Local
Trans community, allies observe Day of Remembrance
Activists vow to persevere following year of increase in anti-trans violence
Participants pause to remember those who have been the victims of anti-trans violence. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
More than 150 people turned out Sunday night at D.C.’s Metropolitan Community Church for the 12th Annual Transgender Day of Remembrance, an international event that recognizes transgender people who have lost their lives to anti-trans violence.
Organizers said the annual observance began in 1999 in recognition of Rita Hester, a transgender woman in Boston who was killed the previous year in what authorities have called an anti-transgender hate crime. Since that time, Transgender Day of Remembrance events have taken place in dozens of cities in the U.S. and abroad.
“These were our brothers and sisters, family members, friends, people of faith, innocent and quite often, as is the case in this crazy world of ours, they have been taken from us by violence,” said transgender activist Jessica Xavier, one of the organizers of the D.C. event.
“But they’re not martyrs,” Xavier said. “They didn’t die for a cause. They weren’t a member of any political movement. They were human beings, just like all of us…This is a time for caring and compassion, for healing and for hope, for sorrow but also strength.”
MORE IN THE BLADE: TRANS ACTIVISTS HOLD PROTEST OUTSIDE POLICE, US ATTORNEY OFFICES
The highlight of the event included the reading of the names of transgender people from the D.C. area and others from across the nation and throughout the world that lost their lives to hate violence based on their gender identity or expression.
Following the reading of each name, the audience responded by saying, “We remember them.”
Transgender activists Julius Agers and Ruby Corado read the names of local transgender victims who lost their lives between 2000 and 2009 and international victims, including several from Latin America, who lost their lives in 2011.
Corado read the name of Lashai Mclean, a 23-year-old D.C. transgender woman who was shot to death in Northeast D.C. in August of this year. Agers read the name of Gaurav “Gigi” Gopalan, a 35-year-old aerospace engineer who was found fatally wounded on a sidewalk in the city’s Columbia Heights section on Sept. 10 of this year.
Police said Gopalan died in a hospital a short time later of blunt force trauma to the head. Police have yet to make an arrest in either of the two cases.
Gopalan, who lived his professional life as an out gay man, was dressed in women’s clothes when he was found unconscious on the street, according to police. Although many of Gopalan’s friends said they considered him a gay man, transgender activists say he likely was targeted because of his appearance as a transgender woman.
Earline Budd of Transgender Health Empowerment. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Earline Budd, an official with the D.C. organization Transgender Health Empowerment and the lead organizer of Sunday night’s Transgender Day of Remembrance, said the event has grown significantly over the past several years.
Budd told the gathering that a greater recognition that anti-transgender violence is rooted in ignorance, hatred and discrimination would lead to the eventual decrease in such violence.
Budd and transgender activist Ruby Corado said they were encouraged by the large numbers of gays, lesbians and straight allies that have joined the effort to fight anti-transgender violence. Corado praised D.C. police officials, including Chief of Police Cathy Lanier, for speaking out and establishing internal police policies aimed at curtailing anti-transgender discrimination.
However, the two said police have yet to solve a string of violent attacks over the past several years against transgender residents of the District, including the murders this year of Mclean and Gopalan.
“You’re hearing an outcry from the community for getting these cases solved,” said Budd. “And again, I’m going to appeal to Chief Lanier to do more in terms of trying to solve some of these transgender murders.”
Police have said murders of both transgender people and gay men often are difficult to solve because the perpetrators usually are strangers whom the victims met at the time of or shortly before the murder. Police say most of the non-LGBT murders are committed by people who have had some type of relationship with the victim, making it easier for investigators to find witnesses who identify a suspect.
Jeffrey Richardson, director of D.C. Mayor Vincent Gray’s Office of LGBT Affairs, told the gathering that Gray considers transgender residents an important part of the city’s diverse and vibrant community.
“We believe people are to be judged by the content of their character, not by their gender identity,” Richardson said. “Let’s rid our city and our country of the hatred that leads to violence and the loss of life.”
Rev. Abena McCray, pastor of Unity Fellowship Church. (Washington Blade photo by Michael Key)
Rev. Abena McCray, pastor of Unity Fellowship Church of D.C., which has a largely African American LGBT congregation, said transgender residents are welcome in the city’s faith community.
