Alliance 2024 Impact Update

2024 Impact Update

“Alliance works. I’m living testament to that.

Alliance transforms people.”

—RUBEN C., ALLIANCE PEER WORKER Photo: David Nager/Alliance

THROUGHOUT 2024, ALLIANCE ENACTED POSITIVE CHANGE INTERNALLY BY ADVANCING OUR AMBITIOUS ORGANIZATIONAL REDESIGN AND EXTERNALLY BY GENERATING POSITIVE CHANGE IN PARTNERSHIP WITH THOUSANDS OF LOW-INCOME NEW YORKERS LIVING WITH HIV AND OTHER CHRONIC HEALTH CONDITIONS. We are delighted to share Alliance’s 2024 highlights: a progress update on our redesign, key program achievements, impact data, and participant testimonials on the value of our work.

Alliance’s redesign positions us to deliver even more intensive and effective services that resource our participants for better health through access to health care, nutritious food, harm reduction, recovery support, and other contributors to well-being. In 2024, Alliance’s service redesign moved ahead as we:

+ Prepared to expand beyond our successful +

pilot at Alliance Keith Haring Harlem Center to our second redesign site at Alliance CASA Washington Heights, launching mid-2025.

Fine-tuned our outreach strategy to engage more people with serious health challenges who are disconnected from services—and quickly link them to insurance, health care, housing placement support, and other resources to get their lives and health back on track.

+ Formalized a team-based approach to

provide each participant with multiple services to more effectively address complex barriers to well-being, such as food insecurity, social isolation, and homelessness.

+ Devised a tailored approach to rolling out

community-responsive redesigns at all six Alliance community service sites based on each neighborhood’s priorities.

In strategically evolving to sustain service excellence in challenging times, Alliance is wellanchored by diligent fiscal and organizational stewardship—and by our enduring commitment to positive change, public health, and the communities we’ve served for nearly 35 years.

THANK YOU FOR STANDING WITH US IN THIS ESSENTIAL, LIFE-AFFIRMING WORK.

ALLEN ZWICKLER

Board Chair

SHAREN I. DUKE

Executive Director/CEO

Photo: David Nager/Alliance

Nourishing Positive Change Access to nutritious food is a cornerstone of well-being. A healthy diet is especially crucial for New Yorkers living with HIV and other chronic conditions.

Despite skyrocketing food prices and massive cuts to federal nutrition assistance programs, Alliance remains steadfast in providing our participants with nutritious food.

Our food pantry, daily meal service, and nutrition workshops provide thousands of low-income New Yorkers with the right ingredients to reduce food insecurity, manage their health conditions, and pursue positive change in all its forms.

20,000+

74% increase over 2023

2,800+

87% increase over 2023

meals served

pantry bags distributed

Saving Lives and Building Trust Alliance is a welcoming community for all— people who use drugs, people exploring or new to recovery from substance use, and people deeply engaged in their recovery journey. Our full-spectrum harm reduction, recovery support, and substance use treatment services offer many points-ofentry for people seeking opportunities for positive change. In 2024, Alliance:

+ Provided 1,400+ New Yorkers with sterile syringes to reduce their risk of acquiring or transmitting HIV and viral hepatitis— and engage them in additional healthpromotion services.

Photo: David Nager/Alliance

+ Conducted 1,800+ Narcan trainings—focusing + Reached 3,724 New Yorkers with harm on areas with very high overdose rates—to equip as many people as possible with the skills to reverse an overdose and save a life as we continue navigating the enormous challenges of the overdose crisis. Our number of trainings increased by 28% between 2023 and 2024 to meet growing demand.

+ Achieved 121 overdose reversals, as

reported by our LES Harm Reduction Center team and community members who took our Narcan trainings.

reduction tools and services through our LES Harm Reduction Center.

+ Distributed 28,000+ harm reduction

supplies to members of the Harlem community through our Keith Haring Harlem Center.

