District of Columbia
Recovery at the Triangle Club
Coming together as a group to fight a common addiction
On Sunday, between the Dupont Italian Kitchen, where the tables are filled with the boozy brunches of the kickball gays, and Mikko, where a young couple is celebrating their anniversary with some Champagne, the door to a row-house opens, and all at once, a crowd pours forth onto the stairs. Only the stairs keep on filling. These folks aren’t leaving. They’ve only left the building to come to the stairs, just to chat. It’s as though 100 people all decided to go for a smoke out front, all at the same time. But if you ask them why they’re there, you’ll get only the vaguest of answers. “We’re just coming from a meeting,” one will say. “It’s a clubhouse,” says another.
There are good reasons for this vagueness. The Triangle Club is a center for queer folk to attend recovery meetings: Overeaters Anonymous, Alcoholics Anonymous, Crystal Meth Anonymous, Sexual Compulsives Anonymous. It’s part of the very mission of these groups to protect the privacy of their members. But these groups also want those in the queer community who need the support to know that they’re there. And so the folks at the Triangle Club were kind enough to welcome the Blade into their space for a few meetings, to see how things worked and shed some light on what they’re all about.
The Club had its kickoff meeting in 1988, during the AIDS crisis. Churches weren’t particularly enthusiastic about hosting gay recovery meetings in their back rooms. And so the Club sought to provide a safe place for those meetings to take place. At the time of the club’s founding, it was estimated that gays and lesbians were twice as likely to report problems with alcohol abuse than heterosexuals. One would hope that things might have changed in the intervening years. But according to a government report released this summer, that figure has barely improved. (The government report did not collect any statistics on transgender people.)
Of course there is no single reason queer people develop problems with drugs and alcohol. But one in particular struck me, especially as a reason I heard coming from a lot of the younger folk at the Triangle Club. “I thought meth was a prerequisite for going out,” said one. “I thought that’s what you did.” Another said, “I drank to find community. And then I drank to numb myself when I didn’t find it in the gay community.” Again and again, I heard stories about turning to drugs and alcohol as a way of finding connection, and as a way of coping with the failure to find connection.
And so while I heard a lot of gratitude for the role the meetings at the Triangle Club played in people’s recovery, I also heard a lot of gratitude for the community of the Triangle Club itself. It wasn’t just that the Club helped people turn away from an unhealthy way of solving their problems. It’s that it gave them what they were really looking for in the first place: a community they could call their own.
Improbably, as I left a meeting of Crystal Meth Anonymous, I found myself wishing to be an addict in recovery. To have a place to share things that would go unsaid among friends and family, let alone therapists. To take part, week after week, in one another’s mission for a more fulfilling life. To be present for the absolute raucousness, as when one gentleman described living on meth as “wearing a fur coat into a swimming pool,” and then “turning the wave-machine on.” To hear the applause that only someone four days sober could receive. But what kind of destructive, life-threatening wish was I making? I couldn’t possibly be serious.
Many of us in the queer community are exhausted by drinking, if not drugging, our way into it. That exhaustion might not rise to the level of addiction, but this has the perverse consequence of not driving us to seek alternative forms of belonging. One of the men I interviewed kept talking of the “sober community,” and my ears perked up. Perhaps there was a broader community of folks, of which those in recovery were only a part, that wasn’t centered around substance use.
“The sober community absolutely extends beyond the Triangle Club,” he told me. “There are a bunch of other gay meetings that go on.” This wasn’t exactly what I hoped to hear. What a sorry state we’re in, I couldn’t help but feel that to be part of the sober community was to be in recovery. As though the community of substance use were so mandatory that it had to drive you to your own personal edge in order for you to find community in sobriety.
The Triangle Club should not be overly romanticized, and they’d be the first to tell you. People talked of trying to find fellowship at the club in the past, and not necessarily succeeding. Being one of two Black people in the room, only for the other to drop out of the program. Or of the demands of service, dragging yourself out late Friday night to chair a meeting, or sponsoring someone for the first time and being scared that you aren’t the right one to advise them. But I think it’s a testament to the space that these things could be said in the space. The meetings aren’t a place of mandatory optimism, but honest experience. And what good is a meeting for sharing honest experience if you can’t share your negative experiences too?
I had hoped, as part of this feature, to attend a meeting of Sexual Compulsives Anonymous. The two meetings I appealed to were kind enough to hold a vote on whether they would open their doors—but in the end they opted to remain private. One gentleman from the meetings volunteered to share a little of what these meetings were all about. Recovery meetings in general depend on coming together as a group to fight a common addiction. But “S” meetings, as the gentleman described them, can’t take “coming together” lightly, nor a “common addiction” lightly.
