Mission Statement
HAI inspires healing, growth and learning through engagement in the arts for the culturally underserved.

HAI (Hospital Audiences, Inc.) is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1969 by Michael Jon Spencer. Each year, HAI touches the lives of more than 400,000 people in the New York City community whose access to the arts has been limited by health, age or income. HAI provides cultural access through music, dance, theatre and the visual arts, reaching out to the frail elderly, mentally and physically disabled, seriously ill children at health and social service facilities, and youth in grades K - 12. Services include tickets to cultural events; arts workshops; onsite performances of music, theater and dance; audio description for visually impaired theater-goers; youth-leadership, conflict resolution, HIV and life skills workshops using role play technique; and transportation for people with disabilities on two specially designed Omni*Buses.

HAI relies on the talent and creativity of hundreds of artists and performers, in partnership with government agencies, foundations, corporations and private individuals, to deliver arts services that improve the daily lives of disadvantaged and vulnerable people.

Since its inception, HAI has reached an aggregate audience totaling more than 11,787,000 million at more than 376,000 cultural events. HAI's work is made possible by city, state and federal agencies as well as foundation, corporate and individual support. The goals of HAI are to bring Hope And Inspiration by providing access:

• to the arts: by bringing people isolated from the cultural mainstream to cultural institutions and other visual and performing arts experiences or by presenting the arts directly to them in the institutions.
  
• through the arts: to life-saving information and decision-making skills regarding critical public health issues, including HIV/AIDS, TB, violence prevention, and homelessness, for people in shelters, hospitals, mental health facilities, residences and housing programs for special populations (such as people living with HIV or AIDS), schools, drug treatment programs, and other settings.