Maine Initiatives is excited to announce the Immigrant-Led Organizations (ILO) Fund’s 2026 Grantee Cohort, ten immigrant-led organizations whose work advances immigrant, refugee, and asylum seeker flourishing in Maine, unceded Wabanaki Territory.

The missions of the 2026 ILO Fund Grantee Cohort exemplify the robust and highly-skilled immigrant-led ecosystem operating statewide, leading vital efforts across a range of fields, including education, gender justice, food access and sovereignty, community building, cultural preservation, health services, healing and movement practices, media production, and youth empowerment.

• Congolese Community of Maine
  The mission of CoCoMaine is to foster community and growth in the Congolese immigrant community in Maine, through providing mutual support and cohesion, facilitating integration, promoting education, and encouraging entrepreneurship.
  
• Hope Acts
  Hope Acts offers asylum seekers access to housing and basic needs, assistance in navigating complex immigration processes, and resources for learning English to help them successfully transition to a new life in Maine.
  
• Ifka Community Services
  To advance equity and empower immigrant and low-income children, youth, and caregivers through culturally grounded education, advocacy, and systems navigation that strengthen stability and build community leadership.
  
• Indigo Arts Alliance
  Our Mission is to build global connections by bringing together Black and Brown artists from diverse backgrounds to engage in their creative process, while building lasting relationships rooted in co-mentorship. An integral aspect of the Indigo vision is providing Maine-based artists of African descent access to a broader range of practicing artists of color worldwide.
  
• Maine Access Immigrant Network
  MAIN helps to improve access to health and social services through culturally and linguistically relevant case management and care navigation, health education, advocacy, and community-led research, as well as in-house dental care and vaccine clinics.
  
• Maine Immigrants’ Rights Coalition 
  Our mission is to improve legal, social, and economic conditions for immigrants in the state of Maine through information sharing, advocacy, and collaboration.
  
• New Mainers Public Health Initiative
  Our mission is to work collaboratively within the community to educate New Mainers about preventative health measures by promoting healthy habits, protecting against disease, and linking community members with available and appropriate resources.
  
• ProsperityME
  ProsperityME empowers, through education and counseling, members of refugee and immigrant communities to invest in themselves to build financial stability, careers, businesses and wealth.
  
• Sustainable Livelihoods Relief Organization
  Sustainable Livelihood Relief Organization (SLRO) was founded in 2015 to address persistent gaps in access, opportunity, and support for immigrant and refugee families in Lewiston and Auburn, Maine.
  
• Young Muslim Sisters of Greater Portland
  Young Muslim Sisters of Greater Portland empowers Muslim girls and young women in Southern Maine through faith-centered awareness, community engagement, and leadership development. We create spaces that nurture belonging and social responsibility, equipping our members to actively contribute to and shape the communities we call home through a faith-conscious approach.

These organizations were selected by the 2026 ILO Fund Grantmaking Advisory Committee, a 30-person decision-making body with aligned lived experience, wisdom, and expertise in the immigrant-led sector. Hundreds of volunteer Readers also supported the participatory process, reading and evaluating organizations’ applications to the 2026 ILO Fund. 

This is the third cohort of organizations supported through the Immigrant-Led Organizations Fund’s participatory grantmaking program, joining 20 other grantees who receive multi-year, unrestricted $45,000 grants and access to peer learning, training, capacity-building, and community outreach activities over the course of their 3-year grant period. 

Join us in celebrating and supporting these organizations’ transformational work, building self-determination, cultural preservation, capacity-building, and organizing power for immigrant, refugee, and asylum seeker communities in Maine.

---

The Immigrant-Led Organizations(ILO) Fund at Maine Initiatives is a participatory grantmaking program that funds, strengthens, and convenes immigrant, refugee, and migrant nonprofit organizations in Maine, unceded Wabanaki Territory. The Program seeks to organize people and resources in support of efforts across the state that intervene on persistent issues experienced by immigrants of color: xenophobia, racialized discrimination, and insufficient support from municipal and state governments. For a three-year period, beginning in 2024, the ILO Fund has committed to providing $1.35 million in multi-year, unrestricted, general operating support to immigrant-led organizations. 

Photo: ProsperityME