BY EUAN BEAR

ebanon, NH — In an ironic twist of fund-
ing fate, Torn Mock, director of A ‘

ommunity Response Network

(ACoRN) of New Hampshire and Vermont,
was recognized in late May for his
Community Health Leadership by the Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation and awarded
$120,000. '

Department of Health declined to pass along
to ACORN‘ any of its CDC grant monies, put-
ting a big hole in the agency’s finances.

“Of course it’s wonderful to be
acknowledged in this way,” Mock said in a
phone interview. “If you believe in karma, you
could look at it this way: Kurt [Kleier,
Vermont’s then—AIDS chief] got fired and I
got a national awar .”

(According to a report in the Valley
News, Mock was eventually able to convince
VDH to locate $28,000 in other grant funding,
which may well be supplemented by an addi-
tional appropriation from the Vermont legisla-
ture for AIDS prevention. Further, New
Hampshire awarded the agency $53,000, an
increase of $12,000 over last year’s grant.)

Mock receives $15,000 of the award
for his personal use. He said he hasn’t
decided yet» how to apply the other $105,000.
“I'm going to DC next week for a week, meet-
ing to share ideas with 30 award winners —
this year’s 10 and the awardees from the pre-
vious two years - before I decide. I’m going to
take my time to think about how best to use
these funds, and take advantage of the techni-
cal assistance at Robert Wood Johnson
[Foundation] .” The terms of the award allow
the monies to be spent over a three-year
period.

Among the other meetings Mock
planned to attend were those set up by the
foundation’s “Project Connect” with New
Harnpshire’s members of Congress. “I was
nominated from New Hampshire, even though
we serve as many clients in Vermont, but
[Project Connect] didn’t realize that until I
called and asked them to set me up with
Vermont, too. They said they would get me a
meeting with’ [Vermont Congressman] Bernie
[Sanders] .”

In those meetings, Mock said he
planned to ask the politicians, “ ‘Will you

It was just last fall that the Vermont '

ACoN’s Mock
Wins Award

‘Foundation Recognizes Leadership

come to an ACoRN event?’ This is one way to
bring some light back to AIDS,” Mock added,
citing the way AIDS stories - the personal sto-
ries about how it is to live with the disease -
have nearly disappeared from the media.

Mock will also use some of his new-
found leverage to get New Hampshire law-
makers to designate Hepatitis C as a
reportable disease. ACoRN decided last year
to extend the agency’s services to include peo-
ple living with HCV, or Hep-C. According to
Mock, “26,000 people are infected with Hep-
C in New Hampshire, and there’s no real treat-
ment or outreach.” And no national funding
for research or testing.

Cathy Dunham, a national program
director for the Robert Wood Johnson

‘Foundation, said that outreach, that expansion

of mission and services beyond HIV/AIDS to
Hepatitis C, was part of what made Tom Mock
and ACQRN stand out among the 600 other
nominees, of which about a quarter were
AIDS-related service organizations.

_ “It had to do with how the work‘ per-
sisted through ups and downs and adapted for
its community,” Dunharn explained in a phone
interview from Boston. And it was “Tom’s

. devotion as first a volunteer and then making

an investment when the organization was hav-
ing difficulties, then stretching out to address
Hepatitis C. The national committee was very
impressed.”

The foundation is not, she said, rec-

ognizing “Lone Rangers,” but whole organiza-'

tions, especially, as here, “organizations that
are overwhelmed from their original tasks and

mission but then say ‘Let’s take on another
task.’ And it’s driven by the need in the com-
munity. There came a point when they were
losing more clients to Hep C than to
HIV/AIDS.”

In order to get researchers interested
in a treatment or a cure, “we need statistics,”
Mock explained. “Hep C is the most prevalent
blood-borne pandemic in the world right now.
It’s estimated that 1.4 million people are
infected with AIDS/HIV in this country. There
are 5 to 10 million with Hep-C.” And many of
those people do not know they are infected.

“A lot of people got infected just by
getting a tattoo, in the days before we went
into the parlors and insisted on clean needles
because of AIDS. Little did we know that
Hep-C was alive in the ink vats,” Mock said.
Tattoo artists now use individual vials of ink
for each customer. .

N Further, Mock declared, “Hepatitis C
is the leading cause of the need for liver trans-
plants.”

Tom Mock first got involved in
HIV/AIDS work when he was counseling
young hemophiliacs who had contracted the
virus through blood transfusions. When he
began speaking out against the prejudice they
and their families faced, some physicians
stopped referring patients to Mock.
“Undaunted, he became Executive Director of
ACORN, which had been struggling financial-
ly. Within a year, he had succeeded in winning
back the full support and respect of the state
agencies that funded the organization,
increased the staff to seven, and quadrupled
the budget,” according to the official press
release announcing the award.

David Chambers, a gay member of
the ACoRN board of directors, nominated
Mock for the award. He noted that Mock,
straight, married and with five children,
including his own and his wife’s from their
prior marriages, had gained the trust of the gay
community in dealing with the AIDS crisis. ,

ACoRN provides HIV/AIDS servic-
es throughout the rural counties of Grafton
and Sullivan in New Hampshire, and Windsor
and Orange in Verrnont_- low-income areas
with limited public transportation, where peo-
ple with AIDS can easily become isolated.
ACoRN also offers assistance with housing,
food and transportation .7

Samara Grants 1

continued from page 3

the agency’s 2005 fiscal year, which
ended on March 31. That represents

» the highest total since the $78,178 7
the agency received in 2000. At the

same time, Lippert’s figures show
annual income of $141,976, and
expenses for the year of $141,225,
leaving a slight gain of $751. The
figures provided show that the
Samara Foundation has had deficits
in four of the last eight years
(1998,1999, 2001, and 2003),
including a loss of $8700 for 2003.

Some of these data are
available on the foundation’s IRS
Form 990, which is public informa-
tion, available for most nonprofit
organizations through a website
called Guidestar (www.guidestar.
org). Basic information and a scan
of the form are available free with
registration. The most recent 990
form available for Samara is_for cal-
endar year 2003. The foundation

changed its accounting process from

cash to accrual and its fiscal year

from calendar to April 1-March 31
in 2004.

The grant figures provided
to 0ITM by Samara show that
Outright has been the recipient of
the most money awarded in grants
since 1998, with $42,500, followed
by Mountain Pride Media (publisher
of Out in the Mountains) with
$34,500, and the Vermont Freedom
to Marry Task Force, with $20,155.
Other five-figure recipients since
1998 include the AIDS Project of
Southern Vermont ($12,600),

R.U.l .2? Queer Community Center
($12,400), Vermont CARES
($10,600) and ‘SafeSpace ($10,550).

This Year's Awards
Eight organizations will

receive some funding from Samara
this year: the AIDS Project of
Southern Vermont, $1500; Vermont
CARES, $2000; Outright Vermont,
$5000; Mountain Pride Media,
$4000; Vermont Freedom to Marry
Task Force, $1750; SafeSpace
$1250; Transgender Day of
Remembrance, $1000; and R.U.l .2?
Queer Community Center $3500 for
“improving and increasing lesbian’
health work” in providing “support,
education and information about
health care for LBT (lesbian, bisexu-
al, transgender) women.”

Three graduating Vermont
high school seniors have been
awarded 2005 Samara Foundation
Scholarships. Larson Hogstrom of
Killington, Lauren Parker of
Williston, and Gavin Rouille of
South Burlington were each award-
ed a $1,000 scholarship. Twenty-two
Vermont high school seniors have
been recognized as Samara Scholars
since the awards were established in
2000. V