Category Archives: Grantee Profile

TJFP volunteer Rebecca Wisotsky chatted over the phone with our 2014 grantees to learn more about what their year has been like organizing their communities, providing public education and services, and working towards trans justice. Our grantees generously took the time to share their stories, including their success and challenges. Come meet some of our incredibly dedicated and inspiring grantees from across the country! 

Prison abolition is real. It’s not a theoretical issue or a pipe dream. It’s a concrete issue and the stakes are high. This is what the staff, “free world” volunteers, and incarcerated members of Black and Pink think about as they do prison abolition work, as they are everyday outraged by the violence against LGBTQ people in the prison industrial complex.

Black and Pink is an organization of  volunteers who work across 8 national chapters, with the most active being in Boston, MA. There are over 6,500 incarcerated LGBTQ folks who are doing the work of Black and Pink. Both inside and outside of the prison industrial complex, Black and Pink volunteers are connecting with each other to abolish a system that is rooted in “isms.”   

When I talked with Jason, Black and Pink’s one staff member, he highlighted two incredible ways that incremental but tremendous change is being made towards the concrete goal of prison abolition and liberation. I will lay them out here for you, in hopes that you will see that making change at both the systemic level and in someone’s daily life is attainable.

Black and Pink at Jobs Not Jails rally

The Monthly Newspaper: With stories, poetry, art, and articles by LGBTQ people in prison, the monthly newspaper is 80% prisoner generated and allows for prisoners to connect with each other. It is distributed to 4,200 prisoners across the United States and is an effective tool for organizing prisoners and sharing strategies for change. Prisoners are able to tell stories about how they have fought for access to hormones, release from solitary confinement, entitlement to programs, and other demands. Recently an incarcerated woman in California wrote into the newspaper multiple times, asking Black and Pink to organize volunteers to write letters to her warden. Her goal was to get out of solitary confinement and get access to hormones. This process has connected her to other trans women across the country and has succeeded in getting her out of solitary confinement, although she is still fighting for hormones. She was so inspired by her experience that she started a Black and Pink chapter in California! Lesson learned from this story? Victory doesn’t always mean winning all your demands. Sometimes it looks more like building cross-struggle alliances and leadership development.

I wish I could only deliver good news, but the reality is that Black and Pink is denied their right to distribute the newspaper to multiple prisons across the United States. In Kentucky, Black and Pink has been denied on the premise that the prison refuses anything that “promotes homosexuality.” Black and Pink have also been denied to multiple prisons in Michigan for “providing information about the prevention of AIDS.” Black and Pink continues to struggle against these denials and find ways to challenge them. You can read the latest Newspaper here.

Black and Pink at the Chicago Dyke March

The Pen Pal Program: Ok, there’s a chance that if you’ve read this far, you might be inspired, outraged, intrigued…but still not know what you can do to support incarcerated LGBTQ people. I’ll make it real easy for you. You can be a pen pal. Right now there are over 6,500 prisoner members and only 2,500 successful pen pals/outside connections. By becoming a Pen Pal, “free world” volunteers work in solidarity with prisoners through a mutually beneficial connection. “Free world” pen pals are educated on the issues that affect LGBTQ prisoners daily and LGBTQ prisoners are relived from some isolation and gain support on many levels. One Chicago-based pen pal has been visiting and writing their pen pal for well over a year. They have been developing a connection based on care and compassion. This has helped the “free world” pen pal ground their work in concrete issues that they have developed into workshops like the School to Prison Pipeline. If you want to become a pen pal or have more questions about it, click here.

I truly hope you will take this moment to understand that prison abolition is a reality that can be achieved. And for the moments in which we’re feeling defeated, I’ll let the resilient words of Zarabee from California keep us fighting for justice.

The Light of Our Great Spirit

Let us be proud of who we are,
Whether we are black, pink, circle or square.
Locked up or free WE will be,
With our head held high, we will strive and survive,
As our sister Brielle in Louisiana said,
“Still I stand and never will I fall,”
Let that be the call to oppression, depression, hatred,
Alienation, discrimination, loneliness, and fear,
Loving ourselves let us be proud to be queer.
Brothers and Sisters, let us rise,
Letting the loves for our lives shine,
Like a beacon of light, A thousand suns,
Rising to the sky at once.
A light of our great spirit.

