ACORN

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) is a multi-issue, directmembership organization of low- and moderateincome families fighting for social and economic justice. Founded in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1970 by Wade Rathke, ACORN now counts more than 200,000 members organized into neighborhood chapters in more than 100 cities in 37 states, Canada, Mexico, and Perú. ACORN members conduct local, multistate and national campaigns; elect representatives to city, state, and national boards; and provide the bulk of the organization's budget through membership dues and grassroots fund-raising. ACORN chapters organize on a range of issues, including environmental justice, neighborhood safety, housing, health care, schools, predatory lending, and community reinvestment. In addition to the direct-membership 501(c)(3) organization, ACORN includes a 501(c)(4) that conducts extensive electoral organizing through get-out-the-vote drives, endorsing candidates, and developing campaigns on voting rights and voter participation issues and the ACORN Housing Corporation, which provides free tax preparation, homeownership counseling, and low-cost mortgages to members.

ACORN traces its roots to the work of Fred Ross, an organizer trained by Saul Alinsky. Ross departed from Alinsky's practice of relying on the existing leadership of churches and other institutions and instead organized individual community members house by house into direct-membership chapters. George Wiley used this model in organizing welfare recipients into the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO). By the mid-1960s, the NWRO had a strong presence in more than 50 cities, but Wiley believed that welfare recipients would never command real power until they could build alliances with other low-income and working constituencies. Wiley sent one of his young organizers, Wade Rathke, to Little Rock in 1970 to attempt to build such an organization.

In Little Rock, Rathke found quick success organizing to demand welfare recipients' access to clothing and furniture in six neighborhoods, and the nascent neighborhood organizations began developing campaigns on public housing conditions, free school lunches, and other issues of concern to working-class families. In 1972, these neighborhood organizations came together in the successful “Save the City” campaign on a range of quality-of-life issues, including traffic problems facing blue-collar homeowners, racist real estate practices, and insufficient parks in African American neighborhoods. The newly formed Arkansas Community Organizations for Reform Now established offices around the state and organized farmers to stop the construction of a sulfur-emitting plant by the state utility. By 1975, ACORN had chapters in 3 states and an elected executive board to direct policy; by 1980, the organization had grown to 30,000 families in 20 states.

ACORN's structure consists of neighborhood chapters whose members elect representatives to city, state, and national boards. Members are primarily recruited through door knocking by organizers and leaders, although recruitment also occurs through house meetings and through services including loan counseling, tax preparation, and lead paint screening. Members pay annual dues, attend meetings, plan and carry out local campaigns, and work on state, regional, and national campaigns. Local resident-led member boards, and larger state and national boards elected by local chapters, set policy for the organization and direct larger-scale campaigns. The weeklong Leadership School, conducted three times a year, trains emerging leaders in organizing skills. ACORN maintains a legislative office in Washington, D.C., and the annual Legislative and Political Conference brings together 150 leaders from across the country for training on the organization's political work.

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