SoHarlem And Other Nonprofits Receive Grant From The New York Community Trust Awards

The city’s community foundation has announced $7.9 million in grants to 58 nonprofits to tackle issues facing communities as they adapt to a post-pandemic life.

As the city emerges from the pandemic, Trust grants are targeting a wide range of challenges, from helping environmental groups advocate for a greener future, to creating equity in the public education system.

These grants are made possible by generations of New Yorkers who have included The New York Community Trust in their wills as well as recent contributors to its work to assist the city as it recovers from the pandemic. One-page descriptions of each grant are available.

Asian Americans

Asian American Federation: $250,000 for its “Hope Against Hate Campaign” that will create a website to report anti-Asian violence and harassment, and will work with community groups to train people in self-defense and tactics to de-escalate potentially violent incidents.

Womankind: $60,000 to aid older Asian women who are survivors of abuse and are hesitant to access services. It will provide assistance in obtaining housing, food, and medical care, virtual wellness activities, and conduct outreach in neighborhoods with large Asian communities.

LGBTQ New Yorkers

Callen-Lorde Community Health Center: $150,000 to work with a group of agencies to develop a comprehensive, shared employee assistance program that takes into account the specific needs of lesbian, gay, and transgender workers.

Hetrick-Martin Institute: $150,000 for a new advocacy program for LGBTQ young people. Participants will research policy issues impacting young people in the city, discuss them with public officials, and create awareness campaigns based on the research.

New Pride Agenda: $100,000 to promote the use of pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) medication among transgender women of color, who are at a high risk of contracting HIV/AIDS. This will be done through virtual and in-person town halls and workshops, recruitment of public health ambassadors, and a referral system for individuals to have PrEP prescribed.

Young People and their Families

Avenues for Justice: $140,000 to help young people involved in the criminal justice system become advocates by preparing them to testify at public forums and training them in digital literacy and social media production.

HeartShare St. Vincent’s: $100,000 to support foster youth older than 21 as they age out of the system by helping them with their academic and career development, housing, and finances.

Gathering for Justice: $140,000 to begin the Youth Justice Roundtable, a leadership program for 15- to 25-year-olds to prepare them to protest police violence. It will introduce them to the principles of nonviolent protest, organizing, advocacy, and campaign strategizing.

IntegrateNYC: $140,000 to expand and improve a youth leadership program that aims to make public schools more racially equitable. It will survey participants to improve the program, train them to organize and speak at public events, and support them as they advocate for reforms to the school admissions system.

Knowledge House: $165,000 to expand its two accredited online courses that train low-income young adults for tech jobs. It will begin offering in-person training for vaccinated students and expand the number of people enrolled in the courses.

Legal Outreach: $150,000 for a civic engagement and social justice initiative for young people. Participants will push for free weekend MetroCards for high school students, examine police brutality, and meet with school and government officials.

Manhattan Legal Services: $160,000 to create awareness about a state law that raises the evidentiary threshold for tracking child maltreatment. It will lead workshops to help parents seal cases, push the state to send notices to parents in their native languages, make sure child welfare workers are following new rules, and promote media awareness.

Girls and Young Women

Kingsbridge Heights Community Center: $80,000 to teach immigrant women how to start their own businesses, and provide them with microgrants and workshops with free child care .

Safe Horizon: $125,000 to help women who are survivors of domestic violence living in shelters get mental health services. It will train social workers to address domestic violence survivors’ specific needs, use a new diagnostic tool to assess their mental health, provide counseling, and help them care for their childrens’ mental health.

Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls: $100,000 to address the gender gap in science, technology, engineering, and math careers by bringing together music production and instruction in coding, physics, and math. The afterschool program will recruit young girls from low-income communities to make electronic instruments, record music digitally, and learn about Afrofuturism.

Older Adults

Lenox Hill Neighborhood House: $150,000 to assess the technology needs of its older clients, provide training and one-on-one assistance, and offer weekly classes.

New York Academy of Medicine: $50,000 for its Age-Friendly New York City program, which taps the experience and knowledge of older adults to improve their communities. The program will hold monthly meetings to identify challenges in under-resourced communities and recruit participants in Queens, the Bronx, and Staten Island.

