Local
Latino LGBT community center celebrates first anniversary
Casa Ruby opened in Columbia Heights in June 2012
Ruby Corado, founder of Latino LGBT community center Casa Ruby. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray was among those who gathered at Casa Ruby in Northwest Washington on Thursday to celebrate the first anniversary of the Latino LGBT community center.
Casa Ruby, which opened in a three-story brownstone at 2822 Georgia Ave., N.W., in Colombia Heights last June, offers a variety of social services and other programs to LGBT Latinos in D.C. area in both Spanish and English. These include job placement programs, referrals to immigration lawyers, HIV testing and a food pantry.
Casa Ruby CEO Ruby Corado told the Washington Blade her organization has provided services to more than 700 people since it opened its doors.
“It’s been an amazing year,” she said, noting the center is a multicultural space that is open to everyone. “It’s been like a dream come true and I feel accomplished because this past year, what I had in mind did happen.”
Casa Ruby has expanded into the third floor of the brownstone to accommodate the clients it now serves.
Corado said the center’s operating budget is currently $5,500 a month, with $4,500 a month in rent and another $1,000 in expenses for utilities and printing supplies. Corado contributes $2,000 – or more than a third of Casa Ruby’s monthly operating budget – each month from her personal savings.
She said a handful of major donors have contributed between $500 and $1,000. A benefit that took place at Black Cat Backstage on 14th Street in Northwest D.C. on June 3 raised $427, but the vast majority of contributions to Casa Ruby come from what Corado described as around 200 “community donors” who donate $10 or $20.
Gray announced during a Blade town hall last Friday at the John A. Wilson Building that LGBT organizations that provide community services could become eligible to receive grants for as much as $100,000 under a new city program.
Corado said she hopes to receive city grants and other funding, but she stressed her most pressing concern is paying Casa Ruby’s rent.
She paid the organization’s landlord $4,000 last week, but she still owes him $7,000.
“The only thing I worry about is the rent,” Corado said.
Client: Life “has changed completely”
Camila Munayki Quiroz had just begun her transition when Casa Ruby opened in June 2012. The D.C. resident who is originally from Perú had been an undocumented immigrant for eight years after her student visa expired, but the lawyer with whom Corado connected her won her immigration case.
“Now I have legal documents in this country, which has opened many opportunities for me,” Quiroz said. “My life has changed completely.”
D.C. resident Marquette, who did not give his last name, has attended job training classes and received an HIV test at Casa Ruby since he became a client two months ago. He told the Blade he feels the organization provides him and others “a lot of opportunities.”
“I’m really trying to do something with my life right now,” Marquette said. “This space is helping me.”
Virginia
McPike wins special election for Va. House of Delegates
Gay Alexandria City Council member becomes 8th LGBTQ member of legislature
Gay Alexandria City Council member Kirk McPike emerged as the decisive winner in a Feb. 10 special election for a seat in the Virginia House of Delegates representing Alexandria.
McPike, a Democrat, received 81.5 percent of the vote in his race against Republican Mason Butler, according to the local publication ALX Now.
He first won election to the Alexandria Council in 2021. He will be filling the House of Delegates seat being vacated by Del. Elizabeth Bennett-Parker (D-Alexandria), who won in another Feb. 10 special election for the Virginia State Senate seat being vacated by gay Sen. Adam Ebbin (D-Alexandria).
Ebbin is resigning from his Senate this week to take a position with Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s administration.
Upon taking his 5th District seat in the House of Delegate, McPike will become the eighth out LGBTQ member of the Virginia General Assembly. Among those he will be joining is Sen. Danica Roem (D-Manassas), who became the Virginia Legislature’s first transgender member when she won election to the House of Delegates in 2017 before being elected to the Senate in 2023.
“I look forward to continuing to work to address our housing crisis, the challenge of climate change, and the damaging impacts of the Trump administration on the immigrant families, LGBTQ+ Virginians, and federal employees who call Alexandria home,” McPike said in a statement after winning the Democratic nomination for the seat in a special primary held on Jan. 20.
McPike, a longtime LGBTQ rights advocate, has served for the past 13 years as chief of staff for gay U.S. Rep. Mark Takano (D-Calif.) and has remained in that position during his tenure on the Alexandria Council. He said he will resign from that position before taking office in the House of Delegates.
