Hospitals and Institutions
H & I is responsible for meetings and providing Big Books, other literature and information to correctional facilities, treatment facilities and non-profit or state run institutions.
H & I receives funds from the “pink cans” circulated during A.A. meetings, which pays for the literature H & I distributes.
State-run facilities are provided some literature at no charge — most suffering alcoholics in these institutions would otherwise have no access to the program of Alcoholics Anonymous.
If interested in volunteering to take H & I into the EDC Jail, it’s necessary to undergo an orientation class offered through the EDC Sheriff Department and pass a background check. Orientations are held four times a year.
Contact an H & I committee member for further details and next orientation date or come to the next H & I meeting.
Chair: [ Area43HandI@gmail.com ] Phone: (530) 215-6387
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H & I meetings
Meets 6:00 pm 3rd Wednesday of each month
Mother Lode Fellowship
667 Pleasant Valley Road, Suite A
Diamond Springs, CA 95619
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Pink Cans
The Hospital & Institution Committee of Northern California is a Ninth Tradition service committee of Alcoholics Anonymous with the purpose of carrying the message of A.A. to those who are confined in prisons, hospitals, treatment facilities, and other institutions. NorCal H&I has been carrying the A.A. message of recovery to confined alcoholics for over 75 years, dating to its origins in 1942 at San Quentin State Prison, and is one of the oldest independent service committees of Alcoholics Anonymous.
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NORTHERN CALIFORNIA HOSPITAL & INSTITUTION COMMITTEE
Annual Pink Can Collection Report – FYE 2021
The Hospital & Institution Committee of Northern California is a Ninth Tradition service committee of Alcoholics Anonymous with the purpose of carrying the message of A.A. to those who are confined in prisons, hospitals, treatment facilities, and other institutions. NorCal H&I has been carrying the A.A. message of recovery to confined alcoholics for over 75 years, dating to its origins in 1942 at San Quentin State Prison, and is one of the oldest independent service committees of Alcoholics Anonymous.
In 2021 the committee changed our fiscal year end date from November 30th to December 31st to conform to the calendar year. All numbers for 2021 include thirteen months of data and are atypical of our normal income and expense due to Covid. In the thirteen months ending December 2021 NorCal H&I incurred $264,648.74 of literature expenses for the use of the alcoholic who is confined. Despite the Covid shutdowns, we were still able to distribute literature, including AAWS books, Grapevine/LaViña magazines and books, and meeting schedules to many of our facilities.These necessary categories comprise 88.7% of the total NorCal H&I 2021 expenses. Additionally, we pay for neither an office nor for salaries for service committee workers, thus enabling us to dedicate such a large portion of our contributions to literature for the confined alcoholic. We publish our Financial Report online monthly in order to be accountable to our Fellowship for these and all other expenses.
Under normal circumstances, Northern California H&I supports 33,000 meetings each year, serving approximately 25 major state and federal institutions plus hundreds of local jails, hospitals, rehabs and other community facilities. Those who are confined have no money to buy the AA literature brought in by the H&I volunteers, so the Pink Can, with your donations, covers this cost. Unlike other areas of the country which don’t have separately funded H&I committees, in Northern CA the use of the Pink Cans allows us to purchase literature necessary to our service without placing the burden of this expense on the local groups or Central Committees.
The Northern California Hospital & Institution Committee has for many years been one of the largest purchasers of literature from AAWS, contributing significantly to the support of our General Service Office in New York. No H&I members are ever paid for their Twelfth Step service, nor are they reimbursed for expenses incurred carrying the message into these institutions, regardless of the distance. It’s not unusual for an H&I volunteer to drive well over 200 miles for a weekly or monthly institution meeting – these travel expenses are a personal contribution of the individual.
The H&I Committee is adamant that the contributions so generously made to our Pink Cans in no way detract from the Seventh Tradition collections of the groups. We therefore ask that the Pink Cans be passed separately from and after the baskets to avoid subtracting from support of the 7th Tradition, and we encourage all members to remove the cans from the baskets if they are being passed together. Many groups have had success in passing the collections at different times, for example passing the basket at the regular time and passing the Pink Cans at the end of the meetings. In 2018, we also made contributing to H&I easier by adding an online payment option from our website at https://www.handinorcal.org/contribute.
We are humbly grateful for the generous contributions, both financial and in service, of the AA members of Northern CA who make our mission possible, and especially for the cooperation of our fellow service committees through-out the area. Without this loving support tens of thousands of confined alcoholics simply would not have access to the lifesaving message of A.A.
For additional information, please visit our website at www.handinorcal.org or write to the Northern California Hospital & Institution Committee, P.O. Box 192490, San Francisco, CA. 94119-2490.