API Legal Outreach continues its efforts to combat domestic violence in the Filipino community in the wake of two recent Filipino domestic violence homicides (Claire Joyce Tempongko's slaying in 2000 and the death of Marisa C. in 2004). With the assistance of the Justice and Courage Project, the API Partnership has been able to revive the Filipina Advisory Council on Domestic Violence. Since December 2004, meetings have been held on a monthly basis, with a strong representation from Filipino organizations, domestic violence service providers, and other community leaders. These meetings have focused on resource sharing, community outreach, developing protocols to deal with emergent Filipino domestic violence situations, and capacity building.
Currently, the Filipina Advisory Council is organizing and implementing an event to commemorate the five-year anniversary of Claire Joyce Tempongko's murder on October 28, 2005. The Council has also embarked on an initiative for 2006 that aims to have Filipino community organizations incorporate a domestic violence curriculum into their own program activities or receive domestic violence training from the API Partnership
Despite the perception that Filipino Americans are fluent in English, 36% of Bay Area Filipino Americans do not speak English "very well" and 13% are linguistically isolated. For this segment of the Community, legal assistance must be provided in a culturally and linguistically competent manner. Through the receipt of a two-year fellowship through Equal Justice Works and Fenwick and West, LLP, API Legal Outreach now has the capacity to provide legal support in Tagalog and two Filipino dialects (Cebuano and Ilonggo) across an array of issues, including immigration, family and consumer law. This fellowship has allowed API Legal Outreach to further expand services offered to low-income Filipino immigrants. Through the fellowship, API Legal Outreach will be able to provide staff and support for monthly walk-in clinics in collaboration with Filipino community organizations in Vallejo and Excelsior, two previously underserved communities with large Filipino populations. This project builds on current efforts to provide free legal service to Filipino veterans, low-income seniors and recent immigrants.
As Filipino immigrants who have made a successful transition to well-paid, long-term employment often offer the best lessons for new immigrants, funding from the fellowship will also support a mentoring network to recruit Filipino professionals to serve as mentors to low-income recent immigrant families. Mentoring networks will also be established amongst Filipino undergraduate and law students to promote service in their communities.
Filipino Americans are now the second-largest Asian immigrant group in the Bay Area. In the Greater Bay Area, Filipinos constitute roughly one-quarter of the Asian American community. In Daly City alone, almost one-third of the population is of Filipino ancestry. Like so many immigrant communities, this Community struggles with issues of equity and fairness. Despite their established presence in the Bay Area, according to recent Census data, 13% of Bay Area Filipino Americans live in poverty, with some families subsisting on less than $10,000.00 per year.