- If the applicant is a taxable entity, the applicant also provides information about its
finances and the community it serves; RAD uses this information to assess the
charitability of a potential funding award
- If the applicant is a taxable entity, the applicant also provides information about its
- RAD staff review the application materials and provide a summary and recommendations to
the RAD Advisory Board - The RAD Advisory Board reviews the application and makes a funding recommendation to the
Board of Hopewell Fund, RAD’s fiscal sponsor. The Board of Hopewell Fund makes a final award
decision - RAD notifies the applicant of the award decision
- If an award is granted, RAD provides the grantee with a grant agreement
- Once the awardee has accepted the award and signed the grant agreement, RAD deploys the
awarded funding to the grantee
The independent sector performs more than half of the country’s abortions, and the great majority of abortions after the first trimester. Yet as the sector has faced a web of challenges, it has historically been under-supported, in part because it is made up of an array of unaffiliated facilities operated by both tax-exempt and taxable entities. Charitable support helps independent abortion providers - especially those serving largely low-income populations - make facility improvements, expand capacity to meet anticipated patient surges, increase security to respond to increased protestor activity, and make other such investments that could not be made solely with service revenue.