Mutual Aid NYC is a multi-racial network of people and groups building support systems for people in the New York City area.
We work at a citywide level to help those actively working in communities find the people and resources they need to do their work. We believe that this access will help them provide mutual aid, advocacy, and services to as many people as possible—now and in the future.
MUTUAL AID NYC GOALS
Provide support to local groups leading mutual aid efforts, and facilitate connections between neighborhood-based mutual aid groups.
Identify gaps in City, State, and Federal responses to crises, and help people find ways to support each other interdependently.
Serve as a point of contact for people who want to get involved in mutual aid work or receive mutual aid support.
Why Mutual Aid
Times of crisis make existing inequalities worse and hit vulnerable communities the hardest. The COVID-19 crisis, during which MANYC formed, emphasized the failure of government and social service institutions to meet the needs of those who have historically been most neglected. It has also emphasized the need for people to work together to create larger structural changes.
Marginalized communities have long relied on support practices at the very local level for sharing resources and skills. These practices are now often referred to as mutual aid, and historically range from indigenous lifeways to mutual support in enslaved communities, to the Black Panthers community support programs, to queer communities surviving the AIDS crisis, to pod mapping for chronically ill people.
Why Mutual Aid NYC
The people of NYC support our neighbors. Mutual Aid NYC aims to provide a decentralized but cohesive citywide support network to coordinate and connect mutual aid efforts across the city. Our aim is to build the power necessary to change failing systems, and build the structure to sustain these efforts for the long term.