A letter to DBH, AACO, and all funders of Prevention Point Philadelphia

Dear Department of Behavioral Health, AIDS Activities Coordinating Office, and all funders of Prevention Point Philadelphia,

Before we proceed, we want to state that we firmly support and are fighting alongside all survivors, especially the Black trans women who have offered their testimony. We are painfully aware that harms against trans women have been historically erased and minimized in harm reduction spaces. Additionally, we recognize the labor and care that many low-level workers of Prevention Point Philadelphia put into the organization and that PPP would not be functioning without them. 

It is important to name that harm reduction - a framework pioneered by some of the most marginalized - is not immune from white supremacy, trans misogyny, and rape culture; violence which has long eroded the integrity of Prevention Point Philadelphia and continue to today. Examples of these are littered throughout the recent Inquirer article and Billy Penn article. To be clear, we have eyewitness testimony which states that issues detailed in these articles remain present and are not merely relics of the past. Executive Director José Benitez gaslighting survivors and outright denying the wrongs committed is but a small example. Not named is Silvana Mazzella, Associate Executive Director, who actively fosters a destructive culture which is ratified by the Board of Prevention Point Philadelphia. 

To be clear, a culture of white supremacy and transmisogyny is not the result of one person’s power or influence. A hostile organizational environment persists at organizations because there is also a culture of cover up in which everyone in power participates. Hence, we are moved to name that the entire leadership team and the Board must be held accountable. We do not see how the conditions at Prevention Point Philadelphia (PPP) can be made better unless the entire structure of the organization is overhauled. 

Further, we want to name that the harm reduction work that continues to primarily be spearheaded in Philadelphia by grassroots organizations and informal networks of People Who Use Drugs (PWUDs) will continue to exist and thrive in spite of the violence that PPP as an institution commits. PPP has long co-opted conversations on drug use and harm reduction in the city and has presented its structure as the be-all and end-all on these topics. Our existence is proof that this narrative is false. PPP’s denial of grassroots efficacy allows for the violence at PPP to continue unchecked. Grassroots harm reductionists in Philadelphia are threatened that if Prevention Point Philadelphia is made to be held accountable for required changes, somehow access to supplies and harm reduction services in Philadelphia would disappear. This fear is unfounded. Time and again, rather than engaging public dialogue around harm reduction and drug use, they instead stoke community tensions and redirect public anger about drug use towards grassroots harm reduction organizations. This severely impedes progress on any radical work that can be done to move our communities forward. Neither have they upheld the harm reduction principle on centering current PWUD and sex workers in making programmatic or other decisions that affect their daily lives. This performative harm reduction carried out by PPP feeds white supremacist notions of profit pursuit and saviorisim. It does not uplift our communities and it does not make our conditions better. 

As the primary funders and colleagues of PPP, we urge you to consider the violence you are cosigning, aligning with and enabling. We encourage you to listen to the survivors and other harm reductionists who have been on the ground doing this work in Philadelphia for nearly 20 years. 

Our members who are the survivors of PPP’s structural violence have the following demands:

• An apology from Prevention Point Philadelphia for both the violence that was silenced and the retraumatization which was created from the gaslighting found in the articles. 

• All staff members, including management and Human Resources, must be required to take training classes on decreasing human rights violations for queer and transgender clients, participants and staff.

• Affected former and current staff must be reimbursed for lost wages from coping with the unsafe environment created by José, Silvana, and the entire Board. This must be supplemented by compensation for previous, current, and any potential future therapy bills, which have already accumulated substantially and will only rise.

• Resignation of the entire leadership team and Board of Prevention Point Philadelphia and a rehaul of the entire working structure. 

Signed, 

Project SAFE Philadelphia, SOL Collective, and The Philadelphia Red Umbrella Alliance