credit: starbooze via Flickr

The MinKwon Center for Community Action…

…to meet the needs and concerns of the Korean American community through our five program areas:

credit: wallyg via Flickr

&

…

The common misconception is that Asian Americans community is generally well off and do not need social services.

The common misconception is that Asian Americans community is generally well off and do not need social services.

There are more than one million Asian Pacific Americans in New York City

credit: Dan Nguyen via Flickr

There are more than one million Asian Pacific Americans in New York City

credit: Dan Nguyen via Flickr

50 of the 200+ languages spoken in NY are Asian languages

28% live in linguistic isolation

50 of the 200+ languages spoken in NY are Asian languages

1 out of 5 does not have health insurance

4 out of 5 are foreign born

1 out of 2 is born in poverty

.4% of the foundation dollars went to the APA community.

credit: Asian American Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy (AAPIP)

.24% of the social service contracts went to the APA community in NYC.

credit: Shao Chee Sim, Asian American Federation

We can’t advocate for a bigger budget just by ourselves.

Neither can these organizations.

Neither can these organizations.

That is why the 13% and Growing Coalition was born.

Kickoff Press Event at City Hall

Asian-led groups received $987,825 in Council discretionary funding

Press briefing at City Council

Asian-led groups received $987,825 in Council discretionary funding

Press briefing at City Council

Asian-led groups received $945,303 in Council Initiative funding

Rally for fair share of the budget

Asian-led groups received $945,303 in Council Initiative funding

Rally for fair share of the budget

Click here to see our work with 13% and Growing!

http://vimeo.com/7071337

Our community faces several challenges in being engaged.

There is a severe lack of representation.

1

Voters are not engaged.

2

We don’t turn out the necessary numbers.

3

Total Seats Number of APA Officeholders

Percentage of the seats held

Percentage of the population

House of Representatives

29 1 3.4% 7.3%

NYS Senate 62 0 0% 7.3%

NYS Assembly 150 1 0.7% 7.3%

NYC Council 51 2 3.9% 12.6%

Total 292 4 1.4% -

Same community, three different ways

of representation

To address these problems, ACCORD was created

Collectively, we held our government accountable.

Only ONE majority Asian district

FOUR new majority Asian districts

We educated our voters so that they knew the candidates…

NYS Assembly District 6 Candidate Forum

…and the issues. Multilingual voter guides

We also made sure that our community was registered to vote…

GOTV Efforts

…and actually got out there to vote!

Phonebanking registered voters

(we made sure that they didn’t have issues voting either)

Asian Voter survey

32%

25% 29%

54%

NYC NYC No Outreach Grassroots

Outreach

2010 General Election Voter Turnout Results

Flushing/Bayside

Korean American voters

All voters

We started fighting against anti immigrant sentiments

The push for immigration reform started up

September 11 brought everything to a grinding halt

credit: Ann Althouse via Flickr

2001

2005

Anti-immigrant efforts intensified.

Rally against the Sensenbrenner bill

But we pushed back!

Rally for McCain-Kennedy Immigration Reform Bill

We have continuously fought for immigrants’ rights on local level as well.

Human chain around Gov. Cuomo’s office

2012

On June 15, Obama administration announced the deferred action policy.

2012

We are legally representing 7% of the total Korean American applicants.

KORE – MinKwon’s immigrant youth-led organizing group

We’re making our path for a brighter future for all!

Presentation by Steven Choi

& Tony Choi M.K.

Made for MinKwon Center for Community Action

Feel free to distribute, give credit to where it’s due. No copyright infringement intended.

For educational purposes only

All photos property of MinKwon Center for Community Action unless otherwise noted.