Rivera Consulting Inc. welcomes Darshan Khalsa as our Vice-President, who comes with decades of national movement-building experience and is deeply passionate about strengthening sustainability and resources for the folks who work in social justice movements, especially racial and gender justice.

Our firm is founded on the concept of “deep democracy”: an urban planning, political and social change tool kit that can support the paradigm shift necessary for a just transition. Critically, this guiding tenant—though applicable to electoral politics— also speaks more broadly to the planning and action steps needed at all levels of organizing, engagement, and activism to enact real shifts in the power structures that define America’s social contract.

At Rivera Consulting Inc. we work at the intersection of people, planning, and politics. We build cross-sector infrastructure that centralizes the leadership of women of color. Our mission is driven by founder Wilnelia Rivera’s philosophy that when we work in partnership to address inequity, whether with our organizations, candidates, or within our urban planning projects, the approach must break the traditional frameworks of change.

At Rivera Consulting, we know that to engage the largest Democratic voting block - American Rising Electorate (unmarried women, people of color, and millenials), we need to invest in movement building candidates on all levels of the ballot. Their election leads to more progressive representation in our Congress, our statehouses, and in our municipal government.

While the chipping and eroding of our democratic norms and values continue, we believe that we need Democratic and movement leaders in the halls of government and decision-making authority that are working to restore trust in each other and our democracy.

Without the collaboration and input of activists, business owners, and community leaders who have paved the way for candidates like Councilor Kim Janey or Alejandra St. Guillen, there is no victory.

Jon Hillman joins us as our new Senior Associate Consultant focused on urban planning and social science research projects with a passion to help advance the firm’s mission to boldly and fiercely reimagine the American social contract.

Founder Wilnelia Rivera gives the Commencement Keynote Speech to Tufts University’s Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning Class of 2019.

“How often do we create new structures and new policies but stick to the same behavior? Pretty darn often. Just look at the old filing case.” Read this recent blog by our Firm President, Wilnelia Rivera, as she shares highlights from one of our major clients in 2019, United for Reproductive & Gender Equity (URGE).

We’re launching a national podcast called Deep Democracy, where we will be elevating the women and people of color who are leaders within movement building politics and belong at the center of our democracy. All of these women are thought leaders and activists in putting the American Rising Electorate (millennials, people of color, and unmarried women) at the centerpiece of electoral change.

For the year ahead, the team at Rivera Consulting, Inc., is focused on supporting locally and regionally based reproductive justice organizations like Women with A Vision New Orleans, United for Reproductive Justice & Gender Equity, the National Latina Institute of Reproductive Health, and more.

The 2020 Presidential primary cycle is informally kicking off next February, and it’s important that we take stock of where and how we invested and what was the return on that investment.

Some political pundits credit the recent victory of Boston City Councilor Ayanna Pressley as an anomaly of the political climate or at worst, an uninformed choice made by a new crop of voters who were swayed purely by good speeches and rallies. Not only does this dismiss Pressley as a viable candidate and a seasoned campaigner but it dismisses voters’ ability to decide on what’s best for their community.

As former government, non-profit, and political campaign staff, we understand the opportunities and challenges that come with addressing inequities and complex social problems. At Rivera Consulting Inc., our deep democracy toolkit is contributing to a just transition to a more representative democracy and automated economy in more ways than one.

To transform communities requires moving beyond the conventional ladder of citizen participation and cross sector collaboration. Asset mapping, social change, and social change innovations are more effectively created with the people directly affected by poverty and other complex social social problems.

The application of asset mapping, in collaboration with indigenous leadership, can build the trust needed to produce new results. We have co-developed an innovative asset mapping curriculum that combines best practices from the Bronx Community Development Initiative’s Economic Democracy Learning Center, popular education, social science, and participatory action research that supports social change agency, self-determination, sustainable community engagement and cross sector collaboration.

Deep democracy is the inherent belief that those at the margins should be at center and that the inclusion of all voices allows for a more complete view of the system. This inclusion takes the radical redistribution of power and privilege. It takes resisting cultural hegemony, taking over the ballot box, and winning governance power.

From Santa Ana, Panama, to Manhattan, we look at a successful year for our clients across policy intervention, planning, and social change education.

Early on in my organizing journey, I made two observations about the culture of the movement: professional development pipelines are limited overall and for women of color it's almost non-existent. If we want to make progress and win on social justice, we must invest in our team members.

Too often as technocrats, organizers, and elected officials, we easily miss the strategic points of collaboration. My work with Next Shift's Collaborative focuses on identifying and leverage these points to enable transformative change.