1st quarter 2005.pub - International Community Foundation

1ST QUARTER 2005 ANNIVERSARY EDITION
How it all began...
This year, the International Community
Foundation (ICF) celebrates
its 15 th anniversary increasing
charitable giving and volunteerism
across U.S. borders to
benefit overseas nonprofit organizations
and communities primarily
in Baja California, Mexico.
ICF has come a long way since the
Pacific American Foundation was
formed by the San Diego Foundation
to respond to donors wishing
to make charitable gifts across
borders. Renamed the International
Community Foundation in
1997, over $8 million has been
granted by the foundation to nonprofits
and charitable causes internationally
with over $7.5 million
granted in the last 3 years.
The importance of ICF’s mission is
affirmed by the fact that less than
2% of charitable giving in the
United States goes internationally.
In this sense, ICF is helping to
meet a critical need in assisting a
growing number of individuals,
companies, family foundations
and even other community foundations
to give across borders.
We hope you’ll join us on May
14 th , 2005 to help us celebrate!
(See Page 12 for Gala Information)
(Continued on page 11)
FEATURED GRANTEE:
BILATERAL SAFETY CORRIDOR COALITION
Page 2
The first Annual Trafficking in Persons Report, 2001 released by the State Department noted
that human trafficking is recognized as a worldwide phenomenon. Marisa Ugarte, president
of the Bilateral Safety Corridor Coalition (BSCC) stated that of the 50,000 people
annually trafficked into the United States, a third are Latin American. In response to this,
Ms. Ugarte established the BSCC in 1997 to help coordinate governmental and nongovernmental
organizations working to address the complex challenges presented by human
trafficking in and throughout the U.S.-Mexico border region. The mission of BSCC is
to prevent the trafficking of persons; educate the community and social service providers
on the issues of trafficking, commercial and sexual exploitation; and intervene to protect
victims and provide them with the appropriate care and services.
The greatest danger for forced prostitution, forced labor and child sexual exploitation occurs
along the U.S.-Mexico border. As Ms. Ugarte mentioned, “while the impact of this
horrible practice on victims is well documented and increasing attention has been paid to
the difficulties in the prosecution of traffickers, witness development, and establishing legal
status for victims, [there is still a lack of recognition for] suitable legal remedies.” Part of
the problem resides in victim “mistrust” toward current legal remedies, partly because past
encounters with law enforcement have resulted in deportation, leading to reinforced
mechanisms that traffickers use to control victims and prevent them from disclosing details
vital to building a case.
To address this issue, ICF granted the BSCC $20,000 to begin addressing the legal facets in
combating human trafficking and commercial and sexual exploitation along the San Diego-
Tijuana border. The project focuses specifically on assisting victims to obtain legal status,
and advocates for the prosecution of traffickers and trafficking consumers. 75% of these
funds will support a new legal resource center through which new training models on identifying
trafficking victims, witness development, prosecution, ORR certification and visas will
be implemented for NGOs, legal practitioners, attorneys and law enforcement agents. The
remaining 25% will be used for organizational capacity building, as well as increasing the
outreach and promotional activities of BSCC along the border to facilitate bilateral cooperation
in the extradition and prosecution of traffickers.
In the long-run BSCC hopes to implement the program in three additional sites along the
U.S.-Mexico border: Nogales, Arizona/Nogales, Sonora; Laredo, Texas/Nuevo Laredo,
Tamaulipas; and El Paso, Texas/ Ciudad Juarez, Chihuahua. These sites were chosen by the
BSCC because of the number of unaccompanied minors and immigrants crossing the border
at these points, indices of violence, the presence of bustling tourist industries, available
social capital, the number of social service providers, and the proximity of military installations.
For more information on BSCC you may visit their website at www.bsccoalition.org, or to
learn how you can contribute to their cause, contact Amy Carstensen at amyc@icfdn.org.