A future where every human, regardless of identity, has access to the care, resources, and community they need to thrive. A future where Black and brown LGBTQ+ communities are not surviving systems built without us, but leading systems built for us.
I Am Human began in Philadelphia as an apparel company founded by Ariq Barrett. From the start, the work was about more than clothing. Proceeds from each piece went toward providing meals to people facing homelessness, building a brand that fed a community as it grew.
Alex Santiago, who worked closely with Ariq, brought the vision to Atlanta. What started as feeding people on the street soon became something larger. In the conversations Alex and his team had with the people they served, a deeper truth surfaced. The need was not just hunger. It was housing. Healthcare. Mental health support. Safety. Connection. The whole continuum of being human, denied to people the systems had pushed to the margins.
Recognizing that this work needed an institutional home, Alex purchased the I Am Human branding rights from Ariq and founded the I Am Human Foundation in 2018. The transition honored what Ariq had built and gave the mission room to grow into the long-term, systems-level work the community needed.
We started with a clear premise: the people who have navigated systemic harm are best positioned to build the systems that heal. The foundation has grown from a meal program into a national nonprofit with offices in Atlanta and San Francisco, running peer-led programs that meet Black and brown communities at the intersection of identity, health, and economic life.
Today, I Am Human Foundation is led by people who reflect the communities we serve. We carry forward the original spirit of the work: meet people where they are, treat them with dignity, and build what they need alongside them.