The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation Announces Homeboy Industries as the 2020 Recipient of the Annual Humanitarian Prize
The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation is pleased to announce that the Los Angeles based, nonprofit organization Homeboy Industries has been chosen as the 2020 Humanitarian Prize recipient and will receive $2.5 million in unrestricted funding. As the world’s largest annual humanitarian award, the Prize is presented to a nonprofit organization judged to have made extraordinary contributions toward alleviating human suffering. To date, the Hilton Foundation has awarded $36.5 million to recipients of the Prize. Homeboy Industries joins the roster of 24 Prize Laureates, including METAdrasi, SHOFCO, icddr,b and The Task Force for Global Health, selected by an independent, international jury.
Peter Laugharn, president and CEO, Conrad N. Hilton Foundation states, “The Jury’s selection of Homeboy Industries as the recipient of the 2020 Hilton Humanitarian Prize speaks to the power of standing with people who have been systemically marginalized, creating space for them to heal and invest in their future, with the intention of ending the socio-economic inequities that impact communities. A tremendous example of ground-breaking humanitarian work right here in Los Angeles, its community-led approach has spawned and supported a global network of over 300 organizations. Homeboy Industries embodies the spirit of the Prize and the work of the Foundation — focusing on equity, resilience and dignity — in an inspiring way.”
Founded in 1988 by Fr. Gregory Boyle, S.J., Homeboy Industries was formed with the goal of improving the lives of former gang members in East Los Angeles. At that time, Fr. Gregory Boyle, S.J. was a pastor of the Dolores Mission Church, the most impoverished Catholic parish in the city, along with Aliso Village and Pico Gardens, the two largest public housing projects west of the Mississippi. They also had the highest concentration of gang activity in the country. While law enforcement tactics of suppression and criminal justice policies of mass incarceration were the prevailing means to deal with gang violence, Fr. Gregory Boyle, S.J. saw young people who deserved a chance and has since worked to change the way the world treats those who have been systematically marginalized...