CAAL provides funding for 11 organizations and 35 leaders in Minnesota to respond to COVID-19 needs in community

For Immediate Release        

June 1, 2020      

Contact

Kara Carmosino kara@caalmn.org | (814) 440-0365

St. Paul, MN – The Coalition of Asian American Leaders (CAAL) has committed $200,000 to support communities to address community challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic. To date, they’ve given out $143,250. Since COVID-19 hit Minnesota, the challenges experienced by Asian Minnesotans as well as Black, Indigenous and Latinx communities have been immediate and multi-layered. As the health, economic and social impacts of COVID-19 intensify, CAAL’s investment will support individual leadership and the organizational infrastructure to enable our community to respond. 

Through its Stronger Together Fund, CAAL awarded grants to 11 Asian Minnesotan organizations, to support efforts that range from emergency relief funds for community members impacted by deportation, to training for Hmong farmers to access and utilize new online platforms, to providing appropriate technology and virtual capacity to enable organizational staff to deliver programming while working from home. 

“We are committed to helping our most vulnerable community members, as well as to support our small nonprofits so that they have the capacity and infrastructure needed to transition critical services to virtual and technology-based platforms,” says Bo Thao-Urabe, Executive and Network Director. 

The 11 organizations include: Asian Media Access, Inc., Hmong American Farmers Association (HAFA), India Association of Minnesota (IAM), Karen Organization of Minnesota (KOM), Lao Assistance Center of Minnesota (LACM), Release MN8, Reviving the Islamic Sisterhood for Empowerment (RISE), Sewa-Aifw, The Southeast Asian Diaspora (SEAD) Project, Transforming Generations and Vietnamese Social Services of Minnesota (VSS).

Simultaneously, CAAL provided funding for 35 Black, Indigenous, Asian and Latinx leaders to carry out projects that addressed an urgent community need through its Spark Leadership Fund. A few projects include:

• Naida Medicine Crow used the funds to help ensure Indigenous communities impacted by homelessness have access to essential resources and health services.
• Xay Yang will use the funds to support a group of women impacted by deportations to learn more about the immigration and criminal system so they can best advocate for families and community at this time. 

Other supported projects include holding healing spaces for BIPOC communities retraumatized by the impacts of COVID-19, to providing free home birth care, to making and distributing free masks, hand sanitizer, and food to health care workers and vulnerable communities. 

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About Coalition of Asian American Leaders: 

The Coalition of Asian American Leaders (CAAL) envisions a State where all Minnesotans, regardless of background, are actively engaged and can achieve prosperity. Our mission is to harness our collective power to improve the lives of community by connecting, learning, and acting together. To learn more, please visit www.caalmn.org. 

About Stronger Together Fund

The Stronger Together Fund was established to support Asian Minnesotan organizations who are supporting the most vulnerable segments of our community during the COVID-19 pandemic. To learn more, please visit www.caalmn.org/stronger-together-fund. 

About Spark Leadership Fund

The Spark Leadership Fund offers financial support to BIPOC leaders in Minnesota. Individual leaders can apply for funds of $500, $750 or $1,000 to support their own growth or to fund a project idea. To learn more, please visit www.caalmn.org/spark.