Local
Gay coach fired at VCU
Advocates renew call for Obama exec order on workplace bias
VCU women’s volleyball coach James Finley says he was fired because he’s gay. (Photo courtesy of Finley)
A women’s volleyball coach at Virginia Commonwealth University, who says he was fired last month because he’s gay, would have a far better chance of getting his job back if President Obama had issued a non-discrimination executive order for federal contractors.
That’s the assessment of Tico Almeida, president of the national LGBT advocacy group Freedom to Work.
“If the executive order were already in place, Coach [James] Finley could have the Department of Labor investigate whether federal contractor VCU allowed anti-gay animus to overshadow the fact that he led his team to a 25-6 winning record this season as well as a perfect graduation rate for his student athletes,” Almeida told the Blade in a statement.
Almeida said VCU would be a prime target for a discrimination investigation under such an executive order because it has received more than $40 million in contracts in recent years from such federal agencies as the National Institutes of Health, the Social Security Administration, and the Department of Defense.
“President Obama should sign the executive order today because every day that passes is another day in which taxpayer money can be squandered on anti-LGBT workplace harassment and discrimination,” he said.
Finley, 52, told the Blade he learned of his dismissal on Nov. 19 when the university’s recently hired athletic director, Ed McLaughlin, informed him he decided not to renew Finley’s contract as coach.
He said he filed a discrimination complaint with the university’s diversity office. The university’s personnel policy bans discrimination based on sexual orientation. A VCU spokesperson said the office has 45 days to investigate the complaint under university rules.
Another university spokesperson, Pamela Lepley, told Richmond news media outlets that McLaughlin’s decision not to renew Finley’s contract was “in compliance with appropriate VCU employment practices and policies.”
In his own statement, McLaughlin said he did not base his action on the fact that Finley is gay.
“It is unfortunate that Mr. Finley feels the decision not to renew his contract was based on anything other than previously stated concerns about the volleyball program,” he said.
Finley told the Blade McLaughlin told him his reason for not renewing the contract was a desire to take the volleyball program in a “different direction” in order to lift the program to “an elite level.”
Finley and his husband, John Sternlicht, an attorney, consider McLaughlin’s rationale for not renewing Finley’s contract a thinly veiled pretext.
The two say they believe the true motive was McLaughlin’s unwillingness to retain an openly gay man as coach of the VCU women’s volleyball team, despite the fact that Finley is credited by students, other coaches, and sports writers with having vastly improved the team and inspired its women players during his eight-year tenure as coach.
“The reality is they were below 500 [in their win-loss record] for 14 straight years prior to me coming here,” Finley said in a telephone interview.
In the years in which he served as coach, the team has had the highest winning percentage in women’s volleyball at VCU in the previous 20 years, he said.
“We had 25 wins with only six losses,” he said in discussing the current year. “We had our highest national ranking in program history.”
According to Finley, many university officials, students, and the athletic department staff have been fully accepting of him and Sternlicht. Many of his colleagues attended his and Sternlicht’s wedding celebration last year, he said
With that as a backdrop, Finley and Sterlicht said McLaughlin remained distant and unsupportive of Finley since the time McLaughlin was hired as athletic director in July of this year.
He never attended any of the women’s volleyball games at the university’s home court, never congratulated him or the players for their successful season, and appeared to turn and walk in another direction whenever the two crossed paths on campus, said Finley.
Sternlicht said evidence of anti-gay animus surfaced when it became known last month that McLaughlin demoted a woman staffer who was the only other out gay person in the athletic department.
According to the Commonwealth Times, Pat Stauffer, a 30-year employee at the VCU Athletics Department, was stripped of her title as Senior Women’s Administrator and given the new title of Senior Associate Athletic Director for Sport Administration.
Finley said any doubt about McLaughlin’s motive for firing him vanished in his own mind and in that of his supporters when his volleyball players told him McLaughlin said the university wants a coach who would “represent the university well.”
“What he was saying is I, as a gay man, can’t represent the university or the athletic program in a positive way,” Finley said.
Finley’s dismissal comes at a time when LGBT advocates in Virginia say they are uncertain over whether sexual orientation non-discrimination policies adopted by the state’s universities and colleges, including VCU, can be enforced.
