Date and Time

May. 19, 2023 • 6:00 pm

Location

Historic Klamath Ferry, Pier 9, The Embarcadero, San Francisco, CA


Event Details

Defying the Impossible: New Breath Foundation Celebrates 5 Years of Grantmaking on May 19, 2023 is New Breath Foundation’s Annual Celebration and Inaugural Awards Ceremony. The evening will celebrate NBF’s innovation, effort to promote cross-racial solidarity, and honor social justice pioneers and Elders.

The evening takes place mainly outdoors and will feature beautiful views of the Bay and Bay Bridge from the Klamath Ferry roof deck docked at Pier 9. There will be specialty cocktails and small plates reflective of our multicultural Bay Area.

This event raises critical funds to help NBF provide programmatic support for our grantees, sustain our capacity to grow, provide more resources to AANHPI communities, conduct education to the philanthropic sector, and increase our grantmaking. Your contribution helps us advance our vital mission that is more important now than ever.

Accessibility

This event will take place outdoors and is elevator-accessible, with amplified sound, cocktail seating, and gluten-free and vegetarian options.

New Breath Foundation believes in disability justice, and we aim to accommodate everyone’s needs as much as we can. We recognize that Covid-19 still impacts others significantly. We will follow local county guidelines and actively monitor the health situation. We currently don’t plan to require proof of vaccination, but we reserve the right to change this decision as we get closer to the event.

 


 

Honorees

Our Annual Celebration & Awards

This year, we recognize Lateefah Simon, Karen Perkins, and Peggy Saika. These three were critical in helping our founder, Eddy Zheng, “Defy the Impossible” by creating a public foundation from the ground up that would explicitly fund grassroots AANHPI organizations serving people directly impacted by criminalization, deportation, and violence. AANHPIs, on the whole, only receive 20 cents of every $100 philanthropic dollars, and these communities receive much less.

Trailblazer Award

NBF’s Trailblazer Award recognizes inspirational racial justice pioneers who build movements by addressing institutional racism and inequities in their communities and others in the United States.

Lateefah Simon

Lateefah Simon is a nationally recognized advocate for civil rights and racial justice, president of Meadow Fund, and board member of Akonadi Foundation, a grantmaker that supports powerful social change movements to eliminate structural racism in Oakland, California.

Movement Elder Award

NBF’s Movement Elder Award recognizes, thanks, and highlights those with decades of work in overlapping grassroots social justice movements, such as civil rights, racial justice, Asian American activism, LGBTQ, and more.

Karen Perkins

Karen Perkins is an Advisor to the Yuri Kochiyama Solidarity Fund and longtime social justice activist and nonprofit management expert.

Peggy Saika

Peggy Saika is the former President of Asian Americans/Pacific Islanders in Philanthropy (AAPIP) and an award-winning social justice and philanthropic activist.

Emcee

Michelle MiJung Kim

Michelle MiJung Kim is a queer Korean American immigrant woman writer, speaker, and social justice activist. She is the award winning author of The Wake Up: Closing the Gap Between Good Intentions and Real Change.

Host Committee

  • James Head
  • Isabelle Leighton
  • Daniel Lurie
  • Marlene & Richard Millikan
  • Arnold X. C. Perkins
  • A. Sparks
  • Roselyne Swig
  • Germaine Wong

Sponsors

ADVOCATE

California Wellness Foundation
Chinatown Community Development Center (CCDC)
Heising-Simons Foundation
Mimi & Peter Haas Fund
The Asian American Foundation (TAAF)
Marlene & Richard Millikan

CONTRIBUTORS

Akonadi Foundation 
RWJF Special Contributions Fund of the Princeton Area Community Foundation

ALLY

All Home
East Bay Community Foundation
Fairview Capital
Golden State Warriors
Kaiser Permanente
Masto Foundation
Sequoia Commercial Group
Peggy Saika & Dr. Arthur Chen
Karen & Arnold X.C. Perkins
Bernida Reagan & James Head
Germaine Wong

COMMUNITY

Advancing Justice – ALC – SF 
Alameda County Supervisor Carson 
HellaHeart Oakland
RBC
Young Community Developers