March 9, 2007
LIFE FORCE ON LIFE SUPPORT
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Queen Latifah stars in Life Support, a new film based on a Brooklyn organization that recently lost its vital funding |
Celebrities and audience members who attended Tuesday’s Manhattan premiere of Life Support, HBO’s latest made-for-television movie about AIDS, got an impromptu lesson on AIDS funding cuts.
HBO gave Housing Works’ terri smith-caronia permission to pass out fliers explaining that Life Force: Women Fighting AIDS, the Brooklyn-based organization that inspired the film, could shut its doors by March 15 due to a lack of funding. smith-caronia and her team even handed fliers to the film’s stars, Queen Latifah and Tracee Ellis Ross, after they made their red-carpet entrances.
Life Force may close because the $192,000 New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH) grant it has relied upon for the past eight years expired on December 31, 2006. The group hasn’t found another source of funding, and staffers are hoping that Life Support will raise awareness about its financial crisis. “The film is made about us. We’re getting accolades for our work. But we need money to continue to do it,” says Valerie Uruburu, the group’s fiscal manager.
Life Force was founded in 1989 and has provided prevention, outreach, testing, referrals, counseling, and education services to over 500,000 women and their families. “The situation is heartbreaking for us and the community,” says Uruburu. “There aren't many women’s agencies in the borough of Brooklyn that do what we do.”
Life Support centers around an HIV-positive, African-American woman with a rocky past of drug addiction who works as an outreach worker for an organization called Life Support, modeled on the real-life Life Force. Nelson George, who wrote and directed the film, based it loosely on the life of his sister, Andrea Williams, who is a peer educator, HIV test counselor, and outreach worker who got HIV from her then-husband, an IV-drug user.
A lifeline lost
Ironically, the premiere of the film coincided with the announcement that Life Force may have to close up shop thanks to the expiration of the DOHMH contract.
The DOHMH actually extended the group’s funding for three more months into 2007 so that Life Force could participate in a competitive application process for $1.7 million in New York City Communities of Color funding awards. But Life Force didn’t receive any of the money. That left them nearly penniless.
Because the organization’s financial woes only recently became known, the news is just now reaching those involved with Life Support. “We spoke to everybody—the press, rap stars, celebs, audience members. Hopefully, we started the process of getting the word out to the mainstream,” says smith-caronia. Adds Uruburu, “The film has not translated into dollars yet, but I keep hoping.”
To help save Life Force, please mail your generous donation to Life Force: Women Fighting AIDS, Inc., 175 Remsen Street, Suite 1100, Brooklyn, NY 11201. All donations are tax-deductible.