Voces Ciudadanas is a grassroots organization that works to build the collective power of migrants and other marginalized people by promoting community leadership and organizing, offering popular education programming and creating spaces to encourage dialogue so that social justice becomes a reality.
Voces Ciudadanas es una asociación comunitaria que trabaja para aumentar el poder colectivo de las personas migrantes y marginalizadas a través del fomento al liderazgo y la organización comunitaria, la educación popular y la creación de espacios para el diálogo para así hacer de la justicia social una realidad.
Our History
Voces Ciudadanas is a grassroots organization founded in 2015 in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. Voces Ciudadanas was founded to create an alternative space so that neighbors could come together to engage in dialogue about gentrification and other issues facing our neighborhood. In 2017, when overcrowded schools in our community became a big issue, Voces Ciudadanas helped establish and lead the Make Space for Schools Campaign.
As part of the Make Space for Schools campaign, Voces organized marches, delivered a petition with over 3,000 signatures to the School Chancellor, and crashed a meeting of the School Construction Authority to demand that new schools were built in our neighborhood. All these efforts contributed to bring 5 new school buildings to the neighborhood! Now, PS896, PS958, old police precinct 43rd & 4th are NOW open and accessible to children in Sunset Park.
During the Pandemic, Voces Ciudadanas distributed over 1200 pounds of food a week to the community including seniors and extended families. We also helped over 400 community members apply for the NYS Rent Assistance Program and the Excluded Workers Fund.
We opened a community center in the midst of the pandemic, which was used first as a food distribution hub. We now offer, in-person art workshops for families and the community to provide a safe space to build relationships and discuss issues affecting our community.
Voces Ciudadanas has grown in the past 3 years. We are looking to expand our work of organizing around issues and integrating art as the catalyst for social change and community dialogue.