Thank you for your support and interest in my documentary abUSed: The Postville Raid (www.abusedthepostvilleraid.com).  Your attendance and feedback at our presentations has been an incredibly valuable reaffirmation of grassroots support for this film. I want to give you a brief update on our progress and tell you where we are headed.

 

I am happy to report that after two years, 25 trips to Iowa and 10 trips to Guatemala during which we compiled over 400 hours of testimonies, images, and interviews we have just finished editing the documentary. We are now putting the final touches on it including sound design, music, mix, color correction, titles, subtitles, credits, licensing and insurance, DVD authoring, mastering and duplication and web page design-essential but expensive elements necessary for a theater ready film. To finish this project we need your help.

 

We have been lucky enough to receive grants from a diverse group of non-profit organizations but our most meaningful funding has come from small individual contributions. We have only 24% of our budget to go! In difficult economic times like these I hesitate to ask you for money but I do so because I believe that the story of Postville must be seen and heard by as many people as possible. 

 

No donation is too small and every dollar is a valuable step forward towards the film's completion. Please consider making a secure online, tax-deductible contribution through our fiscal sponsor, the New York Immigration Coalition. To do so please click here http://www.nycharities.org/donate/c_donate.asp?CharityCode=1722 and designate your donation to:abUSed: The Postville Raid Fund

 

We are hoping to complete the film in order to premiere it at a major festival this fall or early January. Your support will help us get there.

 

With the increased national awareness of the complex immigration issues in our country, I am more convinced than ever that abUSed: The Postville Raid will make a valuable contribution to the national dialogue on one of the most crucial issues of our times and  serve as an important tool for advancing social justice. I think there is no time more appropriate for launching this film than the present.