To begin with, sexual addiction is not as straightforwardly defined as addiction to drugs or alcohol. What sobriety is for one person is not what sobriety is for another. One person might be trying to curtail a masturbation habit. But for others? “That simply isn’t an option,” the gentleman said. And unlike recovery meetings for substances, which can ban substances from the room, the same can’t as easily be said for “S” meetings. We’re sexual beings, and so inevitably, to bring yourself into a room is to bring sexuality along with it. The recovery meetings at the Triangle Club usually end with the group joining hands to say the serenity prayer. But this can’t be a given at “S” meetings, where joining hands might be violating someone’s boundary.
With the pandemic waning, most recovery meetings have slowly started to transition away from video format back to in-person. But “S” meetings have been more reluctant to do so, and most have stuck with a hybrid format. One veteran of Al-Anon voiced his relief at coming back to the rooms. “You can’t hug a square!” I suspect that’s the very reason “S” meetings have been slow to return.
Part of my disappointment in not attending the “S” meetings was how central they seemed to be to a queer recovery organization. Substance abuse might disproportionately affect the queer community, but it is the addicts who are queer, not the addictions. If the addiction is to love or sex, however, the addiction itself is inextricably queer. Aren’t the “S” meetings the heart, in a sense, of the Triangle Club? But a conversation with a gentleman from Alcoholics Anonymous had me rethinking this. “[Accepting you’re an alcoholic,] it’s similar to coming out as gay,” he said. “There are people out there who view it as a moral failing, but it’s just part of who I am.”
The experience of coming out is so central to being queer. How could coming out as an addict have nothing whatsoever to do with it? The same story of a newfound, authentic life was as common to the folks at the Triangle Club as it would be to anyone who comes out as queer.
(CJ Higgins is a postdoctoral fellow with the Alexander Grass Humanities Institute at Johns Hopkins University.)
District of Columbia
Brian Footer suspends campaign for Ward 1 D.C. Council seat
Race’s third LGBTQ candidate cites family reasons for ‘stepping back’
Gay Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Brian Footer, who was one of three out LGBTQ candidates running for the open Ward 1 D.C. Council seat in the city’s June 16, 2026, Democratic primary, announced on Dec. 17 he has decided to “suspend” his campaign to focus on his family.
“After deep reflection and honest conversations with my family, I have decided to suspend my campaign for the D.C. Council,” he said in a statement. “This moment in my life requires me to be present with the people I love most and honor the responsibilities I carry both at home and in the community,” he states. “This was not an easy decision, but it is the right one for me and my family at this time.”
Footer, a longtime Ward 1 community activist and LGBTQ rights advocate, announced his candidacy for the Ward 1 Council seat in July, one month before bisexual Ward 1 community activist Aparna Raj announced her candidacy for the Council seat on Aug. 12.
Gay Ward 1 Advisory Neighborhood Commissioner Miguel Trindade Deramo announced his candidacy for the Ward 1 Council seat on Nov. 18, becoming the third out LGBTQ candidate in what appeared to be an unprecedented development for a race for a single D.C. Council seat.
At least three other candidates who are not LGBTQ are running for the Ward 1 Council seat. They include Ward 1 ANC member Rashida Brown, longtime Ward 1 community activist Terry Lynch, and Jackie Reyes-Yanes, the former director of the Mayor’s Office of Community Affairs.
In his statement announcing the suspension of his candidacy, Footer said he would continue to be involved in community affairs and advocate for the issues he discussed during his campaign.
“I want to be clear: I am stepping back from the race, not the work,” he says in his statement. “Public service has always been my calling. I will continue advocating for affordability, for safer streets, for stability for small businesses, and for a government that responds to people with urgency and respect,” he wrote. “And I will continue showing up as a partner in the work of building a stronger Ward 1.”
Footer concluded by thanking and praising his campaign supporters and calling his campaign suspension a “transition,” suggesting he is not likely to resume his candidacy.
His campaign press spokesperson did not immediately respond to a question from the Washington Blade asking if Footer might later resume his campaign or if his latest action was in effect an end to his candidacy.
“To everyone who knocked on doors, hosted conversations, donated, shared encouragement, and believed in this campaign, thank you,” he says in his statement. “I am deeply grateful for every person who helped this campaign take root,” he added. “This isn’t an ending, it’s a transition. And I’m excited for the work ahead, both in Ward 1 and at home with my family.”
Longtime gay D.C. Democratic Party activist Peter Rosenstein said in a statement to the Blade, “I respect Brian Footer’s decision to end his campaign for Council. It is not easy to run a campaign in D.C. and there are many others running in Ward 1.” He added, “While not living in Ward 1, I thank Brian for all he has done and clearly will continue to do for the people in the ward.”
