Articles
UNION SQUARE AWARDS 2003
AHP emerged in 2002 to address the dramatic increase in HIV/AIDS in Brooklyn's low-income communities. Volunteers go out three nights a week between the hours of 6 p.m. to 12 a.m. They drive throughout targeted neighborhoods stopping at streets, crack houses and other locations to distribute food, HIV prevention/education information and condoms, and they disperse clean needles as needed. When an individual expresses interest in detoxing, AHP volunteers call service providers right on the spot and drive the person to the program. AHP has developed linkage agreements with community organizations, drug treatment facilities and area hospitals that allow AHP to refer clients to fast-track quality care and services. In 2003, AHP formalized an agreement with Wyckoff Heights Medical Center to allow AHP to operate as an Expanded Syringe Access Program.
DAILY NEWS 2004
New York: Help for the At-Risk; Volunteers Fight HIV With Free Needles, Condoms
The van is part of the After Hours Project, a program started two years ago by Fernando Soto and Richard Curtis to stop the spread of AIDS in poor communities. Soto has worked at a daytime needle exchange program for 12 years, where he met Curtis. "My brother died of AIDS in '88. He was an IV drug user. Since then I decided that I would dedicate my life to helping people," explained Soto, who thought that a nighttime exchange better matched the lifestyles of drug users and sex workers. Since June 2002, Soto and two volunteers have driven their van around Bushwick and other Brooklyn neighborhoods three nights weekly, providing free syringes and condoms.
CITY LIMITS 2004
A CLEAN START
The group's van is parked halfway between the area's prostitution and drug market, which puts it right in the path of sex workers coming to and from. "Yo, you got condoms?" asks someone in a group passing by. One of the women wears her long hair in a swoop down the side of her face and neck. Soto guesses she's hiding track marks; when you've been using hard for a long time, you've got to find places to shoot where you can get a quicker, stronger high. The women who work this stroll are using with that kind of intensity. They choose the location for the convenience: Once they turn a trick they can go just a few blocks and cop a bag, and repeat the process all night.
