An alliance of global key population-led networks and other key actors are organizing an international community-led event as an alternative to the International AIDS Conference that is planned to take place in the U.S. in 2020. Immigration policies and legal travel restrictions on sex workers, people who use drugs, and transgender people have made it difficult if not impossible for members of these communities to enter the U.S. Additionally, human rights conditions in the U.S. continue to worsen for immigrants, people of color, people who use drugs, LGBTI people, and sex workers. Activists in the U.S. are therefore requesting that the conference organizers refrain from organizing the AIDS Conference in the country.

The alternative community-led HIV convening is titled: HIV2020: Community Reclaiming the Global Response and will take place in Mexico City, 5 - 7 July 2020.

The organisers of HIV2020 are calling for funders to stand in solidarity with HIV2020 through their funding, submitting session ideas, using contacts with celebrities and others to gain attention for HIV2020, and by promoting HIV2020 and its messages and showing solidarity through their own communications and dissemination channels.

For more info, please visit https://www.hiv2020.org/

Funders Concerned About AIDS organised an information session about both convenings for funders. You can access the slides of that webinar here: https://www.fcaaids.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/How-Can-Philanthropy-Engage-at-AIDS2020-and-HIV2020.pdf

Photo Credit: Vera Rodriguez, Red Umbrella Fund. All rights reserved.

Nadia Van Der Linde, Coordinator of the Red Umbrella Fund (a member of the Sex Work Donor Collaborative), shares a blog post written by her that first appeared in the Anti-Trafficking Review and is now published in Open Democracy’s Beyond Trafficking and Slavery.

Read the blog post here.

DecrimNY — Coalition to Decriminalize, Decarcerate and Destimagtize the sex trade in New York City and state

Here is an update from FCAA (Funders Concerned About AIDS) regarding SESTA-FOSTA and DecrimNY that was presented at the organization’s Spring Funder Forum.

The Sex Work Donor Collaborative is excited to launch a call in search of a consultant or team of consultants to explore the key data needed to make a case to increase funding for sex workers' rights.

To learn more about this opportunity to support the increase in the quality and quantity of funding for sex workers’ rights, please read our official Call for Consultants.

The deadline to submit your expression of interest is 23.59 East Africa Time, Wednesday, 7th August 2019.

The Red Umbrella Fund is now accepting grant applications!

Here’s some basic information about who is eligible for a grant from RUF:

What we fund

The Red Umbrella Fund provides funding to sex worker-led organisations and networks that are:

1. based in any country in the world;
2. registered or unregistered;
3. led by women, men and/or trans.

Our criteria

If you wish to apply, your group, organisation or network must fulfill each of the following three criteria:

1. Be led by sex workers for the benefit of sex workers.
2. Be committed to connect to and strengthen the sex workers’ rights movement
3. Agree with all the principles of the Red Umbrella Fund.

The deadline to submit your application is July 31st, 2019.

The Sex Worker Giving Circle (SWGC) is very excited to announce the launch of its 2019 call for proposals - The SWGC Fellows plan to make at least $300,000 in grants this year to organizations that are by-and-for sex workers across the US, including 2-year grants.

About the Sex Worker Giving Circle
The Sex Worker Giving Circle (SWGC) launched in the spring of 2018: it is the first-ever sex worker-led fund housed at a U.S. foundation. The SWGC was created because sex workers are best positioned to confront and transform the oppressive conditions of their own lives. However, movements led by sex workers and people with experience in the sex trade are critically under-resourced despite increasing political attacks. 

The SWGC is a cross-class, multiracial, intergenerational giving circle made up of a group of Fellows who are women, queer, and trans folks with current or past experience in the sex trade. The Fellows make all high-level funding decisions and funding recommendations.

The Sex Work Donor Collaborative and our partners were recently profiled by Inside Philanthropy in an article titled Out of the Shadows: What Philanthropy is Doing to Support Sex Worker Movements Around the World. Check it out!

Stay tuned for more updates.