The Kentucky State programming of SisterSong advances reproductive justice by building power with Black women, people of color, and the communities most impacted by reproductive oppression and inequities. Through coalition-building, policy advocacy, and community organizing, the Kentucky state programming creates spaces where community voices are centered, solutions are driven by lived experience, and collective action challenges harmful systems. This work is essential to protecting bodily autonomy and ensuring that all people in Kentucky can thrive with dignity, health, and freedom.
What We Do
We work throughout the state to ensure that Kentuckians, especially Black, Indigenous, queer, and trans birthing people, have access to the knowledge, care, and community power needed to thrive across the reproductive life cycle. By blending education, advocacy, and healing practices, we aim to dismantle barriers and build a future where maternal health, safety, and dignity are realities for all.
Our Programming
Birth Justice Care Fund Kentucky: This program provides direct support, including doula care, mental health services, and baby essentials to Black and marginalized birthing people in Kentucky.
Liberated Birthing: Kentucky's Maternal Justice Initiative: Founded and launched by our Kentucky Coordinator in 2025, this program seeks to address the full spectrum of care that Black, Indigenous, and other marginalized birthing people and their families in Kentucky deserve. Core program elements include:
Pelvic Floor Therapy Education
Lactation Support
Postpartum Care & Healing
Recognition of Black Maternal Health Week
Flow and Freedom: Movement for Reproductive Justice: This embodied practice honors the full humanity of Black, Indigenous, and marginalized people. We integrate movement arts, including yoga, meditation, and dance, as tools of liberation, healing, and community power-building. These offering creates a space where participants can release trauma stored in the body, reconnect with ancestral practices, restore rest and balance, and build collective power.
Community Dialogues & Advocacy Conversations: We host honest, healing-centered discussions that build trust and challenge harmful systems. Our community dialogues and advocacy work seek to create a space to explore trust, leadership, and decision-making in policy and family life through conversations exploring how we protect our communities and mobilize for change.
Coalition Building & Power Strategy: We strengthen partnerships across Kentucky and the Midwest to align reproductive justice with broader social justice work. We host events and initiatives that link reproductive justice to issues like policing, economic justice, and community safety. Additionally, we support statewide campaigns, like those advocating for the Consent Decree and maternal health equity.
Reproductive Justice on Campus: Across the state, we bring reproductive justice and civic-power conversations to local campuses for college students, staff, and faculty.
Our work bridges the physical, mental, and political, recognizing that body sovereignty and community care are inseparable from the fight for reproductive freedom. Through partnerships with local wellness and healing practitioners, mental health providers, and institutions, we ensure that these practices are accessible, inclusive, and rooted in the needs of the community.
Why It Matters
Kentucky faces significant challenges in maternal health, with the state ranking among the highest in maternal and infant mortality rates in the nation. These disparities are exacerbated for Black and Indigenous communities due to systemic racism, limited access to healthcare, and economic inequalities. We are working to address the systemic issues of reproductive injustice, particularly the disproportionate impact on Black and Indigenous women, queer, and trans people in Kentucky.
Our work centers on the Reproductive Justice framework, extending beyond the pro-choice movement by integrating social justice, racial equity, and economic justice into reproductive rights. Through these initiatives, SisterSong is actively working to create a more just and equitable reproductive landscape in Kentucky, ensuring that all individuals have the right to make informed decisions about their bodies and choices.
Past Work/Legacy
Through dynamic programming like Informed Decisions: Do You Trust Black Women?, SisterSong has emphasized the critical importance of trusting Black women’s voices in shaping policy, family, and community decisions. Partnerships for events with elected officials spotlight strategies for organizing during political turmoil, while other key initiatives, such as The RJ Way workshop and Mothering Through the Political Climate, explore the intersection of reproductive justice and culturally sensitive birthing care, offering space for resilience, learning, and healing. SisterSong’s partnerships have also been vital, including Defend Our Futures, which examined policing and reproductive autonomy, and their support of The Black Recharge: Hair Show, focusing on Black hair culture, environmental justice, and The Crown Act. With community-rooted gatherings like herbalism workshops and ongoing abortion rallies, SisterSong continues to ground its work in ancestral knowledge, resistance, and collective care.
A historic milestone in this legacy was the SisterSong Day Proclamation on October 28, 2023, during the grand opening of the SisterSong Kentucky office. This marked the first official city proclamation recognizing SisterSong’s national and local impact, signaling a turning point for reproductive justice in Kentucky. The proclamation acknowledged the organization’s critical role in building infrastructure for maternal health and reproductive access, especially for Black, Indigenous, queer, and trans communities. SisterSong’s Kentucky-based initiatives, such as the Mothering in Abundance program, annual Maternal Health Luncheons with ACLU Kentucky, and strategic Kentucky Derby Activations, have become pillars in both political advocacy and cultural celebration. Events like the Trust Black Women Mother's Day Brunches further foster healing, leadership, and solidarity among Black women.
Community Voices & Testimonials:
“Dr. Williams brings a unique blend of clinical knowledge and grassroots advocacy that has transformed reproductive justice work in Kentucky. Her commitment to centering Black women’s voices is unparalleled.”
“Through her organizing and programs, Dr. Williams has created safe spaces for healing and empowerment that are vital to our community’s wellbeing.”
“Her leadership during political and public health crises has helped many birthing people navigate systemic barriers with dignity and support”