University Settlement Society of New York: $100,000 for home-based support and social engagement opportunities for homebound older Chinese and Latinx adults. This will include mental health support, technology training for interactive social activities, preparing volunteers to support the adults, and reducing barriers to accessing technology and engagement.

Arts and Culture

Chicken & Egg Pictures: $200,000 for awards and professional mentorship to female and gender nonconforming documentary filmmakers to complete and increase the social impact of their works.

CO/LAB Theater Group: $76,000 to expand a theater program for people with developmental disabilities by creating a more affordable pricing model that will open its offerings to more agencies, such as schools and day habilitation centers.

Gibney Dance: $275,000 to provide access to affordable studio workspace, prioritizing artists with disabilities.

IndieSpace: $120,000 to help two theater companies, IndieSpace and Indie Theater Fund, merge and relaunch as a single entity, to serve independent theater companies, venues, and artists.

Judson Memorial Church: $120,000 to develop and market a website that will catalogue affordable spaces in houses of worship that artists can use to create and perform work.

New Yorkers for Culture and Arts: $90,000 to increase the organization’s ability to advocate for the arts and cultural sector by hiring a data specialist to synthesize arts-related statistics and creating a paid residency program for artists and cultural workers to receive advocacy training.

SoHarlem: $100,000 to assist with its leadership transition and strengthen its ability to prepare creative professionals in Upper Manhattan for jobs in the fashion and garment industries.

Arts Education

New York City Arts in Education Roundtable: $110,000 to help art teachers in public schools adapt their methods and curricula to meet student needs in a post-pandemic education system. Teachers also will be trained to support students coping with trauma.

NYC Coalition for Educational Justice: $160,000 to advocate for curricula in city public schools that reflect the diversity of the student body. The effort will involve town hall meetings to educate parents and teachers, meetings with public officials, and media campaigns.

Opening Act: $70,000 to provide arts education to over-age, under-credited high school students enrolled in alternative schools. The nonprofit will expand an afterschool theater program to 240 students, tailor the curriculum to their needs, and support teachers in the program.

Studio in a School: $75,000 to use visual arts to improve literacy and language acquisition among English language learners. It will bring the program to 10 schools with large numbers of English language learners, supporting at least 1000 students, and provide teachers with ongoing professional support.

Conservation & Environment

Coalition for Green Capital: $100,000 to help financial institutions investing in clean energy and sustainable development access new federal funding and potential infrastructure investment, and bring more resources to environmentally burdened communities.

Environmental Advocates of New York: $100,000 to foster participation of under-represented groups in plans for implementation of the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which is aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions in New York. The effort also will work with groups from sustainable agriculture, local government, and solid waste management to create regulatory recommendations that can be adopted as part of the Act’s final plan.

Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative: $300,000 to create a global database of planned fossil fuel projects and organize meetings to inform governments, nonprofits, private sector experts, and the general public.

Green Our City Now Coalition: $150,000 to bring together stakeholders to advocate for the environment to newly elected officials, along with promoting increased voter engagement and turnout in neighborhoods with environmental problems such as air pollution, exposure to lead, and proximity to toxic waste.

Health, Environment, Agriculture, and Labor (HEAL) Food Alliance: $125,000 to reform the national food system by pushing large food-service companies to be more environmentally responsible. It also will advocate for the adoption of new food standards that encourage regenerative agriculture (which reverses climate change by rebuilding soil organic matter and restoring degraded soil biodiversity), and push for federal and state legislation that includes reforms.

International POPs Elimination Network (IPEN): $100,000 to forward policies that eliminate lead paint throughout the world. It will support developing countries with research and analysis of lead content in paint, raise awareness, and provide research data. It also will monitor the paint industry and help manufacturers certify products as lead-safe.

Municipal Art Society of New York: $150,000 to improve the city’s environmental review processes for proposed land use by including digital mapping, testing of online databases, producing training curriculum, and increasing media awareness.

New York University – Stern Center for Sustainable Business: $100,000 to help the city achieve its sustainable development goals by attracting private investment. It will create partnerships and provide support for individual projects, presenting others to potential investors.

NYC Green Relief and Recovery Fund: $151,000 to support nonprofits and community groups maintaining public spaces in the city. The organizations will receive training and operational support, and public officials will be informed of the importance of dedicating more resources to green spaces.

