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That's a wrap! Prevention Justice Partners of 2007

The Prevention Justice Partnership (PJP), our year-long, campaign based training and technical assistance program partnered with six grassroots organizations around the country in 2007. No one ever said grassroots organizing is easy, and our partners pulled out all the stops and built local campaigns advocating for cutting edge of HIV prevention policies that we all know will lower infection rates in our communities. Following are some highlights of the year:

The Kemet Coalition is a coalition of African American HIV/AIDS service providers based in San Diego County, California. Kemet worked with CHAMP to develop a campaign to remove the barriers to HIV testing in African American communities. This partnership is still ongoing.

Mujeres Unidas Contra el SIDA, a committed, dynamic group of Latinas in San Antonio, is developing a campaign to compel comprehensive sex education to be provided to students in San Antonio high schools – no simple feat in San Antonio (or just about anywhere in Texas). They have named this effort Project RAGE. As the group considers further, ongoing advocacy work, they are planning a Town Meeting about the importance of providing comprehensive sex education to San Antonio youth, most of whom are Latino/a, in January, 2008.

Community HIV/Hepatitis Advocates of Iowa Network (CHAIN) is an advocacy organization based in West Des Moines. The group has been working on a campaign to increase state funding for HIV and viral hepatitis prevention programs. As the presidential primaries have heated up much earlier this election cycle, CHAIN has been bird-dogging candidates about HIV prevention issues as they travel across Iowa.

The HIV Law Project's Center for Women and HIV Advocacy has truly blossomed in the past year. Led by a group of HIV positive women of color, the group has developed and participated in a campaign for comprehensive sex education on both the New York State and New York City levels. The group successfully executed a postcard campaign, collected over 500 signed postcards and sent them to the state senate and the mayor of New York City. Partly as the result of this campaign and the work of other allies, New York State is refusing federal funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, and redirecting state funding previously earmarked for such programs towards comprehensive sex education. The Center is currently developing a strategy to increase the organization's profile on the national level by collaborating with other women's groups around the country.

Positive Impact, Atlanta Harm Reduction Center (AHRC) and Health Students Taking Action Together (Health STAT) is a unique partnership based in Atlanta, Georgia, formed for the purpose of the Prevention Justice Partnership. Renamed the Georgia Prevention Justice Alliance, members have been working on a campaign to gain Fulton County funding for a syringe exchange program. The group has worked with local community leaders, churches, services providers, and politicians, collecting a letter of support with over 100 signatures. The group has developed a white paper and legal analysis, conducted community forums, and met with the county health welfare representatives. As the local host of the national Prevention Justice Mobilization, the group organized a powerful World AIDS Day speak-out at the Martin Luther King Jr. memorial site, and assisted in an Op-Ed in the Atlanta Journal of Constitution authored by Sandy Thurman, former White House Director of AIDS Policy focusing on syringe exchange.

The AIDS Taskforce of Greater Cleveland enjoyed an early victory in its campaign urging the state to refuse federal abstinence-only education funding. As one of the first states in the country to do so, Ohio has emerged as a progressive leader of this national trend. While the group has been working on increasing funding for comprehensive sexuality education programs, they have also started working to increase the organization's national profile, using a progressive communications framework to identify the values of the organization and allies, to establish criteria for the selection of issues on which to focus, and to determine a process for selecting their next campaign on the heels of this success.



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