The Santa Clara County District Attorney’s Office reported it has awarded $50,000 in “Bend the Arc” grants to 14 community groups this year. The grant is named after Martin Luther King Jr.’s quote: “The moral arc of the universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”
Launched in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, alongside a series of reforms, the increasingly competitive grant program received a record 70 applications this year. Since 2021, the DA’s Office has given back more than $300,000 to the community.
The grants – which ranged from $2,500 to $5,000 – come from the DA’s Asset Forfeiture Fund, which is money seized from gangs, drug traffickers, and criminal organizations. To help repair some of the harm caused by those criminal enterprises, the DA’s Office invests the funds back into the communities that were preyed upon…