The Brave House mobilized to provide our members with hot meals, care packages, emergency funding, connection to local health care services, and a supportive community. In April 2020, we hired a Covid Relief Coordinator to focus on our response efforts. Since then, we’ve distributed over $30,000 in cash assistance to our members through partnerships with the NYC Mayor’s Office of Immigrant Affairs and the Hispanic Federation.

Our why.

The lack of access to critical services provided to immigrants in NYC became even more apparent and serious with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since most Brave House members came to this country as unaccompanied minors, over half of our members do not live with their parents or close family and many have found themselves in shelters or confined to spaces where their health, safety, and well-being are not supported. Our members were excluded from many national and local relief efforts due to their immigration status, such as when the federal government sent stimulus checks to many U.S. citizens.

Our relief efforts.

Food Delivery.

 

To provide our members with warm meals and healthy food during the pandemic, we developed three strategies:

1. Partnerships with local restaurants that cooked and delivered delicious meals to our members. We extend our most sincere gratitude to restaurants like Santo Bruklin for partnering with us throughout quarantine. 
2. Coordination of grocery delivery to members in need. 
3. Provision of gift cards for urgent cases where members could independently place orders to food-providers.

Care Packages.

 

To cover the immediate and social-emotional needs of our members, we sent out two rounds of care packages. The care packages, named “Brave Baskets”, included basic items like snacks and clothing as well as tools for easing anxiety such as journals, coloring books, and candles.

Legal Representation.

 

We provided free legal advocacy to our members all throughout the pandemic. Our efforts included:

• Remote legal meetings with clients
• Know Your Rights workshops
• Ongoing legal work from cases that needed to be completed and frequently reviewed even though immigration courts were temporarily closed.

Resource Navigation.

 

Our team of Youth Advocates continued to carry-out individual check-ins with members to assess their specific needs, answer questions, and connect them to resources. These individual check-ins were conducted with more frequency to assess what their specific needs are and then connecting them to resources (such as mental health counseling).

Youth Advocates connected members with pandemic-specific resources such as food kitchens, strategies for maintaining mental health during quarantine, funding applications, and virtual events.

Virtual Spaces for Community.

 

• We hosted weekly episodes of the Brave Pod, our podcast where we aim to amplify the voices of young people, women, LGBTQIA+ folks, immigrants, BIPOC, entrepreneurs and visionaries who are dreaming big and making an impact in their communities. As of February 2022, we've hosted over 100 episodes!
• Hosted weekly virtual events for our members, with a particular emphasis on guided meditations.
  
• ​Launched The Brave Space, a blog to highlight and center underrepresented voices.
• Developed Know Your Rights information for protests, held healing circles for our black members, and created allyship materials.
• ​Launched a Book Club to learn more about activists throughout history.