These interventions are often a first step in building trust and engaging people in Alliance’s other services, such as HIV testing and expedited access to medical care.

IMPACT HIGHLIGHTS CARE COORDINATION AND ACCESS

Alliance enabled 3,934 people living with HIV and other chronic conditions to access quality medical care, substance use treatment, mental health services, housing, and other essential services.

This includes providing 1,111 New Yorkers with coordinated pharmacy-access services plus HIV treatment adherence education and coaching, through which 95% achieved an undetectable viral load. This is a significant contributor to public health in NYC, because people with undetectable viral loads cannot transmit HIV to others: Undetectable = Untransmittable!

HEALTH CARE ACCESS

4,097 low-income New Yorkers were rapidly connected with health insurance and medical care.

Alliance’s team made the health insurance enrollment process extremely easy. I was finally able to see a primary care physician.”

—YVONNE, ALLIANCE PARTICIPANT

Photo: David Nager/Alliance

HIV AND HEPATITIS C TESTING

We performed 919 HIV tests (1.6% seropositivity rate) and 335 hepatitis C tests (2.4% seropositivity rate), promptly connecting 100% of those testing positive to medical care.

ECONOMIC MOBILITY

For decades, our economic mobility trainings and job placement opportunities have opened doors to workforce entry or re-entry for thousands of New Yorkers living with chronic health conditions. In 2024:

+ 40 people graduated from our Peer

Recovery Education Program (PREP).

+ 93 paid Peer Worker positions provided workforce experience while amplifying Alliance’s impact.

+ 154 individuals completed training

to become Certified Recovery Peer Advocates—positions in demand at hospitals and other health settings.

Documenting Peer Power and Alliance’s History In 2024, Alliance deployed the power of documentary filmmaking to spotlight the myriad ways positive change unfolds in our Peer training program—and how Alliance’s Peer Workers lead the way on our longstanding work in HIV prevention and health promotion. We premiered Rise Up! 14 Short Films About Alliance for Positive Change at the legendary Anthology Film Archives and presented excerpts at two national HIV conferences. We look forward to bringing the film to wider audiences in 2025.

Join Alliance in bringing even more positive change in 2025 by becoming a supporter today! Learn more at www.alliance.nyc

25 Years of Poetry A growing body of research shows that access to the arts promotes mental and physical well-being.

Alliance recognized this 25 years ago, when we launched a weekly Creative Writing Workshop to support our participants’ health, social connection, and self-expression.

In December 2024, we celebrated an amazing 25 years of poetic inspiration and creative community-building at Alliance, with the generous support of the Phil Zwickler Charitable and Memorial Foundation Trust.

Photo: David Nager/Alliance

A Creative Gateway to Positive Change

In my past, I experienced homelessness and substance use. I worked through those challenges and wanted to support other people facing barriers to well-being.

BOARD OF DIRECTORS & LEADERSHIP Allen Zwickler, Chair Anita Venkiteswaran, Vice Chair Robert Shepardson, Treasurer Maabo Kludze, Secretary David Berger Benjamin Eckhardt Stephen Gass Jennifer Gordon Nick Holmes Ofole Mgbako Andres Nieto William Toler Sharen I. Duke, Executive Director/CEO Brenda Starks-Ross, Deputy ED/Chief Operating Officer Tamara Green, Deputy ED/Chief Program Officer

In Alliance’s Peer training program, Photo: David Nager/Alliance I gained insight into my own behaviors while learning how to use my experiences to educate and uplift others. Along with critical professional skills, Alliance helped me create structure in my life and provided me with the economic opportunity to live comfortably.”

Many thanks to our ever-growing circle of donors, funders, and partners.

—MARK G., ALLIANCE PEER WORKER

64 W 35th Street, 3rd Floor, New York, NY 10001 (212) 645-0875 | questions@alliance.nyc | www.alliance.nyc/donate

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