Southern Tier AIDS Program, Inc.

Founded in 1984 by a small group of concerned citizens as “Friends Who Care”, the Southern Tier AIDS Program began with $50,000, three staff, donated office space and a desire to ease the suffering of our friends who were dying. Twenty-six years later STAP is an organization of 50+ professional staff and an operating budget of 3 million dollars annually. The passion and creativity that began this organization continues to inform us today as we provide supportive services to HIV+ persons and state of the art prevention education from 9 offices in 8 counties (Broome, Chenango, Chemung, Cortland, Delaware, Otsego, Tioga and Tompkins) of the Southern Tier of New York. We strive in conjunction with our volunteers and communities to create a world where HIV transmission is rare and those who are HIV+ lead healthy lives. We cultivate individual and community strengths as a means to improve the public health. Our services focus on the health and well being of HIV+ persons, people living in poverty, lesbian, gay, bisexual & transgender persons, youth, communities of color, formerly incarcerated persons and substance users. All services incorporate a harm reduction perspective and recognize that behavior change is a gradual and non-linear process. STAP offers a wide range of HIV-related services in the region and is currently serving the largest caseload of HIV-positive individuals in its history.