Our Story

Throughout the years, the Latino Coalition for Community Leadership has been on a tremendous journey of growth and change in helping communities flourish. 

In April 2003, a national grant writing seminar was held in Los Angeles, sponsored by SAMHSA and the California Hispanic Commission for Alcohol and Drug Abuse. An informal poll among the 125 community-based organizations in attendance found that most were not accessing federal and state funding. It was then that Richard Ramos, our Founder and Executive Director realized the overwhelming need for an organization that could provide technical assistance to help communities gain access to federal and state funding and include the voice of these organizations at the table as legitimate social service providers deserving an equal chance to compete for public funds. With this mandate, the Latino Coalition for Community Leadership (LCCL) was born.

Over the last 18 years, the LCCL has accessed more than $39.9m in Federal grants from the Departments of Labor, Justice, and Health and Human Services and almost $32m in State funding from Colorado and California. In addition, funding from foundations, corporate and private donors has enabled the LCCL to provide comprehensive grantmaking, capacity building and technical assistance to community and faith-based organizations while driving money deep into the communities we serve. To date, the LCCL has partnered with more than 171 CFBOs in marginalized communities throughout the United States to leverage more than $75 million dollars driven deep into low-income communities and communities of color.

The LCCL is intentional in framing our sub-grantees and other CFBOs we work with as Community Partners, to reflect the interdependence and mutual respect of the roles that we each play. An overall goal of this partnership is capacity building, which includes increasing access to public dollars and grants, data tracking, performance measurement, reporting and compliance monitoring, assistance with staff and leadership development, coordinating relationships between state and federal agencies and Community Partners, growth management, and succession planning for sustainability. But our Community Partners are the real heroes of this work, providing services to thousands of individuals and families each year, and creating sustainable programs within their communities that will provide resources and impact well after the partnership with the LCCL concludes.