Will you write an article on how smaller organizations can even get started? Let me preface this by stating I am not asking you for funding like most of these other folks, you already stated you are giving to proven orgs only. I fully understand we are not the kind of organization who will benefit from you, and will not irritate you with such a request, we have already applied for a government grant.

I founded both Autism Fits, Inc., which will focus on helping autistics in primary education, and employment, later on. And Gili Project, Inc., which will host a cultural festival to teach Americans who Rroma Gypsies are, and use the funds to support projects that will improve the quality of life in the poorest Rroma communities worldwide. But we are learning quickly that without progress, we don't get funding, and without funding, we can't make much progress. So those of us just starting out really need advice on how to get that seed funding to begin the work we want to carry out.

Autism Fits, for example, needs around 250k to fund the employment for everyone needed to build the programs and start to engage, to help autistics. I am autistic, myself. As is my entire board of directors. We know more about what we feel, experience, and needed growing up, for support, far better than the board of Autism Speaks, which has 25 members, and only 1 is actually autistic. This is evident by how the autistic community perceives them as a hate group that supports eugenics and abusive therapies, and only spends 4% on the actual cause (all the common statement in the community, not my own words). How do we beat back monster sized orgs like them to gain access to enough of the funding available for our needs? There's already very little available for autistic-based issues, as it is. If we cannot combat against these massive orgs loaded with all the lawyers and professionals, that know how to get that funding, we don't have much hope of ever really getting started.

I ask this because we have actually applied for a 250k grant from the government, but Autism Speaks has recently unveiled a new program, practically the same as what we are working on (well, the part we publicly stated in our objective on sunbiz, when we founded a year ago), and we all feel down about it, like we have no hope of getting that grant now. We feel like Autism Speaks will get it, instead, because they are established, and have more know how on how to obtain the funding. It is beyond frustrating and aggravating. If we are running into this issue, I have no doubt, others are too. Advice from someone who knows more than us about it, would be most welcomed.