District of Columbia
In D.C., 28 percent of homeless youth identify as LGBTQ
Advocacy groups, D.C. agency respond to increase in numbers
Editor’s Note: This article is part of our 2024 contribution to the D.C. Homeless Crisis Reporting Project in collaboration with other local newsrooms. The collective works will be published throughout the week at bit.ly/DCHCRP.
The LGBTQ operated and LGBTQ supportive homeless shelters and transitional housing facilities in D.C. are operating at full capacity this year as the number of homeless city residents, including LGBTQ homeless residents, continues to increase, according to the latest information available.
The annual 2024 Point-In-Time (PIT) count of homeless people in the District of Columbia conducted in January, shows that 12 percent of the homeless adults and 28 percent of homeless youth between the age of 18 and 24 identify as LGBTQ.
The PIT count shows an overall 14 percent increase in homelessness in the city compared to 2023. This year’s count of a total of 527 LGBTQ homeless people marks an increase over the 349 LGBTQ homeless people counted in 2023 in D.C. and 347 LGBTQ homeless counted in 2022.
Representatives of the LGBTQ organizations that provide services for homeless LGBTQ people have said the actual number of LGBTQ homeless people, especially LGBTQ youth, are most likely significantly higher than the annual PIT counts.
Liz Jaramillo, director of Youth Housing for the D.C. LGBTQ youth advocacy group SMYAL, which provides transitional housing for at least 55 homeless LGBTQ youth through four housing programs, said SMYAL staff members have observed a clear increase in the number of LGBTQ youth facing homelessness or housing insecurity.
She said the increase has been a topic of discussion with other groups providing homeless services for LGBTQ youth as well as with officials from the D.C. Department of Human Services (DHS), which provides support and funding for LGBTQ homeless related programs.
“So, I do think there has been an increase,” Jaramillo said. “We see it during our meetings when we are talking with DHS and talking about the need for what the next steps will be for growing LGBTQ housing in general across the city.”
Among other things, Jaramillo and officials with other LGBTQ organizations, including the D.C. LGBTQ+ Budget Coalition, are calling on the city to expand its funding for LGBTQ homeless programs to keep up with the need to address the increasing number of LGBTQ homeless people in the city.
SMYAL began its housing program for LGBTQ youth in 2017. It was preceded by D.C.’s Wanda Alston Foundation, which opened the city’s first transitional housing program solely dedicated to LGBTQ youth facing homelessness between the ages of 18 and 24 in 2008. As of 2022, the Alston Foundation had opened two more LGBTQ youth homeless facilities.
Both SMYAL and the Alston Foundation provide a wide range of services for their LGBTQ youth residents in addition to a safe and stable shelter, including food and nutrition services, case management services, mental health counseling, crisis intervention, and employment related skills development and education services.
The two groups also have designated at least one of their housing facilities to offer their LGBTQ residents extended transitional housing for up to six years.
In September of 2021, at the time when the LGBTQ community services center Casa Ruby lost its city funding for its own longstanding LGBTQ youth homeless shelter, the Department of Human Services awarded a grant for the opening of a new LGBTQ youth homeless shelter to Covenant House, a nonprofit group that provides homeless youth services nationwide. In 2022, Casa Ruby closed all its operations.
At the time, Covenant House announced the facility would serve as a 24-bed LGBTQ youth shelter called Shine in the city’s Deanwood neighborhood. In response to a request by the Washington Blade for an update on the status of the Shine facility, DHS released a statement saying the facility has been expanded to 30 beds and continues to receive DHS funding.
With most of the LGBTQ-specific homeless facilities in D.C. focusing on youth, the DHS opened the city’s first official shelter for LGBTQ adults in August of 2022 following a ribbon-cutting ceremony led by D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser. The 40-person shelter is located at 400 50th St., S.E.