Local
Local LGBTQ groups, activists to commemorate Black History Month
Rayceen Pendarvis to moderate Dupont Underground panel on Sunday
LGBTQ groups in D.C. and elsewhere plan to use Black History Month as an opportunity to commemorate and celebrate Black lives and experiences.
Team Rayceen Productions has no specific events planned, but co-founder Rayceen Pendarvis will attend many functions around D.C. this month.
Pendarvis, a longtime voice in the LGBTQ community in D.C. moderated a panel at Dupont Underground on Feb. 8. The event, “Every (Body) Wants to Be a Showgirl,” will feature art from Black burlesque artists from around the country. Pendarvis on Feb. 23 will attend the showing of multimedia play at the Lincoln Theatre that commemorates the life of James Baldwin.
Equality Virginia plans to prioritize Black voices through a weekly online series, and community-based story telling. The online digital series will center Black LGBTQ voices, specifically trailblazers and activists, and contemporary Black queer and transgender people.
Narissa Rahaman, Equality Virginia’s executive director, stressed the importance of the Black queer community to the overall Pride movement, and said “Equality Virginia is proud to center those voices in our work this month and beyond.”
The Capital Pride Alliance, which hosts Pride events in D.C., has an alliance with the Center for Black Equity, which brings Black Pride to D.C. over Memorial Day weekend. The National LGBTQ Task Force has no specific Black History Month events planned, but plans to participate in online collaborations.
Cathy Renna, the Task Force’s director of communications, told the Washington Blade the organization remains committed to uplifting Black voices. “Our priority is keeping this at the forefront everyday,” she said.
The D.C. LGBTQ+ Community Center is also hosting a series of Black History Month events.
The D.C. Public Library earlier this year launched “Freedom and Resistance,” an exhibition that celebrates Black History Month and Martin Luther King Jr. It will remain on display until the middle of March at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library at 901 G St., N.W.
District of Columbia
U.S. Attorney’s Office drops hate crime charge in anti-gay assault
Case remains under investigation and ‘further charges’ could come
D.C. police announced on Feb. 9 that they had arrested two days earlier on Feb. 7 a Germantown, Md., man on a charge of simple assault with a hate crime designation after the man allegedly assaulted a gay man at 14th and Q Streets, N.W., while using “homophobic slurs.”
But D.C. Superior Court records show that prosecutors with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for D.C., which prosecutes D.C. violent crime cases, charged the arrested man only with simple assault without a hate crime designation.
In response to a request by the Washington Blade for the reason why the hate crime designation was dropped, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office provided this response: “We continue to investigate this matter and make no mistake: should the evidence call for further charges, we will not hesitate to charge them.”
In a statement announcing the arrest in this case, D.C. police stated, “On Saturday, February 7, 2026, at approximately 7:45 p.m. the victim and suspect were in the 1500 block of 14th Street, Northwest. The suspect requested a ‘high five’ from the victim. The victim declined and continued walking,” the statement says.
“The suspect assaulted the victim and used homophobic slurs,” the police statement continues. “The suspect was apprehended by responding officers.”
It adds that 26-year-old Dean Edmundson of Germantown, Md. “was arrested and charged with Simple Assault (Hate/Bias).” The statement also adds, “A designation as a hate crime by MPD does not mean that prosecutors will prosecute it as a hate crime.”
Under D.C.’s Bias Related Crime Act of 1989, penalties for crimes motivated by prejudice against individuals based on race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, and homelessness can be enhanced by a court upon conviction by one and a half times greater than the penalty of the underlying crime.
Prosecutors in the past both in D.C. and other states have said they sometimes decide not to include a hate crime designation in assault cases if they don’t think the evidence is sufficient to obtain a conviction by a jury. In some instances, prosecutors have said they were concerned that a skeptical jury might decide to find a defendant not guilty of the underlying assault charge if they did not believe a motive of hate was involved.
A more detailed arrest affidavit filed by D.C. police in Superior Court appears to support the charge of a hate crime designation.
“The victim stated that they refused to High-Five Defendant Edmondson, which, upon that happening, Defendant Edmondson started walking behind both the victim and witness, calling the victim, “bald, ugly, and gay,” the arrest affidavit states.
“The victim stated that upon being called that, Defendant Edmundson pushed the victim with both hands, shoving them, causing the victim to feel the force of the push,” the affidavit continues. “The victim stated that they felt offended and that they were also gay,” it says.
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