Last year, Virginia Attorney General Kenneth Cuccinelli said the universities didn’t have legal standing to adopt such policies because sexual orientation discrimination is not prohibited under Virginia law.
For more than a year, Almeida and other LGBT advocates have been urging President Obama to sign an executive order requiring companies and other entities such as universities that receive federal contracts to adopt internal personnel policies banning employment discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity.
Existing federal civil rights laws already ban employment discrimination based on race, religion, sex and ethnicity, but those laws don’t apply to LGBT people. A bill pending in Congress known as the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, or ENDA, would add similar protections for LGBT people in federal law.
But ENDA remains stalled in the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives, and Capitol Hill observers say it has no chance of passing unless Democrats regain control of the House in the 2014 elections.
In an official statement released at the reveal event Capital Pride Alliance described its just announced 2026 Pride theme of “Exist, Resist, Have the Audacity” as a “bold declaration affirming the presence, resilience, and courage of LGBTQ+ people around the world.”
The statement adds, “Grounded in the undeniable truth that our existence is not up for debate, this year’s theme calls on the community to live loudly and proudly, stand firm against injustice and erasure, and embody the collective strength that has always defined the LGBTQ+ community.”
In a reference to the impact of the hostile political climate, the statement says, “In a time when LGBTQ+ rights and history continue to face challenges, especially in our Nation’s Capital, where policy and public discourse shape the future of our country, together, we must ensure that our voices are visible, heard, and unapologetically centered.”
The statement also quotes Capital Pride Alliance CEO and President Ryan Bos’s message at the Reveal event: “This year’s theme is both a declaration and a demand,” Bos said. “Exist, Resist, Have Audacity! reflects the resilience of our community and our responsibility to protect the progress we’ve made. As we look toward our nation’s 250th anniversary, we affirm that LGBTQ+ people have always been and always will be part of the United States’s history, and we will continue shaping its future with strength and resolve,” he concluded.
District of Columbia
Capital Pride board member resigns, alleges failure to address ‘sexual misconduct’
In startling letter, Taylor Chandler says board’s inaction protected ‘sexual predator’
Taylor Lianne Chandler, a member of the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors since 2019 who most recently served as the board’s secretary, submitted a letter of resignation on Feb. 24 that alleges the board has failed to address instances of “sexual misconduct” within the Capital Pride organization.
The Washington Blade received a copy of Chandler’s resignation letter one day after she submitted it from an anonymous source. Chandler, who identifies as transgender and intersex, said in an interview that she did not send the letter to the Blade, but she suspected someone associated with Capital Pride, which organizes D.C.’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, “wants it out in the open.”
“It is with a heavy heart, but with absolute clarity, that I submit my resignation from the Capital Pride Alliance Board of Directors effective immediately,” Chandler states in her letter. “I have devoted nearly ten years of my life to this organization,” she wrote, pointing to her initial involvement as a volunteer and later as a producer of events as chair of the organization’s Transgender, Gender Non-Conforming, and Intersex Committee.
“Capital Pride once meant something profound to me – a space of safety, visibility, and community for people who have often been denied all three,” her letter continues. “That is no longer the organization I am part of today.”
“I, along with other board members, brought forward credible concerns regarding sexual misconduct – a pattern of behavior spanning years – to the attention of this board,” Chandler states in the letter. “What followed was not accountability. What followed was retaliation. Rather than addressing the substance of what was reported, officers and fellow board members chose to chastise those of us who came forward.”
The letter adds, “This board has made its priorities clear through its actions: protecting a sexual predator matters more than protecting the people who had the courage to come forward. … I have been targeted, bullied, and made to feel like an outsider for doing what any person of integrity would do – telling the truth.”
In response to a request from the Blade for comment, Anna Jinkerson, who serves as chair of the Capital Pride board, sent the Blade a statement praising Taylor Chandler’s efforts as a Capital Pride volunteer and board member but did not specifically address the issue of alleged sexual misconduct.
“We’re also aware that her resignation letter has been shared with the media and has listed concerns,” Jinkerson said in her statement. “When concerns are brought to CPA, we act quickly and appropriately to address them,” she said.
