2016.advancingjustice-la.orgBUILDING STRONGER COMMUNITIES | PROTECTING OUR

FUTURE BUILDING STRONGER COMMUNITIES PROTECTING OUR FUTURE Home LETTER FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR & BOARD CHAIR MOBILIZING OUR COMMUNITY ACTIVATING OUR COMMUNITY BRINGING JUSTICE FOR OUR COMMUNITY EXPANDING COMMUNITY IMPACT OUR REACH AND IMPACT IN 2016 DONORS & SUPPORTERS PRO BONO PARTNERSHIP & VOLUNTEER SUPPORT BOARD OF DIRECTORS EXECUTIVE ADVISORY COUNCIL PRO BONO ADVISORY COUNCIL ORANGE COUNTY EXECUTIVE ADVISORY COUNCIL ORANGE COUNTY COMMUNITY ADVISORY COUNCIL 2016 FINANCIALS DONATE Toggle navigation LETTER FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR & BOARD CHAIR Letter from the Executive Director & Board Chair Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles (Advancing Justice-LA) was founded to serve and advocate for Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander (AANHPI) communities. Decades later, our commitment to advancing justice for all marginalized communities has never been more important than it is now. 2016 was an incredible year for our communities and civic engagement. As a growing social, political, and economic force, AANHPIs made great strides in raising our voice during a critical election year. Advancing Justice-LA is proud to have worked with key community partners in naturalizing almost 9,000 new U.S. citizens, calling over 100,000 AANHPI voters in Los Angeles and Orange Counties for the June and November 2016 elections, and sending more than 200 volunteers to monitor polling sites across Southern and Central California on Election Day in November. Beyond the elections, we are also proud of our ongoing work on behalf of immigrant workers, including fighting for justice for 11 trafficked workers from the Philippines, who remained resilient despite slave-like conditions at a popular local French bakery, and nearly 400 port truck drivers, who successfully fought a company that defied them at every turn. And as AANHPI communities move beyond traditional gateway cities like Los Angeles, we strengthened and expanded our Orange County office to better serve and protect one of the fastest-growing AANHPI populations anywhere in the nation. Thank you for your generous support that has allowed us to continue our work. We will not back down from our mission or our fight to protect our communities. We are stronger now than ever before because of your partnership. Sincerely, President & Executive Director Nita Song Chair, Board of Directors MOBILIZING OUR COMMUNITY 2016 election & civic engagement Asian Americans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific Islanders (AANHPIs) are the fastest-growing racial group in the United States. With a population of over 21 million, the AANHPI electorate is increasingly influential yet remains largely ignored by campaigns, candidates, and political parties. According to the Asian American Election Eve Poll, which Advancing Justice-LA supported, although 70% of registered Asian American voters casted their ballot in the 2016 general election, only 43% of Asian American voters had been contacted by a campaign or political party to ask to vote or register to vote. AANHPI voters comprise 10% of Los Angeles County and 14% of Orange County voters. This makes get-out-the-vote efforts like ours particularly important. Advancing Justice-LA worked in close partnership with 20 AANHPI community-based organizations through the nonpartisan Your Vote Matters” campaign, which made over 65,000 calls in 11 AANHPI languages and English in the months leading up to the November 8th election. As a result, these and other efforts helped turn out 70% of Asian American voters in California during a critical election year. Many AANHPI voters rely on language assistance to help them vote, including 50% of Korean American voters and 46% of Chinese American voters. On election day, we executed one of the nation’s largest poll monitoring efforts in partnership with Advancing Justice – Asian Law Caucus, training and mobilizing over 600 volunteers to monitor 1,200 polling places in 25 counties across California. We trained poll monitoring volunteers to ensure that all required translated materials were present at the polling sites and that limited-English proficient voters were able to vote on election day. So many people are becoming citizens every day and they just don’t understand that they have so much power in their hands. I want them to know that they do have the power to change where we live, who we are, and how we want to live.” – Nadia Smita, Your Vote Matters” phone banking volunteer Read about another one of our volunteer’s experiences. » ACTIVATING OUR COMMUNITY Endless Possibilities. Citizenship Now! Over 300,000 Asian Americans in Southern California are eligible for U.S. citizenship. Of this, more than half live in Los Angeles County alone. During an important election year, Advancing Justice-LA launched the Endless Possibilities. Citizenship Now!” campaign to encourage more Asian immigrants to apply for U.S. citizenship. In partnership with 12 community-based organizations and 15 Asian ethnic media outlets, the campaign promoted the benefits of citizenship in 21 different languages and dialects. U.S. citizenship remains the strongest protection of one’s livelihood and rights in the United States. In addition to access to jobs, increased income, family reunification, the freedom to travel, and the right to vote, citizenship offers protection from deportation. This united effort between community and media partners was unprecedented in scope and impact, resulting in the completion of nearly 1,100 citizenship applications and over 600 fee waivers for low-income applicants, saving them over $500,000 in citizenship fees. Since the campaign began, we received double the usual amount of citizenship-related calls — nearly 3,500 by the end of 2016. Further, we enrolled over 450 individuals in ESL and Civics courses to ensure that our clients are setup to succeed in the naturalization process. Overall, Advancing Justice-LA and our citizenship partners across the United States assisted 9,000 citizenship applicants in 2016. If you can vote, you’re alive. The best thing you can do as a citizen is to vote.” — Rosadell Bay, Citizenship client who, despite a sickness that left her home-bound, naturalized in order to vote in the 2016 election Read more about Ms. Bay’s story. » BRINGING JUSTICE FOR OUR COMMUNITY Port Truck Drivers Case After a years-long battle, Advancing Justice-LA, in partnership with Wage Justice Center, reached a $5 million class action settlement on behalf of nearly 400 immigrant Korean and Latino American port truck drivers who were misclassified as independent contractors. The port trucking company, QTS, Inc., hid behind purported bankruptcy protections to avoid being liable for shifting the costs of operating their business to the drivers. The drivers were forced to cover the general maintenance and repair costs of their trucks, including insurance, and were left to work dangerously long hours for poverty-level wages. The case is the first wage and hour settlement to successfully attack the dual scheme of misclassification and using bankruptcy to avoid liability, which are endemic in the port trucking industry and many other low-wage sectors, sending a strong signal to drivers and other exploited workers that justice is possible. Read more about the port truck drivers.» L’Amande Bakery Case In 2016, Advancing Justice-LA secured a $15.2 million default judgement and T (trafficking) visas for 11 Filipino bakery workers trafficked from the Philippines by the owners of L’Amande French Bakery, a high-end bakery with shops in Beverly Hills and Torrance. Upon arriving in the United States, the workers were threatened with an $11,000 debt unless they agreed to work at the bakery for at least three years. Alongside working 17-hour days for less than minimum wage and no overtime pay, the workers also served as domestic servants, often expected to do construction or cleaning work at the owners’ personal home. When the workers tried...