Following a selection of songs by her church’s Agape Praise Choir, McCray delivered a sermon-like talk calling for acceptance and support for the city’s transgender residents.
“You are unique, and the Creator loves you just as you are,” she said. “You are not a mistake. God doesn’t make mistakes…We celebrate transgender today. Lord, you knew what you were doing when you created transgender.”
Corado said support of the event by the larger LGBT community has been uplifting to transgender residents despite the continued incidents of anti-trans violence in D.C.
“I am extremely happy because the support that we have gotten from the LGBT community and allies has been outstanding in the last couple of years,” she said. “It’s just amazing that people do care about what happens to us. And it makes us feel like we’re not alone.”
Transgender activist Jason Terry of the D.C. Trans Coalition said he is encouraged that the Day of Remembrance took place less than a week after the White House hosted an historic, first-ever meeting on transgender issues, including the issue of anti-trans violence.
“This is a great event, as always,” he said of the Day of Remembrance. “It’s so important to pause and remember those that we’ve lost. We’ve had a bad year. The way we honor those deaths is by moving forward towards justice.”
District of Columbia
Wanda Alston Foundation announces passing of founding executive director Brian Watson
D.C. activist praised as “passionate advocate” for homeless LGBTQ youth
The Wanda Alston Foundation, which provides housing and support services for homeless LGBTQ youth in the D.C. metro area, announced on July 20 that its founding executive director, Brian Watson, has passed away.
In a statement the Alston Foundation called Watson “one of Washington, D.C.,’s most passionate advocates for LGBTQ+ youth experiencing homelessness.”
Neither the statement nor others who knew Watson have disclosed the cause of death or his age. Longtime LGBTQ community activist Rayceen Pendarvis said she heard only that Watson’s passing followed “a long time illness.”
“The origins of the Wanda Alston Foundation can be traced to a meeting convened by then-Mayor Anthony Williams at the request of Wanda Alston, the Mayor’s Director of LGBTQ Affairs,” the statement says.
“During that meeting, Brian spoke powerfully about the growing crisis of homelessness among LGBTQ+ youth in the District of Columbia and the urgent need for dedicated housing and support services,” it says. “His advocacy helped crystalize a vision that every young person deserves a safe place to call home.”
The statement points out that following Alston’s untimely death, Watson joined other community leaders “to transform that vision into reality by establishing the Wanda Alston Foundation in her memory.”
It says that today the Alston Foundation “proudly carries forward the mission Brian helped create by providing emergency and transitional housing, counseling, workforce development, life-skills training, and other supportive services that empower LGBTQ+ youth to achieve stability, independence, and hope for the future.”
Watson’s LinkedIn page says he served as executive director of the Alston Foundation from July 2013 to March 2014. The Washington Blade reported in April 2014 that the Alston Foundation announced in a March 11, 2014, statement that Watson had resigned to “pursue other opportunities.”
His LinkedIn page shows he worked for or with in a supporting role three local nonprofit organizations since leaving the Alston Foundation, including serving from February 2019 to November 2019 as a Methamphetamine Services Specialist for the D.C. group HIPS, which provides services for drug users and sex workers.
According to his LinkedIn page, from October 2014 to “present,” he also served as Chief Innovation Officer for the Propel Foundation, Inc., which he described as a “501c3 nonprofit organization founded in D.C. that works to strengthen nonprofit organizations through fiscal sponsorship and capacity building.”
A Facebook posting by his brother, Vidale Watson, says his family will be making arrangements for a memorial service and will share the date, time, and location once the details have been finalized.
“There are no words to describe the heartbreak our family is feeling,” Vidale Watson wrote. “While we are grateful for every prayer, kind word, and act of support we’ve received over the past week, this loss is still incredibly fresh.”
Baltimore
The government pressured USA Rugby to ban transgender women. A Baltimore team refused to comply.
Ferals is a women’s-plus team within the Flamingos
By KYLE GOON | It was midmorning, and the March winds lashed against the faces of the players on the Ferals rugby team as they suited up at a park in Frederick. The turf was frozen.
