Hello family,
My name is Tray and today I am reaching out to ask you to be a part of a great vision. I have recently been experiencing the Boston organizing scene and have become inspired in to expand my efforts in fighting against the prison system.
I was the National Director for an organization whose mission and values were based in prison abolition and decided that it wasn’t enough to work for someone else’s vision but that it was important for me to build my own so I no longer had to struggle with feeling like I was passionately working towards someone else’s goals.
My own goals for fighting the prison system come from not only being able to empathize with the stories of those who have been incarcerated, it also comes from a place of living in said system myself for almost 9 years. And as hard as I fought for myself and others while serving my time, once released I knew that my fight wasn’t over because I was out of those walls, but the people that looked like me, weren’t.
I knew that if I didn’t join the movement to tell their stories and fight for their right to be outside of those walls, that my fellow sisters worth and voices would have not only been silenced, but they would have been forgotten as well. And I refused to let that happen, thus I came back to an organization I had began to build but never quite was able to make my one and only passion project, until now. And it’s called #FedFam4Life.
#FedFam4Life is a sisterhood that I have built through the bonds formed inside the prison industrial complex, and solidified since my release. We are dedicated to helping those most impacted by the prison system, women, with a primary focus on LGBTQ women and women of color. From helping them to find formerly incarcerated-friendly housing to building an advocacy team that will help support jailhouse lawyers - the help and resources currently and formerly incarcerated women need to successfully rehabilitate themselves - is what I and my team want to be able to provide.
My hope is to be able to continue the work I’ve been doing with #FedFam4Life but on a larger scale. We are building a home base in Boston and without a doubt plan to make connections with people that share the same beliefs as us and are willing to passionately work to supporting our sisters both in and out of the prison walls to make #FedFam4Life’s work go global.
And one of the connection we are making in an attempt to help us go global is with YOU, my sister, my brother, my supporters, my FedFam. I am asking for your support. WE are Launching with The STILL I RISE GALA. It will be a celebration of Female Leadership. If you can’t attend the Gala on Feb. 10th in Brookline Ma. consider purchasing a ticket for a formerly incarcerated person, or follow this link to donate to the organization itself.
Any size donation will help us move our vision further along and help move, in what we hope to be thousands of our incarcerated sisters, into new and better phases of their life.
We thank you for taking the time to read this letter, We thank you for believing in us, we thank you for considering making a donation to our cause, but more importantly we thank you for being someone who believes in helping prove to those that have been in prison or are currently in the prison system that they are not alone and that there are people willing to fight not only for them but WITH them every step of the way.
With Warm Regards,
Tray and Foxxy
FedFam4life