Our Work

MMP facilitates communication and grassroots media production among local organizations fighting for the interests of poor and working poor people, MMP has five interconnected areas of work:

Media and Communications Organizing

MMP works with groups to implement new tactics for the creative use of media in organizing campaigns. This ranges from creating public service announcements for distribution in impacted communities, to collaborating on a story or press release, to staging a 'media intervention' at a public event or using Facebook to organize college students. Last year, MMP and the Pennsylvania Head Start Association completed the video project Hope In Hard Times, which highlights the strengths of Head Start's work, the struggle parents face to make ends meet, and the importance of parent leadership in the Head Start. The video was sent to members of the US Congress, and Head Start leaders cited the video as a central reason the program was recertified by the federal government.

Media Infrastructure

MMP is developing a grassroots media infrastructure to aid in the production and distribution of our stories. To this end, MMP is one of the founding groups of a community radio station, 88.1 FM (WPEB), which will become a channel for disenfranchised communities. We are also building an interactive website which will include blogging and a newswire. To bridge the digital divide, MMP is teaming with Wireless Philadelphia as a Wireless Internet Partner. In 2008 we commit to getting between 50-100 low income people both Internet access and a computer in 2008 Correspondingly, MMP is training people to make media. We have developed curriculums in audio production, video production, basic web and computer skills, investigative journalism and photography. For example, we a partnering with Juntos, a Mexican community organization, and training immigrants and low income communities in video production and basic web skills We graduated a class of 20 Spanish-speaking participants and have begun a second class with 20 English-speaking participants.

Network Building

The vision for MMP’s work is shaped by a Community Board made up of the groups we work with, including leaders from Pennsylvania Head Start Association, Juntos, Philadelphia Student Union, Casino-Free Philadelphia, Taxi Workers Alliance of PA, Community Leadership Institute, Unite-Here Hotel Workers Rising Campaign, African American Business and Residents Association, and Haddington Residents Association. The MMP Community Board has developed into a network not only to strengthen our individual fights within the city but also to shift away from fragmented battles to build one movement for the city. MMP promotes the coherence of this network through collaborative media projects, strategy sessions, dinners, cookouts, trainings, forums, hearings and actions.

Politic and Strategic Communications Education

We are working to develop a shared leadership and political education program that gives MMP and our network the tools to understand the power structures we face and devise the best strategies and tactics to challenge injustice.

Media Policy Reform

MMP is organizing and educating around media policy issues that converge with the needs of our communities. This includes digital inclusion, municipal broadband deployment, net neutrality and media ownership. While there are many groups advocating around media policy, because our focus is working with low-income communities, we bring new constituencies into media reform battles and connect media policy, which at times feels detached, more directly to everyday struggles.