—Zarabee, California
From the June 2014 issue of the Black and Pink Newspaper

Rebecca Wisotsky, a queer, Puerto Rican Jew from New Mexico, with New Yorkers for parents, has been working towards social justice since she was first able to say “justicia.” 

TJFP volunteer Rebecca Wisotsky chatted over the phone with our 2013 grantees to learn more about what their year has been like organizing their communities, providing public education and services, and working towards trans justice. Our grantees generously took the time to share their stories, including their success and challenges. Come meet some of our incredibly dedicated and inspiring grantees from across the country! 

“We believe that as many people as possible should be involved in making decisions that will affect them.”

“We believe that people are capable of liberating themselves and should not be dependent on others to speak for them.”

“We believe in acknowledging existing barriers to participation in our organization, and are committed to challenging those barriers.” 

These are some of the guiding principles of the DC Trans Coalition (DCTC) that I learned about from dedicated volunteer member Nico Quintana. Nico generously took the time to fit me into their busy day and talk with me about some of DCTC’s biggest accomplishments and biggest challenges.  

In Washington D.C., there has been increasing violence against trans women of color. Government and outside forces have responded to these tragedies without anyone ever asking the trans community what they needed or what they wanted to see as a response. So DCTC decided to take action.

DCTC started a community-led needs assessment to explore and document the many issues trans folks in DC face. The assessment was created by holding local roundtables in which members of the community from many racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic backgrounds explained their areas of concern to researchers. DCTC then hired community members and gave folks stipends to reach as many trans folks as possible to make this survey successful. They ended up collecting 600 surveys! So what is the theme we’re seeing here? Say it with me people: community-led work = community-led solutions = community-led liberation!

In July of 2013, DCTC had a preliminary meeting, in both English and Spanish, to share the data collected and analyzed from the surveys. DCTC used part of their TJFP grant to pay for materials and give out bus tokens to help make the meeting accessible. This was the one of the biggest local efforts DCTC has ever accomplished! You can check out phase 1 of their summary findings here.  Nico relayed that DCTC wants these results to be shared with everyone, but especially with activists in DC who need data in order to push forward policy around trans healthcare, shelters, unemployment, and violence.  “We continuously have to confront the criminal (in)justice system for its systematic devaluing of trans lives.”

While there are great successes to be proud of, Nico told me that there are also daily challenges. One challenge is money. DCTC is not a 501c3 because they believe that “the corporate non-profit model should never entirely replace democratic, grassroots organizations.” They also believe that “political organizations should be accountable to their communities and to the individuals who are most directly impacted by their work, and not to corporations, governments, nonprofit industries, or wealthy individuals.” So they do not accept corporate or foundation funding or private sponsorship, and depend on grassroots fundraising by their members. Radical fundraising like this isn’t easy, so the group’s budget is small and DCTC is run by volunteers members. The challenge in this is that the people who most often have time to volunteer are often also people with more privilege (i.e. they have another sustainable source of income, are not homeless, etc.). This makes it harder to keep and maintain a membership that crosses race and class lines. But DCTC uses the funds they do have to maintain community participation and maintain sustainability. 

Rooted in the traditions of social justice philanthropy, TJFP is a community-led funding initiative supporting grassroots, trans justice groups run by and for trans people. TJFP is keenly aware of the power that funders hold over what work gets prioritized and the importance of local grassroots trans justice work. A perfect (funder) match to DCTC? I think so. 

Rebecca Wisotsky, a queer, Puerto Rican Jew from New Mexico, with New Yorkers for parents, has been working towards social justice since she was first able to say “justicia.” 

TJFP volunteer Rebecca Wisotsky chatted over the phone with our 2013 grantees to learn more about what their year has been like organizing their communities, providing public education and services, and working towards trans justice. Our grantees generously took the time to share their stories, including their success and challenges. Come meet some of our incredibly dedicated and inspiring grantees from across the country! 

While reflecting back on my conversation with Rev. J and her work with Rainbow Community Cares (RCC), I felt overwhelmed by the responsibility of capturing her remarkable commitment. Sure, I could start with posting RCC’s mission, talk about how they aim to serve “as a resource with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and questioning people in the Raleigh, NC area and beyond to promote community reconciliation and enlarge the scope of spiritual expression within organized communities…” But, as with many TJFP grantees, my conversation with Rev. J went deeper than that and got to the core of why trans justice is critical to all movements. How do you express the importance and passion behind someone so committed to this work and making trans justice a true daily lived reality? I’m not always sure how to do it, but I’m about to try.