Scenic Hudson: $300,000 to prepare for the 2023 federal Farm Bill reauthorization by advocating for public policies that promote regenerative land practices in the Northeast and nationally. The group will create a website, support demonstration projects, conduct outreach, and compile a legislative agenda for upcoming negotiations.

Sixth Street Community Center: $140,000 for the teen-led Campaign for Climate Justice that will train 50 young people to become climate organizers and sustainability youth advocates. The participants will protect community gardens on the Lower East Side, testify at hearings, and help manage an emergency food distribution program.

Toxic-Free Future: $165,000 to advocate for changes in state and federal policies to reduce harmful chemicals in products and packaging. It will also work to persuade manufactures to reduce harmful chemicals and use safer alternatives.

U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund: $100,000 to promote the electrification of school buses across the country. Anticipating federal support, it will engage with government and private-sector decision-makers, provide guidance to local school districts so they can finance and build infrastructure for electric buses, and train advocates to use air monitoring equipment.

Community Development

Brooklyn Movement Center: $200,000 for the Central Brooklyn Food Democracy Project, which will work with neighborhood cooperatives to increase healthy and affordable food options for residents.

JustFix: $100,000 for the improvement of its technology to help tenants in low-income neighborhoods document poor housing conditions. Input from tenant organizers and leaders will improve services and inform the creation of tools to help low-income tenants address housing issues.

Neighborhood Housing Services of Staten Island: $125,000 to resume a program that inspects living conditions for low-income, single-family homeowners in Staten Island. The group will conduct inspections, refer residents to health care providers when needed due to poor living conditions, and guide homeowners to affordable do-it-yourself options or pre-approved contractors.

Queens Community House: $80,000 to help residents of the Pomonok Houses, an isolated public housing development, recover from the pandemic. The effort will address housing, jobs, education, food, and health. The program also will connect residents to important social services.

Riders Alliance: $95,000 for an advocacy campaign that focuses on improving the city’s bus service. It will conduct digital outreach in outer boroughs where bus service is more essential, meet with public officials, and launch media campaigns.

Education

Advocates for Children of New York: $220,000 to help immigrant families and students gain access to quality education. It will push city agencies to find effective ways to communicate with parents with limited English proficiency, and improve the enrollment process for immigrant children with limited formal education.

Internationals Network for Public Schools: $150,000 to collect data about the progress of immigrant students during the pandemic and use this information to help educators re-engage students. It also will work with advocates for funding for afterschool programs to help students who have fallen behind.

Health

Executive Chamber Nonprofit Coordination Unit: $125,000 to create the state’s first public health corps, coordinating with the federal AmeriCorps program so high-need communities can receive direct support and young people can gain valuable experience working in the field of public health.

Helen Keller International: $100,000 to offer vision care to clients of settlement houses, including screening, free eyeglasses, and affordable ophthalmic care.

Legal Action Center: $150,000 to advocate for Medicare coverage reform so substance-use disorders are covered more consistently and thoroughly. The advocacy to policymakers will be informed by research on untreated opioid use among Medicare users and the ways Medicare can realign with federal reimbursement laws.

New York Stem Cell Foundation: $150,000 for the creation of the city’s first ethnically diverse stem cell biobank. It will collect skin and blood samples from underrepresented ethnicities across a range of diseases, which will help address inequities in medical research.

Rockefeller University: $180,000 to research ways to rapidly decrease blood clots without compromising the body’s healing during a heart attack, and to determine if antiplatelet compounds can safely be injected under the skin, similar to an EpiPen.

Human Justice

Bronx Defenders: $150,000 to advocate for the passage of two New York State bills that protect parents’ rights in child welfare investigations by keeping them informed about their rights and how they can exercise them.

Fund for New Citizens: $150,000 for a collaborative fund housed in The Trust that supports groups advocating for immigrant and refugee rights so it can address the impact of the pandemic on these communities and advocate for pro-immigrant federal policies.

The New York Community Trust connects past, present, and future generous New Yorkers with vital nonprofits working to make a healthy, equitable, and thriving community for all. It is a public grantmaking foundation dedicated to improving the lives of residents of New York City, Westchester, and Long Island. For more information, visit nycommunitytrust.org.