Love Wins NYC Raises Funds, Friends, and a Glass at Annual Event
Regalo: An Offering or Gift
The temperature in Jackson Heights, Queens, was below freezing on the second Saturday in December, but inside The Queensboro restaurant, you’d never know it.
Members of MSC’s Communications Team joined volunteers from Love Wins NYC and folks from the local community at the organization’s year-end Regalos fundraiser for an evening filled with warmth, food, drinks, music, laughter, connection, and — of course — love.
Love Wins NYC, an MSC fiscally sponsored project, is a queer-centric, volunteer-led organization combating food insecurity throughout the city since 2020. They work with particularly vulnerable populations (LGBTQIA+ individuals, transender/gender non-conforming migrants, survival sex workers, and people battling chronic illnesses).
Regalos Night was the result of an April 2021 fire that devastated an apartment building in Jackson Heights. Love Wins NYC supported families, many of whom were displaced to shelters, with access to quality food. When the holiday season arrived, the organization collected and distributed new toys to children affected by the fire at the first Regalos. In addition to collecting toys, Regalos serves as Love Wins NYC’s year-end fundraising event.

Between bites to eat and a toast, we navigated our way around volunteers, supporters, locals out grabbing a weekend meal, racks of winter coats, and regalos. We caught up with some of the friends we made during our previous visit to one of Love Wins NYC’s eight monthly food pantries, and formed some new friendships, too. Davishmar was on the saxophone, providing a warm, cozy soundtrack that fit with the overall theme of the evening.
Rooted in Love
In 2024, Love Wins supported 30,000 food insecure New Yorkers. By leading through an LGBTQIA+ lens, founder Daniel Puerto said, Love Wins NYC proves to city agencies that communities with high populations of low income, migrant, LGBTQIA+ individuals play a crucial role in the inclusion and safety for people at the intersection of these and other identities facing food insecurity throughout the city.
"This kind of deep, intentional, and persistent love is what will carry our communities forward.”
Puerto acknowledged the operations team and the volunteers who treat neighbors with patience and compassion, and who show up, regardless of weather (some of the monthly food pantries operate outdoors). He reminded us “most success stories are rooted in love, community, and support. And sometimes it takes a village to create change.”
Puerto highlighted four partner organizations who have supported Love Wins NYC, “no questions asked,” and representatives from each received an award and had the opportunity to share a few words. Those groups included New York Common Food Pantry, Citizens Committee For New York City, Stonewall Community Foundation, and Cheer New York — who, just days before the event, named Love Wins NYC the 2024 beneficiary of their Spirit Fund. This came with a check for $32,000 — Cheer New York’s largest donation to date — for Love Wins NYC to continue their work in 2025 and beyond.
Speaking on behalf of Stonewall Community Foundation, Tenzin Saldon thanked Love Wins NYC for ensuring everyone who visits them feels seen and cared for: “The organization that you all have created is proof that love is a verb that you show through action, and that this kind of deep, intentional, and persistent love is what will carry our communities forward.”
Looking Ahead
New York State Assembly member Jessica González-Rojas, who represents several Queens neighborhoods, including Jackson Heights, spoke about attending Love Wins NYC first food pantry distribution in May 2020. “That day was just a seed … that started an organization that’s been dedicated to supporting our neighbors,” she said.
Following this year’s event, Love Wins NYC distributed over 200 regalos to children at a local shelter run by CAMBA. This year, they teamed up with Out My Closet, who provided dozens of new jackets to local children as well.

“Most success stories are rooted in love, community, and support."
When you feel discouraged, disappointed, or depressed about the future, try to remember organizations and communities like Love Wins NYC. In a seemingly never-ending news cycle of hurt, hate, and fear, there are folks at the frontlines giving their all to help their neighbors and create a world of liberation, resilience, and interdependence.
It’s only fitting to give Puerto the final word here. He closed with a reminder that “love will always win … and everyone in this room is proof of that.”
We’ll toast to that.

Support Love Wins NYC’s ongoing mission by donating and/or volunteering during one of their eight monthly food pantries.