Hope for 2025
January 9, 2025
Happy New Year to you and your loved ones. I hope the holidays brought the rest and reprieve so many of us needed. One of my highlights in December was our staff holiday party; even in challenging and frightening times, there was joy and kinship and a moment to appreciate all San Francisco Community Health Center was able to accomplish last year.
I want to THANK YOU for supporting our work so generously as 2024 wrapped up. Thanks to your commitment to our mission, belief in our services, and care for our community, we were able to surpass our fundraising goal! I know so many of you give to many other local and national organizations as well; your generosity of dollars and spirit means more than you know. It gives all of us hope in these uncertain times.
I am currently on the way home from Washington, D.C.; a trip that also represented hope for 2025. I was invited to a ceremonial swearing-in reception hosted by the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies (APAICS), celebrating the unprecedented number (25 to be exact!) of AANHPI elected officials of the 119th United States Congress.
I was inspired by our AANHPI community of elected officials and tireless advocates and leaders. It was crystal clear that we are all fighting for the communities we collectively care about. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries offered congratulatory remarks and spoke of the “gorgeous mosaic of the American people.” He added, “We are going to fight hard for the things that matter… we will push back against far-right extremism whenever necessary – that means calling out and stamping out anti-Asian hate and xenophobia wherever it is found in the United States.”
Congressmember Grace Meng, the new chairperson of the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, called on those in attendance to “...work to coalesce around the values and the issues that are central to our communities’ well-being.” I am proud that SFCHC, along with our partner organizations in San Francisco, have already heeded that call.
Our work is clearly cut out for us. Once again, thank you for supporting SFCHC in so many ways. Come what may in the next few months, focused on our values and love for our communities, I know we will be there for one another and this is what gives me hope.
Warmly,
Lance Toma
CEO, San Francisco Community Health Center