Rev. J volunteers over 40 hours a month at the LGBT Center of Raleigh just to be available to people looking for support, looking for a connection. As a minister, she creates services, ceremonies and rituals for life passages like name changes and transitions. Rev J and RCC are also creating tools that help allied faith communities engage in advocacy work with LGBTQ people. Since faith communities have historically been instrumental in shaping and supporting policies and laws, they also have the influence to help people become better educated on the issues and concerns that transgender and gender non-conforming people face. There is so much work to be done with faith communities to help them understand how they may be supporting policies and laws that hurt trans and gender non-conforming people. RCC has developed a document to be used when helping allied faith communities discern how to best work in engaging in advocacy for LGBTQ folks within their faith community and beyond. To gain access to this and the plethora of resources RCC provides, visit their website.

RCC’s presence as transgender and gender non-conforming folks is extremely important as they respond to the daily discrimination and violence their communities face. They organize and co-facilitate the monthly Affirming Faith Forum at the LGBT Center of Raleigh where local leaders participate in discussions around life issues and needs for LGBTQ folks, their families, and friends. They have been working to encourage people to report incidents of anti-LGBTQ violence, knowing that transgender and gender non-conforming folk face discrimination, harassment and violence at a high rate, and that the data collection on these incidents is poor. Communities of faith can also learn how to better support survivors and work towards preventing violence.

So, I again ask myself—and you, as a reader of this blog—how do you express the importance and passion behind making trans justice a true daily lived reality?  Connect with Rainbow Community Cares, one of our other grantees or applicants, or with TJFP, and let us know!

Rebecca Wisotsky, a queer, Puerto Rican Jew from New Mexico, with New Yorkers for parents, has been working towards social justice since she was first able to say “justicia.” 

TJFP volunteer Rebecca Wisotsky chatted over the phone with our 2013 grantees to learn more about what their year has been like organizing their communities, providing public education and services, and working towards trans justice. Our grantees generously took the time to share their stories, including their success and challenges. Come meet some of our incredibly dedicated and inspiring grantees from across the country! 

The Durham Gender Alliance (DGA) is a moderated, gender-issues support group serving Durham, Cary, Chapel Hill, Raleigh, and nearby regions of North Carolina. DGA is guided by the principles of mutual respect, support, and education, and their goals are to develop community, foster leadership, and offer outreach. Membership in the DGA is available to all gender-diverse individuals (cross dresser, transgender, transsexual, intersex, and questioning), their significant others, family members, friends, and allies.

Marcilla Smith is an active volunteer and member of DGA. She was in the car on her way back from a memorial for a trans community member and friend when I caught up with her. We didn’t get into the specifics of how her friend passed, but I think this is an important time to note that the National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs documented 30 hate-related murders of LGBT people in 2011, and 40 percent of those victims were transgender women of color. Of course I offered another time to talk, but Marcilla saw this moment as an important one to move the work forward. So we got right into it!

Marcilla was excited to tell me about DGA’s new collaboration with other local groups. They had just participated in a sister group weekend, building bridges with the Triangle Empowerment Center and El Centro Hispano’s LGBT group. Each group’s focus is a bit different, ranging from HIV/AIDS communities, Black LGBT communities, and trans Hispanic communities in the South. The goal of the weekend was to work on intersectionality, build community and find ways to collaborate together in the future. They are planning another retreat and regular meetings for trans folks in all of these communities soon. As Marcilla explained, “For folks who are trans*, there is an opportunity in Durham to nurture an LGBTIQH culture which is not only ‘gay’ but truly Queer.”

DGA currently has one support group meeting each month. They also have a listserve which connects trans* people who are local, have moved away, live in rural areas without support, or are otherwise unable to attend meetings. The listserv has over 200 members and as many as 75% of them have never been able to attend a meeting to receive the in-person support that is critical to trans* lives. Both the listserv and the monthly meetings provide space for people to talk not just about gender and sexuality but also intersecting issues like racism and ableism that can marginalize and “other” members.