“As we continue to grow our organization, we’re proactively strengthening the policies and procedures that shape our systems, our infrastructure, and the support we provide to our team and partners,” Jinkerson said in her statement. “We’re doing this because the community’s experience with CPA must always be safe, affirming, empowering, and inclusive,” she added.
In an interview with the Blade, Chandler said she was not the target of the alleged sexual harassment.
She said a Capital Pride investigation identified one individual implicated in a “pattern” of sexual harassment related behavior over a period of time. But she said she was bound by a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) that applies to all board members and she cannot disclose the name of the person implicated in alleged sexual misconduct or those who came forward to complain about it.
“It was one individual, but there was a pattern and a history,” Chandler said, noting that was the extent of what she can disclose.
“And I’ll say this,” she added. “In my opinion, with gay culture sometimes the touchy feely-ness that goes on seems to be like just part of the culture, not necessarily the same as a sexual assault or whatever. But at the same time, if someone does not want those advances and they’re saying no and trying to push you away and trying to avoid you, then it makes it that way regardless of the culture.”
When asked about when the allegations of sexual harassment first surfaced, Chandler said, “In the past year is when the allegation came forward from one individual. But in the course of this all happening, other individuals came forward and talked about instances – several which showed a pattern.”
Chandler’s resignation comes about five months after Capital Pride Alliance announced in a statement released in October 2025 that its then board president, Ashley Smith, resigned from his position on Oct. 18 after Capital Pride became aware of a “claim” regarding Smith. The statement said the group retained an independent firm to investigate the matter, but it released no further details since that time. Smith has declined to comment on the matter.
When asked by the Blade if the Smith resignation could be linked in some way to allegations of sexual misconduct, Chandler said, “I can’t make a comment one way or the other on that.”
Chandler’s resignation and allegations come after Capital Pride Alliance has been credited with playing the lead role in organizing the World Pride celebration hosted by D.C. in which dozens of LGBTQ-related Pride events were held from May through June of 2025.
The letter of resignation also came just days before Capital Pride Alliance’s annual “Reveal” event scheduled for Feb. 26 at the Hamilton Hotel in which the theme for D.C.’s June 2026 LGBTQ Pride events was to be announced along with other Pride plans.
District of Columbia
Capital Stonewall Democrats elect new leaders
LGBTQ political group set to celebrate 50th anniversary
Longtime Democratic Party activists Stevie McCarty and Brad Howard won election last week as president and vice president for administration for the Capital Stonewall Democrats, D.C.’s largest local LGBTQ political organization.
In a Feb. 24 announcement, the group said McCarty and Howard, both of whom are elected DC Advisory Neighborhood Commissioners, ran in a special Capital Stonewall Democrats election to fill the two leadership positions that became vacant when the officers they replaced resigned.
Outgoing President Howard Garrett, who McCarty has replaced, told the Washington Blade he resigned after taking on a new position as chair of the city’s Ward 1 Democratic Committee. The Capital Stonewall Democrats announcement didn’t say who Howard replaced as vice president for administration.
The group’s website shows its other officers include Elizabeth Mitchell as Vice President for Legislative and Political Affairs, and Monica Nemeth as Treasurer. The officer position of secretary is vacant, the website shows.
“As we look toward 2026, the stakes for D.C. and for LGBTQ+ communities have never been clearer,” the group’s statement announcing McCarty and Howard’s election says. “Our 50th anniversary celebration on March 20 and the launch of our D.C. LGBTQ+ Voter’s Guide mark the beginning of a major year for endorsements, organizing, and coalition building,” the statement says.
McCarty said among the organization’s major endeavors will be holding virtual endorsement forums where candidates running for D.C. mayor and the Council will appear and seek the group’s endorsement.
Founded in 1976 as the Gertrude Stein Democratic Club, the organization’s members voted in 2021 to change its name to Capital Stonewall Democrats. McCarty said the 50th anniversary celebration on March 20, in which D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and members of the D.C. Council are expected to attend, will be held at the PEPCO Gallery meeting center at 702 8th St., N.W.
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