“DHS continues to support LGBTQ adults through its low-barrier shelter, Living Life Alternative,” DHS said this week in its statement to the Blade. The statement says the facility is operated by The Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, which refers to itself as TCP, through a DHS Sole Source grant. According to the statement, TCP “sub awards the grant funding” to a company called KBEC Group, Inc., which specializes in providing comprehensive social services and residential living for youth and adults.
“KBEC proactively offers intensive care management services allowing residents to overcome long-standing obstacles preventing them from obtaining and maintaining permanent housing,” the DHS statement says in describing KBEC’s involvement in the LGBTQ adult housing facility.
“These include connections to Behavioral Health Services, Substance Use Disorder (SUD) resources, Supportive Employment Job Training Programs, direct access to health care within the shelter at least once a month, and a comprehensive curriculum of Life Skills to include Financial Literacy Classes, Music Therapy, Art Therapy Classes, and Group Therapy sessions,” the statement says.
It says the goal of the program associated with the LGBTQ adult shelter is to enable its residents to be able to leave the facility within six months through assistance from programs leading to self-sufficiency.
“KBEC has successfully connected more than 50% of residents to some type of housing subsidy, whether through the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ+ Affairs, DHS Housing Vouchers, or Permanent Supportive Housing (PSH),” the statement says.
A least two other non-LGBTQ locally based organizations – the Latin American Youth Center and Sasha Bruce Youthwork – also provide services for homeless LGBTQ youth, including housing services, the two groups state on their website.
Jaramillo, of SMYAL, and Hancie Stokes, SMYAL’s communications director, told the Blade this week that SMYAL and other local LGBTQ organizations continue to advocate for LGBTQ cultural competency training for the staff at non-LGBTQ organizations or private companies that provide LGBTQ-related homeless services.
“We work closely with our community partners to make sure that when a queer young person is matched into their program or placed into their program that they are equipped with basic cultural competency to be able to provide those supportive services to folks,” Stokes said.
“But there is a great need for increased funding for programs like SMYAL and Wanda Alston, which is why we partner with the LGBTQ+ Budget Coalition to advocate for more funding on behalf of all LGBTQ+ housing programs,” she told the Blade.
One example of a possible consequence of inadequate cultural competency training surfaced in April of this year when a transgender woman filed a discrimination complaint against a D.C. homeless shelter after it refused to allow her to stay in the women’s section of the shelter, forcing her to stay in the men’s sleeping section.
The complaint was filed against the shelter operated by the Community for Creative Nonviolence at 245 2nd St., N.W., which is one of the city’s largest privately operated shelters. A spokesperson for the shelter did not respond to a phone and email message left by the Blade asking for a response to the complaint.
Transgender rights advocates have said the denial of the placement of a transgender woman in the female section of a place of public accommodation such as a homeless shelter is a violation of the D.C. Human Rights Act’s ban on gender identity discrimination.
Jaramillo and Stokes said SMYAL has responded to yet another growing need for homeless and housing services related to the city’s immigrant community. Shortly after the shutdown of Casa Ruby, Stokes said SMYAL created an LGBTQ youth street outreach program that focuses on Spanish-speaking LGBTQ youth.
“A lot of folks are experiencing homelessness,” Stokes said. “But this is particularly working with queer and trans Spanish-speaking youth who are experiencing homelessness to either get them connected to housing services, health care, legal documentation or legal support, and education,” she said.
“And so, our team goes out to areas like Columbia Heights and other areas where we know a lot of these migrant populations are setting up communities. And this is an outreach directly to them and it builds rapport in the community.”
District of Columbia
Sold-out crowd turns out for 10th annual Caps Pride night
Gay Men’s Chorus soloist sings National Anthem, draws cheers
A sold-out crowd of 18,347 turned out on Jan. 17 for the 10th annual Pride Night at the Washington Capitals hockey game held at D.C.’s Capital One Arena.
Although LGBTQ Capitals fans were disappointed that the Capitals lost the game to the visiting Florida Panthers, they were treated to a night of celebration with Pride-related videos showing supportive Capitals players and fans projected on the arena’s giant video screen throughout the game.
