APA VOICE (Asian Pacific Americans Voting and Organizing to increase Civic Engagement), convened by the MinKwon Center in 2014, emerged as the first pan-Asian coalition in NYC to increase civic participation rates among Asian Americans, which historically ranked lowest in the City.

APA VOICE ties its origins to the Asian American Community Coalition on Redistricting and Democracy (ACCORD), launched in 2011 for the redistricting cycle based on the 2010 decennial census results, that was also the first pan-Asian redistricting coalition in NYS. During that time, ACCORD had a significant impact in bringing attention to unfairly drawn and gerrymandered districts in densely populated Asian American neighborhoods, and also the lack of Asian American representation in elected office as a result.

Since then, APA VOICE has expanded its coalition, increased the institutional knowledge and expertise of civic participation among Asian Americans particularly in NYC, and has directly led to over 200,000 direct voter contacts per year. APA VOICE has also held some of the most attended and successful civic participation activities, from Census outreach workshops, borough and citywide candidate forums. to multi-language voter education drives, voter pledges, and exit polling.

The mission of APA VOICE is to increase civic participation and expand voting access for Asian American New Yorkers.