The Smith-Barbieri Progressive Fund is a 501(c)3 charitable foundation that believes in the Inland Northwest’s people.

We are home to large and small, national, generational and start-up companies. Our hub, Spokane, Washington, is the service center to over one million people in Eastern Washington and the Idaho Panhandle. Health care, higher education and service industries are strong and growing and the Inland Northwest boasts some of the most beautiful waterways and mountains in the world.

Our region also possesses daunting challenges. It is home to areas of dense poverty and dangerously lacks affordable housing. Basic resources are limited for many of our struggling neighbors who are falling further behind, all of which is exacerbated by racial and class disparities. Compared to Washington State, Idaho and the U.S., the Inland Northwest falls behind in most measurable income and outcome categories. There is a dedicated network of non-profits overburdened by the elimination and/or reduction of services and public and private funding. Public and private funders and institutional social service providers are largely risk adverse stifling innovation.

In recent years, the Progressive Fund has seen growth in nimble and innovative social service providers willing to challenge the status quo. With strong community partnerships, creativity and tenacity, we work to …

Build human potential and access to opportunities. Through our grants and activism, the Progressive Fund helps ensure vulnerable residents have access to tools and resources to thrive. We work to eradicate the systemic causes that lead to poverty including racism and inequities in student treatments, incarceration, health and health care, unaffordable housing, domestic violence, addiction, under and unemployment, racial and gender inequities, wage and benefit disparities and unplanned pregnancies.

More and more people are being left
behind by the burdens of inequity.

Foster nonprofit creativity and ingenuity. Through a unique program of incubation and fiscal sponsorships for startup non-profits, the Progressive Fund backs distinctive ideas by serving as a host foundation. By mentoring and fiscally supporting these innovators, they can focus on their missions versus internal systems. We prioritize all funding for small and start-up efforts who utilize community-based models.

Many funders and institutional social
service providers are largely risk
adverse stifling innovation.

Build power. Through our fiscal sponsorships, grants, advocacy and activism, the Progressive Fund works to help tear down barriers of people and groups often locked out of the system so they can achieve the power necessary to thrive. We challenge plutocracy and patriarchy and measure our philanthropic success not by judging whether our giving is big enough or smart enough, but by whether it’s shifting power instead of accumulating it.