The Asian Pacific Islander Community AIDS Project (APICAP) is celebrating their tenth anniversary this Saturday, Sept. 20, with a gala at the Wyndham Emerald Plaza. The evening will include a silent auction beginning at 6:30 p.m., followed by dinner at 7:30 p.m. The entertainment lineup for the evening includes Jocelyn Enriquez, who is best known for her hits “Do You Miss” and “A Little Bit of Ecstasy.” In addition, local artist Armi Guzman and two dance troops will be performing. Maria Arcega-Dunn of Fox News and Noel Guanzon will host the evening.

Ten years ago the Legal Aid Society of San Diego and Alliance Healthcare Foundation recognized the need for a program to address the increasing HIV/AIDS concerns among the API community. Dr. Sana Loue, the founder of APICAP, was practicing law with the Legal Aid Society when she first noticed the rise in HIV among the API community and how it was affecting their immigration status.

She also noted, “Two problems were dominant: youth involved in drugs and those who were associated with gangs.”

Those growing problems opened the doors for APICAP to address the problems of HIV in the API community. Even so, addressing those issues in the conservative community is not easy.

“The API community doesn’t really see that there is a problem,” said Jess San Roque, executive director of APICAP. “They will tell you to today that HIV is a gay white man disease and they think that only bad people get the disease. I was at a place just two months ago and I was talking to this Filipina lady and I was telling her that I had some Filipino clients and her response was, ‘I thought we were good people.’ My thought was I really need to educate this woman about HIV/AIDS.”

According to its mission statement, APICAP is an organization dedicate to securing justice for and protection of rights of APIs living with HIV. The organization provides services for those affected by HIV and AIDS by offering outreach, paraprofessional counseling and support, health education, prevention and risk-reduction. They also provide culturally and linguistically appropriate HIV/AIDS prevention and care services to the API community. Currently they are funded through the CDC to target their education campaign for youth, and through the County and Operation Samahan to target the men who have sex with men population. Collaboration with other agencies has proven to be an ideal way to fund the agency.

“That’s the only reason why we continue to exist,” San Roque said. “I knew that by collaborating with other agencies that was the only way we would be able to survive funding-wise. We didn’t have any funding from 1995 to 1997 and I worked out of my parent’s house because I knew that there was a need for our services. At that time we were serving 15-20 HIV clients.”

Currently, through direct services, which include case management that coordinates benefits from housing to social security, APICAP is serving 36 clients. The health education, prevention and risk reduction component is targeted at close to 3,000 members of the API community in the San Diego area.

At the gala, APICAP will be presenting three special awards. The Hope Award is being presented to Dr. Sana Loue, the founder of APICAP. Loue currently serves as an associate professor in the Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the School of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University, in Cleveland, Ohio. The Service Award is being presented to Jeffery Tom, who has been with APICAP since its beginning and is currently the vice president of the organization. In addition to his duties with APICAP, Tom also serves on the Mayor’s GLBT advisory board. Last, but certainly not least, the compassion award is being presented to Dr. Linda Lloyd of Alliance Healthcare Foundation, who manages all aspects of the organization’s grant-making processes.

Tickets for the gala are still available by contacting APICAP at (619) 229-2822.