As temperatures rise in Washington, so does the pressure on the D.C. government to pass a budget for the 2026 financial year.

The Washington Blade followed up with Heidi Ellis, coordinator of the DC LGBT Budget Coalition, to discuss progress made — and the steps still needed — to ensure Washington’s LGBTQ community remains a priority for the D.C. Council and Mayor Muriel Bowser’s office.

Asked about the current state of the budget, Ellis was clear: the dust hasn’t settled. The process is still unfolding. Still, she shared that the overall city budget has been cut.

“There was a large cut in the mayor’s budget for Financial Year 2026 — over a million dollars,” Ellis said. “We took a hit of over $6 million in this in the city due to the federal funding cuts.”

According to Ellis, the cuts are due in large part to declining local tax revenue and a Republican-controlled federal government that has shown little support for LGBTQ-specific funding.

“The biggest challenge is the city is in a different place financially,” Ellis said. “The city’s CFO has now had two years plus in a row of forecasts of lower revenue for the city in general, and then we had congressional interference when they cut a billion dollars out of our budget — that still has not been resolved on the federal level. That happened during the continuing resolution on the Hill to pass like their spending bill, which has not been resolved. The mayor had to essentially cut a billion dollars out of the FY 25 budget to make it balanced. That was huge, and then the city is looking at lower revenue over the next couple of years.”

Although the entire city faces challenges, Ellis said the intersectional needs of LGBTQ residents — especially those who are Black, brown, low-income, or otherwise marginalized — demand specific, equitable funding.

“Whatever issues the city has, whether it be housing instability, food insecurity, safety issues, they are always exacerbated when you think about it through the lens of queer people — specifically Black and brown queer folks and folks that are low to no income,” she said. “So the folks that are living at the margins of our community are always going to feel whatever is happening 10 times more. And this administration has brought in a lot of consternation and fear to the city.”

Still, despite the broader financial setbacks, there have been some “wins.”

Ellis named five of the 12 sitting council members who have stepped up to support the goals outlined by the LGBT Budget Coalition: Council Members Matthew Frumin, Christina Henderson, Brianne Nadeau, Zachary Parker, and Robert C. White, Jr.

Each of these members has offered support through their committee work — addressing areas from healthcare to homelessness.

Parker, the council’s only gay member, helped fight for expanded funding for the youth homelessness continuum. A 2024 study found that 40 percent of unhoused youth in D.C. identify as LGBTQ.

Frumin has advocated for additional funds for transgender workforce programs, the youth homelessness continuum, and the D.C. Department of Human Services, which provides critical support for low-income residents.

Henderson backed the LGBT Budget Coalition’s healthcare and HIV-related goals by pushing for expanded hours at the D.C. Health and Wellness Center.

“She’s actually recommending now that they be open on one week night and then two Saturdays a month,” Ellis said. “That’s a huge win, because that allows for more people to access that care.”

Nadeau championed continued funding for the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, which provides $1 million annually in grants to LGBTQ organizations. White advocated for sustaining support for trans workforce programs like Project LEAP, which connects gender-diverse residents with job coaches and employers to build long-term economic stability.

“So far I would say we’ve gotten about four out of the seven to eight things we asked for fulfilled,” Ellis explained. “We were able to get a good chunk of that back to restore some services — like permanent supportive housing and extended transitional housing.”

Ellis emphasized that the LGBT Budget Coalition’s success stems in part from community engagement and platforms like the Blade.

“We launched the letter writing campaign back in April that generated thousands of letters that went directly to the mayor and the council. It was literally folks just signing up and saying, ‘We support this,’ and it automatically created letters. It was a major organizing tool.”

“We did an op-ed in the Blade that ran both in the print and in the online version — that got a lot of traction. Our coalition members have been pushing out what the needs are through their social media and have been testifying before the council through the oversight hearings and the budget hearings. And remember — we just had WorldPride. We reminded them [council members], you all are coming out and waving the flag and taking photo ops for our community, you can’t do that in one breath and then take away our funding.”

Still, critical needs remain unmet — particularly around HIV healthcare funding.

“The HIV funding just continues to close the gap,” Ellis said. “That’s the one that it’s such a big gap that even with the great work of Council Member Henderson is not enough. She even highlighted in her committee report that she’s asking for the Committee of the Whole, which is the whole council, to supplement some of that funding — understanding just how much of a loss we took. The gap is still wide and needs additional funding.”

Beyond HIV-related services, Ellis noted several key areas that still require urgent attention in the final version of the budget. Among them: restoring the D.C. Emergency Rental Assistance Program, which provides housing stability for the city’s most vulnerable; reforming the Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act to better support tenant-led housing solutions; and restoring funding for LGBTQ mental health services, which have faced significant cuts in recent years.

