As with the API community at large, we and our grantees have been devastated by COVID-19.  Dire health consequences for frontline health workers, small businesses left out of COVID relief funding streams and COVID-related anti-Asian hate incidents are the pandemic’s disproportionate effects on the API communities we and our grantees serve.  

The current renewed movement for Black Lives and racial justice has caused us to examine and address anti-Black racism in our own communities and to deepen our commitment to true allyship with Black and Brown partners.  

To launch this initiative on September 10, we co-sponsored with the Bulosan Center for Filipino Studies at UC Davis a virtual Townhall on anti-Asian hate in the Sacramento Region. The Center is an official research partner of Stop AAPI Hate.

Mainstream philanthropies are still catching up to funding the types of organizations and activities we will be funding in this round.  Our prospective grantees need funds to address anti-Asian hate and anti-Black racism in partnership now.  

Notably, our giving circle is the only organization in the Sacramento region filling the unmet gap to fund programs targeting anti-Asian hate and violence. Mainstream philanthropy in our region lags behind on addressing anti-Asian hate and violence and anti-Blackness; our giving circle actively confronts these issues as demonstrated by our recent virtual town hall and in our grant-making focus.

Thanks to the $8,000 contribution from the APPIP Giving Circles to initiate this work.