District of Columbia
D.C. students need academic support, diverse connections for economic mobility
Region offers array of resources for families in need of assistance
Education is the blueprint of good economic mobility.
But when students aren’t set up with the proper resources to secure a quality education, it’s often low-income families that suffer the most, For Love of Children (FLOC) Executive Director LaToya Clark said. Children from low-income families on average grow up to earn $25,600 annually, according to Opportunity Insights.
D.C. families need better economic mobility, and experts say that starts with kids getting an education and breaking generational poverty cycles. Students without a high school diploma earn $738 per week on average, while those who graduated high school earn roughly $930 per week, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Contrarily, those with bachelor’s degrees earn about $1,543 per week.
Students from low-income backgrounds have fewer financial advantages on their paths to securing an education, and hardships faced by public schools make it difficult for them to catch up, Clark said.
From local financial and educational assistance programs to strengthening diversity among educators, here are a few ways researchers and advocates are fighting for better economic mobility in D.C. schools.
Student assistance programs
For many students, falling behind academically is because of circumstances outside of their control, Clark said.
She said teacher shortages, large classrooms and scarce funding can lead to an educational environment not fully equipped to set students on the right path. A one-dimensional education can then hinder future professional opportunities and give students limited economic mobility.
That’s where local organizations like FLOC come in –– to fill in the academic and social gaps often left open by schools.
Clark said FLOC has multiple services that give underserved students a more individualized academic experience. For the Neighborhood Tutoring Program, students are assessed at the grade level at which they’re performing, not what grade they are in. They’re then matched with a volunteer –– ranging from college students to retirees –– who follows a curriculum that matches the student’s performance level.
There’s also the Pathways Forward Program, an afterschool opportunity for D.C. youth in 7th to 12th grades designed to increase high school graduation rates. The program supports those at risk of academic failure to find a successful way forward, and those in 10th to 12th grades to prepare for graduation or transition to postsecondary programs. Both Neighborhood Tutoring and Pathways Forward are free.
“Everything we offer is designed to close achievement gaps, help our students boost their confidence and ensure young people have the skills and support that they need to succeed in schools and beyond,” Clark said.
And that design is working for students. Clark recalled a young girl who was the oldest of six who felt a need to help her mom take care of her siblings. She was falling behind in school until she found FLOC. The girl credited her ability to go to college and find a professional job to FLOC’s individualized and accessible approach to education.
FLOC is a reliable resource for D.C. youth to get academic help, but there are numerous other organizations working to close educational gaps and improve the future economic mobility of students.
Minds Matter D.C. helps underserved students find accessible pathways to prepare for and succeed in college. The organization offers mentoring, SAT prep, access to summer enrichment programs and guidance through the college application and financial aid process.
The work Minds Matter does addresses a disproportionate statistic: While roughly 89% of students from “well-off” families attend college, only 51% of students from low-income families do so, according to a report published by Brookings. Minds Matter reported that 100% of its students attended a four-year college or university.
The D.C. Schools Project, a program of the Center for Social Justice, offers academic help and English-language tutoring for low-income and immigrant families. Each semester, roughly 60 tutors assist about 100 students, their families, and other D.C. immigrants.
D.C. CAP Scholars has a mission to connect youth with financial and academic opportunities that will help them succeed in college. Registration is now open for the organization’s Ward 7 & 8 scholarship, a $12,000 annual scholarship for students who attended high school in those D.C. wards. Those areas encompass communities such as Congress Heights, Deanwood and Anacostia, which are some of the city’s poorest areas.
RISE offers tutoring and college mentoring to underserved populations. Its primary focus is on opportunity academies, including the three in D.C.: Ballou STAY, Luke C. Moore and Garnet-Patterson STAY. These academies are “second chance” schools for students who didn’t complete high school on a traditional timeline.
RISE Executive Director Ricardo Cooper said the organization offers real-time tutors for students in these academies through its Keep Up Tutoring program. RISE also provides summer literacy “bootcamps” and college prep for underserved students.
As a native Washingtonian, Cooper said he wishes opportunities like RISE were available to him as a kid. That’s why it’s so special for him to lead the organization and help D.C. youth rise above the academic and economic barriers he used to face.
“We know that going to college and getting a degree makes you more money,” Cooper said. “Being able to have these programs to support youth in school, to make sure that they feel confident once they graduate high school, to go to college, to feel confident in completing their coursework and just understanding the material is important to raise that poverty line.”
While these programs are crucial to many students’ success, Matthew Shirrell, associate professor of educational leadership at George Washington University, said there are many fundamental solutions to supporting kids that schools should recognize.