Marcilla expressed how important it is that these groups exist because one of the biggest challenges she sees among trans* community in her area is social isolation. Group members often express insecurity about intimate relationships and wondering if they will ever be loved, hesitations about applying for new jobs, and overall general social anxiety. It is critical to the health and well being of trans* communities that members are able to socialize and build community with each other. And it’s critical that we all support groups like Durham Gender Alliance.  Invest in bringing trans* leadership to the center of grassroots social justice movements!

Rebecca Wisotsky, a queer, Puerto Rican Jew from New Mexico, with New Yorkers for parents, has been working towards social justice since she was first able to say “justicia.” 

TJFP volunteer Rebecca Wisotsky chatted over the phone with our 2013 grantees to learn more about what their year has been like organizing their communities, providing public education and services, and working towards trans justice. Our grantees generously took the time to share their stories, including their success and challenges. Come meet some of our incredibly dedicated and inspiring grantees from across the country! 

For those of us who don’t know about the Lakeview area of Chicago, IL, it is considered by many to be a welcoming space for LGBTQ individuals. However, this relative safety may not be felt by the LGBQ and trans* youth who experience homelessness. Police, business owners and neighbors oppress LGBTQ street youth, due to classism, racism, transphobia, ageism and other social issues that disproportionally target LGBTQ youth of color.  

The Youth Empowerment Project (YEPP) serves as an outlet for these youth everyday by creating full theatrical productions from the stories of their lives to create restorative justice pieces between the Lakeview police and queer youth. YEPP seeks a safe environment for LGBTQ street‐based youth between the ages of 12 and 24 to explore their history, investigate new ways to address their struggles and to celebrate their strengths through the process of developing a theatrical performance piece.  Yep, YEPP is so awesome, they made a documentary about them called “Out In The Open.” 

I recently spoke with Bonsai Bermudez, the previous program coordinator of YEPP, about the challenges they’re facing and how impactful this work is on the lives of everyone involved. (Side note: Bonsai is one of the most fabulous, gentle, kind, heartfelt, people in this work I’ve had the privilege to talk to. At the end of the conversation, I wanted to jump through that phone and give them a big hug of strength and solidarity.)  Bonsai explained that YEPP’s work consists of 6-months of individual and group work where LGBTQ youth can collectively process their experiences of being street based queer youth.  They then work together to produce a public performance.  The show is a healing experience for the performers and it is also a group healing experience for the audience. The first show Bonsai worked on with YEPP youth was 3 years ago and Bonsai told me he didn’t realize how powerful it was going to be in the theater. He said, “I feel so privileged to experience something like this and so does the audience. This work, this art, is a healing tool for everyone involved. And let’s just be real and say art is a powerful tool of social justice and most importantly an honoring of our ancestors who created art to survive and share their lives either secretly or subliminally for fear of discrimination and prosecution.”

What YEPP is doing is a beautiful thing, but it doesn’t come without major challenges. Recently, young people in YEPP have been experiencing a lot of HIV related deaths. Some of them are HIV+ and those who aren’t get scared about the risk and internalize it. They say things like, “I don’t want to be queer anymore.” Some YEPP youth have been locked up by the police for minor “crimes.”  The impact the criminal injustice system has on people’s lives is detrimental to their livelihoods in more ways than I have room to list here.  However, there is still beauty and resilience to be found in this moment, and that is that YEPP youth are still rehearsing while they are locked up even though they don’t know if they will be able to perform in the production. A lot of LGBTQ street youth are survivors this has had an emotional, physical and spiritual impact on their lives. Embracing and dealing with the challenges and realities of queer youth’s lives can sometimes slow the momentum of YEPP’s performances moving forward, but it’s also an important part of their work.

For some of these queer youth, the space that YEPP provides is so much more than a place to heal. It also provides liberation and harm reduction through education, food, transportation, stipends and, most of all, friendships and community. As a community-volunteer-run program, YEPP doesn’t have the capacity for a full time paid staff to develop and coordinate fundraising efforts. TJFP’s grant has meant the hustle for funds to pay for the basic needs to run the program has slightly lifted. But as we all know, funding for the arts, LGBTQ youth and social justice is in short supply, so the struggle continues.  To learn more about YEPP you can visit them here. They should be on your list for amazing organizations to watch out for!

Rebecca Wisotsky, a queer, Puerto Rican Jew from New Mexico, with New Yorkers for parents, has been working towards social justice since she was first able to say “justicia.”