Rival AIDS Walk Spurred by Fight for Private Funds

A new AIDS walk-a-thon scheduled Sunday in downtown Los Angeles, touted as a means to get private donations to more groups, is the culmination of a sometimes bitter conflict between its sponsors and AIDS Project Los Angeles, the largest and oldest AIDS agency in the county.

The “Eastside AIDS-Thon” is expected to raise at least $350,000 for 22 AIDS service providers and bring attention to the rising incidence of the disease among minorities, especially those in East and South Los Angeles.

But sponsors also hope the event will break what they consider a monopoly on fund raising by APLA’s original and more famous “AIDS Walk.”

The dispute in the AIDS service sector arose earlier this year, when APLA turned down repeated requests by smaller, community-based groups to share the planning and wealth of its multimillion-dollar AIDS Walk.

The smaller groups charge that APLA, created in 1982 mainly by and for white, gay males, cannot address the cultural and linguistic differences that have accompanied rising numbers of minorities with AIDS--and therefore shouldn’t have a monopoly on private fund raising.

“The AIDS Walk is the single most important symbol of AIDS effort in Los Angeles County,” said Michael Weinstein, president of the Hollywood-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which is spearheading the AIDS-Thon. “Today, it symbolizes a monopoly of power rather than a sharing of resources.”

APLA has vigorously defended its services and refusal to allow other groups to sponsor the AIDS Walk. One official said he wished the AIDS-Thon luck, but considered it partly a sabotage effort by jealous, “ego-driven” agencies.

“I don’t want to go around acting like we’re a minority organization . . . but we provide the services in this town,” said Stephen Bennett, APLA’s chief executive officer. “APLA in the last 90 days has seen its biggest client growth in our history. I don’t think it’s wise to endanger that.”

The expected leveling off of the county’s commitment to AIDS, at an estimated $65 million this year, has increased competition for private funds, such as those raised in the annual AIDS Walk.

In 1985, the first APLA walk raised $600,000 and put the agency in the public’s eye, Bennett said. This year, the walk attracted 15,000 participants who raised $2.3 million.

The proceeds never have been shared, Bennett said, because APLA cannot afford to give away its revenue. The agency, with a $12-million budget, offers more than 20 services, including case management, residential care and free groceries, clothing and other staples to more than 70% of the 10,000 AIDS cases in the county, he said.

But leaders of smaller service groups say the changing demographics of AIDS has altered APLA’s role and unique right to proceeds from its walk.

Blacks, Latinos, Asians and other minorities now account for 41% of all AIDS cases in the county, up from 29% four years ago, according to June figures recorded by the Department of Health Services.

As the statistics change, so does the nature of the problem, service providers said. Many minorities with AIDS also are homeless and poor, speak no English and know little about how to get help, they said.

APLA has worked with other groups to coordinate services, Bennett said. For instance, the agency recently established a computerized client referral system with eight other groups, Bennett said.

But critics charge that the agency has not been “culturally sensitive” enough to communicate with increasingly eclectic AIDS communities. They pointed out that nearly three years ago, several Latino administrators of APLA resigned after protesting that the organization was insensitive to minority needs.

“What does that really mean, when you say you ‘serve’ people?” asked the Rev. Carl Bean, chief executive officer of Minority AIDS Project, an AIDS-Thon sponsor based in South-Central Los Angeles. “If the bulk of the clients that a person serves has been upwardly mobile, pretty well-educated and insured . . . you’re talking about two different worlds.”

Last February, Bean and officials of the Healthcare Foundation, Gay and Lesbian Community Services Center, Being Alive and Shanti Foundation told APLA the public wrongly thought the AIDS Walk benefited the entire AIDS community. It was APLA’s duty, they said, to share the walk’s wealth with smaller agencies, who in turn could help increase the profits.

Three months later, APLA turned down the request. But on Sept. 13--10 days before the APLA AIDS Walk--the agency gave $225,000 to nine community-based groups.

Healthcare Foundation leaders and other groups thought the move meant their campaign had worked. They placed an ad in several gay and lesbian community newspapers with the headline, “APLA: A Good First Step.” But Bennett firmly maintained that the money came from other fund-raisers, not the AIDS Walk.

The refusal to open up the AIDS Walk prompted Weinstein to mobilize 21 other small agencies to create the AIDS-Thon.

“It basically became a situation where they had theirs and we needed to have ours,” Weinstein said. “But we would have preferred to have one event embracing all the groups.”

The AIDS-Thon begins at 10 a.m. Sunday at the Music Center. It is expected to draw at least 5,000 participants through downtown Los Angeles, including the Broadway business district and Little Tokyo, to El Pueblo Historic Park near Olvera Street.

The AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which is financing the event, will receive 50% of the proceeds, Weinstein said. The 21 other sponsors will split the other 50%, depending on how many participants they recruit.

Participants in a walk-a-thon recruit sponsors who pledge a certain amount of money for every mile walked. In addition, corporations are solicited.