The coalition is also pushing for the continued support of LGBTQ+ services administered through the Mayor’s Office of LGBTQ Affairs, including a $450,000 allocation for the Violence Prevention and Response Team initiative. In addition, Ellis emphasized the need for full enforcement of the city’s Language Access Act — and for its expansion to ensure Americans with Disabilities Act compliance, making D.C. services more inclusive for all residents.

Ellis acknowledged the political climate may feel daunting, but pointed to the resilience of the LGBTQ community — both historically and today.

“It’s just a constant reminder that we have been here before,” Ellis said. “We had the Lavender Scare. We had Stonewall. We had the AIDS epidemic. This community has gone through peril, and it continues around me how resilient we are — and actually not just resilient for the sake of being resilient, but that we actually build. We don’t just survive, but we build. I would say that the city has taken a hit, and we’re all trying to figure out how best to move forward and not lose our values.”

She added that while the LGBT Budget Coalition is united in its platform, it does not claim to speak for every LGBTQ person in D.C.

“The coalition is a voice that is united because we wanted to make sure we walk in lockstep, but we do not represent all of the LGBTQ community. We know there’s many factions. We are multifaceted as a community, but we do have a wide range of folks represented in our coalition, and we do our best to advocate with a wider lens and also make sure that we’re thinking about the most marginalized folks in our community. I just wanted to clarify where we enter this process, and I would just say that we’re going to continue to fight. It’s Pride month. It’s crazy that we’re going back to some of these original arguments around humanity, and whether we’re worth this dollar amount, but that’s where we are. But we’re not giving up. So I would just encourage everybody not to give up and get involved where they can get involved.”

When asked how individuals can support the LGBT Budget Coalition’s goals, Ellis had a clear answer: speak up.

“I would just argue for folks to email their council members and call their council members to show up. Just letting them know that you support funding of key services for LGBTQ folks. You don’t have to be part of our coalition to do that. These issues intersect; housing is an issue for all, healthcare is an issue for all. We’re just asking for it to be equitable.”

Addam Lee Schauer-Mayhew, the gay man who was struck in the face by a rock thrown through the front window of his house in Northeast D.C. on June 6 allegedly by a 13-year-old juvenile male says he and his husband think it’s important for the community to know more of the details surrounding this incident.

Schauer-Mayhew spoke to the Washington Blade about the incident after the Blade reached out to him for comment. He said he and his husband, Bryan C. Schauer, wanted to point out that the rock-throwing attack was the most recent in a series of incidents in which the same juvenile and others accompanying him have targeted them with anti-gay slurs and throwing rocks at their house and car since last October.

D.C. police announced on June 16 that they had arrested a 13-year-old juvenile male one day earlier on Sunday, June 15, on a charge of Assault With Significant Bodily Injury, in connection with the rock-throwing attack against Schauer-Mayhew.

A police report says the rock struck Schauer-Mayhew in the left eye causing a laceration under the eye.

A separate police statement said the charge against the juvenile was listed as a “Hate/Bias” incident and noted that “LGBTQ+ flags were displayed at the front of the home.”

Schauer-Mayhew told the Blade he and his husband have displayed at least one Pride flag at the front of their house since they purchased it in the city’s Kingman Park neighborhood four-and-a-half years ago, essentially “coming out” to their neighbors. He said the neighbors have been fully supportive of the two as a gay couple since they moved into their house.

But around October of last year, around the time of Halloween, a few juvenile males began targeting the couple at their house by yelling  homophobic slurs, including the word “faggot,” Schauer-Mayhew said, with the juvenile who assaulted him on June 6 of this year being among them.

Last November, over Thanksgiving weekend, the same juvenile male and a few of his cohorts broke into the couple’s backyard and carport while the couple was out of town visiting relatives, according to Schauer-Mayhew.

He said the break-in, as was the rock-throwing attack, was captured on video by surveillance cameras they have installed in several places on their house and property. Schauer-Mayhew said the couple provided D.C. police with video footage of the rock-throwing incident, in which he said the juvenile can be seen walking up to the house and throwing the rock through the window.

“I was sitting on our sofa in our living room, and I was just sitting there minding my own business,” Schauer-Mayhew told the Blade, while watching a tennis tournament on television.

“I heard the window break and then I felt something hit my face,” he said. “And my husband was upstairs, and he comes running down the stairs. And he was the one that called 911.”   

He added, “My face was covered with blood. My hands were covered with blood. I walked over to my kitchen sink, and I collapsed on the floor.”

But when paramedics arrived in an ambulance in response to the 911 call, he said he declined an offer to take him to a hospital.

Schauer-Mayhew pointed out that the attack occurred on the day he and his husband planned to attend the WorldPride Music Festival held at the RFK Stadium grounds located close to where they live.