Harper Ockert, 24, wrapped her left knee with tape, stabilizing her joint for the jarring hits to come. She had struggled to sleep the night before, but her anxiety was not strictly about the game.
She and her teammates were preparing to defy newly enacted rules set by the sport’s governing body. A nervous energy thrummed in her chest as she considered what her defiance meant.
Ockert is a transgender woman who plays for the Ferals — the women’s-plus team within the Baltimore Flamingos rugby club. Three of her teammates are trans women, too. They had played games for the Ferals before, but this match at Walnut Ridge Park was the team’s first since USA Rugby had shifted its policy to allow only people assigned female at birth to play women’s rugby.
The rest of this article can be found on the Baltimore Banner’s website.
Virginia
LGBTQ community center opens in Leesburg, Va.
Equality Loudoun holds ribbon-cutting ceremony at new space
A group of supporters crowded inside of the new Equality Loudoun Community Center in Leesburg, Va. on Saturday for an open house and ribbon-cutting ceremony. Air quality issues stemming from the wildfires in Canada required the ceremony to be held indoors. Local elected officials were joined by LGBTQ community organizers and supporters to mark the occasion.
The Virginia LGBTQ organization Equality Loudoun was founded in 2003 and organized the first Loudoun Pride Festival in 2022. The Equality Loudoun Community Center, located in the Village at Leesburg shopping area (1507 Dodona Terrace SE, Suite 105, Leesburg, Va.), will now house the organization’s community and youth programming.
“This is a day that we have anticipated for some time,” said Sean Murphy, Equality Loudoun vice president. “Equality Loudoun was founded in 2003 and has been migrating from place to place to wherever will have us to host our meetings, to host our gatherings. We are so grateful to our many, many allies that have provided space for us.”
Murphy continued, “We really have believed for a long time that it’s important for us to have a home, a place to anchor the community, a place for people to feel belonging, and a place for people to find one another, and find people who are like them and have something in common.”
Attendees of the ceremony included Leesburg Mayor Kelly Burk, Leesburg Vice Mayor Todd Cimino-Johnson, Leesburg District Supervisor Kristen C. Umstattd of the Loudoun County Board of Supervisors, and U.S. Rep. Suhas Subramanyam (D-Va.).
“I wish that there was a place like this when I was teaching,” Mayor Burk, a retired Loudoun County Public Schools special education teacher, told the crowd. “So often, I’d have a student, and there was nowhere to send them. They were looking around, trying to see: ‘who’s like me, where can I go, where can I relate, what is happening?’ Middle school is terrible for everybody. But it’s especially terrible if you’re different. And so, I congratulate you on the fact that you had the initiative to do this, the guts to continue it, and the tenacity to make it happen.”
Programming at the LGBTQ community center will include youth programming, game nights and support groups, according to Equality Loudoun Executive Director Katie Cash.
Cash told the Blade, “That’s actually a new thing that we’re branching into that we received a grant this year for: to focus on youth activities. So we’ll have youth support groups that we’re going to work with the Ryan Bartell organization on. Additionally, we’ll have other peer support groups that are run by organizations that are in the space. We’ll have craft nights, we’ll have activity nights, so it’ll be open for drop-in hours on different days as well. On top of normal programming that we’ve been doing as an organization, which can be a series of different craft [activities], social activities, game nights, movie nights, that we’ve been doing for years. Instead of hunting for locations.”
Equality Loudoun is primarily funded through donations, according to Cash. Those interested in supporting the work of the organization and community center can visit eqloco.org for more information.
When asked about future programming at the center, Cash told the Blade that they are seeking feedback from the community.
“We have all the dreams that we have for the space,” Cash said. “But everything’s built off of what kind of resources, what kind of events does the community want hosted? What will they come out for? What do they care about coming out for, and making sure that happens for them.”
Rep. Subramanyam told the Blade, “I’m just so excited about this community center. Equality Loudoun has been so instrumental to so many people in our community. And for them to finally have this center — and it’s been part of their vision for a long time — just is an incredible experience. So I’m so proud to be a supporter of them and I look forward to the center being a sanctuary and a place for people to turn to for many years to come.”
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