Music Biz: Singer Erykah Badu Will Donate Concert Proceeds to Help Process Detroit’s Abandoned Rape Kits
Erykah Badu is upping her efforts to ensure all of Detroit’s sexual assault victims are given justice. You may recall last month, when the singer-songwriter announced she would donate a portion of her Detroit concert profits to the African American 490 Challenge, a nonprofit that raises funds to help process the city’s backlogged rape kits. The organization has a goal of $600,000, which they raise in increments of $490 (the cost to test a single kit).
During the Motor City concert Friday, Badu renewed her commitment to the cause by pledging a portion of all future concert proceeds to the organization and its efforts.
“I pledge to raise the same amount of money with each show that I do until we raise this money,” Badu said after the concert, according to the Detroit Free Press. “I’m with it. I think it’s one of the most important things I could do […] I hope that this venture gives peace to some of us who are victims and some of us who are not.”
According to the Free Press, AA490 organizers are trying to raise enough money to test the 11,341 discarded rape kits found in a police storage unit in 2009.
“What we’re talking about is unsolved, unopened rape kits, unsolved in Detroit alone, that went unsolved and dusty,” she said. “I’m very proud to be a part of that [effort to solve the cases]. We are all victims. When one of us is a victim, we are all victims. We are champions for many young women and boys who don’t have a voice.”
To learn more about AA490 and its mission, go to the organization’s official website.
