Empire Justice Center, Inc.

In a state as large as New York, a steady stream of smart, innovative work is coming from NYHealth grantees and non-grantees alike that is relevant to NYHealth’s priority areas of Building Healthy Communities and Empowering Health Care Consumers and its focus area on Veterans’ Health.

These organizations should be elevating their work and informing key stakeholders at regional, statewide, and national conferences, meetings, and other convenings. Yet, because of a lack of resources, they are often unable to do so. To address this issue, NYHealth is awarding grants through its Sponsoring Conference Participation in Support of Healthy Communities, Consumer Empowerment, and Veterans’ Health Request for Proposals (RFP). Through this RFP, NYHealth is sponsoring low-resource organizations to attend and present at local, State, and national conferences related to these areas. In 2019, NYHealth awarded Empire Justice Center a grant to participate in this initiative as part of its efforts to empower health care consumers.

Under this grant, Empire Justice Center sent three members to the Philadelphia Trans Wellness Conference. Conference attendees received formal training on disability liberation, gender non-binary identities, and how to help health care consumers obtain coverage for medical procedures. The conference also offered legal tips on how to effectively work with health insurance companies to advocate for trans health equity. Empire Justice Center offered technical assistance and training to other organizations across New York State, and attending this conference strengthened its cultural competency to best teach these organizations how to advocate for and empower health care consumers.

View a complete list of conference participation grantees.