Grants Make Our Work Possible

Human Trafficking Intervention Court For the first time in New York City Council history, it has allocated funding for social service organizations to conduct work in the Human Trafficking Intervention Courts (HTIC). NYAWC was awarded $175,000 and it is proud to be the only pan-Asian serving organization to receive this grant. “This funding was significant in allowing NYAWC to redesign the Asian Women’s Empowerment (AWE) program to provide not just a more consistent means of support for clients, but really help us to work to create meaningful and useful programming that is shaped by the survivors,” said Mary Caparas, Project Free manager. Although most participants still have to complete 5 mandated sessions, they can now select from three different in-house developed workshops based on their interests and needs. More importantly, NYAWC was able to hire two full time counselors-one Chinese-speaking, the other Korean-to lead the AWE Program. Prior to the funding, the program relied heavily on social work interns and staff with limited capacities.

NYAWC would like to thank Councilmembers Laurie Cumbo and Rory Lancman for advocating for the organization, and the Midtown Community Court and Queens Criminal Court for providing the space to offer services.

NYC Council DoVE Initiative NYAWC is proud to receive nearly $100,000 in funding from the NY City Council's Domestic Violence and Empowerment (DoVE) Initiative to continue its work with domestic violence survivors and their children. We extend our gratitude to Councilmember Margaret Chin, a longtime supporter, for her generous award of $45,000. We also thank Queens Councilmembers Peter Koo and Daniel Dromm for their awards of $35,000 and $13,360, respectively. This funding will continue to support NYAWC's overall expansion in Lower Manhattan and Queens, where it unveiled bigger community offices in Chinatown and Elmhurst early last year to better accommodate and serve the growing needs for services in those communities.

MUFG NYAWC and MUFG, a repeat gala sponsor and corporate supporter, partnered to plan and implement a financial empowerment workshop for survivors of violence. Abusers typically have control over the women's assets, financial decisions, and employment opportunities, so achieving financial security can be particularly challenging as a result of these abusive or exploitative relationship dynamics. This workshop showed the women how to improve their financial circumstances by providing tools, information, and emotional support from MUFG staff, who volunteered to work with clients to set financial goals, assess their income and expenses, and create an action plan to reach their goals. Prior to the event, MUFG staff held a handbag drive and the bags were given out to participants during the event. As a result of the workshop, a majority of the women felt that their ability to create a monthly budget and to set financial goals improved. NYAWC thanks MUFG for its generous grant of $10,000 for general operations and its continued partnership and support for Japanese survivors of violence.

CLSSP NYAWC is proud to have received a $288,200 from the Grant to Enhance Culturally Specific Services for Victims of Sexual Assault, Domestic Violence, Dating Violence, and Stalking Program (CLSSP). This funding from the US Department of Justice's Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) will allow NYAWC and especially the One Again program continue to deepen its trauma-informed and culturally sensitive engagement with diverse Asian survivors of sexual violence. "We can deepen and broaden our holistic wellness healing programs that allow survivors to experience the transformational effects of mind-body-breath work through Acupuncture, Qi Gong, Yoga, movement and expressive arts," says Aditi Bhattacharya, manager of the One Again program. "Further, we are now able to build out critical Collaborative Community Response (CCR) work between diverse agencies and businesses that serve the Asian communities throughout New York City. CCR is something we know we need to do so that we, as diverse service providers, can coordinate our work with one another without expecting community members to have to knock at several doors to feel supported in the many, many areas that they need support to heal from violence."