Over the last eight years, you’ve funded over a million dollars in grassroots aid projects in Greece, Ukraine, and Poland. This fall, Humanity Now will begin supporting immigrant communities in the United States.
In recent months, immigrants in the U.S. have become increasingly vulnerable. We read about abductions from workplaces, detentions and deportations, and the separation of children from their parents. As an American organization dedicated to humanitarian relief, we have the capacity to offer aid to these communities.
What’s the plan? Humanity Now has developed a successful model for providing aid: We raise money from our donors, then use that funding to support small-scale grassroots relief projects. This model will help us address the increasingly urgent needs of immigrant communities in the United States.
What about Greece, Poland, and Ukraine? We’re not abandoning them. The humanitarian crisis continues in those countries. Greece, for example, saw a 250 percent increase in boat arrivals from Turkey last month. Our commitment to these regions remains strong while we extend our compassion to help people here at home.
Are you a political organization? No. We are a 501(c)3 nonprofit. Like the International Rescue Committee, Catholic Charities, and the Red Cross, we support people whose lives have been upended by war, famine, climate change, and other disasters, no matter what drove people from their homes. We’re smaller, however, and we’re all volunteers (and never use donations to cover administrative costs).
How can a small organization like Humanity Now make a difference? Through research and strategic thinking, Humanity Now creates big impacts with small investments. For example, in Poland this year, funds from Humanity Now enabled the team We Are Monitoring to keep their office open and support 1000 displaced people. We will find equally effective investments in the U.S.
How will you develop partnerships? Initially, we’re focusing on regions where we have extensive contacts—our home states of North Carolina, New York, and California—and have already identified potential partners. In September and October, we’ll make site visits. We plan to distribute our first U.S. grants this fall.
What kinds of projects do you plan to support? Here are a few examples:
- Expenses for the recruitment and training of volunteers, whose labor exponentially increases a team’s capacity
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Supporting the salary of an experienced distribution manager to set up aid collection points, organize inventory, and execute effective distribution
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The production of multi-lingual information like pamphlets explaining legal rights and maps of charitable services
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Training for DOJ Accreditation, which allows non-lawyers to offer legal advice to immigrants and asylum seekers
- Operating costs for a warehouse to accept, store, and distribute donations (diapers, toilet paper, shampoo, school supplies, etc)
This sounds like important work! How can I help? Your support means everything. Just as you’ve funded dental care at a refugee camp in Greece, emergency relief at the border in Poland, and medicine to war victims in Ukraine, you can help vulnerable immigrant communities in the United States. Please make a donation today
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Last year, Ukrainian filmmaker Mstyslav Chernov won the Academy Award for best documentary for 20 Days in Mariupol. This year, he’s out with a searing new film, 2000 Meters to Andriivka, which follows a Ukrainian battalion as it tries to retake the Russian-occupied village of Andriivka. Almost the entire film takes place over the course of a few hours, with most of it shot by soldiers and journalists outfitted with cameras on their helmets. It’s hard to imagine getting any closer to war without being there yourself, and it’s devastating to watch the destruction unfold. Perhaps the most profound aspect of the film, however, lies in the quiet conversations between soldiers in the trenches. As you listen, an anonymous soldier becomes a dad missing his kids and worrying about plumbing problems back home. When any of these men dies, it breaks your heart.