The game began when Dana Nearing, a member of the Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, sang the National Anthem, drawing applause from all attendees.
The event also served as a fundraiser for the LGBTQ groups Wanda Alston Foundation, which provides housing services to homeless LGBTQ youth, and You Can Play, a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing LGBTQ inclusion in sports.
“Amid the queer community’s growing love affair with hockey, I’m incredibly honored and proud to see our hometown Capitals continue to celebrate queer joy in such a visible and meaningful way,” said Alston Foundation Executive Director Cesar Toledo.
Capitals spokesperson Nick Grossman said a fundraising raffle held during the game raised $14,760 for You Can Play. He said a fundraising auction for the Alston Foundation organized by the Capitals and its related Monumental Sports and Entertainment Foundation would continue until Thursday, Jan. 22
A statement on the Capitals website says among the items being sold in the auction were autographed Capitals player hockey sticks with rainbow-colored Pride tape wrapped around them, which Capitals players used in their pre-game practice on the ice.
Although several hundred people turned out for a pre-game Pride “block party” at the District E restaurant and bar located next to the Capital One Arena, it couldn’t immediately be determined how many Pride night special tickets for the game were sold.
“While we don’t disclose specific figures related to special ticket offers, we were proud to host our 10th Pride night and celebrate the LGBTQ+ community,” Capitals spokesperson Grossman told the Washington Blade.
District of Columbia
D.C.’s annual MLK Peace Walk and Parade set for Jan. 19
LGBTQ participants expected to join mayor’s contingent
Similar to past years, members of the LGBTQ community were expected to participate in D.C.’s 21st annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Peace Walk and Parade scheduled to take place Monday, Jan. 19.
Organizers announced this year’s Peace Walk, which takes place ahead of the parade, was scheduled to begin at 10:30 a.m. at the site of a Peace Rally set to begin at 9:30 a.m. at the intersection of Firth Sterling Avenue and Sumner Road, S.E., a short distance from Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue.
The Peace Walk and the parade, which is scheduled to begin at 11 a.m. at the same location, will each travel along Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue a little over a half mile to Marion Barry Avenue near the 11th Street Bridge where they will end.
Japer Bowles, director of D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, said he and members of his staff would be marching in the parade as part of the mayor’s parade contingent. In past years, LGBTQ community members have also joined the mayor’s parade contingent.
Stuart Anderson, one of the MLK Day parade organizers, said he was not aware of any specific LGBTQ organizations that had signed up as a parade contingent for this year’s parade. LGBTQ group contingents have joined the parade in past years.
Denise Rolark Barnes, one of the lead D.C. MLK Day event organizers, said LGBTQ participants often join parade contingents associated with other organizations.
Barnes said a Health and Wellness Fair was scheduled to take place on the day of the parade along the parade route in a PNC Bank parking lot at 2031 Martin Luther King Jr. Ave., S.E.
A statement on the D.C. MLK Day website describes the parade’s history and impact on the community.
“Established to honor the life and legacy of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the parade united residents of Ward 8, the District, and the entire region in the national movement to make Dr. King’s birthday a federal holiday,” the statement says. “Today, the parade not only celebrates its historic roots but also promotes peace and non-violence, spotlights organizations that serve the community, and showcases the talent and pride of school-aged children performing for family, friends, and community members.”
District of Columbia
Ruby Corado sentenced to 33 months in prison
Former Casa Ruby director pleaded guilty to wire fraud in 2024
A federal judge on Jan. 13 sentenced Ruby Corado, the founder and former executive director of the now closed D.C. LGBTQ community services organization Casa Ruby, to 33 months of incarceration for a charge of wire fraud to which she pleaded guilty in July 2024.
U.S. District Court Judge Trevor M. McFadden handed down the sentence that had been requested by prosecutors with the Office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia after Corado’s sentencing had been postponed six times for various reasons.
The judge also sentenced her to 24 months of supervised release upon her completion of incarceration.
