Local
Comings & Goings
Byard joins Gill Foundation board
The ‘Comings & Goings’ column chronicles important life changes of Blade readers.
The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
Eliza Byard
Congratulations to Eliza Byard who has joined the Gill Foundation board. The Gill Foundation is one of the nation’s leading funders of efforts to secure full equality for LGBT people. The foundation makes tax-deductible grants to nonprofit organizations that advance equality by doing research, educating people, developing public policy recommendations, and working within the legal system.
“Our board members are essential to driving the foundation’s work to advance and protect LGBT equality in the United States, and Eliza brings incomparable experience, leadership, and strategic vision to the team,” said founder Tim Gill.
Byard has served as executive director of GLSEN, where she designed and executed strategic initiatives that have transformed K-12 education in the United States to respond to the unique challenges and needs of LGBTQ+ youth. GLSEN’s work has contributed to a significant decrease in anti-LGBTQ+ harassment and violence in schools, and the organization’s advocacy and legislative strategies have achieved bipartisan support around the urgency and importance of bullying prevention and LGBTQ+ issues in education. Under her leadership, GLSEN was honored by President Obama as a “Champion of Change.”
Byard is an expert on education, youth development, and LGBTQ+ issues. She has appeared in a broad range of digital, print, and broadcast outlets, including The Washington Post, the New York Times, POLITICO, Education Week, Newsweek, and a host of other radio and TV outlets. She has served on numerous boards and commissions for LGBTQ+ youth and educational equity and is currently a Trustee of the America’s Promise Alliance. She has taught U.S. History and American Studies at both Columbia and Barnard.
Congratulations also to Matt Nosanchuk who has joined Quadrant Strategies as a vice president. Quadrant Strategies is a research-driven consultancy that works with Fortune 500 and other leading companies. Its specialty is helping clients facing significant challenges to their reputation or brand, or full-blown crises. Quadrant conducts market research to create a strategy and tactics for dealing with the short-term challenges and then determining what a client’s story should be for the long term.
Nosanchuk has extensive experience working in senior policy and communications roles in the Obama and Clinton administrations, on Capitol Hill, and at high-profile NGOs. He served in several senior roles in the Obama administration: at the White House as Director of Outreach for the National Security Council, and as President Obama’s liaison to the American Jewish community; and in senior positions at the Departments of State, Justice, and Homeland Security. Earlier in his career, he served in the Clinton administration as the point person at the Department of Justice on a range of significant policy and legislative priorities. He has worked on Capitol Hill as U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson’s counsel, and as Special Minority Counsel on the House Judiciary Committee. For his work to further LGBT rights, he received the American Bar Association’s Stonewall Award and the Attorney General’s Distinguished Service Award.
Matt Nosanchuk
The Comings & Goings column is about sharing the professional successes of our community. We want to recognize those landing new jobs, new clients for their business, joining boards of organizations and other achievements. Please share your successes with us at [email protected].
The Comings & Goings column also invites LGBTQ college students to share their successes with us. If you have been elected to a student government position, gotten an exciting internship, or are graduating and beginning your career with a great job, let us know so we can share your success.
Congratulations to Yadiel Meléndez, on their new role as Community Associate, with the Wanda Alston Foundation. Meléndez is piloting a new role as a Community Associate at the Wanda Alston Foundation, where they support queer and trans young people in finding their footing, building independence, and experiencing a housing community where they are seen, valued, and affirmed. They are coming into this role with more than a decade of experience as a community organizer and operations specialist, supporting diverse communities through service, advocacy, and program coordination.
Previously they worked for Right Proper Brewing Shaw as a server and bartender and at Sephora, Washington, DC, and at FreshFarm, DC, in bilingual food access. They also worked freelance to build foundational structures for local queer BIPOC performance art coalitions, producing variety shows to curate space for marginalized performance artists in the community. They were a production manager for Haus of Hart Productions, a BIPOC centric performance art production. They also worked as field staff with the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention in Stafford, Va.
Meléndez is bilingual, Spanish and English. Their work is guided by a commitment to dignity, safety, and trauma-informed engagement, particularly within LGBTQ and BIPOC communities.
Congratulations also to Ben Rosen LICSW, on his new role as program director, with the Wanda Alston Foundation. Rosen previously worked with Fountain House’s OnRamps program, helping to build a new, innovative outreach program for individuals considered chronically homeless, and living with serious mental illness, in the Times Square area of New York. Rosen is a Psychotherapist, having worked with SG Psychotherapy, and as the psychotherapist with the Nest Community Health Center (URAM).
Rosen has a B.F.A. in Theatre Arts: Musical Theatre, Minor in Psychology (Cum Laude) from Malloy University Conservatory; and his M.S.W. in Clinical Practice with Individuals, Families, and Groups, from The Silberman School of Social Work, Hunter College, N.Y. He is independently licensed in New York and Washington, D.C.
Rehoboth Beach
BLUF leather social set for April 10 in Rehoboth
Attendees encouraged to wear appropriate gear
Diego’s in Rehoboth Beach hosts a monthly leather happy hour. April’s edition is scheduled for Friday, April 10, 5-7 p.m. Attendees are encouraged to wear appropriate gear. The event is billed as an official event of BLUF, the free community group for men interested in leather. After happy hour, the attendees are encouraged to reconvene at Local Bootlegging Company for dinner, which allows cigar smoking. There’s no cover charge for either event.
District of Columbia
Celebrations of life planned for Sean Bartel
Two memorial events scheduled in D.C.
Two celebrations of life are planned for Sean Christopher Bartel, 48, who was found deceased on a hiking trail in Argentina on or around March 15. Bartel began his career as a television news reporter and news anchor at stations in Louisville, Ky., and Evansville, Ind., before serving as Senior Video Producer for the D.C.-based International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers union from 2013 to 2024.
A memorial gathering is planned for Friday, April 10, 11:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. at the IBEW International Office (900 7th St., N.W.), according to a statement by the DC Gay Flag Football League, where Bartel was a longtime member. A celebration of life is planned that same evening, 6-8 p.m. at Trade (1410 14th St., N.W.).
Minimal version of ‘Streetcar Named Desire’ heading to Dupont Underground
Comings & Goings
An effort to increase the number of psychiatrists of color
Calendar: April 10-16
BLUF leather social set for April 10 in Rehoboth
Police mental health struggles gain growing attention
Man faces first S.C. ‘hate intimidation’ charge
Trump budget would codify expanded global gag rule
Cuba under pressure and without answers
