My 2011 Trans-Advocacy tour will be conducted with Claire Swinford of Tucson, Arizona. Our goal: To bring awareness of other issues that affect the LGBT Community, such as disability and homelessness—as well as lobbying for the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA) and Medicaid Reform.
We will be at conferences, rallies and on Capitol Hill. We will attend outreach events in Phoenix, Tucson, Washington, D.C. and Philadelphia. And to end our tour, we will make a pilgrimage to the Stonewall Inn in New York City. We do this to bring the memory of the riots there by LGBT individuals, back in mind for our youth.
IT'S ALL ABOUT VISIBILITY
TUCSON, AZ
Tucson is a progressive city in Southern Arizona, with a diverse community protected by a non-discrimination ordinance that is fully inclusive of sexual orientation and gender identity protections. Surrounded by desert and mountains, Tucson offers a variety of venues that are frequented by most everybody.
The first couple of days were spent driving about in the Saquero National Forest, through Gate’s Pass and out into the desert. Venues like ‘The District,’ ‘The Surley Wench’ and ‘The Grille’ made up the drink and dinner fare—with the Rialto Theater, Dinnerplace Art Gallery and Fluxx Art Gallery providing arts and entertainment.
“Free Sex III,” Queerfecta” and the “Glitter Ball 3000” events brought out both LGBTQ and Allies with performance art, drag and sundry forms of entertainment for the evenings. Another trip was into the Santa Catalina Mountains just northwest of Tucson, where we did the twenty-five mile drive to the 9,000 foot peak of Mount Lemmon.
On one evening out, Claire was approached by a man who attempted to assault her after we had walked ahead while she parked the auto. After countering back in some self-defense moves, she came into the bar we were at and enlisted the help of the bouncer in attempt to catch the perpetrator. Tucson has a program called the Nightlife Safety Project, where venues volunteer to help prevent instances of violence in and around their premises. The program is administered by the Southern Arizona Center Against Sexual Assault (SACASA). With The District being one of those venues, the bartender and bouncer went out to help Claire in this ugly situation.
As a result of the incident, I visited SACASA’s facility for a briefing on the Nightlife Safety Project to learn more and how it might be adapted elsewhere. I was also interested in features from the ‘Safe Streets Arizona’ project, a program addressing bullying and harassment on the streets, my thought of working with others to implement a similar program in St Louis and elsewhere.
I then visited the Rainbow Support Group, a behavioral health support group that reaches out to the LGBTIQA Community, inclusively. The current session group includes a gay man and a trans woman with such issues. Yet another tour and briefing was with Southern Arizona AIDS Foundation (SAAF), where SAAF manages a vast umbrella of programs ranging from case management, support to homeless housing and a food pantry to legal services, a buying service for prescriptions, youth outreach and anti-bullying programs for youth.
Weather-wise, it has been abnormally hot for the region, but a daily series of fronts bringing in thunderstorms and heavy rain have brought the temps back into the seasonal range of mid-90s. Saturday, we visited the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum where two miles of desert trail on 85-acres brought us in touch with the indigenous plant and animal life, including cacti, mountain lions, river otters, spiders and snakes. We will be leaving for Phoenix on Sunday for a tour of the ‘This Is How’ shelter for homeless trans individuals from around the nation. On Monday, we move the tour to Washington, D.C—we had met with Amanda Sapir, a staffer of U.S. Representative Gabrielle ‘Gabby’ Giffords (D – AZ) here in Tucson and set up for an appointment with her office on next Tuesday.
BY: ROBYN CAROLYN MONTAGUE
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