Diverse learning opportunities
Shirrell’s research has identified a key link to the positive relationships between teachers and students: diversity.
“Having a more diverse teaching workforce would certainly benefit all students, because it’s like their teachers having access to a library with a whole bunch of different perspectives,” Shirrell said.
He said teachers have a continuously growing list of responsibilities not just academically, but in dealing with social and emotional issues that students bring to school. By having a diverse team of educators in each school, teachers are better equipped to connect with students to turn potential barriers into new pathways.
But achieving this is about more than championing diversity –– it’s a way for students to secure better futures and stay out of the criminal justice system, Shirrell said.
Shirrell pointed to the idea of “exclusionary discipline.” In his research, Shirrell found that Black and LatinX students were significantly less likely to be suspended from school when they had teachers who shared their racial or ethnic background.
Teachers of different backgrounds than their students tend to rely on harsh disciplinary action, when in reality the situation could come down to cultural misunderstandings or misconceptions, Shirrell said.
In the long run, this disciplinary bias can disproportionately impact underserved communities. Shirrell said relentless discipline can lead to the students making poor decisions outside of school and potentially ending up in the criminal justice system.
At such a formative age, students need the support, understanding and guidance that only a diverse population of educators can bring.
“You really can’t get that from a book,” Shirrell said. “The best way to learn that is from working alongside somebody who you know is doing things differently than you. There’s tremendous value to having a diverse workforce, whether that be racial, linguistic or economic.”
Securing an education from open-minded teachers is especially important in underserved pockets of D.C., such as Wards 7 and 8. D.C. youth can experience completely different lives and opportunities just by living around the block. Diverse educators can help fill social gaps, but having students from different economic backgrounds share a classroom pushes them to see different points of views and develop their critical thinking skills, Shirrell said.
Luckily, that sentiment rings true in D.C., a city with high social capital –– or the likelihood of low-income people and high-income people becoming friends or crossing paths. About 50% of the friends of low-income people have high incomes, and low-income people are only 4.7% less likely to friend high-income people they meet, according to Opportunity Insights.
Though there’s never one simple solution in growing economic mobility for students and their families, Cooper, the RISE executive director, said having educators who embody multiple perspectives –– as well as ensure students are aware of the financial and academic support programs available to them –– are strong ways to set a child on a brighter financial and professional path.
“There are a lot of factors that also go along with [improving economic mobility], but chances are better once students feel confident in who they are, confident in what they can do and go to college and excel,” Cooper said.
This article is part of a national initiative exploring how geography, policy, and local conditions influence access to opportunity. Find more stories at economicopportunitylab.com.
District of Columbia
Capital Pride announces change in date for 2026 D.C. Pride parade and festival
Events related to U.S. 250th anniversary and Trump birthday cited as reasons for change
The Capital Pride Alliance, the D.C. based group that organizes the city’s annual LGBTQ Pride events, has announced it is changing the dates for the 2026 Capital Pride Parade and Festival from the second weekend in June to the third weekend.
“For over a decade, Capital Pride has taken place during the second weekend in June, but in 2026, we are shifting our dates in response to the city’s capacity due to major events and preparations for the 250th anniversary of the United States,” according to a Dec. 9 statement released by Capital Pride Alliance.
The statement says the parade will take place on Saturday, June 20, 2026, with the festival and related concert taking place on June 21.
“This change ensures our community can gather safely and without unnecessary barriers,” the statement says. “By moving the celebration, we are protecting our space and preserving Pride as a powerful act of visibility, solidarity, and resistance,” it says.
Ryan Bos, the Capital Pride Alliance CEO and President, told the Washington Blade the change in dates came after the group conferred with D.C. government officials regarding plans for a number of events in the city on the second weekend in June. Among them, he noted, is a planned White House celebration of President Donald Trump’s 80th birthday and other events related to the U.S. 250th anniversary, which are expected to take place from early June through Independence Day on July 4.
The White House has announced plans for a large June 14, 2026 celebration on the White House south lawn of Trump’s 80th birthday that will include a large-scale Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) event involving boxing and wrestling competition.
Bos said the Capital Pride Parade will take place along the same route it has in the past number of years, starting at 14th and T Streets, N.W. and traveling along 14th Street to Pennsylvania Ave., where it will end. He said the festival set for the following day will also take place at its usual location on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W., between 2nd Street near the U.S. Capitol, to around 7th Street, N.W.
“Our Pride events thrive because of the passion and support of the community,” Capital Pride Board Chair Anna Jinkerson said in the statement. “In 2026, your involvement is more important than ever,” she said.
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