“I did decline to go in an ambulance to the hospital because I very much still wanted to be able to enjoy Pride weekend,” he said. “I did receive a lovely black eye. But it has since subsided, and the wound is healing well. But I will have a gash on my face,” he told the Blade.

“And after all of this happened, and everything calmed down, I soldiered up and we went to the festival,” he said. But while there he said bleeding under his eye resumed, prompting him to go to an emergency medical services tent on the festival grounds. “I was able to get the proper attention, and then the wound kind of glued up and then I rejoined the rest of the festival.”

According to Schauer-Mayhew, people in the neighborhood played an important role in helping D.C police locate and arrest the juvenile who assaulted him. The arrest took place on June 15.

He said the youth who assaulted him and others who hung out with him were known as neighborhood troublemakers who, among other things, broke into homes and cars to engage in thefts. 

Just by chance, Schauer-Mayhew said he was in his car driving to a nearby grocery store on June 15 when he saw the juvenile who assaulted him leaning out of the window of another car driving nearby.

“And I instantly called my husband, and I said they’re back,” he said. By the time he arrived home he and his husband learned through an online “neighborhood chat chain” that others had also seen the juvenile and his cohorts and called police. The calls and follow-up sightings the next day, on June 16, enabled police to track down and arrest the 13-year-old juvenile.

“My message has always been I feel no malice toward them,” Schauer-Mayhew said when asked if he had a message for the juvenile who assaulted him and those he hung out with. “I just want them to get help and go down a better path than terrorizing people they don’t even know.”

Because court records of cases involving juveniles are sealed from public access, the Blade could not immediately determine the status of the case, including whether prosecutors with the Office of the D.C. Attorney General, which prosecutes juvenile cases, was prosecuting the case as a hate crime.

At least five of the multiple exhibits displayed in D.C.’s Freedom Plaza as part of the local Rainbow History Project’s WorldPride exhibition have been damaged by one or more vandals since the exhibition opened on May 18, according to Vincent Slatt, one of the exhibition’s lead organizers.   

The most recent incident took place during the early morning hours of Sunday, June 22, when someone pulled down two of the exhibits displayed on decorated chain link fences, Slatt told the Washington Blade.

The Rainbow History Project exhibition, called “Pickets, Protests, and Parades: The History of Gay Pride in Washington,” has been available for public viewing 24 hours each day since it opened in Freedom Plaza, which is located near the White House on Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. between 13th and 14th streets.

Slatt says it will remain open until its scheduled closing on July 6, regardless of efforts by vandals to strike at its individual LGBTQ exhibits.

“Covering 1965 to the present, the exhibition explores the history of Pride in D.C. in 10 distinct thematic eras,” a statement released by Rainbow History Project says. “Each of the 10 areas are detailed in thematic cubes rich with history and visuals,” it says.

Slatt said at least two instances of vandalism, including the June 22 incident, occurred between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m. during the time when a security guard working for a security company retained by Rainbow History Project was scheduled to be on duty at the Freedom Plaza site. But Slatt said the guard appears to have left before his shift was supposed to end, leaving the exhibition unsupervised.

“And so sometime during that security guard’s shift last night it happened,” said Slatt, referring to the two exhibits that were pulled down Sunday morning, June 22.

He said a decision was made later that day to fire the security company and retain another company to provide security for the 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. shift. Slatt said volunteers recruited by Rainbow History Project have been acting as “monitors” to secure the site during daytime and the evening up to 11 p.m. He said the group was unable to recruit volunteers to staff the shift from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m.

Rainbow History Project, according to Slatt, received a $1,000 payment invoice from the company that has been providing the metal fencing for the exhibits under  a rental agreement  after one of the vandals damaged two ten-foot-by-ten-foot fencing strips beyond repair last week. 

Slatt said a possible suspect for acts of vandalism appeared in Freedom Plaza the day before the exhibition opened on May 17, as volunteers were setting up the exhibits.

“The first night we were out there we had a homophobe yelling at us when he saw the word gay,” said Slatt, who described the person as a white male with red hair and a red beard appearing in his 30s or 40s in age. “He’s been out here a couple of times preaching the Bible and yelling slurs,” Slatt said.

At least one witness, a homeless man who sometimes sleeps in Freedom Plaza at night, has reported seeing a man fitting that same description vandalizing an exhibit, Slatt told the Blade.

He said Rainbow History Project has reported the vandalism incidents to the U.S. Park Police, which has jurisdiction over Freedom Plaza. A Park Police officer who came to the site on June 22 to prepare a report on the latest incident advised exhibition volunteers to call police immediately if they see the male suspect return to the site.

As if all this were not enough, Slatt said a few of the exhibits that had been damaged by a vandal and were structurally weakened were blown down by high winds during the storm that hit the D.C. area on June 19. He said volunteer workers put everything back together over the next few days only to have the yet unidentified vandal or vandals pull down two other exhibits on June 22.