2024 in Review
Abstract image of a red umbrella, rays of light and yellow stars.
2024 marked New Moon’s second year of operations. Our tiny team stayed committed to serving organizations led by sex workers and survivors of exploitation in the sex trade by unlocking and distributing funding, creating relevant programming for individual advocates, and offering direct support to local grassroots leaders. Through funding, programming, and technical assistance our strategy is to create an “ecosystem of opportunities” for organizations and individuals in the movement for sex workers rights to plug into and benefit from.
New Moon was launched in the summer of 2022 to advance the rights and welfare of people in the sex trade by increasing funding and support for the movement for sex workers rights. We hit the ground running and are proud to share some of our accomplishments. A full report on our efforts and impact will be issued in Q1 of 2024, but in the meantime we have some exciting stats to share:
Snapshot of 2024 Accomplishments
MOVING MONEY INTO MOVEMENT
We channeled $848,250 into 76 sex worker and survivor-led organizations through grants, sponsorships, a giving circle, philanthropic organizing and donations. We are particularly proud of our philanthopic consultation work with corporations seeking to support the movement for sex workers rights, and are excited to deepen these relationships in 2025. Shout out to our supporters at the Abortion Bridge Collaborative Fund, the Carol Leigh Memorial Trust, and the incredibly generous individuals who are making our re-granting possible! We literally couldn’t do this without you.
We secured multi-year funding from ViiV to expand our re-granting and peer-learning programs to increase support for sex worker and survivor-led organizations whose work focuses on HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and advocacy. Our microgranting program will expand to a “seed funding” initiative through which New Moon will provide $1000/mo for a year (totaling $12,000 to each group). We’ll invite one organizer from each seed funding group into a peer-learning cohort at Spokes Hub which will focus specifically on direct services and advocacy related to HIV/AIDS. Stay tuned for updates on this exciting new addition to our funding and capacity building work!
We provided two critical gap loans to sex worker-led organizations who received government grants. Governmental grants are frequently inaccessible to small grassroots organizations because the grants operate on a reimbursement cycle. New Moon is proud to help sex worker and survivor-led groups access substantial government funds by making the reimbursement cycle more feasible via short term, %0 interest gap loans.
CAPACITY BUILDING PROGRAMMING
We provided 100+ hours of technical assistance and mentorship to 15 grassroots leaders and organizations on topics such as grant writing, fiscal sponsorship, budget forecasting, co-leading, avoiding burnout, policy advocacy, and programmatic sustainability. Given that our team possesses deep lived experience with the sex trades and has a combined 30+ years of experience in policy advocacy, direct service provision, non-profit administration and sex worker rights movement organizing, we are well positioned to support sex workers who are striving to make a difference in the world. Being available and receptive to dialoging with new and experienced advocates from a place of understanding and support has emerged as one of New Moon’s strongest contributions to the field.
Our Spokes Hub advocacy academy had its first full year of operating as an “open enrollment” opportunity for individuals with lived experience in the sex trade. This small but mighty program is filling a crucial gap in the movement for sex workers rights by providing non-judgmental spaces for peer learning, listening, and the cultivation of strengths for individual advocates. Support from the program extends beyond graduation in the form of financial support for advocacy work that is otherwise unpaid. Here are some snapshot from what Spokes Hub accomplished in 2024:"
Spokes Hub hosted two graduations, resulting in a total of 31 graduates from the program. Each graduate makes a public presentation on a topic relating to the sex trade, contributing to an ever growing library of sex worker and survivor-generated knowledge. Topics from the 2024 graduations include:
Unresolved Trauma and its Impact on Advocacy Work, Mari de Luna
Supporting Sex Workers in Healthcare Settings, Victoria von Blaque
Safe New Jersey Campaign, Tahtianna Fermin
A Local Law to Reduce Jail-Time & Fines for Prostitution, Josie Oakley
Exploring the Intersections of Non-Monogomy and Sex Work, Kiley George
For more graduation presentations, check out the Spokes Hub home page!
Spokes Hub graduates engaged in 41 acts of advocacy, and in turn were rewarded a total of $14,250 in “Awards Pool” payments. The average requested payment by a graduate was $140 ($250 is the maximum a person can request). Here are some examples of advocacy work that the Spokes Hub grads undertook in 2024:
Victoria Von Blaque spoke at the “Ending the Epidemic” HIV/AIDS summit in Albany NY.
Molly Henderson told her personal story of being placed on the sex offender registry as a survivor of sex trafficking as part of a day long convening with public health and law enforcement officials in Alabama.
Lauren Levitt hosted her first online panel via the UCR LGBT Resource Center on “Trading Sex/Sex Work”.
Sabra Boyd ghost wrote an op-ed for Domina Alexandra Snow that was published in the Columbus Dispatch on a censorship bill aimed at banning porn.
Cedar Selina presented on the topic of mutual aid in sex working communities to a classroom of graduate students at Antioch College in Seattle.
Allison Shulte created sex worker-friendly educational resources for patients and medical professionals on common pelvic floor issues affecting people assigned female at birth.
Spokes Hub hosted 28 classes, most of which are taught by educators with lived experience in the sex trades. Numerous classes were uploaded to a publicly accessible archive. Examples of classes we hosted include:
Navigating Anti-Trafficking Resources taught by Ms. Mercy Gray
Public Charities Can Lobby: How Your 501(c)(3) Can Influence Policy taught by Natalie Ossenfort
Get in Yo Bag: Grant Writing Workshop taught by Carlton Bell
Accountability and Care Work for Collective Advocacy Spaces taught by Rebekah Layton
We won a “Web Excellence” award for AAIR Directory, a free resource library for activists seeking advocacy information, funding opportunities, jobs, conferences and more. AAIR Directory serves as an archive of education materials and bulletin board of current opportunities. Each listing is peer reviewed by a Spokes Hub graduate before being uploaded. Currently, AAIR Directory hosts 422 multi-media advocacy resources about the sex trade and 127 opportunities such as grant cycles, job opportunities, and conferences.
PHILANTHROPIC EDUCATION
We presented at 10 philanthropic and adult industry conferences to engage in narrative change and perspective expansion with key funding networks including Giving List Women, ABFE, The Council on Foundations, the AWID International Forum, as well as XBiz Los Angeles & Miami. Topics we presented on include:
The intersectionality of sex workers rights to the major issues of our day.
The importance of finding common cause where there is disagreement on the issue of sex work within feminism.
Data on the acceleration of the movement for sex workers rights and grassroots groups leading the movement.
Global trends in anti-sex, anti-rights political campaigns and it’s impact on sex workers rights.
How to foster successful relationships through corporate philanthropy.
We contributed to the creation of a report from the Sex Work Donor Collaborative investigating the impact of Open Society Foundation’s funding withdrawal from the movement for sex workers rights, and recommendations for moving forward. We also contribute to the sustainment of the SWDC through participation in its planning and steering committees.
We submitted our 2022 and 2023 funding data US to Human Rights Funders Network, Funders for LGBTQ Issues, and Funders Concerned About AIDS to contribute to an accurate snapshot of the funding landscape for sex workers.
