Economic-, racial- and gender-justice organizer Amisha Patel died April 24 at home surrounded by loved ones after a nine-year battle with cancer. She was 50.
Patel was born May 30, 1975, in Chicago to Indian immigrant parents. She graduated from Stanford University in 1997 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in anthropology. During her college years, Patel co-founded Youth United for Community Action, an organization of young people of color who fought for environmental and social justice in East Palo Alto, California.
In the late 1990s, Patel supported young people by creating an award-winning documentary directed by the ACVPC Video Team titled Young Azns Rising! Breaking Down Violence Against Women, which was screened at film festivals across the United States. It won the Best Documentary category at aMedia’s annual Ammy Awards in 2000.
The project marked the beginning Patel’s lifelong work as an organizer, which included projects aimed at combating violence against women and transforming Chicago for working people.
Her professional accomplishments included six years as the Community Coordinator for SEIU Local 73 in Chicago, where she organized hospital employees and Head Start workers into a union as well as with other community organizers in their fight to stop school closures.
Patel left the SEIU to become executive director for Grassroots Collaborative, a community-labor coalition that builds power with working families to ensure fully funded public education, critical services and affordable housing. She held that post for 15 years.
In 2023, Patel served as a senior advisor for Mayor-Elect Brandon Johnson’s transition committee. She also worked on various other progressive candidates for public office as well as community and labor campaigns.
Patel was also a co-founder of the United Working Families independent political organization, whose goal is to elect more progressives from Chicago to local, state and national offices. Those candidates included included Johnson and Democratic House Rep. Delia Ramirez. Her final organizing work included working with a broad-based national coalition to fight authoritarianism.
She organized until her death. Patel fought for empowering young workers, increasing the minimum wage and ensuring that TIF money was used for community improvements and education. Patel also worked against the terror that ICE was inflicting in Chicago.
Her reach extended beyond Chicago; Patel trained thousands of Illinois residents on race, class and gender issues. In Peoria, for example, she helped Black parents build their power around education justice.
Patel credited her involvement in peer counseling, a process that centers an equitable give-and-take of deep listening and focuses on collective liberation, as key to her ability to stay focused and creative as an organizer.
In an essay for Truthout that Patel wrote this past March, she referenced her work in co-counseling and pointed out lessons she learned as a political organizer. She also wrote editorials for Crain’s Chicago Business, Bill Moyers, In These Times and Chicago Sun Times.
Patel met her wife Neena Hemmady in 2001 through the South and West Asian LBTQ women-focused organization Khuli Zaban. Their wedding took place at the Chicago Teachers Union Jackie Vaughn Hall in August 2019.
Patel is survived by Hemmady; mother Kusum Patel; children Ayush Hemmady-Wright and Varsha Hemmady-Wright; brothers Nitin Hemmady (Weiwen) and Amit Patel (Vaishali); niblings Vishal Patel, Meridith Embry, Sahil Patel and Anishi Patel; and countless chosen family members and friends. She was preceded in death by her father, Arvind Patel.
Hemmady said in a Facebook post, “Amisha was my world and she meant everything to me, as she was that to so many others. She challenged me to be more vulnerable and more open and has made my life so much deeper with love and connection that I never thought was possible. I owe her my life….I will be more in love with her as each day passes.”
Ramirez said in a Facebook post, “We lost a longtime Chicago leader, organizer, and my dear friend, Amisha. [She] was a giant of our movement and she will be deeply missed. Her three decades of work to unite diverse communities to build power laid the groundwork for winning affordable housing, quality education and more in Chicago and across the state of Illinois.”
Close friend and Activist Stacy Davis Gates said, “Amisha was a visionary and had great resilience on a personal level. Amisha’s ability to fight for her life made me trust her when it came to fighting for the lives of Black children in this city. There are a long list of charlatans who say that they’re fighting for marginalized populations [like] young people, workers and the LGBTQ+ community, but you could believe Amisha, because you could see her fight for herself. Anyone who would wage the battle that she waged against cancer is someone I could trust. She will be greatly missed by many people.”
Close friend and Activist Erica Bland said, “Amisha led with a love that forever changed the city of Chicago and the world through organizing. She had a fierce brilliance that challenged systems of oppression, ultimately changed some and helped lay the foundation for many fights to come. Her legacy is woven into the fabric of the Chicago fight of working people.”
Longtime and Activist Madeline Talbott said, “In 2007, Grassroots Collaborative hired Amisha to lead the organization. She made big changes, bringing an unwavering commitment to racial and economic justice and a strategy to include the grassroots members of the coalition’s organizations in popular education trainings, allowing them to build relationships across organizational lines. Amisha also brought her delight in using art and making events fun to the organization, creating a new dynamic in the organization that attracted more participants and made more of an impact.
Close friend Maya Schenwar said, “Amisha combined so many beautiful aspects of humanity into one powerhouse spirit, charged with bravery, creativity and light. She was generous—with resources, her time, her mental capacity, her energy and most of all, with her love. During the times I spent with her in the last month of her life, when she was suffering hard, she still asked constantly about me, and wasn’t interested in small talk. She wanted to know what was going on deep down—the hard stuff—and offered her empathy and insights. Amisha was fierce and steadfast in her commitment to connection, always urging us to see each other in our full humanity, knowing that through connection comes solidarity.”
Grassroots Collaborative leadership said, “Our hearts are broken. After months of striving to beat the disease, she turned her amazing courage toward facing the conclusion of her time with us. Our hearts are with her wife, Neena, her family and the many, many people whom she loved and who loved her back. She gave us many gifts to carry with us.”
Patel’s funeral will take place Saturday, May 2 at New Mount Pilgrim Missionary Baptist Church, 4301 W. Washington Blvd. Viewing will be from 12-2 p.m. and the program from 2-4 p.m.
Hemmady said in her Facebook post announcing Patel’s death that they decided to hold the funeral at this specific church because Patel and “her fellow organizers held so many groundbreaking events there that changed the course of our city.” All are welcome to attend.
