Care First Community Investment
Third Party Administrator

Social Service + Social Justice
Equals Social Progress

Remembrance. Reclamation. Reconciliation. Resolution. Restoration.

Mission

Amity Foundation is dedicated to the inclusion and habilitation of people marginalized by addiction, trauma, criminality, incarceration, poverty, racism, sexism, homelessness, and violence.

We strive to improve health and promote environmental, social, and economic justice.

Amity is committed to research, development, implementation, and dissemination of information regarding community building.

Misión de Amistad

La Fundación Amistad se dedica a la inclusión y habilitación de personas marginadas a causa de sus problemas de adicción, experiencias traumáticas, encarcelamiento, pobreza, discriminación racial o sexual, carencia de vivienda, y violencia.

Nos esforzamos por mejorar la salud y promover la justicia ambiental, social y económica.

La Fundación Amistad está entregada a la investigación, desarrollo, ejecución y difusión de información dirigida a construir un sentido comunitario más completo.

About Amity Foundation

Founded in 1981 in Tucson, AZ, Amity Foundation is a California 501(c)3 non-profit organization that serves individuals, families, and children. Amity began as a therapeutic community and has evolved into a teaching community. Our mission is to foster personal growth, emotional literacy and social responsibility for our students, as well as improve their physical health through nutrition and wellness. These create the fertile ground for students' success in gaining employment, housing, furthering education, and reuniting families.

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people served every year

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of every dollar spent
goes to direct services

Amity’s Approach: Metaphor of the Medicine Wheel

North

Emotional Intelligence

Changing coping skills, learning and practicing how to respond versus react, helps one get out of the position of victim and able to use one’s story to help others. This fosters personal creativity based on one’s own experience.


West

Moral Development

Understanding and developing a moral value system based in empathy is a key component of permanent change. Examining the consequences of one’s past behavior, creates space to make amends and engage in restorative action.

The Medicine Wheel

The Medicine Wheel

East

Restorative Paradigms

A student’s journey begins by learning to live in community, being accountable and part of a larger whole. They participate in circles, ceremonies, mindfulness, workshops and more to begin understanding themself within context.


South

Origins & Family Dynamics

Who we are is, in part, a product of where we came from and our childhood experiences. By examining one’s roots and early life, we gain insight into the culture, history and events that helped shaped choices, decisions and circumstances.

Behind Walls & Beyond Walls

Whether through prevention, pre arrest, homelessness, in jail, during probation or on parole, Amity is able to reach out and help students. 

While living on campuses in Arizona and California, people begin to work to reclaim their heritage and personal history in order to reconcile their past. 

Within prisons, In-Prison Treatment Readiness methods help prepare for reintegration into communities, with the goal of returning people from number to name.


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Naya Arbiter
(9/20/52-3/3/22)

Below is a video tribute to Naya put together by Amity faculty member Thijs Boonen. We hope Naya’s words and teachings will continue to educate and inspire our community and all of those who knew her.

Our Community


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