In addition to the sentence of incarceration, McFadden agreed to a request by prosecutors to hold Corado responsible for “restitution” and “forfeiture” in the amount of $956,215 that prosecutors have said she illegally misappropriated from federal loans obtained by Casa Ruby.
The charge to which she pleaded guilty is based on allegations that she diverted at least $180,000 “in taxpayer backed emergency COVID relief funds to private offshore bank accounts,” according to court documents.
Court records show FBI agents arrested Corado on March 5, 2024, at a hotel in Laurel, Md., shortly after she returned to the U.S. from El Salvador, where authorities say she moved in 2022. Prosecutors have said in charging documents that she allegedly fled to El Salvador, where she was born, after “financial irregularities at Casa Ruby became public,” and the LGBTQ organization ceased operating.
Shortly after her arrest, another judge agreed to release Corado into the custody of her niece in Rockville, Md., under a home detention order. But at an Oct. 14, 2025, court hearing at which the sentencing was postponed after Corado’s court appointed attorney withdrew from the case, McFadden ordered Corado to be held in jail until the time of her once again rescheduled sentencing.
Her attorney at the time, Elizabeth Mullin, stated in a court motion that her reason for withdrawing from the case was an “irreconcilable breakdown in the attorney-client relationship.”
Corado’s newly retained attorney, Pleasant Brodnax, filed a 25-page defense Memorandum in Aid of Sentencing on Jan. 6, calling for the judge to sentence Corado only to the time she had already served in detention since October.
Among other things, Brodnax’s defense memorandum disputes the claim by prosecutors that Corado improperly diverted as much as $956,215 from federally backed loans to Casa Ruby, saying the total amount Corado diverted was $200,000. Her memo also states that Corado diverted the funds to a bank account in El Salvador for the purpose of opening a Casa Ruby facility there, not to be used for her personally.
“Ms. Corado has accepted responsibility for transferring a portion of the loan disbursements into another account she operated and ultimately transferring a portion of the loan disbursements to an account in El Salvador,” the memo continues.
“Her purpose in transferring funds to El Salvador was to fund Casa Ruby programs in El Salvador,” it says, adding, “Of course, she acknowledges that the terms of the loan agreement did not permit her to transfer the funds to El Salvador for any purpose.”
In his own 16-page sentencing recommendation memo, Assistant U.S. Attorney John Borchert, the lead prosecutor in the case, said Corado’s action amounted at the least to fraud.
“The defendant and Casa Ruby received no less than $1.2 million in taxpayer backed funds during the COVID-19 global health crisis,” he memo states. “But rather than use those funds to support Casa Ruby’s mission as the defendant promised, the defendant further contributed to its demise by unlawfully transferring no less than $180,000 of these federal emergency relief funds into her own private offshore bank accounts,” it says.
“Then, when media reports suggested the defendant would be prosecuted for squandering Casa Ruby’s government funding, she sold her home and fled the country,” the memo states. “Meanwhile, the people who she had promised to pay with taxpayer-backed funds – her employees, landlord, and vendors – were left behind flat broke.”
A spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney’s office and Corado’s attorney didn’t immediately respond to a request from the Washington Blade for comment on the judge’s sentence.
“Ms. Corado accepts full responsibility for her actions in this case,” defense attorney Brodnax says in her sentencing memo. “She acknowledges the false statements made in the loan applications and that she used some of the money outside the United States,” it says.
“However, the money was still utilized for the same purpose and intention as the funds used in the United States, to assist the LGBTQ community,” it states. “Ms. Corado did not use the money to buy lavish goods or fund a lavish lifestyle.”
Brodnax also states in her memo that as a transgender woman, Corado could face abuse and danger in a correctional facility where she may be sent if sentenced to incarceration.
“Ruby Corado committed a crime, she is now paying the price,” said D.C. LGBTQ rights advocate Peter Rosenstein. “While it is sad in many ways, we must remember she hurt the transgender community with what she did, and in many ways they all paid for her crime.”
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