Protecting The Legacy: HAAF II

Healthy African American Families II is a 501c3 non-profit founded by the community titan Dr. Loretta Jones. Since 1992 HAAF has made equity it's mission with the community at its center. Dr. Jones’ agency, Healthy African American Families, houses her vision and brings the impact of her servant-leader aims.  The stellar work of this agency includes the leadership and operational delivery of:

-Over 100 bi-directional (community/academic) learning events addressing over 20 health disparities, reaching over 10,000 people
-Provision of work/planning space to over 50 collaborative projects
-Provision of training and community capacity-building space
-Mentorship to academic and community partners and more! 


Healthy African American Families continues to provide the leadership, partnering, and community/academic activities it is known and appreciated for, BUT WE NEED YOUR HELP.  Dr. Loretta Jones is fighting the good fight of faith in her courageous efforts to recover from illness.  Sustainability efforts are needed to support the agency for 6 months of continued service, community-partnered supports, and fund development activities. To learn more about Healthy African American Families and more about Dr. Loretta Jones bio clink here.

The lion's share of these funds will go to programs and operation at a rate of 85%. The remaining 15% will support the CEO and staff. To see more about our campaign and how we will use these funds click here . 



DIRECT SERVICES-PROGRAMS & OPERATIONS

Capacity Building 60%
Collaborative Support 15%
Development -  Sustainability Efforts 10%

ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES

Organization Oversight – CEO compensation  10%
Operations -  Support Staff compensation         5%

If you'd like a more detailed breakdown of how funds will be used please click the link here. 

Dr. Jones is an impactful and dutiful leader! Her work and wisdom have touched the lives of many. Read the testimonials of her colleagues, partners, mentees, and friends below. 


DR. KEN WELLS, MD, MPH- UCLA Center for Health & Society

Loretta Jones and Healthy African American Families (HAAF) have literally transformed my work and life. Beginning with a lunch meeting with Loretta Jones in January of 2003, I apprenticed myself to HAAF for 4 years in the Witness For Wellness program to learn Community Engagement and a partnered research model and then applied it in partnership with HAAF, the RAND Corporation, UCLA and nearly 100 partner agencies over a period of more than a decade. This work led to one of the first randomized trials of Community Engagement relative to an alternative for a major health condition in under-resourced communities (depression) and to results showing benefits for communities in quality of life and social outcomes such as reduction in homelessness risk factors and in behavioral health hospitalizations. This work led to the entire partnership receiving the 2014 Team Science Award of the Association of Clinical and Translational Research among a number of other national and international awards. HAAF’s model of engagement also informed programs such as Recovery Post Katrina in New Orleans and the engagement framework for the UCLA Clinical Scholars Program and it’s current National Clinician Scholars Program. What this means is that Loretta and HAAF II have helped transform approaches to health disparities and mental health recovery as recognized by many agencies.  Continue the legacy. Support Engagement in Life and Thriving for our communities. We, Us and Our. Support the legacy.  Help HAAF II have a meaningful, sustainable contribution to community wellness and partnered research today! 


KEITH NORRIS-MD, PH.D-Professor of Medicine, UCLA Division of General Internal Medicine and Health Services Research.

One of my most amazing journeys in life began over 25 years ago when I first started working with Loretta and HAAF on a preterm health project in partnership with UCLA School of Public Health, Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science and the CDC. That project launched a lifetime filled with new experiences, many under the umbrella of “Building Bridges to Optimum Health”, our signature series to bring community-academic partnered information on priority conditions affecting the health of the community from mental health, diabetes, obesity, and other chronic medical conditions to violence and environmental exposures and even topics such as informed consent and precision medicine. Events also included information and opportunities for research and clinical care. During this journey, each of us learned and grew together as did so many other community and academic partners. Loretta once asked me why can’t there be a community faculty program and suddenly we working together, HAAF, several community health leaders and the Dean’s Office at Charles Drew University every other week for 2 years it became a reality. The inclusion of community into the health professional academy, bringing unique insights and experiences regarding the social determinants of health, the local organizations that work with so many people to help them face these and other tremendous challenges that impact their health is the future of health sciences. I not only became an integral part of HAAF but as an LA transplant, I became a part of her family. Loretta and HAAF have touched so many people in a wonderful way. Always there to help, even when HAAF had nothing to give, HAAF cared, HAAF helped, and then HAAF gave anyway. HAAF is unique in the service it provides to the Crenshaw community and beyond. Their caring approach is embodied in a quote by the late UCLA basketball coach John Wooden who said: “you can't live a perfect day without doing something for someone who will never be able to repay you”. Few have had more perfect days than Loretta and HAAF. Join in to ensure the spirit and the work of HAAF live on. With your support, HAAF can continue to reach out to ensure so many people with great needs continue to be touched by HAAF bringing to each of them as perfect a day as possible.

PAUL KOEGEL. Ph.D.- Associate Director, RAND Health; Senior Behavioral & Social Scientist

For more than 15 years now, I have been privileged to work hand in hand with Loretta Jones and HAAF to improve the lives of the too-often ignored residents of under-resourced communities in Los Angeles.  What a remarkable experience this has been.  Loretta—and HAAF—are truly one of a kind.  They exist to build bridges—bridges between the communities they so deeply care about and the resources that can help galvanize those communities’ strengths to address pressing problems.  Because of Loretta and HAAF, academic and research institutions like UCLA and RAND have learned to truly partner in relationships of equality with community-based organizations and grassroots sources of knowledge, skill, and experience.  Working together, these partnerships have produced palpable change.  And in the process, we’ve all grown immeasurably as people.  I personally owe a debt of gratitude to Loretta and HAAF for the opportunities they have given me to make a difference, for the personal friendships that the collaboration has nurtured, and for insights into issues and problems that I never would have fully grasped without the frank, open, and honest exchanges our partnership and friendship have allowed.  HAAF fills a unique niche that few other agencies can address.  It deserves your support.

BOWEN CHUNG, MD, MSHS- Associate Professor-in-Residence in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA

Working with Healthy African American Families II (HAAFII) and Loretta Jones over the last 15 years has transformed me as an individual and for my life’s work, as it has for literally the thousands of individuals who have attended one of their conferences, been trained by HAAFII staff, or mentored by Loretta Jones. Loretta and HAAFII’s contribution to the world is based on a seemingly obvious, but often forgotten idea that individuals impacted by research, policy, and services in low-income, safety-net settings should be equal partners at the table when developing and implementing research, policy, and policy. And that the failure of efforts at improving the lives of individuals in safety-nets, despite well-meaning efforts by such individuals / institutions, are often due to the having an incomplete understanding of how such efforts can be made to be consistent with the beliefs, priorities, and lived experiences of local communities; as well as the distrust engendered by a long history of tragedies under-resourced communities have experienced such as Tuskegee and Henrietta Lacks in biomedical research. HAAFII and Loretta Jones have made it their mission to ensure that large systems, researchers and policymakers don’t repeat these mistakes through training and education.  They have trained hundreds of nurses and physicians across medical specialties at UCLA through the National Clinician Scholars Program who have become healthcare system leaders, prominent physician-researchers, and policymakers.  Their influence can be seen through HAAF’s central role in the UCLA Clinical and Translational Science Institute, which is using HAAFII’s model for community-academic partnerships to ensure that the findings of NIH-funded research can improve the lives of under-resourced communities through broad public health impact. Please consider supporting HAAFII in continuing their mission for years to come.
ROBERTO VARGAS, MD, MPH-Associate Professor of Medicine, Division of General Internal Medicine and Health Services Research, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA

Loretta Jones and Healthy African-American Families have been one of the most important factors in bridging the gap between relevant community insights and action and the rigorous academic exploration of the causes and solutions to challenges in achieving health equity. As the incubator for partnered solutions for public health problems that we experience firsthand in South Los Angeles and demonstrating how these efforts can be replicated in other settings and communities, Healthy African-American Families has been the exemplar of grassroots activism made scalable for social change throughout the world. Let us all lend our support of this valuable and homegrown legacy.

NORMA STOKER-MTUME-Retired Associate Director and Chief Financial Officer of SHIELDS for Families, Inc.

I have known Loretta since the early 1990s.  We met while she was working with the Community Coalition in South Los Angeles. As part of the executive team at SHIELDS for Families for over 24 years, I had opportunity and privilege to work with Loretta and HAAF on a number of health-related initiatives and projects addressing preterm births, diabetes, and autism, just to name a few.  She has always been a feisty woman to reckon with, standing true to her beliefs about uplifting the community by improving health and wellness. I have witnessed her being the key community mastermind behind numerous academic-community research and overall wellness partnerships over the past 16 years. She is always keen on making sure research outcomes get back to the community, most often through conferences in the community. She invited me to join her, other community leaders, and academic researchers to develop and serve on Drew Medical School's Community Faculty, which has catapulted me to be involved with areas of health I had never imagined existed.  I am most proud of our work together, but even more proud to call Loretta leader, colleague, and dear friend.  

MARTHA BOISSEAU, MPH-CDC Women in STEM Careers

It is my great pleasure to write this note in total support of this GoFundMe for Healthy African American Families. I have had the privilege of working in partnership with Loretta Jones and HAAF for 20 years. HAAF has been a beacon of health for residents of Los Angeles for over 35 years. They have helped thousands of residents improve their quality of life and have been staunch advocates for the health of people they serve.  They are a vital part of the health advocacy community in L.A. I can’t say enough about Loretta. My colleague and my friend.  She has ensured that the people of Los Angeles have access to high-quality health care. She has been a TIRELESS champion for the residents she serves. She has traveled the world on behalf of the people of Los Angeles. Additionally, the seminars and workshops that HAAF has sponsored are legendary.  It is because of Loretta and HAAF that the lives of the people of LA are richer.  It is my DISTINCT honor and pleasure to support HAAF’s GoFundMe. 



We hope that you will support us in our efforts to sustain Loretta's great legacy and HAAF's great work.